yasmin vossoughian picking up our coverage. hello everybody. i'm yasmin vossoughian. hundreds of u.s. troops are on their way to the middle east in response to the dangerous and developing situation in bagdad as the u.s. embassy faces a second day of protests. also, a new year's threat. kim jong-un says he's ready to take shocking action and unveil a new weapon as the north korean leader signals he could restart nuclear and long range missile testing. with the iowa caucuses about a month away, new fund-raising numbers from 2020 contenders that are giving some candidates a reason to celebrate. we begin with the hundreds of u.s. troops heading the the middle east in the wake of the storming of the u.s. embassy in iraq. defense secretary mark esper saying 750 troops have been deployed and more can ship out if needed. they join the 14,000 troops already there, sent to the region in response to concerns about iranian aggression.

the deployment comes as embassy security guards fired teargas to disperse hundreds of protesters who gathered outside the compound for a second day. there are reports that demonstrators have started withdrawing from the area, this coming one day after protesters stormed the compound, making it as far as the main reception area before being repelled. they are angry at the united states over air strikes last weekend that killed 25 members of an iranian-backed militia group. the u.s. embassy in bagdad you see is the largest u.s. embassy in the world with more than 5,500 people working at the 100-acre facility inside that green zone. president trump talking about the u.s. response before he attended his new year's celebration at mar-a-lago in florida. take a listen. >> i think it's been handled very well. the marines came in. we had great warriors come in and do a fantastic job. they were there instantaneously, as soon as we heard.

as soon as we saw there was a potential for problem, they got in and there was no problem whatsoever. i also want to thank the iraqi government. they really stepped up. i spoke to the prime minister today. i thanked him. but they stepped up very nicely. >> so the president has also blamed iran for this violence. he was asked if he thought this could lead to war with iran. >> i don't think that would be a good idea for iran. it wouldn't last very long. do i want to? no. i want to have peace. i like peace. iran should want peace more than anybody. so i don't see that happening, no. i don't think iran would want that to happen. it would go very quickly. >> i like peace, i want peace. let's get the latest on the situation on the ground. joining us on the phone is afb bagdad correspondent maya gabali. you have been on the ground covering this for quite some time. we appreciate you bringing us

analysis on this, some firsthand reports. first get us started as rards the protesters and their retreat from the area. what are you learning? >> reporter: thanks so much. happy 2020 of course. today we saw actually the protesters and their day-long sit-in. the pro iranian military force that is in iraq actually called for an end to the sit-in saying to the protesters, your message has been received. it was abundantly clear that this was a protest meant as a show of force, meant to send a political message to the u.s. and to those diplomats inside the embassy about what may happen to their forces or what the pro iran factions in iraq are aiming for. it was a short-lived showdown. it was a day long. a lot of protesters had been bringing in mattresses and food. what we thought was that things would last quite some time. when we saw the protesters were

retreating, we were quite a bit surprised. it really seemed like it was a message that was delivered to the u.s., by far the most shocking and major escalation we had seen so far in the u.s.-iran tensions play out here. >> with this retreat of the protesters, are you hearing at all that there was any coordination between the demonstrators, the leader of these demonstrators along with the iraqi government? >> that's -- it's quite a complicated issue because the paramilitary force which is the force that called for the protest and eventually ordered for the same mob to pull out, they're formerly part of the iraqi government forces. there's coordination between the iraqi government and the protesters that were there today. we saw even members of the group who were present outside of the embassy. they were specifically called

out by u.s. secretary of state pompeo yesterday, i believe, saying these are riern proxies outside of our embassy. so that has been highlighted, a complicated situation for iraq right now which is stuck between iran and the u.s. it has strong ties to both of those countries. as iran-u.s. tensions rise, iraq has felt stuck in the middle. >> part of these demonstrations was the incentive, it seems, to get u.s. troops to leave the region. that's what many of the reports are saying. "the washington post" reporting that demonstrators plan to pressure the iraqi parliament to expel u.s. troops from that country. do you think that could actually happen, that the iraqi parliament could vote to do this? >> this is a long-standing call, actually. we've seen parliament can come back to this multiple times over the past few months saying we want u.s. troops out, they're supposed to be here to help us fight against the islamic state group. we've beat the islamic state

group so why are these troops still here? we've seen this issue come back over and over again. the iraqi parliament has never been able to get the votes to put that issue to a vote, to get the signatures needed to actually be able to hold a vote on it. we've seen that come up time and time again, but talking to iraqi military sources, talking to u.s. military sources, it seems like on a defense level those guys are on the same page and they understand they need to keep working together to make sure the sleeper cells, the isis sleeper cells that are still present in parts of iraq remain -- they keep those forces down and don't let them resurge into a full isis force like we saw five years ago. >> we're getting an update from an nbc producer on the ground saying all demonstrators have withdrawn from the green zone and the embassy is completely surrounded and secured by iraqi security forces at this time. afp correspond maya gebaili, appreciate you joining us this morning. happy new year to you.

with us to take a closer look, ambassador christopher hill, former ambassador to iraq, currently a professor at the university of denver, also an msnbc diplomacy expert. also, malcolm nance, executive director of the terror asymmetrics project. he's the author of "the plot to betray america," how team trump embraced our enemies, compromised our security and how we can fix it. welcome to you both. happy new year, gentlemen. thank you for joining us on this new year's day. ambassador hill, the u.s. sending 750 troops to the middle east as we speak. more troops could be sent if the situation does worsen. how are people in iraq and elsewhere in the region likely to view this deployment? >> i think most of the troops are going to kuwait for kind of regional assignments of some kind. i think the main element dealing with this latest crisis was, of course, buttressing the number

of marines within the embassy compound. i think we may have been very lucky in the last couple of days, and it appears that the -- for now these rioters or demonstrators have decided to call it a day. i think the fact remains we have a very serious problem in iraq. we have an extremely weakened government, a government weakened by months and months of demonstrations. they've not been able to demonstrate confidence. the prime minister who stepped down is now in an acting capacity, was a former world bank -- worked with the world bank. he understood a lot of the economic issues, and he's not been able to make this work out. so i think there are a lot of difficulties here, and there will continue to be pressure in the parliament, and that, as your correspondent pointed out, has been a long-standing issue. it's one of the reasons why president obama decided it was

untenable to keep troops in iraq who were there in the first place to invade the country, and then to remain. so he took them out. they've come back in. i think the iraqis want to keep them, but i want to emphasize how delicate the situation is. for those who worry about iranian tensions in iraq, perhaps they should have given some thought to that back in 2003. iran has influence and interest in iraq. i think the trump administration needs to take a really hard look at its policy of rejecting the iran nuclear deal and thinking they've made for a safer world, because i think we're in a much more dangerous place as a result of that. >> iran has a long history of influence and interest in iraq as we well know. malcolm, secretary of state mike pompeo appearing on the cbs evening news last night and was asked if the u.s. was caught off guard by yesterday's attack. here is how he responded. >> we've known for a long time

that there was this risk. it's been 40 years the islamic republic of iran has been at this. we've watched them continue to take actions. we saw them take actions that killed an american in iraq just this past week. we saw the united states act decisively to respond to that, to signal to them that we would do precisely what i've said, precisely what president trump said we would do when american interest and american lives are at stake. >> malcolm, what do you make of it? >> ambassador hill made a very, very good point when he mentioned we had these problems stemming back from the invasion of iraq in 2003. in this particular instance, it comes to a spearhead in 2004 where in southern iraq for some inexplicable reason the bush administration decided iranian influence among the shia muslims in iraq who constitute 75% of the people in the country needed to be attacked. and it opened up a second front

in that war which had us going directly against iranian-backed militias. that problem is not going away. and the administration here is making the fundamental error of believing that the people who are in the herb hash shabby, even though they have riern weapons, riern trainers and have some support from the iranian revolutionary guard core, they are iraqis. when we struck their facility and killed three iranians, we killed 19 iraqis, shia iraqis. what you saw here is this force, all these popular militias who are a major component of the iraqi forces who destroyed isis. make no mistakes here, they know how to fight now. what they've done is transitioned to this political action where they are shown vary force without weapons at the american embassy and literally tied us up in a fish barrel. so no number of marines we send

there is going to help this situation so long as we fail to recognize these are iraqis and they have complaints. >> so let's talk about the way forward. we can talk about what has happened in the past and one should have thought of this upon the invasion in iraq in 2003. that has come and gone and now here we are dealing with this situation. new jersey senator bob menendez, the top democratic on the foreign relations committee saying while the trump administration has touted its maximum pressure campaign against iran, the results have been more threats against international commerce, emboldened more violent proxy attacks across the united states and now the deaths of an american citizen in iraq, which the trump administration touted it would be the tipping point. you also have richard haass sayin

saying,. >> there's no question that the trump administration believed that by rejecting the iran nuclear deal they could somehow bully iran into a better deal and it would paint president trump as somehow a better negotiator than president obama. in fact, that proposition is rather severely challenged at this point. i think what the trump administration really needs to do is widen the diplomatic architecture, talk to some of the interested companies, including the french, for example, and see if they could get some type of jcpoa as the iran nuclear deal was called, some sort of jcpoa plus, thing where they can say, hey, this is better than what obama had and call it a day. i think they need to start some quiet diplomacy. i see brian hook up all the time on tv. i hope he's doing things with iranians as well. i just don't see the diplomacy necessary to calm this down.

we are not going to conquer iran. we're not going to change that regime. and i think we need to kind of get real about what we can do there. in the meantime, we have to be very understanding of what is going on in iraq. it is a very weakened country, a country weakened largely as a result of some of the things we've done. we need to figure out how to go forward. i have no problem with going after militia groups that come after our troops, but it's not weather to do it, it's how to do it. hitting several sites with f-16s and killing possibly scores of people, that is a problem and i'm not sure that's going to lead to a better outcome. >> appreciate the analysis very much. ambassador christopher hill and malcolm nance, thank you for joining us this morning. coming up, the 2020 candidates are releasing their fund-raising numbers for the final quarter of the year. some are seeing their biggest numbers yet. could it lead to a shakeup in the field. first, new threats from north

korea. the country's leader warning of a new weapon coming soon. how the president is responding next. you're watching msnbc. u're watc.

today north korea leader kim jong-un is signaling the end of the missile test suspension. he'll introduce a knew strategic weapon in the near future. the announcement came after the north's year-end deadline past

for the u.s. to make concessions. last night president trump responding to the escalating rhetoric. >> i have a very good relationship with kim jong-un. i know he's sending out certain messages about christmas presents, and i hope his christmas present is a beautiful vase. that's what i'd like, a vase. >> joining me morgan chesky and ann garren. morgan, i'll start with you. kim jong-un threatening an unspecified, quote, shocking actual action in his words against the united states. do we have any idea what he meant? >> yasmin, that trademark ominous but very vague statement from kim who didn't elaborate on what exactly that action will entail. nor did he specify the type of

strategic weapon the country plans to unveil to the entire world. those type of weapons typically refer to something delivering a nuclear payload such as an icbm. any attempt to resume any sort of nuclear testing would be perceived as a direct blow to diplomatic efforts from the trump administration which at least up until this point has had north korea's self imposed moratorium as a big of a bit win. >> the president reiterating last night that kim signed a denuclearization agreement and says he thinks kim is a man of his word. i want to tick through a bit of the history between these two individuals. just this year alone another nuclear summit in vietnam. this summer they met at the demilitarized zone between north and south korea. in the meantime we saw satellite images indicating activity, a north korean launch facility. their foreign minister actually said they had no intention to yield to u.s. demands.

they test fired multiple rocket launchers. it goes on and on. we well know the love letters exchanged between these two leaders. at this point the president still very much trusting the word of kim jong-un. >> yasmin, i think what you see the president doing here is going back to his one good thing with kim jong-un which was the meeting in singapore where kim did, in fact, sign a piece of paper, what he agreed to has been debated ever since. president trump last night is putting that signature and that summit in the best possible light because it's basically the best thing that's happened in this really quite remarkable diplomatic gambit that president trump has made with kim jong-un. everything that's happened since sing poor for the la singapore for the last year and a half hasn't gone as well. you went through the last year

and a half that that's not true. kim has said i've given you until the end of 2019 to put diplomacy on what kim considers to be a better path. he wants a couple of things from trump there that trump hasn't delivered, the easing of sanctions and the complete cessation of u.s. military action and cooperation with south korea. trump wasn't prepared to give up those things. kim still says he wants them. that's where we start 2020. >> so now john bolton back in the news, not for the impeachment hearings, although he has been in the news with regards to that, but because of a tweet he's sending with regards to north korea. him saying the u.s. should fully resume all canceled or down sized military exercises in south korea, hold congressional hearings on whether u.s. troops are truly ready to fight tonight, as john bolton says. anne, weigh in on this for me. >> what bolton is doing there,

he's tweaking the president a bit there. bolton never wanted president trump to divorce itself from the joint exercises with south korea. that internal opposition was well known. bolton has never thought that kim jong-un was in any way prepared to give up nuclear weapons. he and president trump disagreed pretty strenuously over that throughout the entire time that president trump was trying to get this thing going. so now you see bolton saying, well, here you go. we should go back to having the full joint military exercises that president trump suspended despite my opposition because trump didn't get anything for the effort of suspending them. >> this is basically john bolton saying i told you so. >> yes. >> morgan chesky, an geern,

thank you. andrew yang on a fund-raising roll, saying he raised more than $a million in the last 24 hours alone. senator kamala harris going after former vice president joe biden on race at the first democratic presidential debate. watch this. >> so on the issue of race, i couldn't agree more that this is an issue that is still not being talked about truthfully and honestly. there's not a black man i know, be he a relative, a friend or a co-worker, who has nod been the subject of some kind of profiling or discrimination. growing up, my sister and i had to deal with the neighbor who told us her parents said she couldn't play with us because we were black. i will say, also, in this campaign, we have also heard, and i'm going to now direct this at vice president biden.

i do not believe you are a racist, and i agree with you when you commit yourself to the importance of finding common ground. but i also believe, and it is personal -- it was hurtful to hear you talk about the representations of two united states senators who built their representations and career on the segregation of race in this country. hi, i'm jonathan, a manager here

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welcome back. 33 days out from the iowa caucuses, and we have some new fund-raising numbers from some of the democratic presidential candidates. pete buttigieg's campaign says he raised $24.7 million this quarter with an average donation of $33 from some 326,000 supporters. that brings his 2019 fund-raising total to more than $76 million. andrew yang, reported his biggest single day of fund-raising to date yesterday saying he raised $1.3 million in the last 24 hours. congresswoman tulsi gabbert's campaign says she raised about

$3.4 million in quarter four and close to $1.2 million just this month. let's go to nbc news road warrior vaughn hillyard in des moines, iowa. what are you hearing from the campaigns about this? >> reporter: you just read the numbers there. these fund-raising hauls, they're in three-month increments, so by quarters essentially. yesterday, december 31st was the last day of fund-raising. it's big because the candidates want to be much more focused on campaigning and the campaign trail rather than soaking up funds and holding fund-raisers which, of course, pete buttigieg was front and center on that debate stage earlier -- i guess now last month in december now for the fund-raisers he was holding around the country because money is important to this race. you mentioned that almost $25 million for pete buttigieg. that's a significant haul for his campaign because this is

more than keeping -- he's got 500 staff across the country according to the campaign. you have to not only be on the airwaves here in iowa and be able to pay your ground organizers in this state, but also you've got new hampshire and then nevada and south carolina. then you have california and texas on super tuesday. this could go all the way through the summer. this is not a short process. so the campaigns need to make sure they have the adequate funds to really be able to see this campaign through. obviously being on the tv airwaves helps to a certain extent as well. so if you're the likes of tulsi gabbert, essentially able to bring in $3.5 million. that's able to sustain your campaign, to keep it in operation, keep it what we could assume without seeing the actual numbers at this point, through the fec, we would assume they're out of debt and not running their campaign in the deficit. so this is very much for these campaigns, this is big. we should note bernie sanders has had the largest quarter haul

of any candidate back in 2018, in the third quarter, he raised $25 million. >> seeing that graphic from mayor pete's fund-raising totals, if we can bring that back up, that is pretty staggering from the first quarter, $7.1 million, fourth quarter, $24.7. what a jump from the first quarter to the second quarter. >> things have changed a bit. >> absolutely. >> vaughn, give us context as we're just a month away from the iowa caucus as to how key iowa is in winning the nomination. >> reporter: people can go and pick apart the democrats and the republicans' primary system and why does iowa go first, why does new hampshire come second? the reality is in 2020 this is how the system works. guess what? on february 3rd iowans across the state, more than 1600 caucus locations that folks will be essentially going into a high

school gym and choosing which corner and which candidate they'll go back and support. if you look back at the modern day caucus system out of iowa, for the most part, if you finish in the top three, that is essentially where the nominees have come from. there's the exception being john mccain came in slightly in fourth place there, narrowly missing third place. by and large, when you look back through past caucus results, the individuals, really the iowa caucus's purpose is to narrow the field. they say three tickets out of iowa. if you're an amy klobuchar, really coming into a third place, that gives you reason, not only to go to donors and say continue to fund our campaign, we have a shot here. we should note at the same time just because you win the caucus doesn't necessarily mean you'll win the whole thing. of course, ted cruz beat donald trump in the caucus back in 2016. rick santorum won back in 2012. mike huckabee won back in 2008.

we should note that barack obama, if you are looking at one of these democratic candidates, barack obama did win the caucus in iowa in 2008. that was huge in signaling to the rest of the country and voters from new hampshire to south carolina that this guy has got a shot and this guy is a for-real candidate. when you look at caucus history, iowa has played no small part in choosing the nominee, yet hasn't always necessarily been the predictor in choosing the eventual president of the united states. >> all right. vaughn hillyard holding it down in des moines, iowa, on the first day of 2020. what a long year ahead it is going to be, as you well know. good talking to you. hundreds of u.s. soldiers are headed to the middle east after the attack on the u.s. embassy in bagdad. up next, we'll get reaction from representative adrianna espaillat. espaillat.

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the government says the protesters have converged on the u.s. embassy in bagdad have pulled back. the embassy announced all public consular operations are suspended until further notice. the withdrawal comes hours after embassy guards fired teargas to disperse hundreds of pro iranian protesters who gathered at the embassy for a second straight day. defense secretary mark esper

says at least 750 troops are headed to the middle east in response to increased threats against u.s. personnel and facilities in the region. state department spokeswoman morgan ard gas had this to say on fox news just a short time ago. watch. >> this was not protesters. these are terrorists, organized, trained and equipped by the iranian regime. we have told the iranian regime countless times do not confuse president trump's strategic patience with weakness. unfortunately the reg eej has done that which is why you saw the strikes over the weekend targeted at these militias. while we have president trump, secretary pompeo have extended the hand of diplomacy numerous times, every time we extend the hand of diplomacy, we seize these sort of kinetic actions -- >> so when -- >> joining us to talk more about this new york democratic congressman adriano espaillat

who silts on the house foreign affairs committee. thank you for joining us. appreciate it. >> thank you. >> there has been quite a few developments overseas over the last 48 hours. i'm happy to have you here at the desk this morning. first i want to get your reaction to what we just heard. >> this is a problem we've been involved in for many, many years, we should be pulling our troops back. guess what? we're increasing our presence there. the question that we must ask ourselves, is the region safer? do we have a strategy, a full-blown policy for the region and for iraq. the answer is no. one strike is not a policy. one strike is not a strategy. we should be talking to our allies and really developing a broader, more comprehensive strategy for the region to make it safer and to schedule the pullout of the american troops back home. >> you heard morgan on fox news saying basically do not confuse patience with weakness when it comes to the president, saying

that iran is confusing patience with weakness. also saying that every time the united states extends the hand of diplomacy, these kinetic reactions occur. do you agree with what she is saying there? and in what instance, if you could lay out for me, has the united states in the last year, especially since the pulling out of the jcpoa extended the hand of diplomacy? >> i think certainly countries involved in conflict or those that are enemies of the united states should know if they attack any american citizen, there will be some level of repercussion for that. i think one strike against -- >> you believe the strikes were warranted after the killing of the u.s. contractor? >> i think the strikes do not really comprise a strategy for the region, nor do they resolve the matter. this is a very complex part of

the world. we know that there are millie yeahs there tied in with iran. we already pretty much lost the battle for syria, where now russia and iran have the upper hand. we're getting ready to pretty much hand over iraq to iran as well and perhaps even the russians. so we're not really moving forward in the region. we're not making it safer. we're not really defending our interest in that part of the world. >> do you think iran is making the bet that the president has a 2020 election ahead of him and he's not willing to compromise that by getting into a conflict with iran right now, so they're trying to push the buttons. if, in fact, that's the case, how do you move forward right now with regard to strategy? >> i don't know if they're playing partisan politics per se. i know we should go back to the table. i think the nuclear deal was weak. i don't know if we should have

scrapped it. we could have made a stronger and to include interballistic missiles that would have been stronger and perhaps not be in the position we're in now. >> you see kim jong-un speaking up once again saying he wants to begin nuclear development again in spite of the moratorium that he promised to the president. you have the president saying he likes me, i like him, we get along, he's representing his country, i'm representing my country. we have to do what we have to do. but he did sign the contract, still believing that kim jong-un is standing by his word. >> this is more of the same. this is really theater at its very best. we saw the interchange between the president and the leader of north korea several months back. we thought this was a done deal. obviously it's not. he's backing up on his word. this is really more of the same. a lot of theater, pomp and circumstance. i think at the end of the day he's playing the president. >> let me get you on the record

with regards to the senate impeachment trial which is just around the corner. obviously you had chuck schumer saying this new "new york times" report is now more of a case than ever, that we should have these witnesses appear before the senate, whether it be john bolton, mike pompeo, mark esper, mick mulvaney. what do you make of that? what do you think the likelihood is of that happening and what should speaker pelosi's strategy should be going forward? >> i think her strategy is correct. we shouldn't hand over the articles of impeachment if it's going to be a sham, a kangaroo court. i think, yes, additional witnesses should come forward. they have a lot to offer to this discussion. we shouldn't jump the gun and make any decisions. i think some of the senators, particularly the republican side of the aisle, have already agreed that nothing was wrong and they haven't heard from bolton or mulvaney. even rudy giuliani saying he wants to testify. let's hear from them.

>> you think if leader mcconnell makes no moves with regards to the senate impeachment trial, that speaker pelosi should hold on to those articles of impeachment? >> i'm not going to second-guess speak speaker pelosi. i think we's acting correct. we had a very zldeliberate and precise process where we had three committees hear from close to 20 witnesses. we had an open hearing. both siesds of the aisle were on each side of the process. not like the democrats were driving the ship. the republicans were there questioning folks that came before the committee. the judiciary publicly drafted two articles of impeachment. we have them in our control and we should not give them over until we know this is going to be a transparent process. >> congressman, thank you for joining us on this new year's day. happy new year to you. what a year ahead it will be. >> thank you. as the new year means new laws, that includes one that takes effect later this year impacting anyone who wants to

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while one new law does not kick in until october, it will affect anyone looking to get through airport security and boarding a plane. nbc's pete williams breaks it all down for us. >> 2020 brings a2020 brings a s requirement first proposed in the wake of the 9/11 terror attacks and delayed year after year. finally beginning this october, anyone wishing to board an airplane flight must present a real i.d. compliant driver's license or passport or military i.d. card. they have a star on the upper right hand corner to show they meet the law's tougher standards. state motor vehicle departments are required to verify each person's records, making it harder the falsify. >> so do it now while you can. get it down early so you don't have any issues in october. >> as of january 1st, new hampshire allows residents to put x under sex on their driver's licenses. for people who don't identify as

male or female. legal to possess small amounts of marijuana in illinois and michigan, bringing the number states that allow recreational use to 11. one is nevada. employers there can't refuse to hire someone who test positive for marijuana. in washington state, parents must put children under 2 in a rear facing seat and children over 4 must use a harness until they're 4'9". they're in middle school. zbr so right over their shoulder and their lap. >> companies in california cannot discriminate against their employees who have racially associated hair styles. support ers of the law were outraged when a referee forced a wrestler to cut the dread locks. and no more single use plastic checkout bags in oregon except for buying fish, meat or taking

out dry cleaning. >> joining me now, our legal analyst. so beginning today, it is now legal, why are you laughing? >> so happy to be here. >> it's now legal to possess small amounts of marijuana in illinois and michigan. what does this mean for the future of marijuana law? >> as a criminal defense attorney, it's a good thing we're moving towards decriminalization of nonviolent drug crimes relating to marijuana u. as somebody who has to live in new york city when i walk around and i walk around and it smells like skunks where ever i go, i'm not a fan. so i think forward, there's going to have to be legislation so we're not walking through clouds in cities that allow small amounts of marijuana. >> not all of us are walking through clouds. >> anywhere in manhattan. >> how about the passengers

under 4'9" and needing a booster seat until the age of 13. that's middle school age. >> middle school and i have to tell you, isn't middle school hard enough already? i was in the dunlgens and dragons club u. some of the kids in my middle school were shoplifting and smoking. i don't think they were using booster seats and if they saw me get dropped off in a booster seat, i'd still be suffering from a wedgie. i don't know. i'm all for automobile safety. cars are very dangerous. this one is going b to be tough on middle schoolers. >> happy 2020, my friend. you really brought it today. thank you. still ahead, minimum wage is going up in almost two dozen states this year. but is it enough? first, the surprising moment caught on camera outside the vatican. the pope slapping a woman's hand. what he's saying b ab it today. you're watching msnbc live. at hy

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today, tens of thousands of protestors in hong kong rang in the new year by taking streets for an antigovernment march that descended into violent c confrontations. it began peacefully, then they used tear gas. organizers argue that the march was peaceful and accused the officers of escalating tensions.

hong kong police saying that around 400 people were arrested for unlawful assembly and possession of offensive weapons. and pope francis apologizing today for slapping the hand of a woman who grab bed his arm while he was greeting pilgrims in st. peters square on new year's eve. you see it happening there. the pope was clasping hands when the woman grabbed the pontiff's hand and pulled him towards her. he turned visibly angry and swatted her hand away. in remarks today, he said quote, many times we lose our patience, me, too. i apologize for yesterday's bad example. that does it for this hour. thank you for watching. right now, my friend, jeff bennett, picks up our coverage. that does it for me. i'm going to go enjoy my new year's day holiday. >> good for you. take care. great to see you. happy new year. i'm jeff bennett in washington,

d.c. right now, hundreds of u.s. soldiers are making their way the iraq where a highly volatile situation has stretch ed into a second day. pro iranian demonstrators again gathered at the u.s. embassy. ahead, the latest from the response from the u.s. military and president trump. plus, it's now officially election year. how candidates are sharpening their message as we hit the final sprint to the iowa caucuses. not just more than a month away. and nearly two dozen states vote ed to intheir minimum wages this past year, but is it enough to live on? that's all straight ahead. but we begin with breaking nes s from iraq. the iraqi government says all the demonstrators who gathered outside the u.s. embassy in baghdad have left and that iraqi force have secured the area. it comes hours after embassy security guards fired tear gas on protestors who gathered outside the compound. they were demonstrating against u.s. air strikes on sunday that killed 25 members of an iranian backed militia group and now

mark esper says 750 u.s. troops are on their way to the middle east. joining us now to talk about all of this is "washington post" reporter from background and hillary, a former u.s. negotiator with iran and former national security counsel director for iran, afghanistan and persian gulf affairs. also co-author of going to tehran, why the united states must come to terms with the islamic republic. my thanks to you for being here. mustaf, what led to demonstrators leave that area of the embassy? >> yesterday when they were gathered around the embassy the prime minister issued a statement to leave immediately. they didn't listen and kept putting tents there. they kept trying to reach inside the embassy until late night. the second gate of the