a record-setting record for new coronavirus cases. we'll have the latest on that. and what the president knew. the story on russians paying to kill americans in afghanistan, and what would republicans risk in losing to joe biden. good morning, everybody. it is monday, june 29th, and i'm yasmin vossoughian. we're going to begin another record-setting weekend for new cases of coronavirus.

three straight days of some of the highest numbers that we have seen yet. a record 46,000 cases on friday. almost 43,000 on saturday. and more than 41,000 yesterday. florida, south carolina, nevada, and georgia all recorded their highest number of cases on saturday, with more than 2.5 million cases now reported and new infections surging. health and human services secretary alex azar issued this statement this morning. >> the window is closing. have to act, and people as individuals have to act responsibly. we need to social distance. we need to wear our face coverings if we're in settings where we can't social distance, particularly in these hot zones. >> and the united states has gathered intelligence that russian intelligence officers have offered to pay bounties for taliban fighters who kill americans. three people have been briefed on the matter, telling nbc news this. "the new york times" first broke

the story on friday, aspects of which have been matched and independently reported by multiple outlet as i cording to the "times." quote, the recovery of large amounts of american cash at a taliban outpost in afghanistan helped tip off u.s. officials. according to intelligence gleaning from u.s. military interrogations of captured militants in recent months, the "washington post" is reporting that the russian bounties are believed to have resulted in the deaths of several u.s. servicemembers. nbc news has not independently confirmed that reporting. two officials telling "the new york times" that intelligence officer and special operations forces in afghanistan alerted their superiors as early as january to a suspected russian plot. officials developed several potential recourse options for russia including sanction, but none have been activated by the trump administration.

the "times" also reported that president trump was briefed on the findings and white house's national security council discussed the problem at a meaning in late march. according to a brief, they were briefed. it would be unusual if top officials did not verbally brief the president on something that is so exclusive. administration officials are telling nbc news the president was never briefed on this issue because there's no consensus within the intelligence community on these allegations. the white house and the president himself have denied knowledge of the russian plot but have not denied the existence of the report. national intelligence director john ratcliffe denied that president trump has been briefed. let's get into this now. a washington reportin' for the

"washington post," daniel lippman. talk me through this. i saw an astounding tweet from liz chainy yesterday. it was retweeted by a lot of republicans in washington. here's what the tweet said. if reporting about the russian bounties on u.s. troops, the white house must skplarngs one, why wasn't the president or vice president briefed and why wasn'ts it in the daley briefing. who knew what when. and thirdly, what has been done to protect our forces and who holds putin accountable? what do you make of this report especially if the president was briefed and did not act? >> it's very damaging reporting because this is just the latest example of many examples over the last few years of president trump going staunch on russia

and putin who he's tried to develop a close relationship with. it's possible the intelligence was in the written presidential daily briefing, but trump is known not to actually read those full reports. he doesn't like to process information through lots of different pages or by reading every single word on the ipad where you can get the pdb. he much prefers an oral briefing. it's also been reported over the years that those intel briefers don't like bringing up russia in those oral briefings. they'd rather kind of, you know, cover themselves by putting it in the pdb, the written form, which evidently he often does not read, which is kind of a lack of curiosity on his part about what's going on in the world. >> so i also want to switch gears here and talk about the surging cases when it comes to

covid nationwide. if you take a look at the state of texas, right, it was one of the last states to shut down and one of the first states to open up. it was really open/shut down for three weeks or so. taking a look at florida, one of the earlier states to open up after the shutdown nationwide. and these numbers are just astounding coming out of some of these states. are the recent spikes in cases, are they impacting the president's support base, especially when you consider the vice president yesterday coming out and urging americans to wear masks at this time? >> i think they're undoubtedly affecting his numbers somewhat because you have president trump with very small leads or even sometimes down a point in places like texas and georgia, which are really rock solid red states usually, and so that indicates that independents, moderates, democrats are enthusiastic about

voting trump out of office. they don't think he's handled the coronavirus pandemic very well. you know, early on he's ignoring it. he's shifting responsibility to the states to, you know, get this under control. and even today he doesn't like to talk about masks, even though it's an important public health aspect of feeding this pandemic, so you would think he would want to support it just in the name of getting this under control so he can kind of have a better re-election message. and so it's all related to one another. and so i think, you know, even some of his republican base in those states, they're saying, well, we see the cases rising, and they don't like his comment that, oh, we slowed down the testing even if his white house specials say that was just a joke. >> also if you look at "the new

york times" ipsos poll from last week, i believe, americans want to save lives more than they want to keep the economy going for now. daniel lippman, thank you. stay close. i'll talk to you in just a little bit. still ahead, democrats are losing in the battle to vote by mail why president trump loses two big immigration battles. and what the white house is saying about offensive language used by one of the president's supporters. and we'll get a check on the weather with bill karins when we come back. he weather withil bl karins when we come back. 300 miles an hour,

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welcome back. the supreme court on friday ruled it would not require the state of texas to permit all eligible voters to vote by mail at an upcoming july 14th runoff election despite the rise in

co-provide. the court was responding to an emergency application to allow all eligible texas voters to do so by mail, not just those over 65 or residents meeting strict requirements for residents requesting an applicant. the appeals court stayed the appeal order. while the case is in the appeal court, justice sotomayor read a statement. this application raises weighty but seemingly novel questions regarding the 26th amendment. i do not disagree with the decision to refrain from addressing them for the first time here, but i hope that the court of appeals will consider the merits of legal issues in this case well in advance of the november elections.

also children are to be released from detention centers due to covid-19. the order applies to 114 kids who have been held with their parents for more than 20 days by i.c.e. there are two such centers in texas and one in pennsylvania. citing the rampant spread of coronavirus in two of these facilities, a u.s. district court judge set a deadline for july 17th for children to be released with their parents or sent to family sponsors. the judge oversees a long-running court settlement over the treatment of children known as the flores agreement. according to a june 16th order, i.c.e. is only permitted to release the child if there's not a suitable sponsor. they waive a right if there's an unexplained reason to appear at a scheduled hearing. let's get into this.

nbc legal analyst danny cevallos. great to see you this morning. >> good morning. >> let's get into this. the numbers out of texas have been skyrocketing. this ruling about mail-in voting is surprising. break it down for us. >> the 26th amendment was passed in 1971, but since that time when the voting age was lowered to 18, it's beenerly been touched by the supreme court or lower court. we don't know what the bundle of rights are. but the fifth circuit in this case, overturning the district court's order essentially said the 26th amendment isn't a broad guarantee to vote. it doesn't create so much a fundamental right. it just lowers the voting age to 18. the right to vote is guaranteed, but not the right to vote by mail. and the fifth circuit court of appeals made a major distinction between those two things so that

as long as the ability to vote is still granted to people over 18, then the 26th amendment isn't really implicated. of course, the argument against that in a time of pandemic, something that we never really dealt with on this level before is that if you don't allow every everyone to vote by mail, you're effectively denying the right to vote because it may be too dangerous to vote in person. >> so also related to this virus, children are being ordered released from detention centers as i laid out. but the order does not necessarily apply to the parents. explain that to us and the rights here that parents have in this situation. >> this is a really challenging situation for the district judge overseeing this case because to release the children without their parents achieves another challenge that we're trying to avoid, which is separating

children from their parents. you can see there on the screen, there are a couple of different situations where the children may even be kept if, for example, the -- right. you see the notes there. there is not a suitable sponsor. there's nowhere they can go. and the only place that is really safe for them is with the parent. but the general rules are that the child can be released to a sponsor or another option that the judge ordered them to explore is that i.c.e. can release them, quote, in i.c.e.'s discretion. what that mean, who knows. but one of the options the judge mentioned is electronic monitoring or gps, which is often used in the criminal context, which is vastly cheaper than housing and feeding them and detaining them. send them out into the wild with a monitor and gps as long as they don't pose a safety threat. that's less likely with immigrants and their children than it is with accused criminals who are out on bail.

>> all right. danny cevallos, thank you as always. great to see you this morning. the ninth circuit court of appeals ruled that they cannot use funds allocated for military spending to build the wall. the 2-1 vote found that the money congress appropriated for military spending used to build a wall violated the laws. the transfer amounted to withdrawing funds from the treasury without authorization by statute. still ahead, everybody. the last remaining state with a confederate emblem on its flag is now set to make a change. we're going to have the latest on that next. we're going to have the latest on that next of 1,2,3 medicines with trelegy. the only fda-approved,

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welcome back. mississippi lawmakers voted to remove an emblemen from their flag. the bill passed the mississippi house in a 91-23 vote and then the state senate, 37-14. it's now going to go to republican governor tate reeves who said he will sipe it into law. lawmakers have been debating a change in the flag amid nationwide black lives matter protests that were sparked after the death of george floyd. the flag which was first adopted in 1894 has red, white, blaund stripes with a confederate battle emblem on it. they established a commission to develop a new design that includes the phrase "in god we trust." mississippi voters will have a chance to vote on the new design in november. also princeton announced it plans to remove the name of former president woodrow wilson from the university's school of public and international affairs due to wilson's racial thinking

and policies. they planned to close the college and change the name, but they moved to accelerate the plan. the president of the university said for me the decision was wrenching but right. wilson helped to create the university that i love. i do not pretend to know how to evaluate his life or his staggering combination of achievement and failure. i do know that we -- meanwhile in response to a number of recent incidents involving the vandalism of statues memorializing the confederacy, the president

signed an order that instructs law enforcement officials to prosecute people who damage federal monuments or statues. the order would reinforce existing federal law that criminalizes the destruction of federal monuments as well as threaten to withhold federal funding from state and local law even force management agencies that, quote rk, fail to protect monumen monument monuments, memorials, and statues. all right. to the weather, we have janessa webb. i didn't know bill karins was taking off, but i'm glad he's taking time off. >> yes. we have flooding and storms moving across central new york. the area of low pressure is making its way offshore. things are going to clear out pretty quickly. now, we have a pretty fluid weather system that's impacting the northern plains all the way

into the mississippi valley, and this will produce some pockets of cells that will have torrential rain associated with it, up to 3 inches through wednesday afternoon. it's pretty much stalled out front, and it's going to produce warm air. the gusts will pick up throughout tonight and into tomorrow afternoon, so the flood risks will be really increased for the ohio valley, all the way into the carolinas. on the other side of the country, we're watching this very dry air that's in place for the pacific northwest. it's the winds that are going to cause that elevated fire risk across the four corners from flagstaff to albuquerque where we could see gusts up to 35 miles an hour. that's going to heighten the fire danger in those areas. look at these temperatures though. they're soaring. we're actually seeing this dome of high pressure that is building from dodge city to chicago where daytime highs are 100 degrees. slightly cooler for the northeast. we're about 5 to 10 degrees above average.

but really that warm air is going to continue to be in place. slightly cooler from charleston to philadelphdelvphiladelphia. by tomorrow afternoon, we're back into the upper 80s. the summer heat is building across the area. jasmizmi >> thank you. according to the "new york post," the nationals will begin their title defense hosting the yankees on the evening of july 23rd. the game is expected to feature a blockbuster pitching matchup between max scherzer against gerrit cole in new york. they have not finalized their upcoming 60-game regular season schedule. still ahead, more states open amid surge infections. and did the trump campaign report signs were missing at its

tulsa rally? we'll have more on that. we're back in a moment. we'll have more on that. we're back in a moment ♪we ain't stoppin' believe me♪ ♪go straight till the morning look like we♪ ♪won't wait♪ ♪we're taking everything we wanted♪ ♪we can do it ♪all strength, no sweat extra cheese, extra pepperoni right to the edge and the biggest slices in papa john's history. but it's bigger than pizza because $1 from each sale is donated to support communities. because $1 from each sale is donated you can't always stop for a fingerstick.betes with the freestyle libre 14 day system, a continuous glucose monitor, you don't have to. with a painless, one-second scan you can check your glucose with a smart phone or reader so you can stay in the moment.

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welcome back, everybody. i'm yasmin vossoughian. we're going to begin this half hour with a troubling update on the coronavirus. the u.s. has surpassed 2.5 million cases with record numbers of infections being reported in several states after businesses there were allowed to reopen in recent weeks. now several governors are rolling back reopening plans as some are fearing the worst is still yet to come.

in texas, governor greg abbott who allowed businesses to start reopening in early may shut down bars and restaurant dining in light of a spike in cases. and in florida, more beaches will be closing again to avoid further spread of the virus as officials try to tamp down on large gatherings there. meanwhile a new report from the "washington post." it is detailing that in the hours before the president's rally in tulsa, oklahoma, the trump campaign directed the removal of thousands of social distancing stickers. you can see in this video obtained by the "post" two men appear to be seen pulling stickers off of the seats in a section of the arena. trump campaign communications director tim murtaugh told nbc news the rally was in, quote, full compliance with the safety

protocol set in place at the arena. as you remember when the president took the stage that evening the crowd was clustered together, and the attendees were not leaving empty seats between themselves. there was no social distancing. it's unclear how many who attended the event contracted the virus. we're watching that development. at least one oklahoma former president has tests pottive. according to the "associated press," he was inside the arena for six hours and wore a mask and practiced social distancing. he said he was never close to the president. this was happening as two more staff members tested positive after the tulsa rally bringing the tally on trump's staff who tested positive surrounding the tulsa rally up to eight. also a new ad from the group, anti-trump services, the

lincoln project. they say he's putting seniors at risk in the haste of reopening the economy. watch this. >> yesterday, in 1941, a day that will live in infamy. >> in 1941 america asked a generation to go to war, to build an arsenal for democracy. they did nothing less than save the world. it didn't come easy. it didn't come quickly. and it didn't come without great sacrifice. >> america will again and soon be open for business. we cannot let the cure be worse than the problem itself. we're not going to let the cure be worse than the problem. >> haven't we asked enough of the greatest generation?

the lincoln project is responsible for the content of this advertising. >> that is powerful to say the least. so the president is facing increased pressure to turn his presidential campaign around as he is continuing face flagging poll numbers. the "washington post" is expressing a major concern is the president's slide in the polls including among white evangelical voters. trump is also slightly behind joe biden in six key battle ground states he won back in 2016 according to "the new york time times"/siena college poll. biden leads trump in six states, surpassing whites in that age group. meanwhile a senior correspondent says republican operatives are raising the possibility that

trump may exit the 2020 race if his poll numbers do not rebound, according to several major players. karl rove warned on friday trump's re-election campaign will neat a significant reboot and significant messaging in order to take on biden in november. >> let's be honest about it. the president is behind today. all the national polls suggest that he's behind. real clear politics average close to 9 points. six weeks ago it was 5. these things happen in campaigns. the question is not where are the polls today, but what does the president need to do in order to regain the advantage. >> all right. joining me once again, white house and washington reporter daniel lippman. he essentially is saying the president has a major uphill battle here, and the hearing talks possibly from fox business that the president may feasibly drop out if his poll numbers

continue to slip. what type of reaction are we hearing in washington from trump's recent fade in the polls? >> i don't think it's likely that he would drop out since he is a fighter. he would not want to go down without swinging basically. but republicans in washington, they fear the worst. they look at the poll numbers. i was talking to a trump campaign official a few days ago and asked that person how the campaign was going, and he said, it's fine or it's going okay. and so even they know -- they can see the writing on the wall, so there's an effort to try to give joe biden a new nickname because they don't think that sleepy joe has been cutting it. so they may be going with corrupt joe and other nicknames to try to also say he's mentally incompetent and would not be a president who is fit for office.

but those nicknames aren't exactly trademark-worthy right now. >> yeah. a new nickname does not necessarily seem like a pivot, considering his terrible poll numbers that we have seen as of late. let's talk about that ad that i just played from the lincoln project, essentially saying that the generation that helped save the world during world war ii is now suffering the most from covid, losing their life. how is the president reacting from your understanding to this latest ad from the lincoln project? >> so we don't know exactly how trump is responding to this ad since it's so new, but he has over the last few weeks criticized the lincoln project when he sees their ads on tv, you know, tweeting about it. i asked a senior white house

official what trump thinks of the lincoln project in general, and that person replied, who? and so they're trying to downplay any kind of blowback, any kind of reaction from trump. but it's definitely getting into the head of people at the white house that they know that these ads are damaging because they do get picked up on social media and in the corridor. so even if they're not hitting the swing states in a big way since the lincoln project is not spending tens of millions of dollars, they're definitely getting under trump's skin. >> daniel lippman, my friend, thank you as always. great to see you. still ahead, the president feels racial tangs with a controversial retweet over the weekend. your first look at "morning joe" is back in a moment. ack in a mo.

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welcome back. at least one person was killed and another injured in a shooting in downtown louisville, kentucky, saturday night at the site of ongoing protests over the death of breonna taylor. a video shows a man standing on the edge of jefferson square park, firing more than a dozen shots that sent protesters scrambling for shelter among tents and park benches. police say then they received calls that members of the sheriff's department were performing life-saving measures on 27-year-old tyler girth who lay ter died at the scene. reports were taken ott another shooting nearby and a person was taken to the hospital for non-life-threatening injuries. the aggressor was taken to the hospital and was charged with first-degree murder and wanton

behavior. a man was in a golf cart shouting white power. the florida community is known as the village, they were protesting against each other. the man heard shouting white power was in response to protesters yelling racist. in a statement trump said, quote, he's a big fan of the individuals but did not hear the video. earlier the trump was criticized for retweeting a tweet fire fauci. when asked, here's what he said. >> he's a wonderful guy. >> why did you -- >> i retweeted somebody. >> did you notice that when you retweeted. >> yeah, i notice everything. >> but doesn't it matter what you retweet when you're the president of the united states and you have millions of

followers? with that, let's switch gears and get a check of your forecast once again with nbc meteorologist janessa webb. good to see you again, janessa. >> hi, yasmin. we have reached over a half a million deaths. we always see a spike on monday. but over twekd we had 270 deaths for the u.s. that's the fewest we've seen since march 24th, but we're potentially still waiting for the data to come in on the most positive cases. we potentially see another big uptick with the latest data that will come in for monday. now, you can see new cases. this has been really consistent for the last week or so for the six states that you're seeing here, florida, california, texas, arizona, georgia, and north carolina. they continue to see that big-time rise. just on sunday, we saw over

8,530 positive new cases in florida. they're going to be watching that area pretty closely. let's transition to weather now. as you can see, the central plains into the great lakes, we're going to watch these heavy storms for your monday afternoon. the heat is continuing build toward the southwest and the fire danger high for the next week or so. the east storms will really keep the east coast pretty soggy until wednesday afternoon. up to 3 inches in some spots from the mississippi valley to the carolinas. and the texas heat, man, we're going into july with triple-digit territory, and the relative humidity, the dry conditions will definitely be in place. the southern storms will pick up for your friday afternoon. i can promise you for the northeast, we're going to be watching for more sunshine from new york city to northern new england as we go into the weekend. yasmin? >> all right. thank you, janessa. still ahead, facebook moves

to tighten its moderation policies as more companies remove their ads over the prolific hate speech on the platform. your first look at business is coming up. k at business is coming up. alright let's roll. c'mon pizza's here. whoa! is that shaq? this is my new pizza the shaq-a-roni and it's bigger than pizza because for every shaq-a-roni sold, $1 is donated to the papa john's foundation for building community.

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welcome back. the advertising boycott on facebook continues to expand to several major company sign-ons, sending the social media giant stock plummets. karen tso joins us. talk about the numbers you're seeing. >> we've seen the content. advertising dollars clearly having an important factor here for facebook. the social media giant will hide or block content considered to be hateful or harmful. there's no exceptions for politicians. you may recall a view that erupted when president trump posted a post on facebook, this

around the shooting of the george floyd protest. the same on twitter had a label attached to it. facebook did nothing with it. zuckerberg was criticized for no intervention. it decide on friday to suspend its advertising. facebook change its policies. a number of brands lining up with similar moves from starbucks to coca-cola. the question is whether it's just july or whether it's much longer. advertising is the lion's share of facebook's revenue, so it is significant. if you think about the stock moves, we saw it plunge 8% on the friday session. that's 56% shredded from facebook. when it comes to mark zuckerberg, that saw him lose $7 billion in one day. before you shed a tear, yasmin, he's close to 80-some-odd billion dollars. >> so he'll be just fine.

let's talk about lorial here f . the skincare giant is talking about changing skin tones. talk about this. >> skin tone products. >> key descriptions, changing the labelling of products removing words like fair, light, and whitening from marketing products. it does follow similar moves by rivals to tread cautiously on product descriptions and lineup, and around concerns used for skin whitening products for age spots and similar products. ny ya, one of the rivals want its fair and lovely line to be more inclusive so makeup brands moving to change some of the descriptions. thank you so much, karen.

great to see you this morning. up next, a look at axios's one big thing. and on "morning joe" another look at record setting cases of coronavirus in the u.s. prompts a new warning from the department of health and human services, the window is closing we have to act. we're going to speak to two democrats poised to become the first lgbtq black members of congress. q black members of congress new tide power pods one up the cleaning power of liquid.

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on the campaign, it does sound though like you're saying do as we say, not as we do. telling people to listen to local officials but in tulsa you defied officials to have an event that even though it doesn't result in a spike, does erie, pas -- dozens of staffers are quarantined. how can you say the campaign is not part of the problem that dr. fauci laid out? >> well, i want to remind you again that freedom of speech and the right to peacefully assemble in enshrined in the constitution of the united states even in a

health crisis, the american people don't forfeit our constitutional rights. and working with state officials as we did in oklahoma and as we did in arizona, we're creating settings where people can choose to participate in the political process. and we'll continue to do that. i think it's -- i think it's really important that we recognize how important -- how important freedom and personal responsibility are to this entire equation. >> vice president mike pence there pressed during a coronavirus task force briefing on friday when paula reid noted the white house administration often contradicts itself when it comes to the pandemic. joining me now with a look

at axios a.m. political reporter for axios, alexi mchammond. great to see you on this monday morning. give us axios' one big thing. >> great to see you. today's one big thing is about trump's reelect campaign. aides close to him are looking privately to rebrand joe biden, aides to the president are admitting privately that the sleepy joe nickname is getting the visceral reaction they found with hillary clinton when they labeled her crooked hillary clinton in 2016. that matters because obviously trump likes to brand people with different nicknames, we've seen that from him before. the difference is, there are a number of polls showing trump is trailing biden in key states. so it's the president and his

team looking at the polls and realizing they're running out of time to turn joe biden, who people view in a familiar way, to someone painted as bad for the country, bad for america and unable to lead the country forward because of his mental acuity they will say. >> hearing the sound from carl rove that the trump campaign has to pivot and hearing from so many they have to pivot given the dismal poll numbers we've seen with regards to biden versus trump, do they actually think that that is a pivot? that rebranding biden, thinking of a new nickname is a pivot for them and will boost trump's poll numbers? >> well, as i just said, and as you know too well, trump loves to try to demonize people by giving them nicknames. the difference here is one to

your point, whether or not a rebrand will be successful, given the way we've seen people moving more towards biden's camp and polling since the coronavirus really started and the president's handling of the protests but aides admit it'll be difficult to get people to hate biden personally because, of course, unlike hillary clinton he hasn't spent years as a boogie man to the conservative media. we saw how those folks treated clinton in 2016 and covered her candidacy through that lens. calling joe biden sleepy, even one republican lawmaker told us privately, some people may like that description given everything they've seen with president trump. so they have to think of something else, because people don't hate joe biden the way they hated hillary clinton. >> the campaign they ran in 2016 just may not work this time around. let's talk about the biden camp and what they're planning on

this week. from my understanding, they're planning on zeroing in on covid and the president's response to testing. >> that's right. so last week we saw the biden campaign talking a lot about covid but through the lens of the affordable care act, of course the president and his administration trying to strike that down in the supreme court, that was their hook. this week they're focussing on biden's response and president trump's response, specific responses at different times to things happening throughout the covid-19 pandemic so far. they'll show images of things that president trump has said, especially the contentious moments in press briefings when the president is sparring with reporte reporters. and show him golfing at times when testing is going up in southern states. and they'll show biden to contrast the leadership. that's a australistrategy we've

from them so far. >> alexi thank you so much. that does it for me on this monday morning i'm yasmin vossoughian. "morning joe" starts right now. the entire thing was offensive. certainly the comment about the whyte power was offensive. we can play politics or we can't. i think it's indefensible we should take it down. >> just another typical weekend for the president of the united states. tweeting out a white power video before later suggesting he didn't know what was on the tape when the words white power were eight seconds in. claiming ignorance on a russian plot to have u.s. troops killed in afghanistan. >> claiming ignorance when everybody else in the government, his security people seemed to know it and even the british were notified. really is the president so addled they didn't tell the president of the united states when we're telling our