about ukraine and anticipated new sanctions this afternoon. this as the white house is acknowledging what former military leaders and diplomats have saying since monday, that russian's president vladimir putin is conducting an invasion of ukraine. putin telling russian reporters that his troops will not hesitate to act with force in eastern ukraine. >> translator: as for using military force abroad, of course, we signed an agreement yesterday and in these agreements republic, republic, there are relevant points that state we are going to continue -- we will provide all type of assistance, including military assistance. ifs there trr a conflict, of course, if it's necessary we will follow through. >> so far the biggest economic

sanction against putin is from berlin, where the new chancellor, scholz, has blocked final approve of the nord stream two pipeline that would bring russia's natural gas to ukraine. the most formal denouncement from-administration so far has been from u.n. ambassador. with a direct message to the kremlin last night. at an emergency meeting. >> in essence, putin wants the world to travel back in time, to a time before the united nations, when empires ruled the world. it is not 1919. it is 2022. the consequences of russia's actions will be dire. across ukraine, across europe and across the globe. >> and putin's window for diplomatic solution seems to be closing and not likely that secretary of stated blinken will

go to geneva for a meeting with lavrov. he'll meet with ukraine kwn's defense minister at the state department today. >> if the worst happens, then a european nation of 44 million men, women and children would become the target of a full-scale war of aggression waged without a shred of justification for the absurd and even mystical reasons that putin described last night. >> and joining me now is nbc chief foreign corsmaundant, richard engel in ukraine and kristen welker. co host of "weekend today." let's start with what we heard moments ago from vladimir putin. an acknowledge he may be using

military force in ukraine. what do you make of that? it seems pretty explicit. >> reporter: absolutely and it came just a few hours after the state legislature voted in favor of giving him the power to use military force, a blank check for military force, effectively and after this morning, the parliament faced a vote in favor of those to recognize the break-away regions of eastern ukraine. are so, getting support of his lawmakers here in moscow, that is no surprise but we saw that press conference that he had with russian journalists as crucial news from that press conference. he was asked about the crucial question about whether the recognition of that donbas region of eastern ukraine extended beyond the area where separatists currently hold ground, even where ukrainian

military are in the area where richard himself is right now and president putin said it did extend that far. he said not direct quote. he said we don't hold that area right now and ominously suggested maybe at some time in the future. he also described the meeting agreement from 2015 as finished and frankly, that's no surprise. it's been on life support for a long time with both sides really failing to meet some of the conditions of that agreement and huge controversy over exactly what the agreement meant. so, no one should be surprise bide that news. and he reiterated a demand that he said the best thing that ukraine could do now would be to stand down any ambitions to join nato. once again a demanding, a forth

right, an uncompromising president putin speaking on russian television just as he did last night with the long, long televised tirade. andrea. >> and richard ang aal, in eastern ukraine he was saying people seem to think it was life as normal. they'd gotten used to a certain level of russian troops. but putin has been so explis andt all the analysis has been he's still going in, in a big way. this does not mean that the larger invasion they had been anticipating that the president actually predicted last week, is actually going to happen. >> well, people have been living on a roller coaster. and it was a small demonstration a few moments ago when i was talking to protesters out here to support the ukrainian government. every day they are trying to figure out what is next.

what they should do for themselves, for their families. many woke up this morning feeling somewhat relieved that there wasn't a major invasion but now they're nervous again going back to the point he was just making. what happened in the hour-long speech by president putin sitting behind his desk with his several phones beside him, he talked about how ukraine doesn't exist. it's not a country, doesn't deserve to be country. that it's a creation of mistakes of the soviet past that have been exacerbated by nato and corruption. and then today he really added a lot more specificity. when putin last night said he was recognizing the break away areas, he didn't specify the borders and today he said it is not just the areas the separatists hold, it's the entire region of donbas and

luhansk. where the ukrainian government is firmly in charge. there are a lot of ukrainian troops in and around the area. if putin does intend to take these areas, it would be a much more overt war and hostile level of conflict than what we've seen now with putin taking over or providing protection to peace-keeping services, as he described it, to an area russia already has. >> that may well explain why the u.s. officials, white house officials overnight began to reassess their initial reaction, as you know, as you've been reporting is not really an invasion because russians have been there for eight years and it really solidified overnight. >> reporter: it did and administration officials are telling me what they witnessed on the ground overnight, everything richard mapped out is why they're shifting language

and sharpening language today and now calling this an invasion by russia. that is significant and it comes as a president biden is set to address this crisis in less than an hour from now. and it's significant because it will trigger sharer and more severe sanctions. we know the administration is going to announce sanctions today. i am told they will be directed at russia. yesterday of course they announced an initial round of sanctions that were imposed on the separatist regions there. but they are still holding off on imposing those most robust sangszs that they have prepared with other allies and partners. why is that? i pressed administration officials about that. they still want to have something to deter putin from taking the most severe actions. all of this as we've been watching to see what exactly will happen with those scheduled diplomacy and diplomatic tracks that were still potentially on the table.

of course the secretary of state poised to meet with his russian counterpart on thursday. we have been talking to and i know you've been working resources as well. a number officials saying that meeting is now in jeopardy and by extension, that means any meeting between president biden and putin would be in jeopardy as well. they never closed the door on diplomacy but it makes that meeting very difficult, andrea. >> kristen welker and simmons and richard engel, thank you all so much. and joining me is john bolton, former u.n. ama basder to president trump -- president bush i, should say. let's talk about deterrent. how do you deter vladimir putin? he seems determined to do what he's about to do because he's amassed this force. do you see him backing down? >> the president announced his

policy failed. he said unequivocally the russian decision had been made. and yet you still hear today from your report that they count on holding back sanctions to maintain deterrent. if deterrent is failed, the answer is to come up with new steps, certainly to bring the guillotine down on all the sanctions they've been kaunltm plating and take additional steps if they want to stop any further military action. their admission they're engaged in gradual escalation is a further admission of a disastrous failure of policy. >> did this not really start under president trump with his embrace, if you will -- i mean it started in helisinky, which is the first u.s. president to sit down with vladimir putin and then agree with putin that u.s. intelligence was all wrong about the bad things he'd done in 2016 and other things. >> as many commentators have

observed, during the trump administration, there were two different policies. one was the president's policy and one that was being implemented. significant sanctions. getting out of the open skies treaty, not agreeing to negotiate on a new start treaty. i think trump policy was, as usual, seen through prism of what was good for donald trump. it was bad because it didn't show putin's consistent resolve to defend our position in europe. >> what kind of sanctions could have any impact on vladimir putin when he has almost 200,000 troops. has a naval blockade and controls the airspace with s 400s that have been turned on in belarus? >> i don't think we have effective sanctions in place for what he's done in eastern ukraine. i think the nord stream two decision by germany is vastly

over hyped. they're already eu suspensions in effect and german suspensions in effect. all that chancellor scholz did was put a third suspension in force. the sanction that would work. you tell putin that nord stream 2 will never be turned on until and unless all russian forces on foreign territory, not at the invitation of the foreign government are removed, like those already in crimea and eastern ukraine. putin still has the initiative, the momentum. the action is his in ukraine right now. >> one of the red lines this administration has had and our allies is ukraine is not entitled to article 5 protection, treaty protection. and the u.s. will not send troops to rescue americans. there are several thousand americans in ukraine and others who may be on the kill list, the

hit list of resisters, others that he wants to arrest or eliminate. do you think that u.s. forces should actually go in to defend? >> i think it's too late for that now. the red line between being a treaty ally and not being one is significant. but theishi arizona in all issues is would a russian invasion and takeover of ukrained averselyfect american national security and that of its nato allies? the answer is absolutely yes. would people say if russia invaded finland, not a nato ally, would they say that doesn't have influence on american security? you have a negative influence, even if you're not a nato ally and we did not act appropriately early. i think we should have had moerb american forces in ukraine early, not to fight but to train

with ukrainians and to have them see amare within flags, i yunder what that means. biden said there would be no american forces involved and he got nothing for it. >> to go back to the trump years because -- >> why not. >> well, why not. because that's when ukraine became so politicized as part of decisions and conversations. there was one call in particular, the so-called perfect call trump had with zelenskyy, which certainly telegraphed the kremlin they could do what they want with ukraine and american would not stand up. >> i think putin was undoubtedly waiting for a second trump term but he is getting almost what he would have expected then. this is going to be a victory for russia. >> you think what the biden administration is doing, rallying nato allies --

>> it has failed. the president says it has failed. >> it has not failed to rally the nato allies. i was just in munich and i can tell you there was no space between the allies. >> there's plenty of space. the prime minister of italy said friday if the eued to the impose sanctions, he hoped it would not indelude energy sectser. that's a huge hole innato unity. what scholz has done is only a paper maneuver that will last a couple months. we'll see how long that lasts. >> i would suggest the italian leader is not the key player and what we've seen from france, u.k., from germany, has been to at least stand up and be united as a presence, as a nato prest presence. >> i'll agree the u.k. is on our side. >> john bolton, it's a pleasure. thank you for being with us. are and guilty, the three men

convicted of killing aubrey sentenced on federal hate crimes charges. that's next. hate crimes charges. that's next. ♪♪ i'm getting vaccinated with prevnar 20. so am i. because i'm at risk for pneumococcal pneumonia.

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and breaking news out of georgia. guilty verdict on all five counts in the federal hate crimes trial of three men convicted of ahmaud arbery, an unarmed black man in 2020. the father and son and neighbor were sentenced to life in prison after a video of them chasing aubrey in the pick up truck leaked online. attorney general merrick garland is speaking and will moderating his comments. joining us is melissa murray. talk to me about the significance of the guilty verdict. they already had life in prison.

what is the impact of being convicted in federal court as well? >> the impact of these convictions is if they are successful in overturning the state-level convictions or reducing them, they're still going to be sentenced on the federal hate crimes charges, which carry a maximum of life in pris aren. that's quite significant and there's the expressive function of labelling a hate crime, underscoring this is a murder undertaken because of racial animus. >> which reinforces that using this procedure, civil rights procedure, which this administration has been dedicated to doing is really an important change from the previous administration's policies. >> it is 180-degree change from the previous administration. and again, underscores it in a very clear way that this is not simply a run of the mill murder.

not that any homicide is a run-of-the-mill homicide but this was undertaken because this particular victim was african-american and these individuals violated, not only to the point of taking his life but violated his constitutional right but by killing him in a place he had oo a right to be, on a public street in georgia. >> i want to switch gears and ask for your expertise on the supreme court. they will decide whether some businesses can refuse to serve gay customers based on religious believes it's a question they've been ducking since the landmark gay rights ruling. what's at stake in the composition of the court? >> they seem different but let me try and link this up for the victory we've seen in the ahmaud arbery conviction this morning. this case, which as you say, is another opportunity for the court to confront the question

of whether civil rights protekds for lgbtqia person conflict with the constitutional commitment to free speech, exercise of religion and all that. to what extent can these commitments be reconciled? they're both pressing constitutional values. the court has always ducked that. but all the ducking came when the court was composed in a different way with anthony kennedy, who often wrote the opinions, also being a member of the court. kennedy's no long thorn court. and more importantly. ruth bader ginsburg, who wa always a stall wart has been replaced by amy coney barrett. this is a majority that's going to take over the base next year and seems to be much more respective to the prospect of expanding protections for

religious liberties. and to be clear this is not just a case that will focus exclusively on the gay men and women. it will have repercussions for other civil rights laws. if they determine this individual cannot and is not rerequired to serve lgbtq persons, that would have repercussions for other civil rights protections as well. >> and just a word of advice. i know you've read all these opinions. people should reread justice kennedy's majority opinion on his definitions of love and mare mg. marriage. i know a lot of couples include that in their vows because it's so meaningful and poetic. and end game, vladimir punt sending more forces into separatist held sections of ukraine but could he have his eyes fixed farther west? this is "andrea mitchell

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waffling over russia had invaded two provinces of ukraine. yesterday a senior official was saying nothing had changed because russian trooped had been there for eight years. both our next guests said the uninvited movement of troops across a bord of a sovereign state is an invasion, period. yesterday, president biden issued a very narrow set of sanctions against those two regions alone, partially held by russian-backed separatists. and joining me is michael mcfall, former u.s. ambassador to russia and former ambassador to ukraine. let's make it clear for everyone. even as the u.s. anticipates a larger action, how would you define it? >> as you know, i teach at stanford university, i teach on international relations. if country x sends soldiers and

tanks into country y without invitation, what do you call that? that's my final exam question to everybody. that's an invasion. yes, the circumstances about who controlled what territory at the time makes it complicated here. but until yesterday, russia, putin was allegedly trying to have an agreement about the future sovereignty of these two republics, regions of ukraine. yesterday he decided he wasn't interested anymore and invaded ukraine. it's just that simple. >> so, why do you think the white house was beingo ambivalent about it? >> well, a couple of two things he number one, the initial declaration that putin signed, the decrees with the two puppets that came to the kremlin to sign them from these two peoples republics, by the way. i want to underscore that word.

that's the same title stalin used for his puppet regimes in the warsaw pact and there you're showing the signing of that. initial he he did that first and he signed another set of agreements about military cooperation with the two leaders. and? biden administration was responding to that act and then he escalated by invading and that's why they properly have change 234d way they're talking about it and i expect you're going to hear more about new sanctions when the president speaks here shortly. >> ambassador taylor, ukraine's foreign minister is in washington, meeting with sec reritary blinken. he tried to accuse the west of appeasing putin. >> ukraine wants strong support from the united states. for it's getting it. let's bow clear. the united states is strongly backing the president, it is strongly supporting the

sovereignty, independence of ukraine. it will continue to do that. it has been doing that. this support is in the form of mill stare support and in the form of political support against president putin by organizing the alliance, by galvanizing the alliance, by bringing the nato allies along with them. you see the unprecedented support and equipment and weapons coming from nato allies to ukraine. so, president zelenskyy knows that, appreciative of that and wants it to continue. >> and the president was very, very tough that he wants to join nato. now, that's not going to happen, correct? >> well, the door's open, negotiations are there. by the way, i think the president has been very firm. i thought the speech he gave in munich was uncomfortable. i think it was a very necessary

speech and in a time of cries, i am struck by how president zelenskyy has managed to unite the country. this is not a country known for unity. it's a rock and roll politics between the different parties. right now he's unified the country. i applaud what he's been doing. i think he's emerged as a strong lieder for ukraine exactly when they need strong leader. >> and ambassador taylor, you spent time with him. he does seem to have rallied the country. and his foreign minister is at the pent dpaun. he's getting the honor reception today from lloyd austin, the defense secretary. so, they're trying to shows a well as they can real american support. >> and it is very realty american support, andrea. it's exactly what president zelenskyy's been looking for.

he's stepped up. and is unified the country. of course, president putin helped him by invading in 2014 and now a bigger invasion threatened has enabled president zelenskyy to pull the country together. even opposition leaders who are are more often at odds with each other. they are supporting him. the people are supporting him. ukraine is now yienited like never before and they will resist president putin's invasion. >> quick question to you. if ukraine had not given up its nuclear weapons back when it did, would they be being bullied by russia now and what's the message to other countries to give up their weapons? >> it's a hard question. i don't have an easy answer to that. but i think the message is clear to other countries. it makes it much harder to

negotiate given what happened hire and tragically what i think is going to continue to happen as putin gets ready tee escalate this invasion. >> mike mcfall and william taylor, thank you very much. and phasing out with covid cases coming down as the movement to a post pandemic world too soon. that's next. c world too soon atth's next. you got it. and thanks to voya, i'm confident about my future. oh dad, the twins are now... ...vegan. i know, i got 'em some of those plant burgers. - nice! - yeah. voya provides guidance for the right investments and helps me be prepared for unexpected events. they make me feel like i've got it all under control. [crowd] yeah! because i do. ok, that was awesome. voya. be confident to and through retirement. oh, man that is wrinkly.

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so, does this point to the beginning of an endemic phase that we've all been hoping for and if you could tell us more about this booster and whether it is more effective than we hoped. >> i think all we're moving from pandemic to endemic. it's not a statistical difference. the way you define endemic is you go about your normal life. it in no way changes what you do. two years before the pandemic, influenza caused about 800,000 hospitalizations and 60,000 degtss. we said we can live with this. there's going to be a certain amount of hospitalization and death that we're going to decide we can live with and it's not going to change our lives. in terms of the boser dose, i think it's clear this is a

three-dose for those over 65 and high immune compromised and people with cormorbidities. we're going to learn how we can best prolong memory cells because that's what determines best protection against ilinize and i think it's likely we could have protection for years depending on how we use the subsequent doses. >> let's talk about children because there's been delay in the research on whether two doses or three doses are needed and the study group has to extend its period. so, what about the parents of children under five years old? what hope can you give them? comfort about some kind of vaccine being available? >> so, my understanding is this is a three-dose trial for pfizer. they plan to finish that three-dose trial by no later than april. they then would submit to the

fda and the fda advisory committee would review that. we need to see the data to make sure the vaccine is safe and effective before we would recommend approveing it for parents of young children. >> do you think it's safe to begin unmasking in schools, especially in young children, where there's been so much written about being able to see a teacher's face, language. is there a move towards unmasking? >> i think it's happening anyway. in the communities where transmission is high and disease rates are high it would be the degree you can opprotect your child with masking, especially less than five. but for the 5 to 11-year-olds wk who we've had a vaccine since beginning of november. only about 25% of children in that age group are vaccinated.

that's the safest thing. >> that's what you really got to do something about the education. but quickly, are you seeing fewer cases of children in severe covid on ventilators and the hospitals when you do rounds? >> far fewer. every child who comes in, whether covid or with covid, takes a test. and a cup olmonths ago it was 30%. now it's about 2%. we have a dramatic reduction in cases in the city of philadelphia. >> that's terrific news. thank you as always. and talking about appreciation. bringing home gold. olympic gold medalist, nathan chen is back from beijing. he joins me in a moment. chen is back from ijbeing. he joins me in a moment.

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if only it was this easy for us. without a doubt, one of the most thrilling athletes to watch at the olympics was nathan schen. chen. setting a world record in the men's short program and clinching the gold medal victory

and capped it 1/2 a back flip on the ice for the olympic figure skating gala. team u.s.a.'s nathan chen. nathan, thank you so much for boeing with us. we were just cheering you, all of us, from home. i hope you realize the support you have and how extraordinary your history-making skating was. is it sinking in? >> yeah, now that dwrm i'm back in the u.s., it's sunk in a bit more. >> you don't have your civil medals from the team competition because of the controversy over the russian doping. >> so, we had tried to fight for having the medal ceremony done at the olympics before the closing but we lost that case and from here, we're just trying to continue pushing forward as much as we can.

i know evan has been an advocate for our team and sort of being the face of our team right now and from there, we're hoping for the best. this can take quite some time and i don't have concrete details quite yet but hopefully soon and we would love to get our medal soon. >> do you think this experience should lead to some change? should there be an age factor or another factor in the way doping is punished? >> i think the there a lot of different routes to take with different pros and cons. there's been conversation about the age increase for a period of time unrelated to the case. so, i think perhaps this may expedite that. but this is my perspective and i don't know what the actual case will end up being like. i'm proud of my team and what we've done. we competed and we did

everything we needed to do correctly and we did our very best and able to come up with the second place fairly. from there, i think we deserve our medal soon. that's basically where i'm at right now and i think there will be change but to what extent, i don't know. happier note, you w surprised by your mom on the "today" show today. she was so critical to your whole -- obviously everything you've done. just seeing her for the first time, tell us about that. >> it was really special. i was not expecting that at all. i asked her, i had all these bags coming in from beijing, like, hey, could you pick them up? she said actually i'm going out of town for a second and see your dad. i was like, okay, that's fine. i had no idea she was coming here. so that was a really cool surprise. of course i hadn't seen her since before i left for the olympics about a month ago. so it was really cool to be able to see her, and of course i hadn't been able to show her the medal yet, so that was really cool. >> for her, i mean, she was born

and raised in beijing, if i'm correct. >> exactly. yeah. she was born and raised in beijing, and i showed her medal and on the backside of the medal there are chinese characters so it's cool to have that on the medal i won. >> you're going back to school. >> i am. starting august i'll be back in school, two more years, and from there we'll see what happens. >> i hope you keep up your piano, as my mom used to tell me. being a pianist and having watched you in some of the profiles, you were an extraordinary classically trained pianist. >> thank you. >> has music been a major tool for you as an athlete? >> absolutely, especially as a figure skater considering every single routine is set to music. i don't think it's necessarily -- like it's a necessity to be able to play music to be a good figure skater, but it's definitely given me more appreciation for what i've skated to and the general joy of enjoying music. there doesn't always necessarily have to be another intense layer on top of it.

more so i love the music i skate to, listening to the music i skate too. we train on these programs every single day, so we hear the song over and over. we all love the selections we have so it's been a lot of fun. >> i noelleton john did. he was tweeting at you. can we see the medal? >> absolutely. >> can you hold it up? oh, my gosh. >> front side, backside. it is quite beautiful. >> and we all appreciate you so much. so thank you for all the plsh you brought to us on so many occasions. >> thank you so much. >> much luck. >> thank you very much. >> nathan chen. we are moments away from the president's address on the russians' invasion of ukraine. we'll head to the white house. this is "andrea mitchell reports." this is "andrea mitchell this is "andrea mitchell reports.r people. i think most adults will start realizing that they don't recall things as quickly as they used to or they don't remember things as vividly as they once did.

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wait, that's new wait, you're new too nobody told you? subway's refreshing with better ingredients, better footlongs, and better spokespeople. because you gotta you gotta refresh to be fresh we're expecting to hear from the president moments from now on the crisis in ukraine. this as president vladimir putin appears poised to send more russian forces into eastern ukraine. meanwhile, another 5,000 american troops have moved into poland, nearly doubling their presence there as they work with nato allies preparing for what could be a wave of people fleeing ukraine. if russia launches a full-scale invasion. joining us is "new york times" pentagon correspondent aileen coomer. there are some people who thought that was easy, putin just goes into luhans'k and

donetsk territories, russia dominated for years, that's it. but is the real invasion still to come? >> i think the short answer -- and thank you for having me, andrea. it's good to see you. i think the short answer to your question is nobody knows at this point. the pentagon has not yet provided independent confirmation of an invasion. we're expecting president biden will likely call it that when he appears to speak to us. and there's no telling at this point where vladimir putin could stop. up until now you've been playing for weeks russian officials denying that their troops are there to do anything more than military exercises. they've, you know, called the term ludicrous all of the american and the biden

administration's information about what russian intentions might be and what russian troops might be about to do. and now you see that russia has gone into donbas and separatist regions. last week the russian parliament recognized their so-called independence. this is what administration officials tolds u.s. in the past would be the signings of an invasion. face it, once vladimir putin and russian forces crossed over that first line into the separatist region, they invaded the country. whether you want to -- you know, officials in the future can start to define things however they want, but as far as president biden had defined an invasion, which he said was one tank, one soldier, that has happened.

>> helene what would a second phase of this invasion look like? do you think it would be artillery? would bit from the air? tanks rolling toward kyiv? >> keeping in mind that, you know, russia can do whatever it chooses, there's some concern about air strikes being the likely next step, and so that will be something to keep an eye out for. but there's also a lot of concern about cyber. administration officials expect, warn that you could see cyberattacks pretty quickly and you could see a quick attack on ukraine's communications structure, ability for the military to have communications and command control with its troops on the ground, troops in the east. you could see all of ukraine, as one pentagon official described to me, going dark, he said, and that means the russians would quickly seize control of the air space and all of the sort of

command and control-type instruments. that could be something that you see in the next few days. >> helene cooper, thank you. we'll track this minute by minute. that's it for this edition of "andrea mitchell reports." follow us online and twitter. chuck todd and "meet the press daily" start right now. and "mes daily" start right now good tuesday. welcome to "meet the press daily." i'm chuck todd. president biden is set to speak to the nation any moment about the situation in ukraine. how will he say the invasion occurred, what will he say, what evidence will he show backing it up? it will be the first time we'll hear from the president since the white house acknowledged that russia's military actions in ukraine is an invasion, which the president has said