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tv   Morning Joe  MSNBC  September 2, 2021 3:00am-6:00am PDT

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bill de blasio and new jersey governor phil murphy declaring states of emergencies, calling on residents to stay inside and not travel. rescue responded to a number of calls for rescues because of high water levels. there have been five fatalities so far. four in new york city one in new jersey. the national weather service issued a flash flood warning for the first time ever in new jersey last night. this is video of water rushing into an apartment on east 22nd street in manhattan. most subway lines as you can imagine were suspended last night due to the heavy rain and flooding. the storm impacted play at the u.s. open, two matches were moved as the rain and winds were just too much for the court at
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luis armstrong stadium. look at yankee stadium taken by broadcaster michael k, the entire outfield under water. a number of funnel clouds and tornados were also reported across the northeast. earlier in the day the storm swept through maryland and the washington d.c. area. news correspondent tom costello has those pictures. >> reporter: touching down in and around annapolis, maryland, tornados on the ground for many miles after spinning off from hurricane ida that slammed louisiana. >> please make sure you're inside. please make sure you're in the lowest level of your house. >> reporter: in downtown annapolis, power lines and signs ripped down. roofs torn off and trees uprooted. in frederick, maryland, flash flooding caught a bus driver off guard, 11 school kids rescued as the bus was submerged. ida unleashing rain on the
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nation's capitol. a tornado watch well into the evening. three inches of rain swamped the region, tearing down trees, flooding intersections and trapping drivers in their car. in rockville, maryland hundreds were forced to flee their apartments when water went surging into apartments as people slept. police say a 19-year-old plan drowned in his apartment unable to get out. >> they're now advising there may be possibly two more adults and she believes they are under water. >> reporter: firefighters used boats to pull people to safety. 150 people displaced. one person still missing. ida continues to unleash tornados dumping record amounts of rain as it marches up the eastern sea board. >> tom costello reporting. let's bring in meteorologist bill karins. you warned us about this a couple of days ago as ida moved out of louisiana and you showed us the path.
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i'm not sure many of us appreciated how serious it was going to be. outside the hum of generate others this morning across the northeast. >> it was unbelievable. the amount of rain that fell and how quickly it fell was just unprecedented and record shattering for areas of the country like the -- periods of record in new york city, go back 153 years. this was fourth avenue i used to live in this part of brooklyn. i used to take the subway line in to do the show every morning, i never saw anything like this at all. this is the road that the new york city marathon runs down each november. it's a low spot. the r subway line is underneath that, that must have been completely flooded. the tornados yesterday alone. this one captured just outside of philadelphia in new jersey is likely going to be one of the strongest tornados in new jersey history. that was probably an ef-3 or 4 tornado. the tornado in annapolis was
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strong. we had adam break in pennsylvania that flooded a town. typically these would be headline stories by itself but what happened through the northeast as this moved through, it's just too much to cover. let's get into the numbers on this, really just incredible. the storm went through new york city and the newark area as we went through a six-hour period. the rainfall totals we knew going into yesterday someone could get 8 inches of rain. unfortunately it was over where about 10 million people live, newark had 8.4, new york had 7 pbt 9. in one hour newark and central park set a record for the most rain ever. so any hurricane never did this before. 3.42 inches in one hour. and this is about a a one in 500 year rainfall event. 6 inches in many new york in six hours, newark 7 inches. bringing it home, i live in the
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town that willie grew up in, the football field had 3 feet of water in your hometown of ridgewood, new jersey. i don't know many times in northern new jersey that didn't have epic flooding. >> if i know coach johnson he'll have it cleaned up this afternoon in tomb for practice. a lot of people waking up in the northeast to this news, listening to your report. what should we be thinking about in terms of safety today as we go outside? there's going to be a lot of debris on the ground but what else should we be looking for? >> people have to remember, this was a flash flood for the most part so this was in and out. a lot of the water has been receding already. a lot of the water is on its way out. there are rivers that will peak today. but a lot of the waters and pictures you're seeing now will be gone by the time the helicopters get up to show where the damage is. there wasn't a lot of wind so
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not a lot of power outages but a number of homes with water in the basements and vehicles are going to be littering the roads with no water. you can see ida is on the way out. boston the rain stopped just areas of cape cod will get more rainfall. from new orleans through the northeast, ida, a storm that's for the record book. one of the worst floods in areas of eastern pennsylvania, new jersey history topping hurricane floyd back in 1999 in most cases. >> just an extraordinary storm for a week now, you've been covering every moment of it for us. as for what ida did leave behind in louisiana, power returned to a section of new orleans yesterday some good news, but many people in the state of louisiana remain without electricity. president biden will travel to new orleans tomorrow to survey damage caused by the hurricane, he will meet with state and local leaders.
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miguel almaguer is in new orleans with more. >> reporter: the miz are you after the may help, the lines for basic services stretching for hours in communities where ida's devastation is no match for its aftermath. >> it's hard. it's hard for everybody out here. >> reporter: on a day where temperatures reached dangerous levels. >> it's hot. we have people in their 80s and 90s here. it's hot. >> reporter: saint martin manor, a senior community in new orleans, home to 150 is still in the dark. disabled residents forced into the lobby as rooms easily top 100 degrees. 74-year-old joanne moss suffers from severe asthma, for three days unable to power her breathing machine. >> how much longer do you think you can last here? >> i can't. i can't last. i can't. >> is this life and death for
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you? >> yes, it is. >> reporter: power across louisiana is still out to roughly 1 million homes and businesses. energy was restored to more than 11,000 in new orleans. just a fraction of those in dire need. it could be weeks before the mangled, shredded power grids is restored. our morgan chesky flew alongside the governor who toured the hardest hit communities who were on an island and off the grid. >> to the folks who are here, they'll be without power for more than a month. >> yeah. >> what do you tell them? >> i'm not certain that's going to be true for everyone. we saw some lights coming back on in new orleans today. i think the momentum is going to build every day. but there are places where the infrastructure is so devastated. >> what do you tell those folks? >> we're going to do everything we can to help them. >> reporter: for a region battered and bruised, the uninhabitable face the
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unimaginable. many coastal homes were swept into the ocean. >> ida made katrina look like a warm summer breeze. i was not anticipating. this is craziness. >> what's left of some communities, a pain staking reminder of what's gone. >> miguel almaguer reporting for us there. louisiana summer heat and no air conditioning continues to be a dangerous situation down there. some breaking news overnight. the supreme court released its decision declining to block a texas law that bans abortions after a fetal heartbeat can be detected, that's as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. it comes a day after the law took effect and became the most restrictive abortion measure in the country. the vote was 5-4 with john roberts decenting alongside the three liberal justices. it allows private citizens to enforce the ban against abortion providers or other who help
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women get the procedure. it side abortion providers who chall lengthed the law didn't make their case adding the ruling was not on the constitutionally of the law. all four descending judges filed opinions. the court's order is stunning. presented with an application to enjoin a flagrantly unconstitutional law engineered to prohow about women from exercising their constitutional rights. chief justice roberts wrote he would have blocked the law while appeals moved forward. he underscored the tentative nature of the ruling. >> let's bring in msnbc legal analyst joyce vance plus white house reporter for the associated press jonathan lemire and washington bureau chief for
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usa "today" susan page. let me start with you, joyce, as a former federal prosecutor and talk about the legal part of this. so effectively the ruling says we're not talking about the constitutionality of the law we just believe that abortion providers did not make their case effectively. does that open the door to more challenges to this texas law? >> well, actually this case itself is still live in some sense. what happened was that health care providers in texas sued state court judges and court clerks who would in essence be the people who would put the texas law into effect, permitting this mechanism we've all heard about, this mechansm where private individuals could bring lawsuits to enforce the law. the dodge is we're not entirely sure we have the ability to enjoin these officials. some of them ensured us they
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don't have any intention with going forward with enforcing the law so we're not going to put in place an injunction that would keep the law from going into effect. that's why this is now the law in texas. the substantive issues remain to be decided. but justice soto mayor is correct when she says this is putting your head in the sand because the impact of letting the law go forward is to create such an atmosphere of suspicion and uncertainty in texas that abortion has all but come to an end in that state. >> what does this mean, joyce, the law is tricky in the way it's written, it takes the onus off of lawmakers and politicians and says we're deputizing private citizens to sue abortion providers. what does that mean, how does that work as a practical matter? >> it's a bounty provision, and the texas law is -- at least it appears to be overbroad. it appears to permit people to
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sue who don't have standing which is a legal doctrine that requires that for someone to bring a lawsuit, essentially their ox has to be gored. they have to have some skin in the game. that doesn't seem to be the case with this broadly drafted texas provision, which would permit anyone willing to go to the trouble of becoming an investigator and learning which woman had abortion procedures, they can bring a lawsuit against anyone who was involved in helping her obtain that abortion. and they -- there's a $10,000 bounty, in essence, that they are able to claim through the courts as a result of their hard work. >> so this is a fetal heartbeat law as it's known. so six weeks. when there's a heartbeat detected in the fetus, there cannot be an abortion at that point, a lot of women don't know they're pregnant at six weeks. there are other laws across the country watching the ruling,
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other states, mississippi is looking at a 15 week ban. what does this ruling by the supreme court portend for laws in mississippi and across other states that want to do away with abortion? >> it's not much of a surprise to anyone who's followed the leanings of the justices that former president trump put on the supreme court that this is now a court that's thoroughly hostile to women's rights in this area, i don't think that's a surprise to anyone. the court has taken the mississippi case to hear next term. some believe this case ongoing in texas would be con sol -- consolidated with the mississippi case and be resolved together. but next term in the supreme court we'll see more about abortion and the fate of women's rights in this country. >> as joyce said, all three
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justices appointed by donald trump voted on the 5-4 majority, they were among the five. this is the holy grail for many anti-abortion activists looking at roe versus wade the 1973 ruling. this, as joyce said, in some ways expected from the court but what do you see because of it? >> this is what donald trump promised evangelical christian voters one reason he consolidated their support in such a significant way. you mentioned he had three appointments to the high court, two of them replacing justices who had supported abortion rights. now as joyce said this is the beginning of the road but clearly a friendlier atmosphere for those who want to restrict abortions in the most significant way. this is a medical issue, a moral issue, it's a political issue as well in a big way this is going
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to have repercussions. it could energize those conservative republican voters, it could also generate some new intensity among democrats and those who support abortion rights as we see this law already now in effect in the big central state of texas. >> jonathan lemire, this obviously, as susan says, will become part of the conversation. we have midterm elections coming up next year the supreme court is going to look at the mississippi law. president biden put out a statement on this yesterday, what did he say? >> well, certainly willie, the president and -- speaks for his democratic party in which he defends a woman's right to choose and was, of course, highly critical of the ruling in texas and we'll be hearing from the white house later today about the middle of the night action from the supreme court allowing it to stay intact even if that may be tentative. certainly the chief justice let
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it be clear this would not be the final word on this ruling but it does put abortion rights back in the center of the political dialogue here with other states eyeing similar restrictions and legislations. texas is the second biggest state in the country basically this law outlaws abortion for the vast majority of women there, so many don't know they're pregnant where these restrictions begin. and this is going to become a major political fire storm here, as noted could fire up voters on both sides of the aisle, both who support abortion rights and those who believe that abortion should be outlawed in the country and puts more scrutiny on the supreme court itself particularly the fate of justice briar who has been long rumored to be eyeing retirement, he was a descending voice in this, but there was speculation when he would walk away and allow a democratic president to appoint his successor.
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right now he has not signalled he would, he is giving interviews saying he'll weigh what to do going forward. he's in his early 80s, i believe. the health of democratic senators their majority in the senate is so fragile, it's 50/50, it would be very difficult here if senators, if they were to lose control, of course, they wouldn't be able to likely get a justice confirmed. mitch mcconnell is already sending those signals. there is a lot at play here, willie. for a white house right now that is juggling afghanistan, juggling these devastating effects of these storms, the surging pandemic, it's another thing on their docket. >> it has energized already overnight, anti-abortion activists who now maybe see this as the first step towards roe versus wade. also ahead, president biden's top military adviser mark milley admits to feeling pain and anger following the u.s. withdrawal from afghanistan.
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plus the latest on the pandemic and the growing concern over pediatric cases as children head back into the classroom across the country. and president biden issues an emergency declaration in response to the fast moving caldor fire in northern california. we'll have a live report from the fire zone where things are getting increasingly dangerous. "morning joe" is coming right back. "morning joe" is coming right back ♪ wow, that's a low price. wow, that's a low price. huh. that is a low price. what's a low price? that's a low price. i'm going to get it. ahh, that's a low price. can you let me shop? hmm, that's a low price. i'm gonna get it . at amazon, anytime is a good time to save.
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. welcome back to "morning joe," health officials across the country are concerned with the growing number of pediatric covid cases, children not yet eligible for vaccination are at a higher risk of being infected than any other point in the pandemic, this is especially the case in areas with low vaccination rates how many times
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have we said that, states like louisiana. the intennive care unit has been packed with covid-19 patients. according to medical staff the causes were simple, parents and family members unvaccinated and not wearing masks. one nurse telling "the new york times," if i get hung up in the anger of it i would confront people in walmart. i can't tell them, why didn't you isolate this kid, so we tell them, your kid has covid, it's hards on the lungs, your child is sick and we'll do everything we can to get him better. let's bring in mary mayhue. give us a snapshot of what's happening in the state of florida broadly, what patients you're seeing and what the trend lines look like. >> florida has been on the front end of this most recent covid surge, delta has had a very
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different impact. we saw a dramatic increase in hospitalizations over a 7 week period. we reached a peak of 17,000 hospitalizations. what is very different during this surge is that we have had healthy 20-year-olds, 30-year-olds, who have been hospitalized as a result of covid. right now, we are seeing very encouraging trends. our hospitalizations have dropped dramatically. we are now down to 14,800 hospitalizations. this is extremely encouraging, our admissions are dropping as well. so there are signs that we have peaked and are heading in the right direction. >> that sounds like a ray of light in this bad news. to what do you attribute that? why do you think the hospitalizations are down? >> much like we've seen in other parts of the world, the uk
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experienced a dramatic increase as a result of the delta surge and then a steep decline. we will say, too, the availability of the antibody treatment is a very effective treatment in reducing hospitalizations. governor desantis has set up 21 sites around the state, over 40,000 individuals have received treatment over the last several weeks. that is absolutely contributing. we still need to emphasize the importance of people getting vaccinated. the vast majority of those who are hospitalized are unvaccinated. we all want to avoid this ongoing repeat of surges of this virus continuing to mutate. it is far more infectious through the delta variant and we are seeing individuals in the hospital extremely ill.
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over 50% of our icu patients are suffering from covid. >> yeah, and i think the number in florida is 90% of your hospitalized patients with covid are unvaccinated. are you seeing any change in the vaccination rates in your state, mary? there was some hope after the fda gave full approval that would clear the way for some people who had been skeptical or hesitant about getting the vaccine they might step up and get it or sadly if they saw covid visit their community or family, they would realize the severity of the virus and get vaccinated themselves. how do the rates look in florida? >> right now florida ranks 22nd in the country in our vaccination rate. we have over 50% of the population fully vaccinated and as a result of the latest surge, it has intensified the efforts, the interest for those to get vaccinated. i think it's important to understand that for
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20-year-olds, 30-year-olds rarely do they think they're at risk of being hospitalized generally and over the last year they heard covid was the greatest risk for our elderly individuals. so we had to quickly change that narrative and emphasize for those 20-year-olds, those 30-year-olds that the delta variant was, in fact, having significant risk for them ending up in the hospital. certainly pregnant women, i have to say, we have seen far too many cases of pregnant women in our hospitals with covid, severely ill, some unfortunately passing away because of covid. we've really got to continue these efforts to aggressively get individuals vaccinated. >> we've been watching mary, the spike in pediatric cases across the country we talked about it in the state of louisiana. what are you seeing in your schools now? schools in florida are open. there's been this political
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fight between school superintendents and governor desantis over masking but what are your concerns about kids in florida in terms of covid? >> no one wants a child to get covid and certainly to end up in the hospital. i will say that of our 17,000 previously -- or 17,000 hospitalizations or the 14,800 today, pediatric hospitalizations are still very low relative to the overall hospitalizations. today we have roughly in the entire state, 200 pediatric hospitalizations. so a trend that we are closely monitoring, as we are monitoring the case trend, the cases in florida are starting to go down. the number of positive cases given that there is still a significant percentage of those that may be children testing positive, we are not likely to see ongoing increases in our
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hospitalization. the other point that i'd like to make, our hospitals are still very full. we are seeing, still, significant pressure within the hospital within our icu, our staff are exhausted. this has been nearly 18 months of our staff, our health care heroes on the front line responding to this pandemic. again, really need to continue to emphasize having folks get vaccinated. >> you anticipated my next question, mary, which was how are your doctors, how are your nurses doing, on the best day these are difficult jobs? over the last 18 months they've been on the front line every day of a war. i know there's attrition, people dropping out of the profession because of how difficult it's been, not just florida but across the country. what are you seeing? how are your doctors and nurses holding up? >> it's indescribable. it's hard for anyone to imagine.
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as you said, under the best of circumstances this is an incredibly difficult, demanding job. now you layer on top of this an 18 month pandemic. and as i said, not only do we have a third of our patients with covid, we have extremely high volumes of critically ill, non-covid patients. our emergency departments are overwhelmed by their demand. i am concerned. i'm concerned about the short term and long term implications on our health care workforce. the trauma that many have experienced watching 25-year-olds desperate to breathe in the icus, watching individuals pass away at a much younger age. this is going to be a long recovery. we have hospitals bringing in clergy, mental health resources. but we have seen a 25% turnover
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rate among our nurses over the last year. >> i can imagine. our gratitude goes to all the doctors and nurses fighting this fight every day. and let's hope those trends you shared with us, the dip in hospitalizations continue so those doctors and nurses can get a well deserved breather. president and ceo of the florida hospital association, mary mayhue updating us. let's turn to the economic recovery, "morning joe" economic analyst steve ratner joins us with more on that. good morning, what are you looking at in your charts today? >> we're looking at today, the difference in performance between the u.s. economy and those of some of our principle allies and friends, other large developed economies around the world. what you see is the u.s. has outperformed by a substantial margin during the covid episode. so what you can see on this chart here is us compared to other members of the g 7, uk,
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italy, france and so forth. the chart shows on average before covid to now their economies dropped by about 3% in terms of the total size of the economy where our economy went up by about .8%. obviously not a huge number but a positive number relative to what they went through. that puts us as the only major economy, which is larger than it was before covid happened. part of that is because we were going faster before covid we tend to have a strong, resilient economy but part of it is also the policy response we put in place, which you can see on the next slide clearly. the amount of resources that we devoted to attacking covid versus these other major countries. so you can see in terms of stimulus checks, extended unemployment benefits, ppe, the special spending for business, ppp to keep them going.
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other expenditures like that. we have put out a full 25% of our gdp, an extraordinary amount of government action. you can see as you look to the left, japan, uk and canada closer to the 15% level. so a different policy response from us versus the others. we put out over $5 trillion of government initiatives to try to address this problem. as a result we are also looking at an economy in our case that is likely to grow faster over the next year or two than pretty much everybody else. the uk will have a rebound, but we will be growing faster. it doesn't come without its own risks and cautions and so forth. and one we talked about before, is the question of inflation. so this spaghetti chart, if you will, shows the various countries coming into the pandemic in terms of their inflation rates where we were in the pack, and then you can see a downturn in inflation caused by
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the brief but sharp recession we had. now you can see coming out of that period that our prices are rising substantially faster than those of our competitors. again, this is a function, thein ying and yang of it is we put so much into the economy to try to keep the economy moving that it does have an effect on our price level. so it's something to watch. but on balance i think we should be quite proud of the economic performance that we have turned in during this covid period under these obviously very, very extreme conditions. >> steve, susan page here, what's the lesson of the charts if for congress? they're now considering two big bill, the $1 trillion infrastructure bill and a $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill. is the lesson we need to keep up the stimulus to keep these good numbers going or is there a
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warning sign when you look at the inflation? >> i would tend more toward the latter myself, susan. i think we have an put an enormous amount of stimulus in the economy. much of the money appropriated or designated still hasn't been spent so there's more government money coming into the economy as we talk about it today and you have this high inflation rate however temporary it may turn out to be. so i would, myself, move on the side of caution in terms of how much more money we put in this economy without offsetting revenue. in other words it great to do infrastructure but we need tax revenues to offset, all of that ideally in my mind. we have a record number of job openings in this country right now, we're not short of jobs we just need to get people back to work. >> jonathan lemire? >> morning, steve. good to see you. we know that, obviously, there's a lag in any data like this.
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and we know that, you know, in the last couple of months, last few weeks in particular, the delta variant has wreaked havoc on a number of states across this country. what are you seeing in sort of your forecasting? do you think we'll see the variant impact the economic numbers, the recovery? have things started to slow, and with some hopeful signs that maybe the surge has peaked, is there a sense that could be a temporary blip? >> well, i sometimes say, you tell me what the virus is going to do and i'll try to give you advise on what the company is going to do, i'm not a public health guy. but i think there's mixed signals. i think the economy is generally doing quite well. we'll see unemployment numbers tomorrow but other data suggests in general people are spending money, the travel numbers are still quite high but you see weaker pockets in terms of restaurant reservations driving and things like that.
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the stock market's view for what it's worth, i saw a flashed a chart up there briefly, the stock market's view, as you know the market is hitting records, it does believe the impact of the delta virus will be relatively modest. i think that's right including the fact that no real experts know where the delta virus is going. maybe a slight dip here and there, but moving in the right direction. >> so the recovery doing better than most places in the rest of the world. thank you, steve ratner. coming up, how the u.s. exit from afghanistan will affect the global balance of power as china looks to fill the void. janice mackey frayer joins us with her new reporting. "morning joe" is back in a moment. orning joe" is back in a moment
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we are learning more this morning about americans still in afghanistan as the taliban now controls the country completely. nbc news white house correspondent geoff bennett has details. >> reporter: the taliban parading what it says is some of the billions of dollars worth of american weapons and equipment they now have in their arsenal. as the biden administration weathers fierce criticism for the americans left behind when u.s. forces withdrew. among them a 3-year-old california boy. an american citizen. trapped with his family in kabul. and afghans who helped america's military effort are stuck too. like the afghan interpreter who helped rescue then senator biden when he was trapped in taliban territory on a trip there years ago.
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now telling "the washington journal," mr. president save me and my family. the white house committing to get him out. of the 120,000 mostly afghans lifted from the kabul airport, initial figures suggest just 8,500 were afghans who helped u.s. military forces. while at the pentagon today, the secretary of defense and the joint chairman of chiefs with a message to veterans who may be struggling to process the end to america's longest war. >> we are all conflicted with feelings of pain and anger, sorrow and sadness, combined with pride and resilience. your service mattered and was not in vain. >> geoff bennett reporting for us there. meanwhile, a senior state department official said the majority of special immigrant visa applicants are still in afghanistan. in a briefing yesterday the official said in part, quote, everybody is haunted by the choices we had to make and there were some really painful
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tradeoffs. eligible afghan citizens reportedly are receiving few details about future evacuation plans even as the state department pledges to continue e efforts. in an email obtained by nbc news, our commitment to the people in afghanistan is enduring. we will use every diplomatic, economic, political and assistance tool at our disposal to ensure the taliban honors its commitments to uphold the basic rights of all afghans and support continued humanitarian access to the country. talking about many, many afghans who helped the united states during nearly 20 years of war there trying to get out of the country and unable despite a promise from the white house and state department. the wall street journal has new analysis about how the withdrawal from afghanistan reshuffles power relations and creates new complications for china and russia. the stunning meltdown of the
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united states' afghan client state have marked the limits of american hard power. the dramatic scenes of despair in kabul have frustrated and angered many americans. but it does not appear to have escaped beijing and moscow that the u.s. isn't the only one losing out. in terms of raw military strength and economic resources, the u.s. remains dominant. its pivot away from afghanistan means washington has more resources to put towards its rivalry with china and russia. america is far more removed from the direct consequences of the taliban takeover. managing afghanistan from now on is increasingly a problem for moscow and beijing and their regional allies. the chaotic and sudden withdrawal of american forces from afghanistan is not good news for china.
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said an international relations scholar. china is not ready to replace the u.s. in the region. the prevailing view among u.s. allies and partners in asia is that washington now can deliver finally on the pivot to asia that the obama administration promised as a way to counter china but failed to deliver as it was preoccupied with afghanistan and the middle east. let's bring in janice mackie frayer live in beijing. you spoke yesterday with pakistan's ambassador to china, what did you learn? >> reporter: well, we've -- the world has learned that the taliban is not the only winner here. china and pakistan are looking to step into the void in afghanistan and that's going to be strategic implications for the u.s. as it repivots its
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strategy here in asia. in the one sense, china has feasted on the messy withdrawal. they've portrayed it in media as the decline of american influence, that its credibility is in shreds perhaps the u.s. should be investigated for, quote, the massacre of civilians. but for beijing the end of the american presence in afghanistan presents a greater liability than opportunity. there's been talk about the mining and the other projects but those are secondary to beijing for security. they're looking at afghanistan strictly through the lens of domestic security. and that's where pakistan comes in, pakistan is china's close ally and conduit to the taliban. they have facilitated meetings, including the taliban delegate that visited in july. at those meetings the taliban gave security assurances to china saying that its territory would not be used for fighters as a base for attacks inside
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china. this speaks to beijing's fear of weer militant si, it's what they used to justify the detention of weer and other majorities. i sat down with pakistan's ambassador to china to get his view on their regional power dynamics and how they're shifting in the era of the taliban's takeover. who then do you see holding the cards in the region? who has the power to then hold the taliban to account? >> accountability, again you are talking about accountability, first of all it's about afghanistan. people of afghanistan. they have to take this historic opportunity to come together, collectively, and have an inclusive government in kabul. which is not only meet the broader expectations of the
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international community but also look after their own people. they had enough. the region has seen enough. >> reporter: now pakistan's relations with the u.s. during the war were seen as duplicitous at best. in fact, the prime minister has been criticized for appearing to endorse the taliban takeover of kabul. afghan officials, the government officials who fled have blamed pakistan's support for the taliban as being key to the group's resurgence. this is something that pakistani officials flatly deny and reject. the ambassador told me the power vacuum that exists in kabul carries risks for the whole region. >> nobody has been able to control afghanistan from outside. so all we can do that we can mash it down, we can encourage them to, of course, meet the
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expectations of the international community. >> reporter: so the taliban takeover is in some ways viewed as a victory. >> taliban had walked over in kabul, that was given to them on a platter. i don't know what you would call it, a victory or what. >> reporter: both pakistan and china are seeing the taliban victory as what they call a political reality, willie. they say it's just a fact on the ground and that the taliban deserves the chance to see if it can govern. >> fascinating interview. it's a new day for sure. janice mackey frayer in beijing for us. thank you so much. it has been four days since hurricane ida made landfall in louisiana and the full scope of destruction just now coming into view. plus white house senior adviser and former louisiana congressman cedric richmond will be our guest.
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welcome back to "morning joe." the sun is up over new york city after a wild night of flooding. waking up looking at the damage in new york and across the northeast it's just before 7:00 in the morning here on the east coast. susan page, usa "today" has new polling out as we approach the 20th anniversary of september 11th. the question is has 9/11 permanently changed american lives, in this poll 60% of americans say yes that number is up from ten years ago and a year after the attacks. what do you see in the numbers? >> willie, this was a surprise to us, as you say. we've asked this question
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repeatedly over the last 20 years and we thought the sense that maybe 9/11 changed americans lives permanently would start to fade. it hasn't happened. it's gotten more intense. and actually, the younger you are, the more firmly you believe that 9/11 has left a permanent stamp on the united states. let me mention one thing that has changed, the sense of domestic terrorism being a bigger threat than international terrorism. that's not a question that occurred to us to ask in the year following 9/11. that's how big a change is. >> what are the respondents saying to your poll, why did they believe more than a year after or ten years after, that 9/11 changed our lives? >> when we did call backs it's practical things, tougher
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security at airports than you had to before 9/11. but more of them talked about a general attitude about a sense of peril for americans in the world. i think a lot of people we talked to felt this wasn't something that the americans had to worry about, and even 20 years later, a woman said when i go into a crowd i try to make sure i'm aware of an exit route. it made people feel there was a danger in the world that could affect americans that a lot of americans assumed beforehand wasn't there. >> jonathan lemire, when you look at that list from this new usa "today" poll about what people believe was the most impactful event in the last 20 years, covid, 35% we're living in the middle of it right now, that's to be expected. something we never could have imagined a year ago, january 6th insurrection at third.
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>> it's a sobering list, willie. it's hard to imagine that anything could top september 11th in a poll like this, certainly in terms of singular events in one day, it's hard to believe it will never do so. certainly the pandemic has been with us for so long it's changed society deeply. talk to us about you mentioned how americans think that 9/11 changed day-to-day lives in terms of security. is there polling in in there that suggests about how they view the world? america's place in the world? certainly not as invincible as we thought we were before september 11th but also the role we should be playing outside our borders which has come into heightened focus that we saw in this withdrawal of afghanistan, the country we went into right after 9/11. >> other questions we ask in the poll there's a reluctance to have the united states do nation
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building in other countries that may reflect our experience now 20 years of effort in afghanistan and the very messy withdrawal we saw there. there is a sense, and we've seen a series of presidents cap this sentiment that americans need to be taking care of america first and see a more limited role that we have played for so long, since world war ii. you know, that is something that president trump and president biden share this sense that let's not go to places like afghanistan and try to help build new democracies. we have other fish to fry in this country, including at the moment this covid pandemic that has cost more than 600,000 american lives and is not under control yet. >> really interesting new polling from usa "today." nine days ahead of the 20th anniversary of the attacks of september 11th. thank you both so much. we have hit the top of the hour
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here on the east coast, it is 7:00 in the morning. and the remnants of hurricane ida are hitting the northeast this morning with reports of major flash flooding and tornados in new york, new jersey and philadelphia. last night, new york city mayor bill de blasio and new jersey governor phil murphy calling on states of emergency, calling on residents to remain inside. rescue crews conducted a number of water rescues and evacuations. at least five weather related fatalities so far, four in new york and one in new jersey. more than 3 inches of rain was recorded in central park within an hour, shattering a record set last week. this is video of water rushing into an apartment in manhattan. most subway lines were suspended last night due to the heavy rain and flooding. storm impacting the u.s. open in
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flushing, queens as well. a number of funnel clouds and tornados were also reported across the region. let's bring in meteorologist bill karins. >> you've been out shooting video where you live in northern new jersey, just extraordinary scenes. a lot of people waking up without power this morning and as the sun comes up, getting a real view of destruction left behind through the northeast. >> so many towns. this was already a billion dollar weather disaster from what happened in louisiana and mississippi. and i have no doubt what happened in eastern pennsylvania, new jersey, the new york city area, connecticut, still happening in rhode island and southern massachusetts will add billions more to the legacy of hurricane ida. here's the radar loop of what happened. it was like someone took a sponge and just wrung it out over top of the tri-state area.
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this is brooklyn, fourth avenue where the new york city marathon runs down this road, the bottom of a hill, park slope is the area. i've never seen water like that. for the most part many of the areas are seeing water levels that have come close to hurricane floyd in 1999, hurricane irene in 2011. this is not something we see often. unlike a hurricane which has a build up, it happens, takes longer. this was in a very compact time period. so the flash flooding was worse than with irene and floyd. rainfall totals, newark airport almost 8.5 inches of rain. central park 7 inches of rain. if it snows that much it shuts things down. this is an incredible amount of rain. here are some of the numbers. this was the most rainfall ever in one hour in newark and in central park. so think of any hurricane, any thunderstorm you've ever watched, this was more rainfall
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in any of those. it's incredible. and the a tigss are telling us this was a one in 500 year rainfall event. that means going into every single year, .2% chance of this happening. it shouldn't happen again but, of course, with climate change we wonder if these numbers are changing. we know as the planet warms the atmosphere can hold more moisture, which means it can rain more too. the storm is moving out. boston is done. cape cod getting a little bit of rain. we are almost completely finished with ida. we'll see tens of thousands of cars flooded, still stranded and littering the highway. it's a disaster out there. >> it is a disaster and has been since it started spinning in the gulf almost a week ago. overnight the supreme court declined to block a law in texas that prohibits abortions after
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about six weeks less than a day after it took effect and became the most restrictive abortion measure in the country. the vote was 5-4 with chief justice john roberts descending alongside the three liberal justices. the conservative justices argued the abortion providers challenging the law have not made their case. adding the ruling was not made on the constitutionality of the law and does not limit proper challenges to it. katy beck has more on what this could mean for women in texas and across the country. >> my body is my own. >> reporter: outrage in texas. >> it's going to be nearly impossible for folks to access the care they need. >> protest over what is now the most restrictive abortion law in the country. going into effect after the u.s. supreme court did not act opponents' requests to block it. >> bill that i'm about to sign that ensures that the life of every unborn child who has a
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heartbeat will be saved from the ravages of abortion. >> reporter: passed by the legislature in may it probids abortions in texas after cardiac activity is detected, typically around six weeks. it allows individuals to take legal action. permitted to sue any person who might have helped someone get an abortion after six weeks. providers, relatives, even a taxi driver can face damages up to $10,000. >> it's a very sad day. >> reporter: amy miller oversees four abortion clinics in texas which is complying with the law, turning large numbers of women away already. >> they don't hear the anguish from the women, hear the stories about why they need access to safe abortion. >> reporter: pro opponents call it progress. >> what we hope is that abortion limits consensus on abortion
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will be allowed to make their way into the law. >> katy beck reporting for us there. let's bring in former u.s. attorney for the northern district of alabama joyce vance. also with us national affairs analyst host and producer of "the circus," john heileman. and professor at princeton university, eddie glaude jr. joyce i want to begin with you for this hour. help us understand the ruling from texas yesterday from the supreme court what it means, what it doesn't mean and the implications it may have down the road. >> so a majority of the supreme court close to midnight last night made the decision that this law in texas, the most restrictive law on abortion in the country, could go into effect. they had been asked to enjoin the law by a group of abortion providers and advocates for
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abortion. but the court said it couldn't enjoin the law because the texas statute is very unusual. instead of using normal government entities to enforce it, it's enforced by creating what justice sotomayor in her decent calls citizen bounty hunters. any citizen can go after people who helped a woman obtain an abortion. they can't sue the woman herself but they can get a $10,000 bounty if they succeed in this action. the court says we're able to enjoin state authorities from doing this activity but we can't enjoin in this novel and unique situation. the three liberal justices are joined by chief just roberts. saying it should have continued with the status quo while the case continues to be litigated.
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>> if there's a fetal heartbeat detected, you can't get an abortion that comes around the six week mark of a pregnancy, at which point many women don't know they're pregnant. it's estimated about 90%, 9-0, of abortions performed in texas happen after that six week point. what did you make of the opinion of the majority here, joyce, where they said we're not ruling on the constitutionality of this, it's just that you didn't make the right case, talking about the abortion providers who challenged it. does that mean there's hope for people who support abortion that this law could be struck down in another challenge? >> the law is facially unconstitutionally, willie, which means it violates prior supreme court precedent, roe versus wade, and casey, but that does not appear to be an operative set of facts any
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longer, because the majority has said that they don't believe that there's a clear chance of success on the merits of the case by the plaintiffs. and although it's tough to read anything into a two-page unsigned opinion, but they appear to be caveating that on this private enforcement mechanism, we know from prior writings that they are open to reversing roe and whether it comes in this case or comes next term in the dobs case out of mississippi it seems likely that whether they actively reverse roe saying that roe is no longer the law, cases like this will make enroads that will lead to gutting the protections that roe has provided. the texas law doesn't permit abortion even in the case of rape or incest or maternal health. it is a very restrictive law and a dangerous moment for women in texas. >> and the mississippi law
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you're referring to is a 15-week abortion law. no abortions after 15 weeks. obviously the prize has been roe versus wade for nearly a half century now for those who oppose abortion. what does this ruling in if texas mean as you look down the road, over the horizon, is there a chance roe could be taken off the books? >> it depends on whether or not the supreme court has a majority of justices who believe that it matters. we're a case law driven legal system. that means when we have binding prior precedent it's controlling. and roe is the law in this land. it permits abortion prior to viability of the fetus. so this majority in the supreme court has, and can do, what it wants. there are ways to reverse roe without explicitly saying that they're reversing roe. something we see in the texas lawsuit that's a warning sign
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for the future of long-standing precedent in roe is this willingness by states to use novel and really unseemly mechanisms to do what they themselves think they can't do directly. this notion they can create private citizen bounty hunters who can appear in women's lives and attack in courts the people around them that help them that obtain medical care is a new era in anti-abortion legislation. and whether the court wants to directly take on roe or not, it seems the litigants will give mechanisms to strip out its protections. >> this was designed, this law to get politicians off the hook. it bars them from -- legislatures from enforcing the law, and as joyce laid out, it deputizes people with these bounties to enforce it themselves and call in people and become deputies of the
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anti-abortion movement. so this isn't a huge surprise, if you look at the three justices appointed by president trump, justice gorsuch, kavanaugh and amy coney barrett. what do you see coming down the road? >> good morning, what i read into the decision is the intensification of the culture wars. you have to read this decision alongside the attack on quote/unquote crt, the january 6th insurrection. the overall sense that the country is at each other's throats. so i think this is an intensification of the culture wars and will define the political battles in the midterms and the upcoming presidential election in 2024. so i think that's very clear. but i also have this kind of historical analogy and it's going to sound strange, but the fugitive slave law of 1850, what it did was said that every private citizen had an
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obligation to return a fugitive slave to their owner. what it did, it forced a choice onto the nation, are you going to be individually complicit with the institution of slavery, you see. so now this private, citizen bounty, in so many ways intensifies the choices being made by everyday, ordinary people. it's a novel way that texas has, in some ways evaded the issue, but it's also intensified the culture wars that define our day-to-day interactions. we need to buckle up. it's going to get more intense. >> john heileman, let's talk about what this means. this is the beginning. we'll look at mississippi, the supreme court is taking up that mississippi law as well. what does this mean as we look at midterm elections coming up next year, a 2024 presidential election, the president has come out and said this ruling basically violates the core of roe versus wade. what are the politics of this?
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>> you know, willie i think -- first of all, good morning and happy friday, not a happy friday in the context of this for women in texas and elsewhere. where this is the moment where pro choice activists and the other side also have been gurding for this day, the day when laws would get to the point where we have a court in place that would be ready to overturn roe and states would be employing laws that are designed not to just strip the right of abortion for most women but also put test cases in front of the court that will allow them to depart and give them a context, a reason to knock down roe finally which as you noted has been the goal on the anti-abortion side for many years. and there's a moment of clarity about this, in terms of the politics of it, right, where down in texas where we also have
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another battle going on over voting rights. these things happening in states like texas have clarified the stakes of our politics, not like for a lot of people, the stakes don't need more clarification than they did during the trump era but they raise the stakes on that. you have people on politics i know we said 2020 when donald trump's name was on the ballot that 2020 was the most important election in our lifetime, it may now be 2022 has just as much importance if not more. i think the main thing that's going to happen, the midterm elections are low turnout, you have one side fully energized the other side kind of complaisant. i think this is the kind of ruling and law and the movement on the court and the prospect of a full-on overruling of roe v wade that's going to make both
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sides of the political aisle incredibly intensely energized for the midterm elections because they are going to see with this stark clarity what's on the line. i think people are moving for the notion we could have the highest midterm turnout we've seen because the battle we thought was over in 2020 has really just started. >> add this to covid, afghanistan, what's happening at the border, there's a lot on the table at the midterm elections. joyce vance thanks for being with us this morning. your incites have been invaluable. turning to afghanistan now, lloyd austin said he will travel to the arab yeian gulf as the united states looks to find housing for the hundreds of thousands of afghans since ending military action this week. >> now the war is over and we're entering a new chapter.
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one where our diplomats and interagency partners take the lead. we're part of an urgent team effort to move afghan evacuees out of temporary housing in intermediate staging bases in the gulf and europe, and on to begin new lives. >> but as we reported last hour, senior state department official is saying the majority of special immigrant visa applicants remain in afghanistan. in a briefing with reporters yesterday the official said in part, quote, everybody is haunted by the choices we had to make and there were some really painful trade offs. eligible afghan citizens are receiving few details about future evacuation plans. in an email obtained by nbc news, the department told some afghans on tuesday, our commitment to the people in afghanistan is enduring we will use every diplomatic, economic, political and assistance tool at our disposal to ensure the
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taliban honors its commitments to uphold the basic rights of all afghanistans and continued humanitarian access to the country. in addition to the americans who remain in afghanistan there are vast numbers of afghans who helped the american war effort over the last 20 years, those holders of special immigrant visas who want to get out of the country and have a promise from the white house and state department that they will be helped in that effort. >> yeah. you know, willie with the sivs, the immigrant visas, that's going to be the focus of a real forensic autopsy here in this country about what happened. what was the hold up with issuing those visas over the course of many years. of course, in may of 2020, when the trump administration did the surrender deal with the taliban in doha, without the afghanistan
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government participating, they shutdown the siv process, and no one single visa was issued the rest of 2020. now we have this backlog and the human tragedy of people on the ground in afghanistan holding such visas unable to get out of their country. the feeling is that we have resources still on the ground in afghanistan trying to implement some exit plan, but that's going to depend on the cooperation of the taliban in order to do that. but i think it is an ongoing process. i think there is potential for getting many of them out of afghanistan, but it's going to have to be on the near horizon. it's going to have to be within the next couple of months. what we've gone through with the taliban over the past couple of weeks is, in effect, the taliban's opening day on broadway. their opening week on broadway. they're trying to present a more functional picture to the world of who they are. nobody trusts them, and we're
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going to find out who they really are or if they'll revert to what they were very quickly. but right now is an envelope of time, maybe a couple of months in order to try and get these people on the ground in afghanistan out of that country. and then the larger question to the world, including the united states, is going to be the issue of acceptance. how many of these people are we going to accept after all they've done for us. >> and the administration not putting faith or trust, they're quick to point out, in the taliban but admitting they need them to help continuing to get people out of the country. that's a tall task for this medieval cult. john heileman, let's talk about this, the deal with the taliban was cut by president trump in late february, early march 2020, secretary of state mike pompeo sat with the leader of the taliban. president trump afterward said he had a great call with the leader of the taliban, they had common interest, the taliban
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wanted to see the end to the violence. so republicans coming out, and there is a lot to criticize in the way this end for the biden administration, but there's levels of hypocrisy about republicans pounding the podium, going after joe biden. >> some level. the level of hypocrisy by people like kevin mccarthy is as high as my confusion of what day of the week it is. it is apparently only thursday not friday. >> yeah. >> i appreciate that. even mike barnicle knows it's thursday. but look, it is. there's hypocrisy among republicans is nothing new here but stunning to see kevin mccarthy, standing up, who were cheerleaders for donald trump, cheerleaders for this element of the policy, "the new york times" had a story on this, going back and playing the tape, seeing people like kevin mccarthy, much of republican leadership, in
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fact, applauding trump loudly on the specific question f of our need to withdraw from afghanistan on the deal that he made with the taliban just a year ago, now standing up and saying that this decision by joe biden is the most disgraceful foreign policy decision of their lifetimes. and, you know, again you said it, i think we've both have been on the air the last three weeks, there are a lot of things to criticize about the way in which this withdrawal was handled and many made the criticisms over the last three week, but the notion behind the large question of getting out, joe biden and donald trump were in the same place, so it is beyond a little bit rich to see these congressional republicans standing up and saying exactly, not just the -- not just something different from what they said before, but the opposite, having switched their position the most hypocritical way, again makes my confusion about what day of the week it is look almost consistent and normal.
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>> john i'm going to thank you and wish you a happy weekend because apparently yours begins this morning. thanks so much, good to see you my friend. still ahead on "morning joe," it has been two years now since elijah mcclain, a 23-year-old black man died after a confrontation with police, now a grand jury has handed down an indictment against three officers and two paramedics involved in his death. we have that next. "morning joe" is coming right back. ♪ music playing. ♪ there's an america we build ♪ ♪ and one we explore one that's been paved and one that's forever wild but freedom means you don't have to choose just one adventure ♪ ♪
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a grand jury has indicted five people, more than two years after elijah mcclain died following a deadly encounter with police in aura, colorado. joining us now gabe gutierrez
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with details. gabe, good morning. >> reporter: willie, good morning. legal experts say it's highly unusual for police officers to face charges in this type of case but extremely rare for paramedics to do so. the 32-count indictment comes after an eight-month long grand jury investigation. >> give us more units we're fighting him. >> reporter: police officers and paramedics in aurora, colorado are facing criminal charges after stopping 23-year-old elijah mcclain after he walked home from a convenience store. >> we're here today because elijah mcclain is not here and he should be. >> reporter: police had gotten a call about a suspicious man wearing a mask. they restrained him with a ka carotid hold. and paramedics gave him ketamine.
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four of the five also face assault charges. mcclain's family described him as a kind introvert. they say he often wore a mask to keep warm because of a blood condition. >> this is a loud and resounding statement that nobody is above the law. >> reporter: right after his death in august of 2019, prosecutors did not charge anyone. >> say his name. >> reporter: for these protesters -- but the case drew renewed attention last year following the murder of george floyd. some of his last words i'm just different became a rallying cry. calling that response a hysterical overreaction, the police union said our officers did nothing wrong. sadly mr. mcclain died due to a combination of his decision to resist and a heart condition. >> it means a lot people will be held accountable for what they did.
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i know my son would be smiling. >> reporter: separately colorado's attorney general has a civil rights investigation under way into whether the actions of the police department were part of a pattern. city officials say they're cooperating. >> gabe, thanks so much. eddie, this is two years now, we just passed the two-year anniversary since the death of elijah mcclain in colorado. the entire confrontation, if you watch the police body cam video is disturbing. he's saying i'm an introvert please leave me. they put him in the hold and then the paramedics injected him with that powerful sedative. does this indictment, this 32-count indictment, does this tell us anything about what could happen in future cases? >> i'm not sure. you know, it's very clear that this would not have happened if
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it wasn't for protests in the streets. if it wasn't for organizing, to bring pressure to bear. for those people to be held accountable. and it has taken two years for that to happen. one of the striking things about this case, willie, at least to me, and i saw our colleague geoff bennett try to read elijah mcclain's last words yesterday on this network, is that there was a sense of you heard the innocence in his voice as his life was being snuffed out. there's a sense in which the people who were supposed to protect him were actually killing him. and so here we are, two years later, after people got in the streets, after george floyd's murder, risking their lives in the midst of a covid pandemic. we still don't have a george floyd justice in policing act. we still don't have federal mechanisms to hold people accountable for this kind of behavior. so on the one hand to answer your question directly, i don't
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know what this will suggest, but at least we know if we're active, if we're organized, if we bring pressure to bear, we can at least get an indictment but now there's the trial ahead of us. >> mike barnicle? >> well, you know, willie, just the pictures that we just saw on our tv sets around this country, it's a young man, a calm, quiet young man, played his violin for cats in an animal shelter to subdue the animals to make them feel more comfortable. and eddie, as i looked at just the pictures, i was thinking, you know, the phrase defund the police became very popular last year during an election yea it's an absurd idea we're not going to defund the police. but educate the police seems to be more apparent each and every day. the length of training that police officers go through at various police academies i would submit is not long enough.
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you have to learn to engage with people, speak with people, talk with people, to get a bah ram ter, a feeling of what you're dealing with quickly and you can do that if your mindset is, i'm here to protect these people not to arrest these people. those are the most magic words, the only words that one group of people in this country have, you're under arrest. and they better pay attention more to who they are engaging with, rather than what they're doing. >> you know, mike in so many ways what we're trying to do, whenever you think about the phrase, defund the police, there's this insistence that we reimagine safety and security in this country, that we move beyond simply arresting and incarcerating folk to really trying to get to the underlying issues that define our communities, which would make us more comfortable and more safe. i think what's important in the elijah mcclain case, here's a young man with anemia, wore a
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mask and people in his community viewed him because he had a mask on a threat. there's also the assumption not just by the police but our citizens that just being in a black body, being a black male, navigating straight, walking down the street you pose an imminent threat, a danger. so they call the police because they think you're not supposed to be where you are. because there's a sense in which this country is constantly trying to police where we are. right. and so if we're going to get to a place, where this is a truly multi-racial democracy, where everyone, no matter the color of their skin, no matter their zip code, can move around this country and feel protected by the police we will find ourselves in these tragic moments trying to make sense of the death of an innocent young man who played violin for cats who said he was an introvert,
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was put in a choke hold by police. >> those officers and two paramedics now indicted. coming up next a look at the hardest hit areas of louisiana ahead of president biden's visit to survey the damage from hurricane ida. morgan chesky joins us live from new orleans with his reporting from the ground. "morning joe" is coming right back. ground. "morning joe" is coming right back
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welcome back to "morning joe." incredible live pictures out of philadelphia where the flooding from the remnants of hurricane ida have been felt across the northeast as the sun comes up we're getting a view of what it left behind last night. this all began, of course, in the state of louisiana. morgan chesky joined the louisiana governor as he flew over some of the hardest hit
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areas of the state. morgan joins us now from new orleans. morgan, good morning. what does it look like there and what did you see from the air yesterday? >> reporter: willie, there is still a long way to go in these post hurricane flights are too familiar to the governor, as well as the damage that even today stretches across this entire region. the governor told me restoring power remains a top priority. and after flying over louisiana it was clear that help cannot come fast enough. this morning struggle and heartbreak in the wake of had had. >> hurricane ida -- >> utter devastation. >> reporter: we joined the governor wednesday on a blackhawk tour of the devastation as he visited parishes left reeling. as we headed south, damage from the category 4 hurricane becoming more apparent in size and scope. ida's powerful winds responsible
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for knocking down eight transmission lines. we are in st. charles parish, this damage absolutely heartbreaking. this is one of the places that they say people may not get power back for more than a month. >> reporter: on the ground, the governor sharing his message to those so desperately in need. help is coming. when you fly over and see the scope of the damage, how does it hit you? >> it's a gut punch and the people of louisiana really are reeling, tremendous devastation. this is a tough storm. we're going to recover. >> reporter: in towns thrashed by the deadly storm, lines of wars waiting to stock up on gas and other essentials. some drivers forced to push their cars to the pump. >> you got to do what you go to do. >> reporter: national guard handing out other supplies.
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>> i survived i'm good. >> when i realized the power is on, it was a blessing. >> reporter: nearly 1 million homes and businesses still without electricity. now people cheering on the crews. >> when it comes on, it comes on. >> reporter: working to get the entire region back up and running. >> ain't no telling how long it's going to be before we get power back. >> reporter: giving credit to the levies to protect new orleans from flooding, the governor said there needs to be more investment into the power grid after witnessing this catastrophic failure and as ida has made its way to the northeast, the death toll from the storm is only expected to grow. willie. >> those pictures from the air, the more we see the worst this gets. morgan chesky in new orleans for us. thanks so much. president biden will travel to louisiana tomorrow to survey the damage caused by the storm. joining us now, white house senior adviser, cedric richmond.
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it's good to see you today. i know this is a very personal story for you, your former district as a congressman stretched from new orleans to baton rouge. what are you hearing from the ground from the people you served? >> we're hearing about the destruction and the devastation that's left in the wake of hurricane ida. what we're also hearing which i know very well is the determination and the resiliency of the people on the ground. so we know exactly what we need to do. we know how to help. but more importantly we know to talk to those elected officials that are on the ground. i know the frustration of trying to recover after a hurricane. so the number one priority is to restore power. over a million people in louisiana lost power, 100,000 in mississippi lost power. to date they've restored homes with power but we have a way to go. we lost 1500 utility polls and
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140 0 transformers were damaged. it's a challenge that the federal government must come down and help those hurting. >> the power seems to be the big concern at this moment for a lot of people when you have that many people without power. even the city of new orleans still in many places has no power. when you think about louisiana, the place you lived for so much of your life in early september, with the heat and humidity, we think about the elderly, long-term care facilities many of which have generators but run on gas that is in short supply. what are the immediate concerns and what can the federal government do about it? >> what you said. power is very critical. the president convened a call with the ceo of the southern company and the trade association for utility companies to make sure they understand it has to be all hands on deck and to make sure that whatever they needed from
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the federal government that we give it to them because we know that power is the most essential need in recovery. people need to get back home so they can start rebuilding their homes and their lives. we need to make sure that they can have air conditioning, make sure gas stations can have electricity, hospitals. the sewer pumps. electricity is the basic element of recovery which is why we're making sure it can happen quickly. >> eddie you're from mississippi. i'm sure you've been in touch with people down there. this storm hit land as a category 4 and now a lot of people who need power don't have it and they haven't reached some of the people who need to be reached. >> absolutely, willie. not only do i have family on the gulf coast i have family in new orleans -- gulf coast of mississippi but in mississippi as well. i wanted to ask a basic question. we've both been through hurricanes we know the difficulty that one experiences
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as you try to recovery. but this is unusual because we're in the midst of a pandemic. in fact, a pandemic raging on the coast of mississippi and in louisiana. it seems the response of the federal government must be different than in the past because a pandemic is ravaging the area at the same time the hurricane has hit. so what is the federal government doing in light of these background conditions within which ida has left so much devastation? >> willie, you're right -- i mean, eddie, you're right. i'm sorry. it has compounded and made the challenge a little bit more difficult. so when we're talking about sheltering, when we're talking about taking care of people, talking about evacuations, you have to take in mind the safety of those people who are doing the rescue and those people who need to be rescued. so in our shelters we're making sure that we follow the cdc guidelines of social distancing, testing, and those people who
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want vaccines. p but it only goes to show why it was so important that the president stressed over a month ago, going into hurricane season, why it was important to get vaccinations because we knew this was the potential result in august. you know it, every hurricane season brings about challenges. but we were prepared for it and now we're going to continue to do our work. we'll continue to try to keep people safe while we do it. but again, i will put the message out again, the best way to protect children, our families and those who can't get vaccinated yet is for adults who can to get vaccinated. because we're all in this fight together. >> and hospitals are already overwhelmed by covid, as you say, now dealing with this historic storm as well as the president hetd heads down to louisiana tomorrow. cedric richmond. we appreciate your time this
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morning. >> thanks for having me. it's been ten weeks since the devastating condo collapse in surfside florida, kerry sanders is there with us this morning with the remarkable story of one family that lived through it. that's just ahead on "morning joe." ahead on "morning joe. let's go walter! after you. walter, twelve o' clock. get em boy! [cows mooing] that is incredible. it's the multi-flex tailgate. it can be a step, it can even become a workspace.
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today marks exactly 70 days since the tragic condominium collapse in surfside, florida, outside miami. 98 people died in that disaster. the exact cause of which still is unknown. this morning nbc news correspondent kerry sanders has the story of one family who made it out alive, kerry joins us now from surfside, good morning. >> reporter: well, good morning, tavai can't space over my shoulder is where the champlain towers south once stood. it is 12 stories tall. as you know, firefighters pulled 98 bodies from the rubble. but they also rescued three
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survivors and this morning for the first time, we're hearing from two of them. 16-year-old and her mother who are still asking the question, why did this happen? >> whoever thinks a building is going to collapse on you? i'm sorry. >> half the building is gone! >> reporter: in 12 second at 1:30 a.m., the 36-unit condo collapsed. >> i remember mom yelling, "run!" and dragging me out of bed. >> angela and her father had been watching a late night horror movie in the master bedroom. all were laying in the same bed when. >> it felt like an earthquake. >> angela 45-years-old says a split second be floor gave way, she heard what she thought was thunder. >> i just screamed, "run!" we made it a couple steps out of
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our bedroom and the floor started to cave. >> reporter: their condo was on the 9th floor, devon fell with the building five stories. her mother on debris slightly above. devon's left leg was crushed, her femur snapped. but she was able to scream for help. >> is anybody out there? >> reporter: rescue teams reached devon and then her mother who had been knocked unconscious. her older sister had been out and rushed home to find concrete dust and chaos. >> they told me if they were on that side of the building, there wasn't going to be any survivors. so that was a very difficult night. >> reporter: taylor eventually found her sister and mother in the hospital. angela was in a coma for five days. she came out of it on her birthday and then learned her husband edgar had not survived. >> he was my best friend, he was
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my person. >> i didn't get to say good-bye. but a lot of people, sorry, have said that saying good night and i love you and miss you in the morning was a lot better than a good-bye. because it's like i'll see you later. i'm glad i had that. >> reporter: the family lost all their possessions except for edgar's wedding ring recovered from his body. >> we have this thing that every week each of us get it. i got it for the first week of school. it's going to be taylor's turn on monday and then after taylor, mom, we'll all wear it. >> each week we share it, yeah. >> reporter: angela faces a long road but doctors say she should walk again. the gonzalez family says they now hope federal versions can determine why this happened. >> i want to know why my husband lost his life. i want to know why he they are left without a father. i have my daughters, so i have
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them, i have something to look forward to but i know there is other mothers there that have lost you know a husband or child and it's just not okay. it's not okay. >> reporter: you may have noticed that 16-year-old devon is on crutches. she is a standout volleyball player and says what is driving her in her recovery is to get back out there on the volleyball court with her teammates. the gonzalez family lost everything they owned within this building came down but somehow their pet cat binks has been found and reunited with the family. just a horrible story, also remarkable story?
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thank you for bringing it to us. i mean, the middle of the fight. you never could have imagined such a nightmare. kerry sanders in florida for us. thanks so much. we will be back here in just 90 second with news, breaking news of the heavy rain, historic flooding across the northeast as remnants of hurricane ida their through the region. incredible images when we come right back.
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. breaking news, i'm willie geist on a thursday morning. these are pictures new to us from east rutherford, new jersey. flash flooding across the northeast. there has been destruction. there has been death as the remnants of hurricane ida are hitting the northeast this morning with reports of flash flooding and tornadoes in new york, new jersey and philadelphia. late last night new jersey and philadelphia mayors calling on residents inside to the to travel. fire and rescue crews responded to a number of water rescues and evac weighings because of the high water levels. there have been at least five weather-related fatalities recorded. four in new york city, one in new jersey. the national weather service issued a flash flood emergency in new york city for the first time ever last night. more than three inches of rain was recorded in central park within an hour. shattering a record set just
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last week. this is video of water rushing into an apartment on east 22nd street in manhattan. most subway lines as you can imagine were suspended last night due to heavy rain and flooding. it impacted play. two matches were moved as the rain and wind were just too much for the court at louis armstrong stadium. the entire outfield under water under funnel cloud and tornadoes were also reported across the northeast. nbc news' stephanie gosk has more. >> reporter: this morning the east coast pummelled by deadly storms, fueled by hurricane ido you. tornado flooding and heavy winds throughout the northeast. in new york and new jersey, historic rains causing one of the wettest septembers on record and it's only the second day of the month. new york city's infrastructure devastated, making streets impassable.
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road and parkwayings quickly submerged. residents needed rescue from rising waters. the national weather service posting this is a life-threatening situation. seek higher ground now. new york's governor declaring a state of markets captured on video, flood waters pouring into subway stations, submergeing vehicles n. queens, heavy rains causing this exxon station to collapse on to a vehicle. on staten island, firefighters rescued an mta bus driver and supervisor as workers jumped in to help them to safety. in west chester county, just outside of the city, high wind and heavy rain making driving conditions dangerous. >> how bad is it out there? >> it's pretty bad. >> cars are stuvenlg people get stranded. people taking public transportation, if they have to. >> reporter: in new jersey, governor phil murphy also declaring a state of emergency. one mayor hector laura asking residents to stay off the roads.
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>> in the streets, water has risen so high we have four-to-five vehicles stuck in the middle of the street. we are presently trying to help individuals come out of the road. >> reporter: look at that tornado! >> i've never seen anything like this, especially in south jersey. >> reporter: multiple homes were destroyed. >> winds within five minutes and then just everything was decimated. >> let's bring in meteorologist bill kierans. you warned us days ago. i don't think many of us appreciated how high this was going to be the hum of generators across the northeast. >> it was unbelievable. the amount of rain that fell, how quickly it fell was unprecedented and record shattering for areas of the country. the records in new york city go back 153 years. this was 4th avenue. i used to live in this part of brooklyn. this is the bottom of park
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slope. i used to take the subway line and do this show every morning. i never saw anything like this at all. this is the road the new york city marathon runs down each november. it's a low spot and that water, the subway line is right underneath that. the tornadoes yesterday alone, this one that was captured outside of philadelphia in new jersey is likely going to be one of the strongest tornadoes in new jersey history. that was an ef-3 or ef-4 tornado. the tornado in annapolis was strong. we had a dam break. specifically, all of these things would be a headline story all by itself. but what happened through the northeast as this moved through. it's almost too much to cover. so let's get into some of the numbers on this, because it's really just incredible. so the storm went through new york city in the neuralgic area as we went through about a six-hour period. the rainfall totals, we knew going into yesterday, someone could get 8 inches of rain.
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unfortunately, it's where 10 million people lived. new york had 7.19. in one hour, one hour, both newark and new york central park, any hurricane that did this never did this before. 3.24 inches and 3 inches of rain if one hour to let you know this is a one in a 500-year rainfall. six inches in new york and bringing it home, people may not know i live in the town willie grew up in and played football in. if you know the football field, willie, it had three feet of water yesterday on it in wynwood, new jersey. i don't know many towns in northern new jersey that didn't have epic flooding. >> if i know coach johnson, he'll have that cleaned up this afternoon in time for practice. there are a lot of people waking up in the northeast to all this news that listen to your report.
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what should we be thinking about in terms of safety today as we go outside? obviously, there will be a lot of debris on the ground, what else would we be looking for? >> well, people have to remember, this was a flash flood for the most part so this was in and this is out a. lot of the water has already been receding. a lot of the water are on the way out. there are some rivers that will peak later on today, a lot of the water will be gone by the time the helicopters get town show where the damage is. it wasn't a lot of wind with it. so there is not a on the of power outages, thousands of homes with waters in it especially in the basements. the number of vehicles stranded on the highways, they will be littering the road with no water. the water is on the way out. behind me you sigh ida, boston, the rain stopped, cape cod and areas of maine will get more rainfall. all of the damage from ida is over with from new orleans all the way through the northeast a storm that's for the recordbooks. this will go down as one of the
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worst floods in eastern pennsylvania and new jersey history in many cases topping hurricane floyd back in 1999. >> just an extraordinary storm for almost a week now. you have been covering every moment of it for us. bill kierans, thanks so much. as for what ida lid leave behind, power returned to a section in new orleans, some good news, many people in the state of louisiana remain without electricity. president biden will travel tomorrow to survey damage caused by the hurricane. he will meet there with state and local leaders. nbc news correspondent miguel almaguer is in new orleans with more. >> reporter: this is the misery after the mayhem, the lines for basic services, food, fume, water and ice stretching for hours in communities where ida's devastation is no match for its after math. >> it's hot out here. >> reporter: on a day where sweltering temperatures reached dangerous levels.
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>> it's hot as -- we have people in their 80s and 90s here. it's hot. >> reporter: st. martin manor, a senior community in new orleans, home to 150 is still in the dark. disabled residents forced into the lobby as rooms easily top 100 degrees. 74-year-old joanne moss suffers from severe asthma for three days unable to power her breathing machine. how much longer do you think you can last here? >> i can't. i can't last. i can't. >> reporter: is this life and death for you? >> yes, it is. >> reporter: power across louisiana is still out to roughly 1 million homes and businesses. energy was restored to more than 11,000 in new orleans. just a fraction of those in dire need. it could be weeks before the mangled, shredded power grid is restored. our morgan chesky through
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alongside the governor who toured the hardest-hit communities who are on an island and off grid. to the folks here, they'll be without power for more than a month. what do you tell them? >> first of all, i'm not sure if that will be true for everyone. we saw from today, but there are some places where the infrastructure is so devastated. >> reporter: what do you tell those folks? >> we will do everything we can to help them. >> reporter: for a region battered and bruised, the uninhabitable still face the unimaginable. many coastal homes were swept into the ocean. >> ida made katrina look like a warm summer breeze. yeah, i was not anticipating. this is crazy. >> reporter: what's left of some communities, a painstaking reminder of what's gone. >> miguel almaguer reporting there. still ahead, the united states supreme court votes 5-4
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to leave a texas abortion law in place. what it may mean for the future of roe versus wade. plus, an update on that massive wildfire theiring through northern california, a live report from lake tahoe next on "morning joe." lake tahoe net on "morning joe. and democrats in congress have a plan to lower costs for america's working families. lower costs of healthcare premiums and the price of prescription drugs. pay less for electric bills by moving to clean energy. and do it all by making the ultra-wealthy pay their fair share of taxes. it'd be a win for the everyday american family. right when they could really use one. congress, let's get this done. liberty mutual customizes car insurance so you only pay for what you need. how much money can liberty mutual save you? one! two! three! four! five! 72,807! 72,808... dollars.
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to protect every device on it— all backed by a dedicated team, 24/7. every day in business is a big day. we'll keep you ready for what's next. comcast business powering possibilities. . some breaking news overnight. the supreme court released its decision declining to block a texas law that bans abortions after a fetal heart beat can be detected. that's as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. that came less than a day after the law took effect and became the most restrictive abortion measure in the country. the vote was 5-4 with chief justice john roberts dissenting alongside the three liberal justices. the controversial law also allows private citizens to enforce the ban through lawsuits against abortion providers or others who help women to get the
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procedure. the majority opinion was unsigned. it said abortion provider who's had challenged the law essentially didn't make their case adding the ruling was not on the constitutionality of the law and did not mean to limit quote procedurally proper challenges to it. all four dissenting justices signed opinions, justice sotomayor red this way. the court's order is stunning. presented with an application to enjoin a flagrantly unconstitutional law engineered to prohibit women from exercising their constitution rights. chief justice roberts wrote, he would have blocked the law while appeals moved forward. he underscored the tentative nature of the majority's ruling. let's bring in a former u.s. attorney for the district of alabama and msnbc legal analyst joyce vance and jonathan le mere
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and bureau chief susan paige. good morning no all of you. let me start with you, joyce, as a former federal prosecutor. let's talk about the legal part of this. so effectively the real ruling says we're not talking about the constitutionality of this law. we believe abortion providers did not make their case effectively. does that open the door to more challenges to this texas law? >> well, actually, this case, itself, is still live in some sense. what happened was that health care providers in texas sued state court judges and court clerks who would, in essence, be the people who would put the texas law into effect permitting this mechanism that we have all heard about, where private individuals could bring lawsuits to enforce the law and the dodge that the majority of the supreme court uses here is to say, well, we're not entirely sure that we have the ability to enjoin these officials. some of them have assured us
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they don't have intention of putting in the law. we're not going to put in place an injunction to keep the law from going into effect. that's why this is now the law in texas. the substantive issues remain to be decided. but justice sotomayor is correct when she says this is putting your head in the sand because the impact of letting the law, itself, go forward is to create such an atmosphere of suspicion and uncertainty in texas that abortion has all but come to an end in that state. >> so what does this mean, joyce, when the law, it's tricky in the way it's written and sort of takes the honus off lawmakers and politicians, in effect, we are deputizeing private citizens to sue abortion providers. what does that mean? how does that work as a practical matter? >> it's a bounty provision. and the texas law is at least, it appears to be overbroad. it appears to permit people to
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sue who don't have standing, which is a legal doctrine that requires that for someone to bring a lawsuit essentially they have to have some form of skin in the game. that doesn't seem to be the case with the very broadly drafted texas provision that would permit anyone who is willing to go to the trouble of becoming an investigator and learning which women have had abortion procedures. the law doesn't permit them to sue the woman, herself, but they can bring a lawsuit against anyone involved in helping her obtain that abortion there. is a $10,000 bounty in essence that they are able to claim through the courts as a result of their hard work. >> so this is a fetal heart beat law as it's phone. so six weeks, there cannot be when there is a heart beat detected in fetus. a lot of people don't know they
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are pregnant at six months. mississippi, for example, is looking at a 15-week ban. what does this ruling by the supreme court portend for laws in mississippi, laws across other states that want to do away with abortion? >> it's not much of a surprise to anyone who's followed the leanings of the judge justices that former president trump put on the supreme court. this is a court that is thoroughly hostile to women's rights in that area. i don't think that comes as a surprise to anyone. the court has taken mississippi, the dog's case, the 15-week ban to hearing next term. some believe this case ongoing in texas would be consolidated with the mississippi case and the issues would all be resolved together. but i think it's safe to say that next term in the supreme court will see a lot more about fate of abortion in women's rights in this country. >> susan page, as joyce said,
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all three justic supported judge cavanaugh and amy coney barrett voted on the five majority. this is the holy grail for many anti-abortion activists looking at roe versus wade the 1973 ruling. this says, joyce said in some ways expect fareed this court. but what do you see coming down the road because of it? >> well, this was what donald trump promised, evangelical christian voters. it's one reason he consolidated their support in such a significant way. you've mentioned he had three appointments to the high court. two of them replacing justices who had supported abortion rights. now, as joyce said, this isn't the end of the road, it's the beginning of the road, clearly, a friendlier atmosphere for those who want to restrict abortion in the most significant ways. this is a medical issue. it's a moral issue. it's a political issue as well in a big way.
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this is going to have repercussions. it could energize those conservative republican voters behind republican candidates. it could also generate some new intensity among democrats and those who support abortion rights as we see this law already now in effect in the big central state of texas. >> jonathan le mere, this will become a part of the conversation. we have mid-term elections next year. president biden put out a statement on the yesterday. what did he say? >> well, certainly, willie, the president and speaks for the democratic party in which he defends a woman's right to choose, of course, was highly critical of this ruling in texas and certainly you will be hearing from the white house later today about middle of the night action from the supreme court allowing it to stay intact even if that, indeed, ma i be tentative. the justice may be clear, he
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wrote, this will not be the final word on this ruling. certainly, it puts abortion rights back at the center of political dialogue here with other states eyeing similar restrictions, texas is the second biggest state in the country. basically it outlaws abortion for the vast majority or women there. so many don't know they're pregnant at the mark where these restrictions begin. and certainly this is going to bomb a major political firestorm here. kit fire up voters on both sides of the aisle. both who support abortion rights and those who believe abortions should be outlawed. it puts more screening on the supreme court, itself, particularly, the fate of supreme justice brier. he, of course, is one of the dissenting voices in this. but there has been speculation as to when he would walk away. not allow at this moment a democratic president to appoint a successor, certainly right now
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he has not seen -- he has been seen in interviews he is weighing about what to do going forward. it's not about his health. he is in his early 80s, i believes but the help of democratic senators, their majority in the senate is so fragile. it's 50-50 that it would be very difficult here if senators were to lose control, of course, they wouldn't be able to likely get a justice confirmed. mitch mcconnell is sending those signals. so there is a lot at play. for white house right now struggling afghanistan, juggling the devon stating effects of these storms, obviously the surge and pandemic, it's another thing on their docket. coming up, the pandemic is testing the health system like never before, of course. america's nurses are among the hardest hit. they now are calling on the administration to declare a national crisis. details ahead on "morning joe." zblempblts
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. welcome back to "morning joe." health officials across the country are concerned with the growing number of pediatric covid cases.
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children who are not yet eligible for vaccination are now at a higher rick of being infected than at any other point in the pandemic. this is especially in cases with areas of low vaccination rates. how many timess have we said that? states like louisiana and children's hospital new orleans, the intensive care unit has been packed with covid-19 patients. according to medical staff, the causes often were simple. parents and family members who were unvaccinated and not wearing masks. one nurse telling the "new york times", quote, if i get hung up in the anger of it, i would walk around confronting people in wal-mart, here, everywhere. i can't tell them why dun isolate this, kids? you tell them your kid has covid, it's hard on the lungs. your child is very sick. we will do everything we can to get him better. let's bring in president and ceo of the florida hospital association mary mayhew, thank you for being with us this morning. give us a snapshot if you could of what's happening in the state of florida broadly.
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what kind of patients you're seeing and what the trend lines look like. >> good morning. florida has been on the front end of this most recent covid surge. delta has had a very different impact. we saw a dramatic increase in hospitalizations over a seven-week period. we reached a peak of 17,000 hospitalizations. what is very different during this surge is that we have had healthy 20-year-olds, 30-year-olds, who have been hospitalized as a result of covid. right now, we are seeing very encouraging trendsch our hospitalizations have dropped dramatically. we are now down to 14,800 hospitalizationles. our admissions are dropping as well. there are science we have peaked and are heading in the right direction. >> well that sounds like at least a ray of light in all this
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bad news. so to what do you attribute that, mary? why do you think the hospitalizations are down? >> well, again, much like what we've seen in other parts of the world, uk experience, it was a dramatic increase as a result of the delta surge and a similar steep decline. now, we will say, too, that the availability of the monoclonal anti-body treatment is a very effective treatment in reducing hospitalizations. governor desantis has set up 21 sites around the state over 40,000 individuals have received treatment of the last several weeks. that is absolutely contributing. we still need to emphasize the importance of people getting vaccinated. the vast majority of those who are hospitalized are unvaccinated. we all want to avoid this ongoing repeat of surges of this
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virus continuing to mutate. it is far more infectious through the delta, through the delta virus. and we are certainly seeing individuals in the hospital extremely ill. over 50% of our icu patients are suffering from covid. >> yeah, i think the number in florida is 90% of your hospitalizations with covid are unvaccinated. are you seeing any change in the vaccination rates in your state? there was some hope after the fda gave approval, it would clear away for people skeptical or hesitant that they might step up and get it or sadly if they saw covid visit their community or family, they would realize the severity and get vaccinated, themselves? so how do the rates look like in florida? >> right now florida ranks 22nd in the country in our vaccination rate. we have over 50% of the pop lake fully vaccinated and certainly as a result of this latest
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surge, it has intensified the efforts, the interests for those to get vaccinated. i think it's important to understand for 20-year-olds, 30 -year-olds, generally they feel they are at risk. over the last year, they heard covid was the greatest risk for our elderly individual. so we've had to quickly change that narrative and emphasize for those 20-year-olds, 30-year-olds, the delta variant was, in fact, having a significant risk for them ending up in the hospital. certainly pregnant women i have to say, we have seen far too many cases of pregnant women in our hospitals with covid severely ill. some, unfortunately, passing away because of covid. we really have to continue these efforts to aggressively get individuals vaccinated. >> president and ceo of the
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florida hospital association mary mayhew updating us on the state of florida. thanks so much, we appreciate it. coming up, before serving in congress, max rose was a combat platoon leader in afghanistan. he reflects on both of those roles in the weeks when the united states left afghanistan. that's straight ahead on "morning joe." afghanistan that's straight ahead on "morning joe." hearing is important to living life to the fullest.
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welcome back to "morning joe." you are looking at live pictures out of philadelphia where there are house-to-house search and rescue missions under way in those flooded streets. that is on the roof of the building what are you looking at right there. you see someone on the roof of the building waiting to be rescued. this storm, this is the remnants of hurricane ida, ida sweeping up through the mid-atlantic.
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overnight as the sun has come up. we are getting all of these images. neighborhoods as you can see fully submerged there in philadelphia. same story in new york and new jersey. extraordinary pictures. the new york police department just updated a few minutes ago, it a confirmed fatalities because of the storm. that number can go up. there is an effort looking for fooem people who may need rescued. we will stay on stop of this story for you. meanwhile, out west, flames from california's caldor fire. let's bring in nbc news correspondent steve patterson live in south lake that low. good morning. how's it look out there? >> willie, good morning. a victory for the crews on the ground, these winds expiring overnight. by and large the whole of lake
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tahoe stands. the fire is still burning dangerously close. tens of thousands of homes at risk. this threat far from over. this morning, firefighters trying to beat back onsite flames in a desperate attempt to save homes in a popular resort. some using snow blowers to fight the fire. >> how close is the fire to south lake tahoe? >> it's really close, it's right behind a road that outskirts the community. >> reporter: a strike team of at least 16 firefighters now side lined with covid-19, sparking fears it will affect more critical front line crews. how much more can californians experience this? >> you have to experience the smash mouth realitys of climate change taking shape in real time. >> reporter: at 23% contained, the fire already has burned over
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2,00000 acres, despite 4,000 firefighters trying to contain it. >> panic attacks, anxiety attacks. >> more than 53,000 have been forced to evacuate, hundreds heading to safety in neighboring nevada. >> i'm very concerned. i don't want to lose my house and everybody i have n't want to and everybody i have . >> reporter: this is what crews are dealing with, forests of flame, it takes one pocket of embers and a strong wind gust, you can have these all over south lake tahoe. that's what firefighters. that's what they're up against. >> what it can do to south lake tahoe? >> mother nature is the most powerful force on the planet. it will determine fate of the future of south lake tahoe. >> reporter: firefighters have been battling this thing day an night for weeks. still the fire less than 25%
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contained. the fire now continues burning east and now threatening nevada. willie. >> an arduous and frustrating task for those firefighters. nbc news' steve patterson in tahoe, thank you very much. many hospitals at capacity with covid patients, there now is a new challenge, a struggle to fill tens of thousands of vacant nursing positions. it's a shortage that has been looming for years burnout made it more dire, many nurses retiring early. one hospital is trying the incentive of a $40,000 bonus for intensive care and operating room nurses, other nurses in indiana and pennsylvania offer ac signing bonus. joining us the president of the american nurse's association. dr. earnest grant. his group sent a letter to the u.s. health and human services
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aurnling them to declare the staffing shortage a national crisis. thank you for being with us. so if you can layout if the starkest terms you can how serious this problem is, what it means for our hospitals. >> well, thank you very much nor having me. i would go so far as to say this is a significant crisis in that we are having nurses who are leaving the profession. nurses choosing to retire early and of course there was a shortage before the pandemic struck. so you can see that we're being hit on all sides as a result of this and this is something the solution is not a one size fits all. because nurses can't fix this alone. so we're calling on the government and the private sector to engage and respond. we expect the secretary to respond to the letter that we sent. >> dr. grant, what does it mean to engage and respond, what
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would you like to see what happened? what would keep more nurses in the hospital or recruit new furss into the profession? >> there the a need for short term and long-term. short time we need more nurses at the bedside. it's simple. we can do our part to get vaccinated and drive down the virus so more work force nurse u nurses are able to care for other illnesses that are still needing care, such as when you have a heart attack or you need to have surgery or things of that sort. those are things that hospitals are not necessarily being able to devote a lot of resources to, now they're filling one covid patients. nurse are quickly tired mentally and physically from the first few surges that happened as a result of the pandemic. now we're going into a fourth
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surge, it's just really emotionally and draining for them as well. i hear from nurses every day, they just can't take it anymore. they're going to have the leave because of their own mental health and, of course, right now, we need to do everything we can to try to relieve the pressure that is coming on nurses. so that's sort of a short-term fix. long term, i think by working together, we can come one some strategies that would help to increase funds for nursing education. so that we can get more nurses out there. also, there is the need for nurses to have a significant investment in who we are and to have you know full scope of practice. we shouldn't be included in the room and board as a profession. we need to have our own stand-alone ability to be seen as a profession. not you know rattled up in the room and board costs.
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>> we certainly understand the burnout. they have been working around clock as we said with our earlier guests. this is a difficult job in the best of times. let alone on the front lines of the pandemic, a 24/7 effort to keep people health years save lives and often be at the bedside of people dying who cannot be with their families. so as this shortage sets in, what to the specific implications in an icu, what does it mean for a hospital to be struggling tof enough nurses. >> what it means if you come to the hospital or emergency room and expect the care you traditionally were used to getting. you are not going to get that now. as a result of that you know, nurses because of how tired they are, there is an increased chance of mistakes or medication errors or the quality of care that you are used to getting is going to go down. we don't want that. we want to continue to maintain that high quality of care.
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but that's hard to do when you are taking care of more patients with less staff. so it's extremely important that we begin to work on these issues now, so that we can correct the healthcare system going into the future. >> dr. grant, mike barnicle is here with a question for you. mike. >> dr. grant, willie just described quite accurately and vividly the ramifications of burnout among nurses, but there seems to be a new concept arising in medical care among nurses, the concept of travel nurses, nurses who are not necessarily from a hospital or a region where they are working. how is that, first of all, tell us about it and how is it working out? >> reporter: well, travel nurses means that a nurse would choose to leave their current employer and he or she would join a company that would sponsor them
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if you will no work at another hospital. as a result of that they are paid anywhere from three-to-four or larger times their hourly salary rate. i've seen in cases where nurses can make $5,000 per week. are you robbing pe tore to pay paul. you are creating the shortage where they work at another institution and, of course, that forces the institution where they were at to now try to get more travelers to come in also. so that's, there is a, it's almost like a dog trying to catch his tail so to speak. i understand the need to do that. unfortunately, that creates dissatisfaction among nurse was remain loyal to the institution and yes, they are getting bonuses an things of that sort as well. but their salaries are nowhere near what hospitals are paying that travel nurse to come in.
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so that creates, you know, a work environment that's not really all that conducive to good collegial working relationship. >> just doing heroic work every minute of every day in those icus and emergency rooms. please pass along our gratitude. i know it doesn't much to allay their exhaustion. this country is so thankful for them. the american nurses association, dr. earnest grant, thank you very much. >> thank you. joining us, democratic congressman max rose of new york. he recently finished a six-month stint as a senior adviser on covid-19 to the secretary of defence. he is also a veteran of the war in afghanistan, a recipient of the bronze star and purple heart. so great to see you. tell me about this role you play at the pentagon and covid-19 response what do you think as
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you look out across the country? we had it bad as you know anybody in new york with the advent of the vaccine, we felt like, okay, maybe we will push through this. here comes the delta variant in a country in many states that isn't getting vaccinated. where are we? what is the pentagon doing to help in. >> it's great to see you as well. as we move from crisis to crisis over the course of the past year-and-a-half, it's difficult for us to stop and think about all that we have accomplished, but especially over the course of the last nine months or so, it has been absolutely extraordinary, an unprecedented vaccination effort. one in which the department of defense played an unprecedented role setting up vaccination stadiums for all intents and purposes across the nation. but it is important now we take a step back and think not just how do we address this crisis? how do we prepare for the future. the truth of the matter is covid
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is a crisis of medical staff as your segment previously just outlined. it's a crisis of hospital capacity and it is a supply chain crimes we all remember we didn't have enough testing supplies and reagents. the list goes on and on. we need to invest as a nation preventing this from happening again, and that means dramatically scaling up each of those resources which we have the capacity to do. think about what we did after 9/11. the last 20 years we have been investing in counterterrorism operations and counterterrorism infrastructure, a security infrastructure. we need a similar plan, equally robust plan for pandemic preparedness. >> max, what's it like in staten island in terms of vaccine hesitancy, people getting it. obviously new york city has high vaccination rate broadly. another on the streets talking to people. for those who are hesitant, have been skeptical about the vaccine, did fda approval help,
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did seeing people they know, people they love contract the disease, did that change their minds at all? what's the energy, what are people feeling about the vaccine right now? >> well, this is not just an issue of vaccine hesitancy. i don't think we do this issue justice if you think of it just that manner. at times it is an issue about vaccine encouragement as well. certainly fda approval helped, but when we saw at the pentagon seeking a vaccinated group of hard to reach younger people, you have to make this thing as accessible as possible, often encourage individuals to do so via a myriad of different tools and lastly i think it is really important that we are patient with individuals as they make these very important medical decisions and point them to not just their personal responsibility but also the collective responsibility here. if we do not continue to evacuate individuals at
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increased rates, we will see our hospitals get overloaded. we will see our medical staff burned out, and increasingly see more medical facilities unable to provide other critical services. getting vaccinated is a matter of public service and that is something, staten island and communities across the nation, people understand and they will respond to it. >> max, want to ask you about afghanistan, a place you served and earned a purple heart. you earned the bronze star as well. what were your feelings, emotions, thoughts on policy as president biden met that august 31st deadline and the last american troops left that country. did joe biden make the right call? >> in a word, yes, he did. look, willie, we've spoken about this before. i've got the scars of this war on my body, on my soul. i have seen people who i absolutely love get hurt in
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afghanistan so this is personal and the last month has been in a way triggering but i won't let that emotion cloud my reasoning here. president biden did the absolute right thing and we're all safer as a result. we have basically three different groups of camps now. we have those that supported the decision, those who previously supported donald trump in his vision of leaving afghanistan and now they flip flopped, those people are frauds, and then we see this resurgence of this foreign policy establishment blob who apparently think that we were all born yesterday. they're saying no, we could have turned afghanistan into japan or korea or germany, we just needed to stay a little longer. they're saying the afghan national army was just about to turn the corner and now they're saying we are as unsafe as we were pre9/11. it is simple now. afghanistan is one of roughly 20
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different nations across the world from africa to asia to middle east where terrorists could constitute. we shouldn't perpetually occupy each and every one of those nations, we should have and we do, have a global counterterrorism infrastructure that can respond to threats wherever they come. we have to be amenable as we have been to working with bad actors to fight evil actors such as the taliban if the opportunity presents itself. that doesn't mean we should trust them, it means we should do everything we can to keep the home land safe. lastly, disabuse ourselves of the notion that somehow our decision to leave afghanistan is in the interests of china or russia or our peer threats. they have a destabilized environment in their backyard. it was a tough decision, it was the right decision, the decision previous presidents were unwilling to do, i think history will be on the president's side.
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>> max, mike barnicle has a question for you. >> max, the scars that you mentioned, the scars of afghanistan, your personal scars and our nation's scars, talk about someone you know or knew who made impact on you in afghanistan? >> you know, i often think about a noncommissioned officer named sergeant richard mcgall. he is still in the military. he will be upset with me after this for having spoken about him. when he was a young service member in iraq, his vehicle hit an efp and nearly severed his leg. he was offered full time disability for the rest of his life and instead rejected that and decided to stay in the military and deploy over and over and over again. i had the honor of serving with
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him in afghanistan. what he will be the first to tell you is that he doesn't think he is anything special. he is. but there are hundreds if not thousands, there are thousands of others just like him who we over the course of the last 20 years asked more of than we ever asked of anyone in the history of our nation. five, six, seven, eight deployments. i deployed once. that's nothing. this country is capable of so much. our service members, member and women in uniform, we live amongst heroes. and i believe when we make smart and rational, forward thinking geopolitical decisions like this president just made that pay honor to their service, that that is truly, truly how we can treat them as the most precious resource that they are. >> max, you served alongside many afghans during your tour
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there. they're having trouble getting out of the country, even with special immigrant visas. the state department said they had to make tough choices and couldn't get them out. you understood a promise they would be taken care of after the end of the war for all they sacrificed and for fighting alongside men like you. >> i think back to when my vehicle hit an improvised explosive device. i woke up in the arms of my interpreter. these who we served with, i assure you, the enemy did not differentiate between us and them. they put their lives on the line, and when so many of us went home at the conclusion of our deployment, they stayed at war. their service knew no bounds and what we see now after the most significant evacuation in the history of the world is that thousands, hundreds of thousands
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of them in the future will know freedom they could never have even dreamed of. we have got to do everything possible to continue to invest in this program and we have to make it far, far less bureaucratic. it took too long, too much paperwork. i don't know if you looked at this paperwork, it was ridiculously complex. we have to learn from this and make sure not to make this process nearly as arduous as it has been. >> a lot of those people worried about falling into the hands of the taliban. former congressman max rose, veteran of the war in afghanistan, recipient of the bronze star and purple heart. always great to see you, max. >> great to see you as well, my friend. >> and that does it for us this morning. we are back tomorrow morning. stephanie ruhle picks up coverage after a quick final break. e picks up coverage after a quick final break.
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savor your summer with lincoln. hi there, i am stephanie ruhle. september 2nd. we have to start with breaking news and state of emergency in the northeast as remnants of hurricane ida rage across the region. at least nine weather related deaths, including a toddler, have been recorded in new york city and new jersey with flash floods drenching the area overnight, along with reports of tornadoes. fire and rescue crews in the region responding to multiple water rescues and vauktsz from the rush in waters. fdny deploying five vehicles brought in after hurricane sandy for water rescues on flooded roads. a first ever flash flood emergency declared in new york city, the city banning

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