to learn more about our response. this is not the kind of situation where we can send in goods. the airports are crowded, so really donations are best at this point in time. >> okay. christy dellafield, thank you so much. i thank you for the heads up on all of this. that will do it for me, everyone, on this addition of "alix whit records. i will see you at noon eastern. my friend yasmin vossoughian continues the coverage. welcome, everybody. wow, it is quite a saturday. good afternoon. i'm yasmin vossoughian. we are following several major breaking news stories at this hour. henri, a hurricane and headed for landfall in less than 24 hours, set to become the first hurricane-strength storm to hit the region directly in decades. we have new information on the ground at the kabul airport. nbc news reporting a threat to the airport today came from isis.

we will have more on that ahead. you don't want to miss that reporting. plus the mask mandate. the fight in schools if florida heating up with the clock ticking towards the deadline when state officials say they will take money from schools that are trying to keep kids safe. then a special report on the billions of dollars in pandemic aid that has gone to scammers overseas. that is coming up as well as a special report from ken dilanian on that. we want to begin with the breaks news off the seaboard. as henri spins its way on course for a collision course with new england, we want to get to michelle grossman who is following the track of the storm. let's talk through this thing. we are seeing the track of the storm obviously shifting, it seems making landfall over long island. what are we expecting at this time? >> hi there. so good to see you. you got it. that's the expected landfall. the first landfall over the eastern part of long island, and

then a second landfall as a tropical storm over connecticut or rhode island. that path still needs to be nailed down but we are getting closer. it is pretty good expectation we will go over long island and then into connecticut. this is what it looks like on satellite. where you see the red colors those are the high clouds, the thunderstorms. it is not organized when you see it on satellite but still a category 1 storm. we are looking at winds of 75 miles per hour. it is going through really -- it is going through an area it that it likes so it has low shear, warm waters so we it expect to maintain category 1 status. it is moving north/northeast at 17 miles per hour, so moving pretty quickly right now. that is going to change drastically as we head toward z sunday and monday. it will slow down drastically. i put a couple of pause pins on here because i want to show you what we expect with this.

the national hurricane center expects it to go over the eastern part of long island as a category 1 storm. that would be either the early part of sunday or around 11:00, noon on sunday. then it will make a second landfall into connecticut, roland island, somewhere there. a little bit after that as a tropical storm. either way we are looking at a strong tropical storm at this point. then the last graphic here, i want to show you this because this will be the big takeaway for henri. we are looking at flooding rains or the potential for flooding rains because where you see the white lines, those are 12-hour increments. that tells me the storm is going to move painfully storm. a tropical storm is able to drop a lot of water. it is like a sponge. you squeeze it out, it is going to wring itself out and drop a lot of rain on areas that are already saturated. monday by 8:00 we are looking still over parts of new england, and it really doesn't take off until tuesday. we will see a lot of power outages. this is a graphic that shows you where the hurricane warning is, and really that's to tell you now is the time to take action. if you didn't do it this

morning, now is the time because things are going to start to stir up later on tonight as we are sleeping into sunday. now you want to fill your water bottles, you want to move your cars away from any trees that could be knocked down including montauk, new haven, islip, even extending down to new jersey, so the new jersey beaches not out of the woods either. this will be the big takeaway. we will see flooding rains. the grounds are so saturated from record rain in july and then what came through with fred a couple of days ago. >> right. >> we are looking at rainfall rates, 3 to 5 inches, and then isolated up to 10 inches in some spots. so, yasmin, as we go throughout the next 12 hours it is really going to be very telling, and this is going to last at least monday, tuesday and lots and lots of power outages. >> michelle, while i have you, i know we will check in with you later on, but, you know, the governor mentioning hurricane sandy, a lot of people here on the coast remembering hurricane sandy, there was complete devastation along the eastern

seaboard when it came to hurricane sandy. i was on the ground covering that myself. >> yes. >> how do you compare this storm to that? >> okay. so it is different, and i completely know that feeling. you know, it is that feeling that you can't shake still. i was 7-months preg nantd during that storm and covering that storm. the difference with that storm is there was a big area of high pressure. it was just like you were driving on the road and you have a stop. you know, you can't get past it. that's really what happened. so this storm is going to move. it is going to move but it is going to move slowly. think of it more like irene with flooding rains. >> got it. >> i think that will be the story we remember years down the way when we think of henri, we will think of the flooding rains on the heels of fred. i know a lot of people are thinking of sandy, it is hard not to, but it is a different scenario. >> you are not necessarily expecting as much devastation as we got from sandy, is that accurate? >> right. >> and the assessment? >> yeah, that's accurate. i think what you need to do is prepare for a hurricane, but also prepare almost like a tornado is going to come through. get your cars away from trees.

it will be our outages that's what we will do well, and flooding rains, but not on the scale of the super storm. >> preparedness is everything. thanks nor the clarification on that. i appreciate it. so the approaching storm leading to a bizarre scene a short time ago during the press conference i was talking about with the new york governor who is set to leave office on tuesday. when the briefing was opened he was peppered with questions why he was leaving since his resignation is set to take effect in a matter of days. he was pressed about an appearance in which his lawyer made yesterday in which he questioned some of the reports cited in the report by the attorney general. here is what was said. >> i don't want to get into albany politics, which is what has been going on for the past few months. this is about a storm briefing to save lives of new yorkers. but you are the law journal.

if you think justice is to accept a complaint from a person without investigation and without credibility determinations and without looking at past actions of that person, then you don't know what the justice system is. >> not surprising the governor got questions like that with the end being near, just a couple of days away. nonetheless, the governor then ended questions soon after that. not surprising. the governor has denied all of the allegations against him and said that he is resigning for the good of the state. let's move on to afghanistan here. following breaking news out of there as well. nbc news learning of a new threat from isis at the kabul airport, the u.s. embassy warning americans not yet at the airport to hold off trying to get there. nbc's ali is joining us from there. let's talk about the breaking news from kabul and the

expectation there could be terror threats. what are we hearing on the ground there? >> reporter: that's right, yasmin. earlier today americans in afghanistan were advised to avoid traveling to the airport because of a potential security threat outside the gates of kabul airport. now nbc news knows it was a very specific threat from isis against kabul airport and against americans and others trying to get to the airport. now, the u.s. military is working on alternative ways to get americans, afghans and third country nationals safely to the airport. now, they're coming up with different methods and ways to see how they can do it. this includes limiting the flow of people, gathering small groups of people at specific locations, and then moving them to the airport in intervals. the goal is to get them there safely and to make it easier to get through the gates with smaller groups of people, because, as you have seen from the pictures, it is pandemonium outside those gates. >> yeah. >> there's so many people

crowded there and you just simply can't get through it. a few people have even been crushed there this morning, so that option is becoming very difficult. one of the biggest concerns right now are the large groups who have gathered outside and the concern is that could isis people sort of mingle in with what we think are mostly civilians who want to get to the evacuation sites there. this could be a very soft target for isis. you know, they have been limited in their international threats. they've been hit hard over the years. so there isn't much border security right now in afghanistan. the place is chaos, as we've seen. the taliban are a fairly small force of 75,000, so they're not going to be able to control any isis figures in there. the real worry is that, you know, americans, afghans that have helped americans and other third party nationals could be a very soft target for isis if they want to hit anybody on the ground there. >> ali, talk about quickly the

distinction between the isis network that poses a threat possibly in kabul versus the isis network in places like syria. >> reporter: yeah, they're a different branch. not all of the branches necessarily get on with each other. there are also different branches of al qaeda working in afghanistan as opposed to the ones we see in iraq and syria. the ones in afghanistan are much more hard core. they don't get on with a lot of the other branches of isis and al qaeda that are there. they seem to work a lot more independently and they seem to be a lot more ruthless. so that's what the fear is. but from what we can garner, their numbers in afghanistan are around the 200 mark. we are not entirely sure, but there are 200, pretty hardened fighters there right now. >> quickly where you are, ali, in tehran, is iran at all accepting afghani refugees? are afghanis trying to pour in

through the afghan/iran border at this point? >> reporter: they have been trying to pour in since the fall of kabul, but as of recently the iranians are now starting to close the refugee camps as the numbers of people start to swell. they're saying part of the reason is because of covid. they're also saying they want to stem any possible terrorism flowing into the country. another major reason also is on the western border of iran where a lot of afghans try to go into turkey and then into europe, the turks have built a 180-mile long wall along that border. so it is very difficult for afghans now to get out of iran once they're in here, and that's why the authorities are also stemming the flow of them coming into this country. >> got it. ali arouzi for us. thank you. good to see you. i want to go to washington where the president has decided to cancel his plans to go to delaware this afternoon after receiving a briefing from his

national security team on the situation in afghanistan, including the new threat from isis against the kabul airport. i want to go to nbc's josh leaderman at the white house. first, i want to get into a response we are hearing about this isis threat at the airport we are hearing from the white house. >> reporter: we haven't heard from president biden himself who was expected today to go to his home in wilmington a day after he was scheduled to. now the trip is scrapped all together as the president stays with national security aides addressing the situation in afghanistan. we know he met this morning with the national security team, and among the issues they discussed according to a white house read-out of the meeting was counterterrorism and the ongoing threat posed in afghanistan by isis k, this affiliate group of isis, the main group that the u.s. fought in syria and in iraq. we know that this news of this new threat had come just a few hours after the u.s. embassy in kabul, now operating out of the

airport, had put out this security alert to americans who they previously had been telling try to get to the airport if you can, we are going to get you hoe. now the embassy is saying stay put because there are concerns about the safety of actually getting to the airport. so it has been a big question of whether that alert was actually prompted by this new threat that courtney kube and others are reporting on. the spokesman at the pentagon, john kirby, was asked about that a little bit ago and this is what he said. >> we're going to try to do this in a safe and orderly way, and that means making sure that nobody gets hurt to the maximum extent possible. so what you are seeing out of our state department colleagues, i think, is, you know, prudent notification to make sure whatever movement to the gates outside the airport is done as safely as possible and that people have the information they need. >> reporter: what you are seeing over and over again here,

yasmin, is how what was already a gargantuan task of airlifting tens of thousands of people in basically a two-week period is continually being thrown by one loop after another by the crazy chaos on the ground. first, we had this issue of where are we actually going to put all of these people and the backlog that was building up in doha leading to the flights stopping on the ground for a period of hours in kabul. now we have this new problem, how are you going to get people safely to the airport when there is what we now know is a specific threat from an isis affiliate to americans and others trying to get to the airport. the u.s., if they are going to be actually going on sortees into taliban-held kabul to try to get people and bring them to the airport, that is going to significantly complicate the mission and increase the risk, making it even more uncertain how president biden is going to deliver on this promise of getting everyone out, especially by the end of the month. >> we're going to talk more about that as well. josh ledderman, thank you.

coming up later on this hour we will speak to the first female pilot for the afghan air force who says she is terrified for the women that are still inside that country. with all that is going on this weekend, let's talk about coronavirus. new today, florida officials, they're threatening to withhold funds equal to the salaries of school board members if school districts in two counties don't immediately do away with strict mask mandates. this is in a state that's become the third to surpass 3 million cases. more than 150,000 of those just this past week. that threat to cut salaries is aimed squarely at a tampa-area school district where a mask mandate has going into effect after more than 1,000 students have, in fact, tested positive. nbc's stephanie stanton is outside franklin middle school in tampa, florida, for us. stephanie, good to see you this afternoon. give us the latest here on the district's plans to curb really the spread of covid amongst its students. >> reporter: well, yasmin, it is good to be with you. as you said, i am here in

hillsborough county. this is in the tampa area, and the school board here has decided to mandate masks for the next 30 days. that means that parents will not have the opportunity to opt out unless they can provide a doctor's note, and officials here did that because cases are essentially blowing up. now, this district does have a dashboard, and according to the dashboard more than 13,000 students and teachers at the moment are out on quarantine. this is also in light of the fact that they've had nearly 3,000 cases and school has only started just this past week. they had 300 students who were diagnosed on friday alone with coronavirus. now, this school district board decided to defy governor ron desantis's no-mask mandate for a couple of reasons. obviously one of those reasons is safety. they feel that their students will be safer. they also want to cut down on these quarantining of the mass

amounts of students. i had an opportunity to talk to the superintendent earlier this morning. he says at this point he believes in parents' choice but he says he had no choice but to go along with the school board. take a listen. >> we haven't heard from the department of education as of yet. we know that we will. they have been truly focused on broward and alachua and openly through the recent information that was sent they will be pulling, yeah, some salaries. from our side of it, we hope it doesn't happen to the school board in hillsborough county. they have worked diligently to make sound, hard, difficult decisions to protect our students and also the working conditions of our adults. they've made some bold decisions. my job and role and responsibility is to support them in that process and continue to really focus on children every single day versus adults. >> reporter: and the superintendent saying that he does fully expect to hear from the governor's office, state owe initials in terms of possible

salary cuts. so he is waiting for that. now, really quickly, i want to let you know, yasmin, that we know that the u.s. secretary of education has reached out, is reaching out to these local district superintendents here, telling them to hold the line, telling them that they will make those federal funds available to make up for those differences should the state of florida decide to go ahead, go forward with that threat to pull those salaries. >> stephanie stanton for us. thank you, stephanie. coming up a little later on this hour, we will be joined by texas school superintendent tom leonard who has had to address physical altercations between parents and teachers over mask mandates. we will speak to medical contributor dr. uche blackstock who will fact check the concerns fuelling the fight over face coverage. still ahead, covid cash grab. the investigative unit uncovers widespread cyber scams that bill canned millions of pandemic

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have been stolen. among the ripest targets for the cyber theft have been jobless programs. the federal government cannot say for sure how much of the more than $900 billion pandemic-related unemployment relief has been stolen, but credible estimates range from $87 million to $400 billion, at least half of which went to foreign criminals. joining me is one of the correspondents of that piece, ken dilanian. good to see you this afternoon. i got to say, this is astounding stuff. i guess, you know, i can't imagine how this actually even happened. how were they actually able, these foreign hackers, to trick the system? >> reporter: great to see you, yasmin. thank you for highlighting this issue. look, it starts with the fact that the personal information of millions of americans is available for sale on the dark web. criminals buy this stuff in bulk, and, look, unemployment programs have always been ripe

for fraud, in part because the states use really old computer systems and they've been warned for years about vulnerability. there's generally about a 10% fraud rate. during the pandemic that exploded for a couple of reasons. states were making it actually easier to apply for the benefits. understandably, right? there were a lot of jobless people who needed benefits and most of the applications were happening online. then they had a new program for gig workers like uber drivers or self-employed people where they didn't even have the check of employer verification. so criminals seized on this. they used stolen identities en masse to prey on unemployment programs. they filed thousands and thousands of fake identities and sucked the money out. and there were some programs where the states would give -- would allow you to apply retroactively. for these criminals one identity was up to $20,000 on a debit card and it was quickly sent out of the country. the reason i'm covering the story as a national security reporter, yasmin, is when i

learned as much as half of the $400 billion was stolen by foreign criminal groups, talking about nigerian fraudsters, chinese hackers, that's a national security issue. >> two things i want you to answer because we don't have a lot of time left. you got estimates from $87 million to $400 billion, how do they not know how much money was lost? what are they doing to stop it? what security measures have they put in place for more verification? >> that's the crazy thing, is that the states don't have a handle on how much was stolen. the best estimate comes from a company called id me which has contracts with 27 states, which is trying to improve the verification process. but everybody has their head in the sand about this, yasmin. the biden administration has addressed it. they basically blamed it on the trump administration, but nobody can say for sure how much money has been stolen and what is being done about it. look, most of the up to $400 billion is gone, but there's a huge covid fraud task force at the justice department to try to

prosecute people, get some of the money back. the biden administration has appropriated $2 billion to try to plug some of these leaks in the state unemployment systems going forward, but it is like turning an aircraft carrier. meanwhile, hundreds of millions are still going out the door to fraud, yasmin, and a lot of the state unemployment agencies just don't want to talk about it because it is really embarrassing for them and they have no way to stop it. >> i can't help but think putting $2 billion towards recovering $87 to possibly 400 may not even be enough. ken dilanian for us, thanks. appreciate it. we are tracking henri, everybody. coming up, the latest on the track of the hurricane headed for long island. we will be right back. . >> yasmin, it is calm before the storm, but we have a major hurricane that is about to barrel across the northeast. millions of people will be impacted. i will have a live update coming up. ve update coming up like many people with moderate to severe ulcerative colitis

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all right, everybody. we will get back to the breaking news. as hurricane henri continues its track, moments ago new york governor andrew cuomo declaring a state of emergency for new york city, long island, westchester and the interior regions of the hudson valley and the capital district. we have meteorologist janessa webb who is on the south side of long island on long beach. janessa, good to see you this hour. talk me through what you are seeing so far and what we are expecting. you are essentially where this thing could feasibly make landfall for the first time. >> reporter: yeah, i mean it has been over 30 years that we've seen a cat 1 hurricane, and you know the prep here in long beach has been very strong all day. we've had a turn of events. it first was a tropical storm, and then now a cat 1, so people are really taking heed to that. but it is a saturday. people are trying to enjoy their last weekend, this is officially the last weekend of summer so people really want to be out and

about. so hundreds of people still trying to enjoy the day, but, yasmin, i have been here since 6:00 a.m. and we saw a ton of sunshine but things are slowly but surely starting to change. you can start to see the high tide. it is starting to make its way in. now, i did talk to some officials this morning, and they told me that the high tide that came in earlier was right about here. now, we are expecting a storm surge 3 to 5 feet with this cat 1 coming in tomorrow afternoon. what is expected is the entire beach will be full of water. they told me hurricane sandy, they put these sand dunes up to really try to stop the water. throughout the day they have been prepping dunes, the lifeguards, to maybe try to down play a little bit of the storm surge that is about to take place. now, during hurricane sandy it was flooded streets. also, officials are telling me

that they are doing thousands of sandbags just here in long beach. so a ton that is happening and still many are still dealing with preparations across the area. so you can see the dunes. they are very large in many spots across the beach, and, you know, people are really concerned in the next 12 to 24 hours with the significant weather change. i have talked to just a ton of people and listen to what they've had to say. >> i have a boat that i had to secure, i put extra lines on and get all of the furniture ready, get the generator gassed up and ready to go. all of the furniture, we had to move off of our porch and we are just waiting to see what happens. >> i was in stop and shop this morning and there were literally lines like you remember from tropical storm and hurricane sandy. >> reporter: so hurricane warning put in place across long island into southern new

england. tropical storm warning, wind concerns, flood concerns. the time is now to get prepared. yasmin. >> yeah, it is really going to be the next 12 to 24 to see what this thing really has to deliver on. janessa, thanks for that. stay safe, my friend. we will be checking back in with you throughout the day. let's talk covid. florida governor ron desantis threatening schools to stop them from mandating masks. the texas supreme court though is stopping governor greg abbott from even enforcing his ban in the state, but it is not stop the mask drama in texas. the exciting return to school for students in one texas district turned sour this week after physical and verbal altercations broke out between parents and teachers over, you guessed it, wearing masks. according to the isd superintendent one parent reached a teacher's mask off her face during a meet-the-teacher event while others yesterday and one another and a teacher to remove the mask because they claimed it made it difficult to

understand what she was saying. these incidents are a small reflection of the growing tension around mask mandates in schools across the country for the new academic year as covid cases are surging especially amongst kids. joining me to talk about this and the sen that unfolded at his school, tom eng. thank you for joining us. what a harrowing time in which school is getting started. this is a time kids can usually celebrate and excited to get back to school, buying books and trapper keepers, whatever they are called. it has been a while since i've been in school. now we have something else to deal with and it is the mask mandates, and obviously the debate over that. your response to what unfolded earlier this week was essentially not fight mask wars in our schools. were you even expecting something like this to go down? >> i was hoping nothing like this would happen. but to say i wasn't expecting it, you know, there's been a lot

of attention across the country, across schools everywhere. i was hoping -- you know, we have very supportive parents, great teachers, good kids. i think some people just let their emotions get a little away from them and that was sad, which is sad. we really don't need that in our schools. the kids still are excited to be in school. they really are. it is a little more difficult during a pandemic, but kids are still kids and we want them to have a great education here. >> how are you advising teachers specifically in the classroom to talk to their kids about this unfolding controversy, especially when so many of these kids' parents are involved in it? >> you know, our teachers aren't bringing this to the classroom. >> got it. >> that isn't what they should be do in. they're teaching kids the subjects they should be teaching them. the coaches are coaching kids. we are not spending a lot of time talking about the politics that's out in the rest of the

world right now. we are concentrating on what we do best, which is teaching and caring for kids. >> are you worried for the safety of your teachers right now? >> no, i really am not. i think this is a bit of a wake-up call in our community. i think -- like i said, the vast majority of our parents do support our teachers, and i do believe even the parents who are against masks, the one thing that we can unite on, i believe, is that we want our teachers to be successful and we want that classroom to be an oasis for kids. i think that's valuable. >> superintendent tom leonard, thank you so much. appreciate it. good luck on the year ahead. i know you are going to need it. thank you. to talk more about the impact of this surge on kids, i want to bring in dr. uche blackstock, founder and ceo of advancing health equity. thank you for joining us on this. really appreciate it. give me first your reaction to what we are seeing across the country, and it is not just

instances happening in texas. it is happening in parts of this country where the mask mandate has been politicized, we should say, and there is this real war as schools are getting started over whether or not masks should be worn by children. >> well, thank you so much for having me. just listening to that segment just before me about a parent tearing off a mask from a teacher, we've gotten to a very low point in the pandemic. we know that public health messaging has been politicized from the very beginning and, unfortunately, you know, that's getting in the way of these parents understanding the science, understanding the public health, understanding how these mitigation strategies including wearing masks actually work and are effective at protecting their own children. so there's a gap there. you know, these parents are not -- some of these parents are not understanding the messaging,

and that's why these mask mandates are important. that's why we need to make sure that we are implementing multiple layered strategies in schools to make sure schools don't become key drivers of infection, especially with the delta variant so widespread. >> so let me tick through a couple of things while i have you because we have a lot of things developing when it comes to covid. first, this expected monday full approval of the pfizer vaccine. is that a game changer? >> reporter: i do think it is a game changer. i do think that the fda and cdc should have been more transparent in terms of messaging to the public about why it was taking so long. but here we are, you know, hopefully it will happen on monday. it will be a game changer because there are people who are on the fence yet unvaccinated who have said that if the vaccines receive full approval, this pfizer vaccine, they will take the vaccine. so that will help. but even i think the larger

impact is on businesses, employers, universities, schools, who now feel that they can -- it is official that they can actually employ these vaccine mandates within their institutions without having to worry about legal repercussions. so i think from these vaccine mandates, these different environments we're going to see an increase in vaccinations as a result. >> i want to get where you stand on the booster shot, right. there's been a debate about the biden administration advocating for a booster shot, some of it based on science but also hearing from the head of the world health organization saying, listen, americans shouldn't be getting a third shot when you have countries around the world right now that haven't even gotten a first shot. where do you stand on this debate? >> i absolutely agree with the w.h.o.. it is incredibly problematic we are talking about vaccinating or giving boosters to the general population. obviously getting boosters to people who are immunocompromised is a different story, but so far we have no convincing evidence that the vaccines are less

effective against the worst outcomes of covid-19 such as severe disease, hospitalization and death. we would be more effective by focusing on vaccinating the unvaccinated, not just in this country but globally, because the more time that we have where people remain unvaccinated, the more opportunity there is for variants like the delta variant to evolve and spread. so i think that's where the focus should be right now. >> while i have you i want to get your reaction to something that the lieutenant governor of texas said about vaccine hesitancy in the african-american community. take a listen. >> the covid is spreading, particularly most of the numbers are with the unvaccinated and the democrats like to blame republicans on that. well, the biggest group in most states are african-americans who have not been vaccinated. the last time i checked, over 90% of them vote for democrats in their major cities and major counties. >> dr. blackstock. >> that is categorically false.

even when you look at the data, especially even in texas, black people only make up 13% of the population, and when you look at the raw numbers there are 4 million more white texans that are not vaccinated. there are 4 million more hispanic texans that are not vaccinated than black texans. i think spreading that, that's misinformation he is spreading and that's very important that he not do that because we don't want to send that message that is inaccurate and irresponsible. i think personally very dangerous. we want to encourage everyone to get vaccinated, but by spreading misinformation, that can counteract our efforts. >> dr. uche blackstock, thank you as always. great to see you this afternoon. still ahead, everybody, the war on women, the real fears facing afghan women under taliban control. after the break we will speak to first female afghan aviator, niloofar rahmani, how she was forced to flee death threats in

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kraft. for the win win. today the pentagon says 3,800 people have been evacuated in the past 24 hours from afghanistan, many of them women. but thousands are still desperately trying to get out. their fate under taliban rule seems grim despite promises of honoring women's rights. reports are already circulating the taliban killed a woman for not wearing a burka. i'm honored to be joined by a woman who knows too well what life is like in afghanistan, retired captain niloofar rahmani. thank you for joining us. i really appreciate it. >> thank you for having me. >> at this hour what are your biggest concerns for your family and friends that are currently in afghanistan? >> i'm actually deeply concerned for everybody including my family, the people in afghanistan, and i cannot stop watching the news.

i cannot stop watching the videos that it is posting in the social media. people are, like, so scared and there's like thousand, thousand people are trying to, you know, just to get to the airport just to get out of the country. and i never, ever saw such kind of situation it it looks like a nightmare, like a bad dream, and it is scary to see people like that. >> you were raised with some freedoms in afghanistan. you were able to accomplish what you have accomplished, able to go to school. the fear that all of the strides that women have made in afghanistan, the fear is that those will now be gone under taliban rule. where do you stand on this considering the taliban has said they have changed over the last 20 years, but knowing what you know about the taliban? >> i grew up during the freedom when there was, you know,

everything was given to a woman. they were free to go to school, be educated, and, like me, other women in afghanistan had the same dream and the same feeling. nobody would think this would be the future, and i don't believe what they say, even if i want to be hopeful and be positive and think positive that they changed, but my heart does not accept that because we already see their violence in the city. they already started looking for people. they already start disappearing the women in the city. there's no women in the city, and they're already killing woman by not covering themselves. you know, as little girl, i grew up during the taliban when they were in the country, and it was hard for me to see as a child, a little girl, how we got treated, how my mother got treated. it breaks my heart to see the future of afghanistan, the future of afghan women. it is going to be even worse than that. >> what is your reaction to

ashraf ghani leaving the country so quickly? >> i guess just disappointed. i don't have any other word to describe it because, you know, i have been going through this seven years ago and when i needed help and support from them, and i feel like the way they abandoned me so easily and no support, they did exactly the same thing for other soldiers, other pilots, other people that needed them the most. this was a time that the people of afghanistan needed them the most, but they chose to leave >> all right. niloofar rahmani, we appreciate you spending time with us. we wish you the best of luck in the years ahead. i hope you do come back and speak with us and i hope your family and friends remain safe in afghanistan and are able to get to where they're going. thank you so much. all right. we are getting reports as we are following the developments from hurricane henri that the president has actually spoken to local governors in the northeast

in preparing for what hurricane henri will bring. with that we have governors across the region holding press conferences. we just heard from new york governor andrew cuomo. now the massachusetts governor speaking. >> if you have to go out, be careful, plan ahead, and be cautious. i don't think the -- my original concerns, our original concerns, especially around the cape and the south coast, that we expect and anticipated wind level and storm level, that was in fact where the storm made landfall, has been lessened to some extent by the curve the storm took, but people still need to be careful. >> reporter: you said you were ready to assist new york. how so? how do you -- >> i don't know if we will need to or not, but we should all remember there are mutual aid agreements that exist between and among all 50 states, and we have been a huge beneficiary of those mutual aid agreements over

the course of the last seven years. mutual aid agreements made an enormous difference during the winter of 2015. they made a huge difference during the merrimack valley gas explosions. they made a major difference during the bomb tornados and the hurricane that went through the cape a couple of years ago. i have always felt incredibly grateful to my colleagues in the northeast who mostly through the national guard, and it is usually gear and equipment and personnel that can run it, that's a big part of that mutual aid, that when we call them they came. if we end upcoming out of this in relatively good shape and there's significant issues in other states in the northeast and people pursue a mutual aid approach to this, we are going to wants to be able to respond. >> reporter: governor, what are the challenges preparing for possible storm --. >> you know, i guess -- i guess what i would say is that the --

they come -- a tropical storm and a snowstorm come with different issues. i think the single biggest difference between them is the timing associated with the move to get all of the gear that these folks have to get out on to the highways and the roads at exactly the same time everybody is trying to get home. there's a timing issue associated with that that you don't have with respect to this. you never want to be in a position around snow storms where you are literally sending everybody home at exactly the same time in the midst of the storm when all of that stuff that these guys have is trying to get out on the roads and clear them. you don't have that issue with respect to tropical storms, but most of the rest of it is pretty much under what i would describe as a framework of plan for the worst, make sure you have communicated with all of the

folks and local government and the other agencies that you need to. do the best you can to station assets in locations where you think they can be most helpful to help solve problems and deal with the power issues, the vehicle issues, the debris issues, whatever they might be, and then make sure you have enough folks who are talking to each other on a pretty regular basis once it gets started to make sure you don't miss something. >> because of the storm's change in track, are the utility crews no longer sort of focusing, are they moving? >> some of them are, yeah. i mean we are going to end up with a very different geographical distribution of guard personnel, clean-up crews and even some of the public safety and d.o.t. folks will be in different places as well. >> thanks, everybody. >> thank you. and if you go out tomorrow, be careful and stay safe. >> all right. so listening to the massachusetts governor baker there briefing folks in his state ahead of hurricane henri that is expected to make landfall on sunday.

as we know at this point the risk of storm surge, wind and rain will impact portions of coastal new york and southern new england. hurricane storm surge watches are in effect for portions of connecticut and massachusetts, who we just heard from, new york and rhode island as well. we are watching a couple of press conferences that will be happening throughout the next hour. we have the governor of connecticut who will be briefing folks in his state in just a couple of minutes and then new york city mayor bill de blasio around 4:30 p.m. eastern time briefing the city as well, which is under a hurricane watch, category 1 hurricane. expected to make landfall, again, seemingly tonight into tomorrow morning. so we have full coverage, of course, of hurricane henri as it comes towards the northeast. we will be bringing it to you throughout the next hour and throughout the day on msnbc into tomorrow as well. we will be right back, everybody. erybody. and one we explore one that's been paved

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hi, everybody. i'm yasmin vossoughian. thanks for joining us on this busy saturday afternoon. we are watching hurricane henri as it approaches landfall. we expect a new update on the track in the hour ahead. millions of people in the path of the hurricane, grabbing supplies, preparing for what could be days and even weeks -- we hope not though -- without power. we have a live report coming up on that. we have new information on the situation at the kabul airport. nbc news reporting just a short time ago that a threat against the airport that led to a message to americans to stay away came not from the taliban but, in fact, from isis. coming up, i will get reaction to that from a congressman who is calling what is happening in afghanistan a, quote, catastrophe. we will take a deeper look at american intervention in the

middle east and why it seems just so hard to learn the lessons of the past. also this hour, republicans in texas poised to pass their restrictive voting bill after some democrats returned to the state. is it a surrender or a tactical retreat in this fight? i will talk to one of the democrats who have returned to texas ahead. bu i do want to start with the latest on a hurricane that could impact more than 40 million americans. new york governor andrew cuomo has declared a state of emergency for long island as residents brace tore landfall sometime tomorrow morning. we just heard from the massachusetts governor a moment ago. we expect to hear from connecticut governor ned lamont shortly as well as new york city mayor bill de blasio. we will bring those to you as well. right now i want to bring in meteorologist michelle grossman who is tracking the storm for us at this hour. we talked to you 3:00 p.m. eastern, and we know these things update pretty quickly, every hour or so. what has changed? >> so, unfortunately, not