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to show up. for staying connected. the questions they weren't able to ask. show up for the first day of school, the last day at their current address. for the mornings when everything's wrong. for the manicure that makes everything right, for right now. show up, however you can, for the foster kids who need it most— at helpfosterchildren.com a very good day to all of you from msnbc headquarters. welcome, everyone, to "alex witt reports." there's more breaking news on russia's invasion of ukraine. the night falls, and refugees continue to stream across ukraine's border into poland, and just in this last hour, air raid sirens have gone off in lviv, also in kyiv with warnings for residents to get into bomb shelters as the fighting there

continues. this as russian president vladimir putin suffers the fallout from his comments today that he is putting nuclear deterrents forces on alert with european countries circling the wagons to isolate russia, pitching in to arm ukraine and posing economic sanctions and banning russia from flying aircraft over their collective air space, making it more difficult for russia to launch attacks or fly supplies into the conflict zone. also now this hour, the group that sets the doomsday clock says it will meet this week to evaluate putin's comments. that doomsday clock was set at 100 seconds to midnight in january when the russian invasion was a mere threat. now the group is concerned about unintended escalations. putin's actions and comments raising new questions about his ambitions. >> i don't think he's irrational because he's fearful. what he wants to do more than anything is restore russia to national greatness.

he's driven by that, and also by the desire to remain in power until at least 2036. to you will of that is at risk. he doesn't look very powerful, and this is going to jeopardize his ability to stay in power. >> but there is a glimmer of hope for resolution to the conflict with volodymyr zelenskyy agreeing to send dell immigration to the border for talks with a russian dell immigration. at this hour, story lines both overseas and here at home, we have correspondents in moscow, ukraine, as well as at the white house. first, let's go to our senior international correspondent keir simmons. what does it mean to be on alert, and discuss the implications of that. >> reporter: well, look. as well as the war in ukraine, there is a propaganda war, and i think the best way to understand the threat that president putin has again made today about russia's nuclear deterrent about

part of that propaganda will keep in mind that up until now as well as the russian campaign in ukraine, perhaps not going as well as russia had hoped, it has not launched a full onslaught for example on kyiv. so it would be an enormous escalation to move from that to a nuclear posture, and i think what president putin is doing is signaling to nato, and i think that's where it danger really is here. my understanding from a former russian official with ties to the kremlin is that there have been conversations today in the kremlin about whether or not to target supply lines, military supply lines from nato into ukraine, how to try and prevent that. now of course, that wouldn't be targeting nato specifically necessarily, but what it does illustrate is the dangers of an escalation, the dangers that russia and nato and the u.s. get into a confrontation, and i

think that's where it gets truly dangerous when russia, president putin is signaling this nuclear capability. as you mentioned, we don't actually really know what it means because russia's nuclear capability is always kept at a high state of readiness. that is the nature of it. in general, russia's policy is not to use nuclear weapons unless there is an existential threat to russia, but it just illustrates the extraordinary changes and dynamics that we are seeing fast-moving with this crisis. this is a threat of nuclear weapons we haven't seen since the cold war, and then conversely you have germany escalating its nuclear spending and saying it will send weapons to ukraine. that is an enormous change in german foreign policy, truly stunning developments. >> okay. fast-moving indeed. thank you for keeping track of all of us. there in moscow. we're also hearing reaction in the white house. that is where lauren egan is standing by. welcome to you.

what's the latest from there? >> reporter: alex, strong condemnation from this white house against putin's latest move. senior defense officials have told nbc they have no reason to doubt these reports that putin has activated his nuclear forces. they say this is just the latest example of putin creating a false pretext to escalate the situation they have been warning has been happening throughout ukraine. listen to what the press secretary had to say earlier. >> this is exactly the kind of manufactured threats that president putin has been using since the beginning of this crisis to justify further aggressive action. what is fact here is that russia is under no threat from nato, has never been, is under no threat from ukraine, has never been. it is russia and president putin who are taking the aggressive actions. so this is just an attempt -- an escalatory attempt on their part.

we have the ability to defend ourselves as does nato, but i think we all need to be very clear-eyed and call this out for what it is. >> the white house's comments there just the latest example of the west coming together really to condemn putin, and showing a unified force in a way that perhaps the russian president just wasn't prepared for. alex, i'm not sure you can hear some of the protests going on behind me. >> you can. >> reporter: a lot of shouting about stop the war, save ukraine. just another example of this public outrage against what's happening in ukraine that perhaps russia just was not prepared for. >> apparently those protesters continuing what they were doing all day yesterday. they are not letting up. they are determined to have their voices heard as well they should. okay. lauren egan there across from the white house. thank you for that. let's go now to cal perry who's joining us from lviv in ukraine. so many developments while we have been on the air. there's a prospect of a meeting between both sides here, and the eu rallying around them today.

>> reporter: yeah, look. i think there's certainly a hope that these talks can lead to something, but there is when you speak to ukrainian officials a great deal of suspicion. the russians in the past have a history of trying to lure folks out in situations like these, and there's a concern certainly on behalf of the president i think that his security could be at risk, which is why as you mentioned he said he would send, quote, a deldelegation. now the talks were originally according to the russians -- the invitation i should say was to go to minsk and belarus. that's not neutral ground as far as the ukrainians are concerned. it houses russian troops and some of to those have crossed into ukraine. that was a nonstarter, but we heard a couple of hours later they were willing to send a delegation to the river that divides that two countries. the delegation, and we're not clear who will be on it. we've heard from the ukrainian ambassador to the united states. take a listen. >> they attacked us because they always wanted to destroy us,

because free, democratic and sovereign ukraine is a threat to them. that's why for the past eight years they've done everything to pressure us into -- into this, and that's why now they started the war, but again, in ukraine, all ukrainians whether we speak ukrainian or russian, whatever nationalities we are, we are all united right now around one simple idea. we want to be independent. we want to be sovereign. we want to restore our territorial integrity, and we just want russians to get out from our country and not kill us. >> reporter: we talk a lot about nato and the nato countries, but we should keep in mind that the european union is also that border with poland, and that is why the european union is very much interested in violence as you have hundreds of thousands of refugees that have already left ukraine. we know that millions of folks according to the eu have already been displaced and there's a

growing concern that this is going to be a humanitarian catastrophe, and when you look at what's happening on the other side of country from where i am, the east, there has been fierce fighting. there has been fierce fighting in kharkiv, and we're hearing from the mayor of kyiv, and i told you earlier, they are saying this morning, they're still under ukrainian control. there are no russian forces in the city. still true, but he has just set that now the city is encircled. they're not going to be able to get anyone out, any more civilians out and they're concerned that could turn into a siege, alex. >> that is not news they wanted to hear. nor is the news that prevented you from being on the broadcast with us an hour ago. you were hearing air raid sirens and you had to go down to a bomb shelter to seek shelter. have you heard anything since then? >> reporter: no. it's been quiet since then, and these are the first sirens in about 16 hours, and again, we're 350 miles from the capital. so it wasn't clear what the threat is. i will tell you there's been a

growing concern about what they call, quote, insider attacks here in ukraine. there have been rumors running rampant. part of this is a disinformation campaign, and it's russian troops putting on ukrainian army uniforms. it has people spooked and the police checking the army for their i.d.s. it's why there's a curfew here and one in place in kyiv. >> that's frightening no doubt. thank you so much for that. stay safe, my friend. well, joining me right now is the arizona congressman, a member of the house services and natural resources committee. he's also a u.s. marine corps vetera to you. let's talk about these headlines. putin ordering nuclear deterrent forces to be on alert, and holding the talks with no preconditions. we hear russia is frustrated by its lack of progress in ukraine. could these developments be a result of that, and also your instant reaction to hearing what cal perry just reported? this from the mayor of kyiv,

that apparently the city is encircled. how does that complicate things for the residents of kyiv? >> for the residents of kyiv, it's going to be a couple of really, really rough days and if you think about it, they have had rough days, but where the russian army is, they're going to have to either understand that they're going to have to go house by house in kyiv and potentially lose a lot of men, or they're going to start doing really hard shelling in the hopes to have destroying the resistance. either way, i don't think that's going to work, and i think it's going to come to the russian realizations pretty quickly after that. now to the other area about the talks, i'm actually -- i believe those so-called peace talks or whatever you want to call them are designed to calm the markets. right now the russian ruble has dropped almost in half right now. it takes about 171 rubles to equal a dollar. it used to be 81 rubles

yesterday. so i think this might be an effort by, you know, putin to maybe calm the markets, but it's not going to work. as for the nuclear deterrence thing, i mean obviously we should always be worried, but they are always at the ready. so by the way is our nuclear capability, our triad system. we're always at the ready. i wouldn't take that as something we should be afraid of. i think it's more of something that putin is throwing out there because he's just getting desperate at this point, and he knows he's losing the public opinion across the world, but also in his own country, and so these are efforts i think to try to figure out some breathing room for him at least to look like he's still a leader of his country, but right now i think the person that's most in danger actually is putin in terms of not being able to finish his presidency. >> yeah. looking at the brutality of the russian playbook right now, president zelenskyy said that last night was brutal saying, russia attacks everything

including ambulances. the ukrainian resistance yes, still fighting back. it is protecting the capital of kyiv, but what do you make of russia's advance? are you surprised at the fight that ukraine has effectively put up? when you look at how outmanned they are, literally troops on the ground, you know, citizens fighting troops. when you look at the amount of military armor that ukraine possesses versus that of russia, it is remarkable what they have been able to accomplish, but are you surprised by it? >> no. i mean, i went and visited ukraine in december, and i spoke to the ukraine special forces, ukraine government, and i knew then that if given the opportunity, given the weapons that they would be able to defend themselves, and always -- countries are defending themselves and they know they have the spirit to keep fighting especially in a country that has been at war by the way for almost ten years now with russia. so you have a lot of veterans there that are ready to go too. so my biggest thing when i got

back in december was that we needed to make sure that they were supplied. here's what's i don't think russia quite understands. if they're giving you this much resistance now, and then now you're going to late stage to these cities and you're going to kill more of them, how are you going to effectively occupy a country of 44 million? are you going to keep 200,000, 300,000 troops there for the next year to two years? because at some point it's not sustainable, and at some point the people will rise again and throw off whatever puppet govern you install. until the russian, you know, i would say oligarchs or leadership start coming to an understanding of how this ends, this is not going to g well for russia because at the end of the day, they will never get ahold of ukraine. they may capture it, but they will not be able to hold it. >> do you agree with sending more u.s. troops to central europe to protect the nato countries, and is there a scenario in your mind that plays out which triggers sending americans to fight? >> i think right now we do need to send our troops to our nato

countries, you know, clearly putin is getting desperate. we don't -- i don't believe he's a rational actor anymore which is very scary, and he may try to trigger a larger war, and we need to reinforce our allies and make them feel safer. what are the conditions under which we would send troops into ukraine? i can't really say that right now. i think certainly there could be an argument made if there's massive amounts of civilian deaths where there's just, you know, the random leveling of cities, i think there could be a humanitarian argument made, but at this point the most important thing we could do, and the most effective fighters are the ukrainians themselves, and we just need to make sure we're feeding them information, and feeding them the ammo. giving them the intel about where to shoot, and then given the capability to shoot at it, and that will basically i think end of winning the day. >> president biden has said that nato is more united than ever. now we have both finland and sweden. they're brushing off russia's

threat on joining nato. how critical is this entire unification to stop putin? you were in munich last week for a security conference. is the world effectively isolating russia and putin? >> i don't think i've seen this level of unity among -- across the world against one person, maybe since saddam hussein invaded iraq -- i'm sorry. invaded kuwait in the 1990s. the fact that we're cutting him off from our transactional system s.w.i.f.t. with the world system, people are stopping their planes from even coming across borders. this is something that i think has never really been seen, and the fact that finland and sweden who really have always tried to stay close to nato, but not so much so that they end up joining and pissing off russia, there is some benefit. just being close enough is not going to do it, and, you know, i think really putin created his own worst nightmare.

and he has the self-fulfilling prophesy here. i do a lot of work with the finnish government, and they're very capable fighters and that's going to be a sting should they join nato. it will really affect russia. they will actually psychologically affect russia. >> okay. always a pleasure. thank you so much for your insights today. >> thank you. coming up next, what you give up when you are forced to leave your country in the middle of an invasion. a former member of ukraine's parliament tells me her story ahead. a former member of ukrains parliament tells me her story ahead.

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some breaking news now. new details on a big hit to russia's energy industry british petroleum is offloading its nearly 20% stake in the russian state-owned company. rosneft. on the moscow, hadley, and how

big of a deal is this? put this in perspective. >> it's an incredible, incredible story actually, alex. because when you think about this against the fact that everything that we're seeing happening right now, this is a company that has spent three decades investing in russia, and growing their energy dynamic not just with the russian government, but with the russian people as well and they've decided to offload this 20% stake. this is a stake that made them $2.7 billion in profits last year. that's about a fifth of their total profits for 2021. it's been highly lucrative over the years, and frankly when you think about this a bit more broadly, this is a massive blow to vladimir putin because this is the first and maybe most significant so far withdrawal of a foreign company. this is a company that is russia's largest foreign direct investor. now the ceo essentially saying that this is immediate effect and they denounce this. they're calling this a loss. this is essentially toxic property. who is going to buy this?

but at the same point, you have to think about this a bit more broadly when it comes to what's happening on the ground because this is a company that's been under significant pressure in the last couple of years because, you know, energy transition, they want to be seen as an energy company, not just oil and gas. they have been accused of green washing. lots of pressure on them in the last couple of days and this is a man i spoke with just two weeks ago, and i asked him, what's going to happen next? do you believe slad peer putin is going to invade? he said, we're strictly about business. if sanctions come, we'll deal with them, but today he makes this announcement, and he says that it's just not worth it for the company to be there. short-term pain for long-term gain. it's going to better for the company essentially, and they were deeply shocked and saddened. i want to point out one thing about all of this. when you talk about foreign investors in russia, generally they are partnering with companies like rosneft, the state-backed oil company. these companies are backed by the state, and most often they are run by oligarchs. these are the close comrades if

you will of vladimir putin, and the one we're talking about today is a man whose moniker or nickname if you will is darth vader. so when you think about this a little bit more broadly, this isn't just hitting the russian economy. this is actually hitting president putin very, very close to home. alex? >> yikes with that darth vader moniker. anyway, very comprehensive reporting. thank you so much hadley gamble joining us from moscow. also, "the wall street journal" is now reporting that fedex and ups have suspended shipments into roirn. the action reportedly being taken out of concern for the safety of its employees. the shipping company already stopped service to ukraine. ukrainians are flooding into neighboring countries as russia continues their assault. the united nations says there are nearly 370,000 refugees leaving the country, almost half of them in poland alone. nbc's kelly kobier is in the east of poland there.

kelly, to you. >> reporter: alex, these numbers are really growing dramatically by the day. today we saw a train come into a very small station on the border with ukraine full of refugees. women and children, and there were families on the other side of the fence waiting to greet them, and we've talked about these huge numbers, alex, but you really want to put a face and a story to who these people are. who are they refugees? that one 29-year-old man named maxim, he's been working in poland for the past several weeks. his family living in their home village in ukraine. he's a father of three with another one, a fourth on the way, and his family said that fighting was coming within 12 miles of their home. so his pregnant wife and three very young kids had to get out. they made it to the border today. they made it today and they were on that train, and he said he's relieved they're with him now. he's also worried. he's a laborer.

he works in building, and he was staying in a very small flat or a very small room just for himself, and he now has to find a place to house his expanding family. alex, these are the kinds of stories that are, you know, you can -- you can times that by 100,000, more than 100,000, 368,000 people have now crossed ukraine's borders into neighboring countries, and they will -- most of them, the great majority of them will need some sort of support, and it's going to be interesting to see how that plays out over the coming weeks. many european countries have vowed to welcome them with open arms and support them, but these numbers are continuing to grow, alex. we're not going to stop it doesn't look like at 368,000. >> all right, kelly cobiella.

of those 368,000, i want to bring in one of them now, a former member of parliament and ukraine. svetlana, welcome to you. i know you were forced to leave your country. tell me where you were living and what went through your mind as you were making your way out of the country. what did you see, and how did it make you feel? >> i left my -- my city, my home city kyiv, the capital of ukraine, but i didn't leave my country, and i prefer to be an active and responsible citizen and to do something useful here on the ground. i think that without the situation today, we would decide how the next century will develop, and we will either have justice or we will encourage the big nations for further assault, and i think all of us can do something. especially here on the ground, we can be useful. >> in what ways do you think you

can be useful, and i know perhaps just being there, talking, showing your presence. i mean it's the kind of thing drk given your leadership there, it's the thing echoing president zelenskyy, the fact he is not leaving and he's giving ukrainians that emotional support that they need to continue fighting. >> you're right. the president demonstrates incredible leadership, incredible leadership, and putin probably thought that it would be a victorious war in a couple of days, but it turned out to be a humiliation for him, and loss of power and authority. so and today, president zelenskyy is backed not only by his army, but i can assure you he's backed by 40 million ukrainians here. we do not give up. we need more strong international community response, more sanctions, more weapons. we need to make russian people

our allies. we need russians, angry russians standing into the streets and protest against the leader. >> i hope you're hearing news reports. we have been seeing evidence of that ourselves here at msnbc. we've seen the video, particularly uprisings, protests in both moscow and st. petersburg. i should hope you take that as a level of comfort knowing there are many russians against what is happening right now to your country. give me a sense of certainly you have the emotional support there, but logistically, what are you hearing about the march by russia on ukraine, and the ability for the ukrainian military, a citizen military in many ways to be able to hold them back? >> the situation is really difficult. at the moment, of course, i support my contact with people in kyiv and in many other

cities. what we see is that attacks have been increased. tonight for example in kyiv we've heard seven consequent sirens, and people have to go to the shelters and shellings and shootings are happening even with the citizens in the capital of the country. and of course, it's scary. at the same time we see a big mobilization of people. people join territorial defense, and my brother for example joined with the territorial defense in one of the small towns surrounding the capital to protect the entrance to the city. >> i've heard, svitlana, that you are blacklisted in russia.

are you concerned for your own safety wherever you are right now? >> indeed, i was a member of parliament. i was a member of the committee for foreign affairs responsible for legislation against russian aggression and of course, we campaigned against russian aggression since its invasion in 2014. so i was blacklisted. partially that's why i left kyiv. i was concerned about my safety, but at the same time, i mean, this is devastating personal experience, but i saw to be honest, i feel guilty that i left kyiv because so many people didn't leave kyiv and protecting my city, and i'm so grateful to all those people that are doing that right now. >> well, you are very brave and bold, no doubt. we hope for your safety, and i know you want to get in there and do anything you can, and i have no doubt you will do so. thank you so much for your time. good luck. >> thank you for having me. so is it a sign of a

cyberattack or something else? what happened at the kremlin following russia's invasion of ukraine? we'll explain. invasion of ukraine? 'lwel explain. like what you see abe? yes! 2b's covered with zero overdraft fees when he overdraws his account by fifty bucks or less. and 2c, well, she's not going to let a lost card get her stressed. am i right? that's right. that's because these neighbors all have chase. alerts that help check. tools that help protect. one bank that puts you in control. chase. make more of what's yours. at xfinity, we live and work in the same neighborhood as you. we're always working to keep you connected to what you love. and now, we're working to bring you the next generation of wifi. it's ultra-fast. faster than a gig. supersonic wifi. only from xfinity. it can power hundreds of devices with three times the bandwidth. so your growing wifi needs will be met. supersonic wifi only from us... xfinity.

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our best deals on every iphone. ♪ ♪ ukrainians are not just taking up arms in the streets. they are also fighting back in cyberspace. just a short time ago, a ukrainian national police official said that police and cybervolunteers have taken down a series of russian and belarusian government information sites. it comes after anonymous claimed responsibility for taking down the official site of the kremlin yesterday. joining me now, olivia troy, the former top homeland security adviser to mike pence. always good to see you. let's talk about this because ukrainians, they may now be deploying their own cyber forces, but it is now widely known that russia has advanced cybercapability? do you expect this war to escalate? >> it's always good to see you. you know, i do.

i think it's something we have to keep tabs on and be vigilant. i especially think this isn't just contained to ukraine and what's happening there in russia right now, but this is something that we all need to be vigilant on, especially, you know, here in america as well. i think we are a world that is connected. we need to be watching our social media. we need to be careful with our self-protection of our cyberposture, because i do think that these attacks will continue to escalate, but i'll say this. good on the cyber community that is helping ukraine to stand against this, and good on them for coming together and helping them defend themselves. i'm really glad to see people coming together and stand by them. >> yeah. in terms of what you are alluding to back here, stateside senator chuck schumer said this morning that the country is definitely aware of the possibility of cyberattacks on the u.s. by russia. the biden administration working to ensure critical infrastructure is protected. how does one go about that?

what should entail? >> i think we'll be watching our most important areas like our electrical grid, our banking system, our gas sectors and for us personally at home, you know, make sure that you have your websites and personal social media password protected. make sure that if you are doing remote log-ins, make sure that you are taking the precautions to secure your own networks especially our u.s. companies and businesses. we know this is how russia behaves. we know these are the actions it takes and they do this continuously, and there are times where they're not engaging in an act of war on democracy. so i think that biden is fully right to tell people that they are taking this very seriously, and our intelligence community is tracking it very closely. i know homeland security is paying close attention to it as well. >> senate intelligence chair mark warner addressed the ramifications. take a listen to what he had to say olivia. >> if putin launches his full

cybercapabilities, shuts down the power in ukraine, does that somehow shut down the power in eastern poland as well? >> cyberattack is again, one of those areas where we have had strategic ambiguity, but if you see american troops get hurt because the power has been shut off our polish citizens die because the hospitals go down, you're approaching a violation. >> this is important. nato secretary general also said a cyberattack could trigger article v, and that says an attack on one is an attack on all. how much does this concern you, and what can be done to prevent something like this from happening? >> well, i think that's -- this is why it's good that the international community is coming together on this, and look. i think it's been a great show of force against putin. i think he underestimated the fact that we would be coming together internationally against his tyrannical actions.

it's good that people come together, and they need to be paying close attention to what's going on here. >> okay. i do want to talk about something that we heard from you on '60 minutes" just this last week that you said you've likely suffered from havana syndrome. it's a bout of unexplained vertigo, confusion, memory loss, and now multiple u.s. homeland security officials say they've experienced it and it's rather alarming because you think you experienced this on white house grounds. tell me what happened. >> this is something that's really personal to me obviously. it's hard when you are discussing your own personal health publicly, but i think it's a subject of great importance especially since these incidents are happening here, domestically. this is not something that's just solely happening overseas. there are numerous people here domestically that i know of, intelligence officers, national security officials, who have been impacted by this, and i'll tell you this. it's a very, very significant,

unique feeling when it happens, and it's indescribable. it's something that you feel like a pounding against your head. you experience nausea, dizziness, all of these symptoms that i have never experienced before in my entire life until that moment, and a year later when it happened to me again, i recognized it, and at the time i'll say this, i don't think i realized exactly what was happening to me until later until i started to piece it all together, and i've realized that others have had similar incidents like myself including on white house grounds. >> yeah. including in those others, miles taylor with whom we spoke yesterday. miles suggested russia could be behind this. is there reason to agree with him? >> you know, i think that's a topic of conversations across the national security community, and i certainly -- when i look at foreign adversaries, i think russia would be at the top of the list of a possible foreign adversary that would look to

target national security people in that way. >> okay. olivia troye, i thank you for the personal discussion pitch thank you every time you're on our air. you make a lot of sense, and thank you for illuminating these important topics. two things to tell you about. next, we have the shock poll from that conservative conference cpac. the numbers might surprise you, and then looking ahead to the president's state of the union address, it's a moment many of us are going to be waiting for. f f us are going to be waiting for timber... fortunately, they were covered by progressive, so it was a happy ending... for almost everyone.

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breaking news out of orlando. the straw poll is out at cpac, the largest conservative event in this country. vaughn hilliard is there, and who came out on top? >> reporter: alex, the chairs are being put away here at four days after cpac. the straw poll results are in, and on the question of who would you vote for for the gop nomination in 2024, you can see that the former president donald trump still has a significant edge here. >> wow. >> reporter: about one year in which we really expect this -- really the potential of others start jumping into the race. you see desantis who was not here as the former president was addressing the cpac crowd, and you see the rest of the names. an absolute drop in significance or relevancy, and these activists and other elected

officials gathering of about 900 who participated in the poll here in orlando, and that is exactly what you saw last night. the former president delivering that keynote address here to an adoring crowd. >> put that back up. let's look at these numbers again. am i wrong in recollecting that last year at cpac desantis trumped donald trump? didn't he come out on top? pompeo, there's no reason to talk about him right now or anybody else, only 2%. >> reporter: desantis actually, there was the question posed including if trump were not to be or declare a candidacy, then desantis was running far and away here. >> gotcha. >> reporter: sorry. it's loud to my left, but there was a lot of question that was apart of this here, that i want to reference which is, what is the greater problem facing the u.s.? the question was presented to folks, russian military

aggression or illegal immigration on the u.s. southern border. 16% of the attendees said russian military aggression, and 81% their focus and belief of the greatest threat was the southern border, and their words illegal invasion here. >> thank you for your results. much appreciated here as well as following all that at cpac. joining me right now, hayes brown from msnbc "daily." your reaction to the cpac straw poll and reporting right there? what do you think? >> i'm not very surprised by this. we saw the trajectory of the republican party and the way their base was going in the weeks and months after january 6th last year after the impeachment, the second impeachment of donald trump. we knew he was still retaining that level of support amongst the hard core, and that's what cpac is. this is the hard core, we are willing to pay money to go to miami just to hear these people

speak about whatever it is that we're mad about today, but these are the people that are going to turn out to primaries which is going to be important moving forward, but they're not necessarily representative of republicans or americans at large. >> if the director can play the sound bite from donald trump last night, i would like to remind viewers of what he said. we played it once early in the broadcast, but it's been a couple of hours. can you tell me if we have that? i would like for hayes to react to it. here we go. take a listen. >> yesterday reporters asked me if i thought president putin was smart. i said, of course, he's smart. putin is saying, oh, they're going to sanction me. they've sanctioned me for the last 25 years. i'm going to take over a whole country and they're going to sanction me? the problem is not that putin is smart. the real problem is that our leaders are dumb.

>> what's your reaction to trump's comments there, hayes? i mean, defending his praise of putin, trying to downplay the close relationship they had when he was in office. what do you make of it, and ultimately, giving a level of propaganda to vladimir putin by calling our leadership dumb. >> well, first of all, bully recognize bully. he is seeing russia and putin specifically act towards ukraine in a way that he recognizes. he recognizes it when someone who is bigger pushes around someone smaller, and looks at him and says, ah yes, i see what you are doing there, and i think good job. so on the one hand there's that. on the other, you hear him say, oh, russia can take over a whole country and there's sanctions? what you don't hear is what he would do instead. trump in this speech and other times addressing this crisis has said, oh, well putin just wouldn't have done it when i was in charge. he wouldn't invade other countries. he didn't say what he would be doing at this point. russia has invaded, and while,

you know, i don't know if trump is going to say, then we would militarily act to push putin out, if he thinks he can just call up putin and say, hey, you seem to accidentally tripped and fallen into ukraine, and you should leave now, and putin would listen? he doesn't make clear what his next step would be, clear what next step would be. he said, here is the problem, i wouldn't have allow td to happen in the first place. how would you fix it? not let it happen in the first place. >> thank youfully he's not in president right now to be in charge of this. we also have congressman marjorie taylor greene speaking at a white nationalist event. she said she didn't know the views of the conference and didn't apologize for his appearance. what do you make of that? >> i fully believe, i can see a world where marjorie taylor greene does not know who nick fuentes is, but that's why congresspeople have staffers. if her staff looked at the name of the group and said okay,

america first. we believe in america first. let's go and talk at this convention, where it's mostly young people. if she got taken in by a sales pitch, that's bad staff work. the fact she's defending it, saying i did nothing wrong, that's where the real problem comes in, in my opinion. if you can go and speak at a white nationalist group and afterwards try to pivot and spin and say, well, yeah, i did, but i didn't know who it was. and not condemn the things that the person who you were standing next to actually believes, then you are pretty much endorsing that person. and i think that i would hope at least this comes back to haunt her in the future, but given the fact paul gosar is still in congress after previously speaking at this conference, i don't know what sort of repercussions we can expect from the republicans towards marjorie taylor greene. she's still someone who her endorsement is sought out in the coming primaries. kevin mccarthy has really -- while he's not really pushed

back on her or gosar despite expressing these views, i don't think much will come of this, unfortunately. >> yeah, okay. one more question here. i want to ask you about president biden's historic nomination to the supreme court. judge kattany brown jackson. he's going to make that a highlight of the speech, so what are your expectations when he does. >> when he brings her up, i'm hoping she's there, she gets to stand and be recognized by the congress and by the american people, because i think it is important that this nomination did happen before the state of the union so it can be part of the rollout of introducing her to the american public. i hope he emfuicizes she's a former criminal defender who believes in justice for all. that's the sort of rhetoric that should be pushed forward against this gop, oh, she believes in

being soft on crime. she believes everyone under america's form of government and justice deserves the equal right to protection under the law. that is something that's core to america, and i really hope the white house and other democrats really play that up as we move forward with her nomination. >> okay, hayes brown, thanks for the chat. always appreciate them. have a good one. >> new proof the world is watching every move russia makes. kemas. that's going to do ite

on this edition of alex witt reports. i'll see you next saturday at noon eastern. up next, andrea mitchell reports. we leave you with an emotional moment at the start of "snl" instead of the usual open, viewers saw the ukrainian chorus. listen for a moment to the anthem, prayer for ukraine.

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good afternoon, everyone. i'm andrea mitchell in washington with this special sunday edition, and we have breaking news on russia's assault against ukraine. it's 3:00 p.m. on the east coast of the u.s. 10:00 p.m. in ukraine, with the strength of that country's military and civilian resistance to moscow's war machine with government issued weapons and homemade molotov cocktails to defend kyiv and kharkiv has inspired people around the world. we're told president biden is getting regular updates from his national security team. as vladimir putin raised the specter of russia's nuclear force, putting russia's nuclear deterrent forces on high alert. a step immediately criticized by the white house and european allies. at the same time, ukraine's president zelenskyy agreed to meet with russia on the border of ukraine and belarus with no preconditions after belarus's president, a putin ally, guaranteed him safe passage to