that are needed. vaccine, other supplies that are needed, and the president made a direct pitch to congress to do more so the u.s. can be prepared for the next wave and to keep the treatments and vaccines free. >> if congress fails to act we won't have the supply we need this fall to ensure the shots are available free, easily accessible for all americans. even worse, if we need a different vaccine for the future to combat a new variant, we will not have enough money to purchase it. we cannot allow that to happen. congress, we need to secure additional supply now. now. we can't wait until we find ourselves in the midst of another surge to act. it will be too late. >> one of the things the government has been able to do both in the trump era and in the biden period has been using the buying power of the federal

government to buy from the drug companies that have made these vaccines and have created the ppe and the tools we have been living with the last couple of years during the pandemic, buying them early to have them available and to have the stockpile ready and as that runs out that puts the country at risk if there is another big surge. >> okay, doctor, let's talk about the booster. it's being authorized for those in the older age group and those with immuno -- who are immunocompromised. how effective is the fourth shot? what is the data behind it? and there are going to be those asking why they are not able to get a shot if they are in the younger group? >> people with high risk of complications, the third dose wears off. it's not uniform, not the entire population, it's the elderly and immunocompromised. that's why you see a little bit

of a targeting of this booster versus other boosters. the fda approved it for people above the age of 50 and it's more narrowly indicated for those above 65 and 75 as well as those immunocompromised. it's important to remember the goal of the vaccine campaign is not to prevent all infections but severe infections and that's why boosters are best targeted. they are doing it somewhat with the fourth booster and we have to be clear about what we are trying to do, and it's not to prevent every infection but to focus on where the infection has waned. >> my husband and son got it, and i never got it, even though there was not masking in my household. it seems like there's some protection that stays on from the vaccine. he had no symptoms. is the experience that we had an

amattic of the population? is it just not as severe? >> that's definitely the case. when you are fully vaccinated you are kind of shifting the virus to the milder of the symptoms, and that's been the goal of the vaccines. we are trying to make this virus more manageable, much like the viruses year in and year out. it's the immunocompromised population we worry about. for healthy people, i think they can go about their lives free from the worry that they are going to get severe covid because the vaccine removed that capacity. >> we found it was the fact that i had to stay home for as long as i did, so i didn't get anybody sick here, so if anybody has wondered where i have been for the past week, it's been at home taking care of my kids.

thank you both. coming up, which republican senator just said that they would vote yes to ketanji brown jackson? what will jared kushner tell the january 6th committee tomorrow? ♪ well, the stock is bubbling in the pot ♪ ♪ just till they taste what we've got ♪ [ tires squeal, crash ] when owning a small business gets real, progressive gets you right back to living the dream. now, where were we? [ cheering ] (woman) oh. oh! hi there. you're jonathan, right? the 995 plan! yes, from colonial penn. your 995 plan fits my budget just right. excuse me? aren't you jonathan from tv, that 995 plan? yes, from colonial penn. i love your lifetime rate lock. that's what sold me. she thinks you're jonathan, with the 995 plan. -are you? -yes, from colonial penn. we were concerned we couldn't get coverage, but it was easy with the 995 plan.

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here's a look at some of the other top stories we are following right now. chris rock will perform tonight in boston and it's his first time onstage since the night of the oscars and the slap. the academy will meet again today to consider consequences for will smith, and that could include expulsion. and then the plaintiffs, the families called the offer a quote, desperate attempt by alex jones to escape a public reckoning. in florida, billboards are popping up across the state in

some of the state's largest cities encouraging passersby to say gay. a new ball outlaws teaching sexual orientation known as the don't say gay bill. and then senator susan collins said she will vote yes on jackson's confirmation. also on capitol hill, the january 6th committee will sit down with somebody in donald trump's most inner circle. jared kushner will sit down and it will be virtual. he will be the first trump family member to appear before the committee. joining me now is punchbowl news

founder and msnbc contributor, jake sherman. there has been a lot of news in the past few days. what are you hearing? >> here's what i would make of the jared kushner news, katy. this is the highest ranking aide to come in and testify. he's not doing so under subpoena. that, to me, tells me two things. he's not having a lawyer involved, at least in negotiating with the committee. he's probably consulting with a lawyer and having him present in the interview, and he doesn't think he has anything to hide in this incident. what he will be able to say is what the president was thinking and doing on that day, on january 6th. jared kushner has taken pains to keep himself out of the political world in the post donald trump kind of political order. i think this is another example of that. again, he's coming voluntarily,

which means he will not be subpoenaed. why is that important? they are trying to piece together that day, katy, trying to get all the information they could get about the mood at the white house and what president trump was thinking and doing on january 6th. >> there's a seven-hour gap in the logs where they do know the president was making calls because they have evidence from other witnesses or people that they asked for documentation from, including mark meadows, text messages and such. this seven-hour gap, and donald trump said he never heard of a burner phone. what will they be able to piece together, given there's a gap on one hand and text messages on the other. >> that's the big question. here's the unfortunate reality for donald trump is that so many people are participating, whether trump knows it or we know it or not, and he has aides

who have been around him, and members of congress who have spoken to him, and aides who have spoken to him and people who said in the public sphere they spoke to him. one of the big things that i would say is just emblematic of the entire investigation, mark meadows turned over a bunch of documents and then decided he was not going to cooperate. it doesn't prevent them from piecing together the full picture of this day of january 6th. the other interesting thing i am watching, katy, is what does the committee do about sitting members of congress. no sitting members of congress have been subpoenaed thus far. jim jordan and kevin mccarthy turned down voluntary request for interviews, and we are almost in april and the election is in november, and kevin mccarthy told me last week if this committee is still in

existence next congress it will look into what nancy pelosi knew about the january 6th incident and what she was trying to do to head off the riot with the sergeant in arms of the capitol police, and so they need to get going if they are going to bring members before the committee, and they are going to fight it and not show up, and all of those things might happen and they want to do public hearings this spring or this summer. >> this spring. it is this spring. so that would be soon. >> yeah, we are in that season. >> ketanji brown jackson is now getting a yes from susan collins. any other republicans you are watching right now? mitt romney, maybe? >> mitt romney i am watching, and i am watching lisa murkowski, although i am doubtful about her. and listen, the white house wanted it to be a bipartisan vote and they are going to get that label which is incredibly

important in their estimation for publicity sake. >> any chance of a democratic defector on this? >> no, no, no. joe manchin was the only one who was possible, and i don't think kyrsten sinema will surprise us. i think it will be a low 50s vote for kbj as we have been referring to her. >> thanks for being here. >> thanks, katy. what a school in poland is doing to keep ukrainian kids -- all those kids -- from falling behind. and then a man in lviv putting himself in the line of fire to evacuate ukrainians.

the press secretary john kirby is taking questions at the pentagon. let's listen. >> there's a question about putin's advisers not giving him accurate information particularly about the state of the battle. does the pentagon believe those reports? do you have anything that you can point to that actually suggests that that is actually happening? >> yeah, so on the withdrawal. we have seen over the last 24

hours the repositioning of a small percentage of troops that -- and the battalion tactical groups that russia had against kyiv, probably in the neighborhood of 20% of what they had. some of the troops we assess are repositioning into belarus. we don't have an exact number for you but that's our early assessments. none of them -- we have seen none of them reposition to their home garrison, and that's not a small point. if the russians are serious about de-escalating because that's their claim here, then they should send them home but they are not doing that, at least not yet. that's not what we are seeing. i don't know, you know, our assessment would be, as we said yesterday, that they are going to refit these troops, resupply

them and then probably employ them elsewhere in ukraine. i don't believe that at this stage we have seen the refitting going on, you know, with any specificity. on the reports of putin not being well advised. i will be careful to not get into intelligence, but we would concur with the conclusion that mr. putin has not been fully informed by his ministry of defense at every turnover the last month. i want to caveat that. we don't have access to every bit of information he's been given or conversation he's had, and i have seen these press reports attributed to a u.s. official and we would concur

with the basic finding. but i am not going to get anymore specific than that. okay. court. >> to be clear on the repositioning, the 20%, you are not saying all of those -- >> i said less than 20%. >> less than 20% of what has been a raid around kyiv has moved out, but -- >> has now -- they started to reposition. i wouldn't say all of them moved out. we have seen them begin to reposition. less than 20%, our assessment, you know, today, and we think some of them, not all, but some of them already moved into belarus. >> what do you mean by reposition? they are moving away further from kyiv? >> yeah, they are leaving kyiv and heading more towards the north, away from the city. >> are they continuing as they are moving away, are they continuing to launch attacks on the city? are they launching artillery

from further away still? would you characterize that -- >> i think the troops we are seeing moving away, that's their focus, moving away. we assess as we did yesterday that kyiv is still being attacked by bombardment, artillery fire as well as air strikes. as i said yesterday, there's still a majority of the forces that mr. putin put around kyiv are still there. as i said a couple days ago, they are largely in defensive positions. several days ago we stopped seeing advancement on their part. they were not moving closer to the city. from a ground effort there was no more advancing on kyiv but the air strikes have not stopped, so kyiv is still very much under threat. >> did you say how many total -- >> i want to be careful about that, and we never gave a number on the total, and again, our

assessment is less than 20% over the last 24 hours. they have seemed to start to reposition. i want to hit it again, because i think it's an important point. if russians were serious about de-escalating and wanted to take the pressure off, and if that's the case, send them home and that's not what they are doing. >> there was basically three lines of advance, northwest -- >> i would say from the north and northwest. those groupings are the ones they are drawing from now. >> does that include chernihiv? >> yeah, it does. we do think some troops that were raiding against chernihiv are repositioning.

we think some troops have repositioned into belarus. >> so is it wrong to say -- you are using the word repositioning, and i am trying to understand, and is it wrong to say russia withdrew some of its forces from kyiv? >> if you want to call it withdrawal, i am not going to be argue about the verb. the way they are saying is it they are trying to de-escalate and depressurize the situation, and we have not seen any evidence of that now. >> you are saying there are still using missiles and bombardments and -- >> yeah, i don't know where they are landing. >> this is according to our reporting. the forces regardless of the de-escalation, russia is withdrawing some of the troops

away from kyiv? >> they are repositioning some of their troops away from kyiv, yes. >> do you see more troops going in the direction of donbas as they said they would refocus on donbas -- >> we have not seen the small percentage of troops that we have seen repositioning, we have not seen any of them go elsewhere inside ukraine. all i would tell you is that the russians have said themselves they are going to prioritize the donbas region. we have seen them become more active there in the last few days. for instance, we think the wagner group has about 1,000 people dedicated to the donbas. we have seen an increase -- i should not say increase, but we have seen them prioritize air strikes in the donbas area.

i can't count every single -- i won't count every single artillery shell or missile strike, because they continue to bombard population centers through the air. that's mariupol.chernihiv. it's kharkiv. it certainly is kyiv. but generally where we see them prioritizing the airstrikes now it's in the north. with the exception of mariupol it's largely in the north. it's kyiv. it's still kharkiv. it's still chernihiv. and it's in the donbas. when we're talking about what they're doing in the donbas we know they added now private military contractors. we know they're prioritizing some of their airstrike activity about in ways they weren't doing before. and we know that they're considering other ways of reinforcing as well as what i said yesterday is you know, we can see them make a concerted effort to try to occupy more territory in the donbas.

yeah. >> can you explain what the reason would be for them sending troops from the wagner group into the donbas? >> sure. you have to tell me who you are and what -- >> i'm sorry. my name's liz fried and i'm with fox news. >> okay. >> can you explain maybe the concerns that the u.s. would have about them sending those private troops to the donbas region and their reasons for doing it? >> a couple of things. they have used wagner contractors in the donbas over the last eight years. this is an area where the wagner group is experienced. so it's not a surprise. number two it's a reflection of the very tough fighting that continues to go on there in the donbas and mr. putin's desire to reinforce his efforts there. you guys asked me yesterday show

me how you think he's prioritizing. that's one of the ways we think he's trying to prioritize the donbas region. >> so the department has released its budget and now we're in budget season. you're going to the hill justifying what you want to do with the annual budget. and i'm sure lawmakers will want to know what the department is doing vis-a-vis russia and this new reality of russia being in ukraine and being an acute threat. what would be the department's response to congress? how will it describe what it's doing to kind of counter this new reality with russia? >> i think if you look at the budget itself, and the reason why we wanted to do a national defense strategy in concert with the budget was to show that the budget is strategically aligned with what we're trying to do in this department. and of course china remains the pacing challenge, the number one concern for the department. there's no doubt about that. but as you said, we refer to russia as an acute threat.

you don't have to look any more than what you've been seeing over the last month to see the threat. the kinds of threats that russia can pose to international security. so if you take a look at the budget and the investments we're making for instance in research and development, in scientific and technology, $130 billion. the highest water mark ever for this department in terms of r & d investments. cyber, space, hypersonics, you look at that stuff and yes, it will help us against the pacing challenge of china but it will absolutely help us against what we consider the acute threat of russia. let me go to the phones here. tara kopp. >> with the movement of the forces away from kyiv are you also seeing a movement of equipment and artillery or is it

just personnel that's departing? thank you. >> no, when we -- we're seeing units go. so it's our assessment they are also bringing much of their equipment with them. again, for refit, we believe, for refit and repurposing for future operations inside ukraine. but look, tara, i can't count every vehicle, you know, every ruck sac that these guys are moving with them. but it's our assessment that their intention is to reposition these units so they can refit them for future liebermann, cnn. >> a question specific to mariupol. given the destruction that you're seeing there, would you characterize that as the russians carpet bombing the city or conducting a scorched earth campaign there, or would you not use that sort of terminology in terms of what you're seeing? >> it's devastating what we're seeing there. i'm going to -- i'll let experts decide how they want to characterize it or label it.

but it is obviously devastating. you don't have to look any further than the imagery that your network is showing as well as so many other news outlets to see just how significant the damage the russians are doing in mariupol and the devastating effects that it's having there on what can only be described as the civilian infrastructure. residential buildings. hospitals. recreation. parks. everything. i mean, the place is just being decimated. from a structural perspective by the onslaught of russian airstrikes. kaitlyn, "stars & stripes." >> hi, john. i'm just trying to break down some of the jargon i'm noticing in the budget and that nds explainer. can you just describe for us

what's the difference between an acute threat and a pacing threat? >> okay. we'll try this again. we call china a pacing challenge because in many of the military kinds of capabilities that we know we're going to need to respond to what is an increasingly aggressive china in the indo-pacific specifically and the potential threats that those capabilities mean for us, that we're going to have to -- we're going to have to stay ahead of those capabilities. and again, you look at the budget, you can see the kinds of capabilities that we're investing in for the future. to make sure that we are not just keeping apace with china's military modernization but we stay ahead of it. we are ahead of it now we believe. we need to stay ahead of it. and as for an acute threat, what we're talking about here with

russia is this is a military that remains potent and if you want proof of being an acute threat, a specific threat, a relevant, timely threat, if that's the way you want to describe acute, that's the way we would certainly look at it, look at places like mariupol. look at the question that oren just asked. you can see it for yourself, that they're very much posing a threat right now in this time frame, acutely on the european continent. and that's what we refer to when we talk about an acute threat. megan. >> general walters at ucom told lawmakers this morning that there needs to be some sort of repositioning of permanent and rotational forces in europe. and he said he talked to lawmakers about it. you've said in the past couple weeks the pentagon -- that's a discussion in the pentagon. is that part of the posture review that was completed last year? can we expect in the next few months or this year any

announcements about moving permanent basing around or having different kinds of rotational deployments in europe? >> i'm not going to get ahead of decisions that haven't been made. but i think it's safe to assume that given what russia has done over the last month and the ways in which the security environment on the european continent have changed, and i use that as past tense, not present tense, you can bet senior leaders here at the department are going to take a look at our european posture going forward. now, again, i can't tell you when a decision's going to be made one way or the other or what that's going to look like. but the secretary absolutely wants to keep an open mind about european posture going forward. clearly because of the acute threat of russia and clearly because of the way the security environment in europe has changed. so could it mean more troops more permanently based in europe? it could. but again, no decisions have been made right now. >> it sounds like this has been a discussion with ucom for a lot longer than these last couple of

months with russia. >> it was part of the posture review. sure. when we put the posture review together we absolutely spoke to general walters and our allies and partners as we sort of gamed that out. but of course that was completed well before mr. putin decided to invade ukraine. so we're going to keep an open mind, megan. the security environment is different now. and however this war ends, and we don't know when and we don't know what that's going to look like, i think we are working under the assumption that europe's not going to be the same anymore. and so therefore, we probably shouldn't have the same outlook to our posture in europe. now, again, what's the blend going to be between temporary and rotational deployments versus a permanent posture? we don't have that figured out right now. the other thing i'd say, it's really an important point to make, whatever decisions we make they're going to be in lock-step with the allies and partners. we're going to do this in full consultation. because some nations are simply going to be more eager for additional u.s. force presence

than others. and we have to respect that. >> right. so my question is this has been going on, this discussion's been going on a lot longer than just the ukraine conflict. so are you -- have you already begun some of those consultations and those negotiations with those countries keeping in mind that you've been having this discussion for a lot longer than just this year? >> yes, we've had these discussions going on before the invasion. clearly. but in terms of post-invasion posture decisions, no. now, look, we've been to brussels twice in the last couple of weeks. the secretary has visited poland and germany and slovakia and bulgaria. and in every one of those conversations when he meets with his counterparts there's a discussion about u.s. leadership in the region and what it means and what they want it to look like. so i mean, i'm not going to -- i'm not going to walk you away from the idea that informal discussions are happening. of course they are. you would expect that to be the case given what mr. putin has