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tv   Andrea Mitchell Reports  MSNBC  September 16, 2019 9:00am-10:00am PDT

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alternative to cigarettes. the fda several days ago issued a warning letter to juul claiming those claims are not factually based. they're not supported. right now locked and loaded. president trump says america is ready to retaliate. mike pompeo is blaming iran for attacking the world's largest o oil field in saudi arabia. >> make no mistake about it. this was a deliberate attack on the global economy and the global energy market. >> full court press. some of the democratic hopefuls
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call for brett kavanagh to be impeached after a new allegation of sexual misconduct when he was in college. >> you can't make that decision just on news reports. you have to actually get those documents. it w we didn't get all the documents pertaining to his professional work or his personal life. and paw patrol, a climate in crisis and a warning from the top of the world as an arctic culture is threatened. >> even the old tradition of dog sledding is jeopardized by climate change. ♪ good day. i'm andrea mitchell in washington where president trump on twitter is threatening military action after afternoon attack against the world's biggest oil facility in saudi
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arabia, prompting global fears as oil prices spike to new highs. the president met with his national security council today. on sunday mr. trump tweeted there is reason to believe that we know the culprit. are locked and loaded depending on verification but are waiting to hear from the kingdom as to who they believe is the cause of the attack. secretary of state mike pompeo is holding iran possible even though iran denies any involvement. joining me now is kristin welker, wendy sherman and former national security advisor to the george w. bush. welcome all. first of all, kristin welker,
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the president saying he's locked and loaded, the secretary of state making it very clear whom they think is responsible. what is the proof they're offering, if any? >> reporter: so far, no proof, andrea. you have the secretary pointing the finger at iran. president trump has yet to do that specifically. mark short, chief of staff to vice president mike pence, saying that he expects the secretary of state will be providing more direct evidence, more proof of what they think link this is s this attack to ie day goes forward. we did see satellite images to show the drone attacks. that is one piece of evidence that the u.s. is using. but again they're not mapping out exactly why they're holding iran responsible for this. president trump saying that the u.s. is locked and loaded.
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what specifically does that mean? well, it would suggest some type of military action. of course, we've heard the president use this type of language. we've seen him use this type of language on twitter in the past specifically as it relates to north korea. in that instance, ultimately of course that was part of what was the constellation of events that led to the talks between president trump and kim jong-un. so is president trump aiming to have the same thing happen this time around? it's not clear. mark short downplaying that language saying, look, the president was referring to energy dependence of the united states. will there be talks at the u.n. general assembly between president trump and iran's leader president rouhani. the trump administration giving no indication that there are plans for that but not taking it
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off the table and iran's leadership saying that's not going to happen. >> there were indications, the president saying he would meet with rouhani without preseasons. so did mike pompeo. and then over the weekend after the attack happened saying that he had never said that, that it was all the fake news media, which it wasn't. who would benefit? who could have done this? we've had a four-year civil war. we've had ballistic missile attacks from the iran-backed houthi rebels against riyadh. for as long as we've had this civil war in yemen, that facility, it's the largest in the world, it's the most vulnerable. it knocks out half of the saudi oil production, 6% of the oil supply in the world. it is the economic disaster
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scenario that economists have been writing about for years. >> yes. in 2006 al qaeda attempted to attack the facility, particularly to try to disrupt the economy, to try to hurt the saudi government, to try to hurt the united states. you're right, the energy infrastructure has always been the soft underbelly of the soud saudi system. i think you have the proxy war that's been going on not just between iranian proxies and saudis but in cyberspace in the maritime domain really coming to if for the fore. what you have here is the flairing flair i flaring of a flash point. the houthi have launched attacks. so they h u.n. has reported they have new
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capabilities to reach even further into saudi arabia. the houthi's acknowledge sending ten drones in for this attack. this would be the revolutionary guard. there could be elements of the iraqi militia. those are aligned to iranian interests. what is clear is we're reaching a crisis point where the proxy battles that had been going on in the cyber domain, the maritime domain are starting to look like all-out warfare. the question for the u.s. government is what is the next step? are we moving toward a more open confrontational moment with iran? >> you helped negotiate the iran nuclear deal, which of course this president walked away from and some people have suggested
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that that precipitated a lot of lack of planning as to the next step because iran was going to respond and it would escalate. but this is kinetic accident. we had a u.n. national security council meeting. this could escalate. >> no doubt about it. we didn't need to be here. i think if the president had stayed in the nuclear deal, he would have been in a better place today. if indeed we can assign c culpability for these attacks, the united states needs to decide how to respond. the president and his team should provide an immediate classified briefing to members of congress to share what intelligence we have, what facts we have. we know what's happened in the past when we've gone to war under suspicious circumstances. i certainly with all due respect
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to good advice i don't want to outsource american security to saudi arabia particularly in the wake of the kashoggi killing. i'm sure juan does not either. so there are very tough decisions to be made here. i think the chances of a meeting in new york between iran and the united states has gone way down as a possibility. but the real concern here is what did happen here and what is not just america's response but the international community's response. the last point, the senate is considering the national defense authorization act which has to be conferenced with the house. the house passed a part of that legislation saying that the 2011 aumf does not support the president taking action against iran or the last aumf we had authorization for the use of
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military force. i think it's critical the senate do likewise and the united states congress take some responsibility for when this country decides it must go to war. >> the white house has been pointing out that we are much more energy independent than in past crises like this and we can and probably will be drawing down from the strategic petroleum reserve, at least tech ra temporarily. but oil is a global commodity. this could become politically damaging to the president as well. >> it as to the economic uncertainty, no doubt about that. i go back to my conversation earlier. the u.s. is more energy independent, so we approach this crisis with that in mind. as you point out, this is a president who has really staked his reelection claims on the
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economy. right now he's dealing with a trade war with china and certainly this situation could exacerbate all of that. so they're watching this very closely. and again, the president saying he is prepared to take the very rare step of making the strategic oil reserve available for use in order to mitigate some of the impacts of all of this. >> i want to play what the president said to chuck todd. they ended up doing a cyber attack insaid but that was the retaliation from the u.s. drone shot down. >> i thought about it for a second. i said, you know what, they shut down an unmanned drone, plane, whatever you want to call it. and here we are sitting with 150 dead people that would have
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taken place probably within a half an hour after i said go ahead. and i didn't like it. i didn't think it was proportionate. >> so the question now will be what is proportionate? juan, you've been in these meetings. you can imagine the conversation that's going on. john bolton is not there. but now you've got an indication from all of our sources, they believe that it was iran whether it's from iranian territory, iranian proxies, iranian weapons, they're pointing to iran not the houthi rebels. let's say they're going to come out and say today we're going to see the president later with the crown prince of bahrain. >> right. >> they're going to say it's iran. what are the military options? >> i think wendy already articulated some of this, which is you have to be clear about attribution, about
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culpability, the nature of the attack. that has to be clear raas much possible. there has to be consideration of what our allies want to do. i completely agree with wendy. we don't outsource our national security and certainly not our military. how the saudis view this as an attack on them, their economy, their stability is a key question. this is an am lie of ours. so we've got to consider that. finally you've got what are the options. everyone always retreats to the military. you could strike revolutionary guard corps sites. i think one interesting question is what are the other asymmetric tools we have to bring to bear. the iranians feel like we are assaulting them economically. there's more to be done potentially in the cyber domain.
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there's more to be done in the maritime domain. maybe we push back on some of the things the iranians have done to try to put maritime assets at risk in the straits of hormuz. there are several things you could do before you get to a military strike. i would hope and asthum u.s. authorities are looking at those options as well as any military options. >> president rouhani of iran is right now in turkey with erdogan, a nato ally and vladimir putin. >> talking about syria. >> what could go wrong? >> i'm not advising the saudi military. we're working with the ministry of finance under my consulting firm. >> thank you so much. tha >> thank you.
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coming up, courting controversy as new allegations of sexual misconduct emerge. will calling for the impeachment of brett kavanagh help or hurt democrats? mpeachment of brett kavanagh help or hurt democrats? saturdays happen. pain happens. aleve it. aleve is proven better on pain than tylenol. when pain happens, aleve it. all day strong. ♪ thousands of women with metastatic breast cancer are living in the moment and taking ibrance. ibrance with an aromatase inhibitor is for postmenopausal women or for men with hr+/her2- breast cancer that has spread to other parts of the body - meaning it's metastatic - as the first hormonal based therapy. ibrance plus letrozole significantly delayed disease progression versus letrozole. patients taking ibrance can develop low white blood cell counts which may cause serious infections that can lead to death.
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supreme court politics have now fuelled the 2020 race anew with democratic candidates
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including elizabeth warren and kamala harris calling for the impeachment of justice brett kavanagh after an essay in the "new york times" opinion section from an upcoming book on the sexual misconduct allegations made against kavanaugh during his confirmation hearings. that piece under skrcrutiny overnight overnight. pointing out that the book on which the article was based says that the female student declined to be interviewed and friends say that she does not recall the incident. president trump is seizing that editor's note as he rallies his base behind justice kavanaugh. ma you're a fellow judiciary committee member and
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presidential candidate amy klobuchar is saying you've got to see the documents first. as much as she opposed kavana h kavanaugh's confirmation, she says this report does not have all the essential is these repos did go to the fbi but in that supplemental investigation and that they did not investigate further. what do we do now? >> what we do now is what i called for which is for the house to begin an impeachment inquiry. during the time of the kavanaugh hearings when these allegations came to light, her attorneys let the fbi know there were 25 potential corroborating witnesses, none of whom the fbi talked to in their so-called supplemental what i call sham investigation. under normal circumstances, i
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would ask the i.g. to do an investigation as to why the fbi investigation was so limited and to get to the bottom of these things. but these are not normal times, so i would ask the house judiciary committee to begin impeachment inquiry so that we can get to the bottom of whether or not kavanaugh lied to congress, specifically to the judiciary committee. >> as you well know, your republicans colleagues in the senate are not going to let this ever get anywhere. let's talk about the raw politics of it. the president is already using this. no candidate has ever talked about the supreme court on the trail or -- i should say no one's been asked about the supreme court. the democrats have not made the supreme court an issue, so they're not even making it an issue but the president and his supporters are using this to rally their base. >> of course.
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so the federalist society, heritage foundation have spend millions getting their conservative people on the courts including of course brett kavanagh. so some of us have been talking about court packing that's going on and the danger of court packing by mitch mcconnell and trump. in fact, some of us wrote an amicus brief to the supreme court urging them not to accept cer, the on a new york gun case that should have been a moot situation leading to the "wall street journal" accusing the five of us of threatening the court. really? how can you threaten people with hie lifetime appointments? court packing is a huge danger and i believe is one of the lasting legacies of this trump presidency with these very idealogical serve membeconserva
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members. what's more important than people on the supreme court? with the fact that the fbi did not do a thorough investigation, the american people should find out through an investigation as to why this happened and why this man is on the court and why he should not continue to be on the court should the impeachment inquiry lead us to that conclusion. >> do you have any concerns this issue is going to backfire against whoever comes the democratic candidate because of the way it's playing and because there is an issue of proof if the victim is not -- in this particular case, i'm not talking about ramirez, which is a different case, but this other new allegation. the victim was not remembedoes . the accusing classmate was actually a member working for ken starr.
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>> that is why it is the ramirez allegation that ought to be investigated. there were 25 potential corroborating witnesses to that, none of whom the fbi talked to. so i could see why the president and his enablers would focus on the one witness who doesn't remember what happened. ic see why they do that, totally disregarding the 25 witnesses the if facebook should hafbi sh. i concluded it was a sham investigation. and the "new york times" article really points out that all of these potential witnesses were never interviewed. so it's just appalling but it is par for the course as far as i'm concerned, because mitch mcconnell's goal in life is to have as many as the heritage foundation people on the court at every levels.
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court packing is a huge threat to women's right to choose to voting rights to voter suppression issues, health care. all of these issues are going to come before the judges that mitch mcconnell and trump is busy places on our courts at all levels. >> thank you so much. it's a wonder why it's not becoming more of a campaign issue on the coming up, the motorcycles politics of race. can joe biden hold onto support after some controversial comments. o support after some controversial comments when you shop for your home at wayfair, you get more than free shipping. you get everything you need for your home at a great price, the way it works best for you, i'll take that. wait honey, no.
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in the centuries long campaign of violence, fear, trauma brought upon black people in this country, the domestic terrorism of white supremacy has been the antagonist of our highest ideals from before the
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founding of this country. now hate is on the rise again. we're at a defining moment again in american history. who are we? what do we want to be? >> joe biden in the pulpit delivering an impassioned speech on race in birmingham where why is supremacists bombed the place of worship killing four young african-american girls. the tragedy mobilized the nation in horror. it became a turning point in the civil rights movement. joe biden can deliver a speech and on this subject he has an authenticity and a clarity that is profoundly moving. but then you compare that to what i can only describe as the word salad of his answer in the debate on thursday which has gotten a lot of attention, some
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because of the use of the record player. but to a lot of african-americans what was really offensive was his suggestion that social workers need to come in and tell black parents how to raise their children. how do you reconcile those two things and is he vulnerable, at least generationally with african-american supporters? >> i was struck. i was at that speech yesterday in the church. there's a lot of explanation for joe biden's performance issues. the easy one that a lot of people are turning to is age. i was so struck at just how comfortable he was in that setting. the reception for him was very warm, very positive, a standing ovation. he tends to do better rhetorically when he is in a place of comfort like that, versus a debate stage. this is something i've also
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heard from biden advisors. something he was able to cope with better is a stutter and it's starting to reemerge again. you saw him yesterday, i think the reminder t eer to his opponf what is the bedrock of his support which is primarily older african-american voters. we've heard him talk about race in this campaign, but when he talked about how even him, somebody who was motivated to get into public service by the civil rights movement, he can never fully understand the struggles the way an african-american can, even somebody who's well intentioned as he is. >> you talked to the vice president about this in a really memorable interview for your podcast. you talked about your aunt gloria and how devoted she is to joe biden. there is a generation gap here. >> right. if you take my aunt gloria and
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the folks who are older than her, joe biden is stability, he was president obama's vice president although that doesn't factor as prominently as you would think. they view him as someone who can beat donald trump. let's not forget that vice president biden started his campaign with that video that talked about charlottesville. the best speech he's given during this campaign was the one he gave on race in iowa, which was infinitely better than the one he gave yesterday. to mike's point about the vice president giving a nod to the criticisms he's received, there would have been no better place for vice president biden to more fully talk about that answer and the issues that people have had with it than the 16th street baptist church with a congregation that was -- >> he didn't address it. >> did not explicitly address
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it. the other point about the generational divide, it is real. and younger african-americans are not looking at joe biden. younger african-americans want to turn the page. that's why senator elizabeth warren is seemingly ahead with that cohort of voters. bernie sanders is ahead with that cohort of voters. so all of the campaigns have to figure out, one, how are you going to appeal to african-american voters, but two, how are you going to get the younger demographic to come out and vote for you. >> thanks so much. of course, coming up the walkout. united auto workers union striking general motors. the first time in 12 years. fie s at verizon, we're building the most powerful 5g experience for america. that's why the nfl chose verizon. because they need the massive capacity of 5g with ultra wideband, so more screaming, streaming, posting fans... can experience 5g all at once.
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general motors executives and union leaders are resuming negotiations today after 46,000 gm workers hit the picket line in the fiegght for better wages and benefits. molly hunter is in detroit. tell us about the strike and what they're striking about, of course. >> reporter: good afternoon. you can see this little picket line behind me. we're going to catch up with richard patterson. he's one of the guys out here
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picketing. he works in one of the plants in toledo but he's out here. why are you guys out here? >> equality. >> reporter: i don't want to stop you from walking. what are you hoping for? what are you not getting from gm right now? >> we want gm to remember everything we sacrificed from y'all, 2006, 2007. we want y'all to remember, we sacrificed a lot for you guys. >> reporter: a lot of things we're hearing is wage increases and health care. >> we ain't going to talk about wage. we're going to talk about health care. health care is very important. these plants break us down on a daily basis and now you're asking us to pay into it. we're already paying into it. let's keep it fair. >> reporter: how long are you prepared to stay out here? >> as long as it takes. >> reporter: that's a really expensive answer for gm. now the estimates are in 2007
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was that every day in that strike cost the company $300 million. that's going to be a lot more possibly if they stay out. it all depends on how long these guys are willing to stay out here. they want wage increases. they want security. this plant right now, 700 workers are in there. this plant is set to be what they call unallocated. that means all 700 jobs are not guaranteed past 2020. >> thank you so much. coming up, narrowing the field. why some democrats say it's time for more of the 2020 candidates to step aside. candidates to step aside. every day, visionaries are creating the future. so, every day, we put our latest technology and unrivaled network to work. the united states postal service makes more
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vincente gonzalez flipping his support for julian castro to joe biden. the stage is getting more crowded, not less as activist tom steyer makes the 11 t n 1tho make the cut. joining me now is david jolly, susan page and donna edwards. donna, you have been writing in the "washington post" that it's time to narrow the field. let me read from part of what you just post ed, that in a primary voters want to absorb the narrower differences among democratic candidates on some issues. vo who would you leave, just the
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top three, top two? how would you make the judgment as to who deserves to be on the stage? >> i think what we see right now is there already are a couple of tiers of candidates. we have the top tier of candidates, biden, warren and sanders. then you've got the middle. and everybody else below 2% in every national poll, in all of the statewide polls, not pulling in the kind of money they need to run a race. i think at some point or another you have to say, voters either think your ideas are already represented or they're just not buying what you're selling. i think individual candidates have to make that decision for themselves but the calendar is actually tightening. we've got the holidays coming up. just a few weeks after that, the iowa new hampshire primaries.
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we've really got to get down to business choosing a candidate that we believe can defeat donald trump and make sure that democrats win up and down the ballot. >> aside from bernie sanders and elizabeth warren, who together are in the more progressive wing, that would eliminate anybody who could compete with joe biden for the more moderate part of the party. >> i think there's a darwinian imperative that narrows the field. if the candidates are now making the debates, it seems to me they are increasingly irrelevant to the conversation. but if the 11 candidates who have now qualified for the october debate, it seems to me there is no reason why they would feel like they should drop out while things are still in a state of flux. we've been amazed by joe biden's durability in the polls, but that may not last forever. that's one reason why some of the more moderate candidates
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would stick around and wait and see what happens. >> david jolly, the republicans have this huge advantage in that their primaries are not going to include some of these challengers to the president. it is the trump republican party that's controlling what's happening. so he's got all this time, all this money while the democrats are flailing around and you do have a crowded stage. >> you certainly do have a crowded stage. to donna's point, we had during that last debate about 20 or 30 minutes of an incredibly cogent and interesting intellectual debate around health care. among the leading candidates, you did get to see the contrast in their plans. those types of debates in a long primary are good. they're good for the candidates to improve their tldelivery of
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their plans. what is not good in a long and extracted primary is the fact that you are spending a lot of money among candidates in a race that perhaps is not as consequential. to your point, donald trump has a highway all the way to his nomination in particular because at least four states. we will see iowa, nevada, south carolina, new hampshire. the question is do people drop out before that for reasons of their own legacy or simply because they don't have the resources to go. i imagine we'll lose some democratic candidates over the holidays before the first votes are cast. >> the latest gut check on guns, nancy pelosi, chuck schumer talking to the president yesterday. it was described as a cordial conversation by both sides. they said they even promised the president that if he endorses this legislation and gets
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senator mcconnell to act on what the house has passed, we would both join him for an historic signing ceremony at the rose garden, clearly playing to the president president. do you think that he will buy it? >> i don't because ultimately i think the gun lobby will get to him. what i took coming out of the weekend, schumer and pelosi seemed to indicate that their answer to incremental reform is no. they seemed to indicate that any reform that stops sort of universal background checks isn't going to be sufficient to get democratic support and that is important because suppose the only thing republicans gave the democrats were red flag laws, it is a hard question. should democrats go along with at least a little bit or do they hold out for the next election and say we need more comprehensive solutions. >> let me do a quick gut check yes or no action on the background checks. >> i think that there will be because you the american people want it and i think that ultimately the president is going to go where 90% of the
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public is. >> unfortunately, i think it doesn't pass. >> a guided house here. david, donna, susan, thank you all so much. coming up, a dog's purpose. how climate change is keeping arctic sled dog from the work they have done for centuries. stay with us. there's a better choice. aleve pm. the only one to combine a safe sleep aid and the 12-hour pain-relieving strength of aleve that dares to last into the morning. so you feel refreshed. aleve pm. there's a better choice.
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all this week nbc news and tell mun temundo are highlighti climate change is impacting the world. as seen on "today" this morning, with al roker's dramatic reporting on the ice melting in greenland, along the arctic circle, climate change is completely changing the way of life with the winter season dramatically shortened, even the iconic sled dogs are being forced to change their ways. kevin tibbles has this report. >> reporter: just 600 miles from the north pole, and these hearty huskies are raring to go. we are here at one of the most northern inhabited places on earth. people live side by side with sled dogs, reindeer and the occasional polar bear.
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they are all preparing for winter and frigid 24 hour days of darkness. >> how many dogs do you have? >> 114. >> reporter: sled dog operators are passionate about their job and their arctic culture. >> when you go into the nature with these guys and it is quiet and only on thing that you can hear is footprints in the snow and skis of the sled, it is complete completely silent. >> reporter: but he is also aware that his world is warming. winter comes later and leaves earlier each year. and that means instead of using a sled and running in to snow, the dogs six to a team are hooked up to a four-wheeled wagon if a tour of the tundra. even the old tradition of dog sledding is jeopardized. while the dogs seem happy to pull anything, others in this isolated northern corner notice the climate is changing and worry. steve hudson hails from philadelphia. he now studies weather patterns
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in the arctic. is it cause for alarm? >> yeah, it is a picture of what is coming. things are happening faster here. we knew it would happen faster here but the rest of the world will catch up. >> reporter: and they have a warning -- do you feel like you're a bit of a canary in a coal mine? >> in a way because we will get the strong est impact from it. and we're trying to make the world aware of this. >> reporter: for centuries the dog sled represented the only way people here could travel. the only way to reach the outside world. >> and that will be hard if the snow disappears. >> reporter: today they fear climate change caused in part by the outside world will change the way they live forever. >> andt continuals is i continue bells is in from the cold. i've seen dog sledding up in
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alaska and i can't imagine them losing the ice pack. >> reporter: well, it is quite astounding. like going to another planet in that part of the world. and as we mentioned in the spot, it is the fear of some 2,000 people that live there, it is that their climate is changing and there really isn't anything that they can do about it because of course there is such a small community. interesting enough, a lot of that story because shot in a town of long yearbian and it is named after an american coalminer. and the ren people are there at all is because of the coal mining industry. and so at the same time that norway is saying we're having these tremendous problems with climate change, they are also very aware that they have actually helped contribute to it over the years because of the fact that they have been doing so much coal mining on this very place. now, people have dog sleds up there, obviously it is now more
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of a hobby than it used to be in the past. but it is something that is tradition to them, it is something that is sacred to them. and while it is beautiful to watch, it is also heartbreaking it see what could be happening to it in the years down the road. >> such beautiful dogs. and not just of course coal, norway is a huge oil supplier as well. >> yes, absolutely. >> kevin tibbles, you have the best assignments and make the most out of everything that you do. thank you so much. that does it for us. remember follow the show online on facebook and on twitter. and here is ali velshi and stephanie ruhle. >> and so the other time i've been dog sledding five years ago and the differences in the images from then to now is shocking. and glad kevin is up there to give us the stark images of everything. >> and of course the scientists
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and administration are crying for help, but the white house says there is no climate science. >> and best we can tocan do is spe people stories like this. >> and think about the time last wim devot week devoted an entire issue around climate change and "times" argued that you can argue about how to handle it, but not whether it is happening. it is happening. and it is monday, september 16th. coming up this hour on "velshi and ruhle," america blames iran for attacks on saudi oil facilities. global crude oil prices are up and now president trump says america is locked and loaded. could this be used as a reason for a military strike against iran? >> and here in the united states, 50,000 general motors workers are now on strike. we'll be live in detroit to find out what is happening behind the nationwide standoff. and also the maker he