saving you up to 60% a year. and it's only available to comcast business internet customers. so boost your bottom line by switching today. comcast business. powering possibilities. when it was time to sign up for a medicare plan... mom didn't know which way to turn. but thanks to the right plan promise from unitedhealthcare she got a medicare plan expert to help guide her to the right plan with the right care team behind her. ♪ wow, uh-huh.♪ and for her, it's a medicare plan with the aarp name. i hope i can keep up! the right plan promise, only from unitedhealthcare. get help finding your plan at uhc.com/medicare. good morning. i'm jose diaz-balart.

right now, all eyes are on georgia. today marks the final day of voting in the critical senate runoff. we'll get a live report from atlanta. in north carolina tens of thousands of people are waking up again in the dark as authorities search for answers in what they say was a targeted attack on two energy substation ps. >> it's cold and i come over here a couple times today to get some hot food. >> moments from now, the suspect in the mass shooting at an lgbtq nightclub in colorado springs will appear in court as the community mornings the lives lost. meanwhile overseas, moscow pointing the finger at ukraine in the wake of a series of deadly explosions at two russian air bases deep inside the country. we'll talk about that with senator tim kaine who sits on the foreign relations committee. and later this hour, a closer look at what's driving a major surge of flu cases and

hospitalizations just ahead of the holiday season. we begin this hour with our top story. it's election day in georgia again. right now, voters are lined up to cast their ballots in today's critical runoff between democratic senator raphael warnock and chalker herschel walker. but officials in fulton county are warning there could be significant wait times at election presints. with rain on the forecast, voters could face difficult conditions getting to the ballot box. joining us now with more is national political correspondent steve kornacki. tremaine lee is in atlanta. and lisa ram, host of the senior producer of morning edition. so at a polling place in metro atlanta. so what are you seeing? >> i am here at a polling place

in atlanta. folks are excited despite the cold and despite the rain. the polling places across the street where folks have been trickling in. and right here across the street, organizers have set up a party at the posts. folks are computed getting everyone ready to vote. the stakes are extremely high. so folks are not playing around here. they are coming out. it's not all about the party at polls. there's some real issues that folks are facing i i spoke to one voter just moments ago. here's what she had to say. >> me being a young black woman, my rights, my body, my voice and me being able to make decisions or have someone to fight for me to make decisions that are best for me and my family. >> reporter: despite breaking early voting records last week

and despite a little fatigue from the voting process being extended this way, folks are excited and may have help are from advocates who want the to make sure they make their voices heard. >> so how is the weather today? it looks cold and somewhat rainy? >> reporter: we have a little bit of break in the rain this morning. it was cold and rainy and wet. now it's just a little overcast and cold it's not a bright, cheery day. no one is excited to be out here, but they are excited to vote. hopefully if the rain holds out, folks will come out. but could get nasty pretty quickly. >> and meanwhile, what are you hearing from voters about their experience at the polls? >> we started interviewing voters as soon as the polls open. and there were lines today on election day. people braving the rain. there's an interesting study that we did. it was taken in the 70s on rainy

days, typically democrats would not come out to vote, but now the trend seems they vote early. if anybody is affected by all this rain today, it's going to be the republicans. why? because republicans generally wait to vote on election day. so that was an interesting note we talked about today. but people are out in full force. we checked with the georgia secretary of state. he said they are reporting lines everywhere. the turnout is larger than they expected. we asked them about early returns. just how soon may we find out the winner of this contest. they just couldn't give us an idea. >> really, no idea? it's interesting because there's been day after day of record setting voter turnout. >> yeah, for sure. when early voting started a week ago saturday, 70,000 people turned out. that sunday almost 90,000 people turned out so by monday, almost

had 200,000 people who already cast ballots. they believe the majority of those voters are democrats. women, young folks 18 to 24. asian americans, hispanic, again, we're waiting to see, though, how that will pile up against republican voters today, who are expected to turn out in high numbers as well. >> so steve, what are you going to be watching tonight? >> yeah, a couple things. we'll call up the scoreboard that will start filling in after 7:00 eastern time here. i think one of the factors is the democrats feel good about what's happened during the early voting period. you look at the stats on who has turned out. it does seem to be a democratic-friendly electorate. more democratic than in the early voting period leading up to the general election in november. that means the question becomes who turns out today. i think what this race might turn on for herschel walker is a

key question here. there were in november more than enough voters to reelect a republican governor of georgia. that was brian kemp. kemp won ease lu over stacey a wrams. there were more than enough voters to elect republicans to a bunch of statewide offices in georgia. herschel walker was the exception back in november. he he finished a point behind warnock. meaning there are a lot of republican friendly voters in november who came out to the polls, voted up and down for republicans except for herschel walker. so with the walker campaign needs to do, if they are going to catch warnock and win this, they need to get those voters back to turn out today in this time they need the voters to vote for herschel walker. how steep of an obstacle? tough to say. one thing you'll hear is this time around unlike in november, brian kemp, the republican governor, has been involved

actively campaigning for herschel walker. the walker campaign, here's a place in cherokee county. north of atlanta here. it fringes this the metro area. this is a core republican county. so you take a look back in november, walker won this county. it was a 50-point victory for brian kemp in the governors race in cherokee county. cherokee county produces the biggest republican porlties in the state. that becomes the question in a place like this, both walker and kemp of carried it, but kemp carried it by a much bigger margin than walker can walker get those voters who were for kemp but not him in places like cherokee county? can he get them to turn out and can he get them to check his

name off? has anything changed that will get them to do that? that's what walker needs if he's going to pull this out. >> so steve, what's the population in a place like cherokee county? are there enough votes to make a significant difference in the statewide election? >> sure. you're talking about in the november general election, the par gin between warnock and walker was 37,000 the votes. if just take a look at this. i'll call it up this way. if you look at this, in the senate race in cherokee county, walker carried it. that's a margin there of 46,000 votes. kemp carried it that's a margin of 60,000 votes. that's a 14,000-vote difference between kemp and walker. how much they carried it by. 14,000. and remember walker only lost statewide or finished behind warnock by 37,000. that's about 40% of the statewide gap is just the gap between how walker did in cherokee county and how kemp did in cherokee county.

so it's cherokee county, very similar size right next door. it's a very slr story. walker carried it by 32 points. kemp carried it by 46 points. just those two counties f walker is getting kemp numbers in those counties, that alone would pretty much erase what warnock got in terms of the lead over walker in the general election. that sounds simple. there's a reason why those voters weren't willing to walk for walker. he has to get them to do it this time around. but the numbers if he can get them to do that, the numbers would be there for it. >> interesting. is and steve, any idea of how the process of of counting the votes how long it's going to take? >> so as a point of reference in november, we called at 12:25 a.m. eastern time, we declared that the race would go to a

runoff. so they have gotten a little quicker in georgia relative to 2020. folks remember how that took a few days to get a result there there's a lot of encouragement from the secretary of state for these big counties to tabulate during the day today. their early vote and their mail et vote and to release it as quick as they can after 7:00. in fact in november, fullton county, biggest in the state, they released more than a quarter million votes at 7:06 p.m. so war thok jumped out to a very big lead in the early tally back in november. walker chipped away at it as the nougt within the on and warnock ended up in the load. you can expect a similar pattern we'll see who ends up in the lead at the end, blue that's the pattern to look for. the democrats jumping to a big lead early. >> thank you all very much for being with us this morning. this morning schools remain closed in nearly 40,000 people are in the dark in moore county,

north carolina, following a targeted shooting attack on two substations over the weekend. duke energy says crews are working around the clock, but power may not be fully restored until thursday. the governor says the attack is raising concerns about the threat to critical infrastructure. >> protecting critical infrastructure like our power system must be a top priority. this kind of attack raises a new level of threat. >> joining us now from moore county is blain alex ander. what are conditions like there today? what are people facing today? >> reporter: good morning to you. there's still more than 30,000 people waking up now for the third straight day without lights, without power, without

any sort of heat. and really as you mentioned, this could be going all the way to thursday. i spoke with a representative from duke energy. he said even with crews working around the clock, this is a the rather slow process because some of the damage was just so severe that pieces have to be replaced. they have to ship those replace the parts from other parts of the country. that's why we're not going to see power restored until early thursday for the vast majority of the people impacted. so that really raises the question that's been growing louder in the past couple days, which is what does security around these stations look like? why were vandals able to gain access and disable power for some 45,000 people. i spoke with a representative from duke energy. i asked him about that. here's what he told me. >> how were they able to access these areas so easily? >> we maintain hundreds of thouls of miles of overhead lines. it's impossible to protect

everything from any type of interaction, but what we try to do is buld a system that is stronger and able to resist outage, but when they happen, to prevent other problems in the sl. >> reporter: he said they are going to be looking at security measures in the wake of this and see what needs to change. he said that it does match up with industry standards. as for what people are facing here in moore county, we talk about the cold temperatures. it's in the 40s. we talk about lights at night. there are oib other things. i asked the sheriff what is his wigest concern. he said one of the biggest thing are traffic accidents. the fact that traffic lights are not working. even during the daytime, people come to intersections and maybe don't realize there's a power outage. ask they breeze through those intersections. he says that's the biggest concern. that's why this curfew is crucial. we'll see it enacted begun

again tonight. >> so many etc. questions for you. this is sufficient an unusual thing. what are you see whg you're locking at this? >> it seems like one person knew where to attack. >> it is not something that's got national headlines, but this has been a trend over the last decade. there was an incident that i remember seeing in a counterterrorism class involving a power station in california. in that case, the power was able to be rererouted, but someone deliberately targeted with a weapon substation and took them out. there have been incidents about the vulnerability of power stations and that extremist groups might attack them. that's really on everyone's mind right now. is this tied to an ideological cause. one of those was a group known

as the boog loo. their concept was to bring about second civil war, try to accelerate war. they are antigovernment. that case also involved a plot or discussions about targeting a substation. so when we look at this, there's kind of three categories i'm sure investigators are pursuing. which is one, is it tied to any foreign extremism. probably not a location that would be hit by a foreign terrorist group. then it's the domestic terrorist group. there's been several plots in this nature. and the third is why would someone know to attack this point? that comes down to is it an insider threat of some sort, shb who knew the electrical system and knew how to take it out. i'm sure investigators are exploring all of these right now. but it does point to the larger problem, which is how do you secure these power stations. many of them off in rural areas when there's a huge part of our

critical infrastructure. >> it's so surprising for civilians to think that a substation somewhere remote could be attacked and that could have an impact on an entire city. this is a hardware attack. >> that's what's surprising. we send to focus on cybersecurity. that's been a big focus over the last decade. especially colonial pipeline was being seized in the past couple years. but this shows the vulnerability of anybody that simply has weapons. legally authorized weapons can conduct an attack that would affect a wide swath of the country. paj if this was done in a multisubstation tags. the parts for this are not ready available. we have supply chain crises. >> thank you so much for being with us this morning.

still ahead, a last-minute immigration reform proposal in the works in congress. does it have any chance of passing? plus tim kaine. but first top leadership from both sides will come together for a special moment on capitol hill. we'll explain the reason for this rare moment of bipartisanship, next. you're watch "jose diaz-balart reports" on msnbc. ports" on msn. you need a better network. 'tis the season to switch to verizon. they'll give you the new iphone 14 pro. (scrooge) amazing phone! (vo) this holiday season verizon gives you the new iphone 14 pro. plus an apple gift, like apple watch se, ipad and beats fit pro. all on us. that's a value of up to $1900. (scrooge) wow! (vo) and there are unlimited plans for everyone starting at just $35 a line. it's our best deal of the year. get the network you deserve and the savings you want. only on verizon. tide pods ultra oxi one ups the cleaning power of liquid. can it one up whatever they're doing? for sure.

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right now, president biden on his way to phoenix, arizona, where he will visit a company called tsmc, which makes high-tech computer chips. the president will use the trip to highlight his economic plan, specifically his chips and science act. he will not be going to the border, however. moments ago, he told reporters why. >> why go to a boarder state? >> they are going to miss millions of dollars in new enterprise. >> now to a moment of bipartisanship on capitol hill. in roughly 40 minutes, a ceremony will be held to honor law enforcement official who is defended the capitol during the january 6th attack. they will be presented with a national congressional gold medal. leaders from both parties are expected to make remarks. members of the house january 6th committee worked to finalize

their report before the end of the year. joining us now is political contributor jake sherman. good to see you. what can we expect this next hour? >> reporter: it's important to vote that some republicans are against this. some republicans did not want this to happen. but the vast majority of congress will come together in a very important institution, which is awarded to historic figures. it's been through every permutation of power on capitol hill congress awards this. so i think this is going to be a big moment for the capitol police. also for the metropolitan police. people don't always remember that police in a number of agencies including park police, fbi, a ton of agencies responded that day on january 6th and kept many of us safe. >> this gold medal, we're seeing folks who are already congregating as we speak.

i want to turn to what congress has left to do in this session in punch bowl this moning. you wrote about the government funding bill. what do things stand there? >> the two sides, we're ten days away from the government shutting down. can't emphasize that enough. congress needs to take some action before december 16th to avert a dpoun. we expect they will do a short-term measure. what democrats and republicans are trying to do is enact a full year of government funding to keep the government funded until the end of september 2023. that would be one last chance to cement spending priorities into law before republicans take over the house. but there's a lot of work to be done between now and then. and the two sides are billions, $23 billion apart in their offer. there's a big gap to bridge in that intervening time. it seems like we will be here through christmas trying to wrap this up.

>> so no cr just to get things going? >> there will be a cr from the 16 to the 23rd. maybe the 23rd to the 30th. they are going to need as much time as possible. this is a huge task to enact a full year of government funding in the span of just 20 days. >> there's also some renewed discussions to try to make a deal on immigration reform. is there any realistic chance of that? >> there's not. for a few reasons. what you're seeing here is the inisn'tives behind this is congress really wants to republicans and the democrats to get something done before republicans take over the house and institute a very hard line on immigration policy. it's going to be difficult to get any bipartisan immigration law into the books if republicans -- when republicans take the house majority. but calendar is the endmy here. there are three or four weeks

until the end of the year. it's going to take a week to do government funding. the national defense authorization act, which sets policy for the pentagon and is a must pass every year for the last 60 years, needs to get through in that time period. a bunch of other priorities will ride alongside the ndaa. but the calendar does not allow for immigration reform to get done right now. >> jake sherman, thank you very much. it's good to see you. up next, we're live with an update surrounding the deadly mass shooting at a colorado springs lgbtq club. you're watching the "jose diaz-balart reports." -balart re. ♪♪ subway's drafting 12 new subs for the all-new subway series menu the new monster has juicy steak and crispy bacon. but what about the new boss? it looks so good it makes me hangry! settle down there, big guy the new subway series. what's your pick?

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the suspect appear in court wearing a yellow jump suit. it's expected to be read the tort mall charges, five counts for the preliminary charges of first-degree murder, five counts of as biassed attack. the question today is will the those me pretty limb nar charges match the charges that are expected to be formally read. there's some question about that. those charges can change. especially when you look at those expected hate crime charges as well. court is just beginning as we speak. i think they are going to bring him up in just a few seconds. there was also some question about whether or not his status would play into the formal charges. remember defense attorneys listed their suspect as nonbinary, using they/them pronouns. there was question about how much that play into how much the charge cans will be. that's what we're looking for. court is just starting. >> steve patterson, thank you.

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12 irresistible subs. the most epic sandwich roster ever created. ♪♪ it's subway's biggest refresh yet! 35 past the hour. ukrainian president zelenskyy traveled to thank soldiers as russia reported a new drone attack near one of its airfields. and the foreign minister says dangerous packages were delivered to embassies in romania and denmark. it comes days after packages containing eyes of animals and explosives were sent to ukraine office ace cross europe. and right now, the u.n. security council is holding a meeting on the maintenance of peace and security of ukraine. joining us now from kyiv is allison barber. president zelenskyy warning that a new wave of attacks on

ukraine's critical infrastructure are eminent. >> reporter: yeah, unfortunately, for ukrainian citizens, that warning is not new. they have been dealing with these missile strikes since early october. there's kind of this cloud that hangs over everyone. cities like kyiv because you just don't know what the next strike might happen. yesterday russian forces fired 70 missiles. they intercepted 60 of those. but here in kyiv within hours of that missile strike, about 40% of this region was without power we know the energy infrastructure was hit in three different regions. the other thing we're watching, you mentioned the strikes that took place inside rusia. we have heard reports of three different strikes. two of them taking place on russian airfields the morning of december 5. another on an oil field near an

airport in russia this morning. i want to talk about those two strikes that took place on december 5th. the ones that were on russian airfields because those are quite significant. they were deep inside russia about 300 miles beyond the ukrainian border. most of the weapons that the western allies have provided are medium range missiles, things that cannot travel this far. russia's ministry of defense says the two airstrikes were carried out by ukrainian forces using soviet drones. ukraine has not publicly commented on these particular strikes, be but if these strikes were carried out and that seems likely, it suggests of the not only a willingness to push the fight to military bases in russia, but it suggests their weapons capability and their ability to use weapons effectively against rusia at a distance is growing. that's outside of what the west has said. from ukraine's perspective, they have been asking for more long

range weapons for quite awhile now. they don't just want to hold russia where they are. they don't just want to take things back to where testifies 287 days ago when the larynx scale invasion started. they want to reestablish the borders since 1991 and that includes crimea. they have this debate about worrying if they provide ukraine with weapons that can hit targets inside russia that the conflict could just become much bigger. nato could get brought into it. with this it seems like ukraine might have figured out a way to use some of their open went weps to start carrying out those strikes. and from the ukrainian perspective, they say, hey, if we can't target where the missiles are coming from in russia, thn our cities are going to keep getting hit with the bar ralk of missiles ask life is going to continue to be difficult and the war will not end. >> thank you so much. really appreciate it. joining us now is senator tim kaine from virginia. he serves on the armed services

and foreign relations committee. it's a pleasure to see you. i vsh much appreciate your time. wondering your thoughts. there's a majority of americans that support supplying ukraine with arms. however, the public is divided on whether washington should urge ukraine to settle for peace as soon as possible. just wondering what your thoughts on that? >> i saw that poll. i have been really gratified by the strong support of a bipartisan super majority in both houses of congress. and as i travel around virginia, we're a very military state with so many installations, the support for ukraine is very strong. our attitude has been nothing about ukraine without ukraine. they need to set the terms for peace. they need to be at the table exploring ways to bring this war to an end for humanitarian purposes. but this war is not equally on

both parties. russia has staged an illegal invasion violating all the norms of international law. so it's thot like ukraine is the party that has to build a bridge to peace. this is really more on russia. and we will more likely get russia to a supply where they will do the right thing if we keep providing very strong and unwavering support for ukraine's ability to defend itself. that's what we would want if we were under attack we would want our allied nations to support our right to defend ourseves. that's where we need to be with ukraine. >> turning to another crisis, you and your colleagues introduced bipartisan legislation to support human rights. what does that mean? >> this is a fact finding mission that's done a really good job under tough circumstances of documenting human rights abuses by the regime.

that mission is set to expire. they are set up with a time frame. and the main toex of this bill that i introduced is get the u.s. to exercise leadership at the united nations to continue the u.n. mission so that we can continue to document and hopefully by documenting reduce human rights abuses. this is going hand in hand with the resumption of talks between the regime and opposition leaders mexico city. those talks led to one positive so far, which is a u.n. humanitarian fund that can be used to help people facing dire consequences, welcome of access to medicines and vaccines, hunger, disease outbreaks sorks there's some after a long period of really no progress in these negotiations, there's some forward movement, but we don't want to take the pressure off of this spotlight that the u.n. has

had on human rights abuses. we need to keep that pressure front and center. >> and they proposed a path for citizenship for dreamers in exchange for $25 billion for border security and an extension of title 42. what's your take on that? >> i have not seen the details my first thought was deja vu. you might remember in february of 2018, we had a bipartisan proposal on the table that got a vote. we had had eight republican co-sponsors. i was key to negotiating it. i was it was protection for droemers in exchange for $25 billion of border security over ten years. not building the wall, but using that money to do security the right way. we had a bipartisan agreement. we also had president trump saying you put a bamp bipartisan on my desk and i'll sign it. within a day after announcing the deal, he in the white house chose to blow the deal up. i don't know how different the proposal is to what we had

before. i'm not sure that it is as expansive in protecting dreamers. it also includes the whole title 42 question, which was not an issue in february of 2018. so the devil is in the details. we have to take a look. i'm always glad when there's a discussion about can we find a path for dreamers. we'll see if this is one that has the right elements to it. >> senator tim kaine, it's always a pleasure. thank you for being with us this morning. >> glad to be with you. up next, flu cases are spiking across the country. we'll talk to a doctor about how effective the flu vaccine is and what it does for you when you take it. you're watching "jose diaz-balart reports." you're wat diaz-balart reports. is totally ! (cecily) you need a better network. 'tis the season to switch to verizon. they'll give you the new iphone 14 pro. (scrooge) amazing phone! (vo) this holiday season verizon gives you the new iphone 14 pro. plus an apple gift, like apple watch se,

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now to the worst flu outbreak in more than a decade. nearly every state reporting high or very high flu levels. recent spike like thanksgiving gatherings and travel. joining us now is sam brock and msnbc medical contributor dr. patel. sam, you spoke with doctors concerned about the rise in hospitalizations. what are they telling you? >> reporter: the headline gives you a snapshot of the picture nationally. doctors are seeing figures that would be normal for the middle of winter and right now we're in early december. they are watching them close pit. it's also notable the doctors say they are sigh seething symptoms that are not just mild. it's not just a common situation with the flu. they are seeing younger people

reported feeling as bad as they have ever have and the figures would back that up. through thanksgiving week, you're looking at 20,000 hospitalizations. that's the highest figure in a decade. check out this. map the darker the color, the higher the transmission rate. most states are in red or purple, which would be higherer rates of transmission. texas and california may be at the highest levels. but now where i am in south florida, they are not seeing the uptick just yet. but they are preparing. the chief medical officer here says they are doing whatever they have to to pivot at a moment's notice. take a listen. >> we're keeping an eyen opt the numbers daily to see if we see big spikes, we can transition beds to accommodate patient who is may need isolation for flu and covid. we're just watching every day and need to make changes quickly, which we're able to do if something does spike up.

>> not surprisingly, the number one bit of advice is to get the flu shot. some americans are feeling a degree of fatigue from covid vaccination, but it's really important. if you lock at the pediatric deaths, 80% of the deaths are from children unvaccinated. >> sam brock at jackson memorial, thank you so much. how effective is this year's flu shot against all these strains? >> so just a lult bit of level setting inspect a great year a flu shot is 40 to 60% effective. the goal is not to prevent you from getting sick. i have patient who is say i and got sick, and the goal is to curve the severity, and we look at south of the equator to see how the flu shot we are giving

out now could perform, and it's about 50%, and that's a win, and only if people get it and the younger patients, we want to make sure they are a high priority to get vaccinated. >> thank you for bringing this up in our conversation. what exactly is the flu vaccine effective at doing? >> yeah, so the basics of the flu vaccine, and we had so much talk about the covid vaccines and mnra, and the flu vaccine looks at the version of the flu, and it's formulated for what we think is going to be the dominant strain across the world, and your body is programmed to make antibodies naturally against that flu virus, and a lot of things have

to go right including you calculated the accurate strain. we recommend people get their flu shot around october, around halloween, and i tell people to trick-or-treat and get your flu shot. the flu shot you are getting today, it might not protect you like in october. if you get the shot, it's 50% effective against the flu, but you can still get the flu and you need to protect yourself. and the cdc recommended wearing a mask again and it protects against flu, rsv and covid. >> yeah, it's a tripledemic everybody is talking about, and it's all around us. how can we tell which illness we

have if we get sick or if somebody we know gets sick? >> yeah, it's hard to tell. obviously there are tests for all three viruses so you have to get to a doctor's office or have a home antigen tests, and the government doesn't have anymore money to pay for, so you have to find one, and you can see if you at least have covid, and if there are not any flu or rsv tests available and you can't check, you need to get to a doctor's office or pharmacy for that testing. at the end of the day, josé, if you have any sort of respiratory illness, stay away from others and put a mask on, and while you are trying to understand what you have, because for covid we still have treatments we offer. and for rsv, we have supportive treatment we can recommend, and for the flu, they are antiviral

medications, and seek out help to see what you need to know. >> always a pleasure. thank you so much for being with us this morning. >> thank you. up next, what the biden administration just announced it would do to provide humanitarian relief for haitian migrants living in the u.s. you're watching "josé diaz-balart reports" on msnbc. a. serious allergic reactions and an increased risk of infections or a lower ability to fight them may occur. tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms, had a vaccine or plan to. ♪♪ ♪ it's my moment so i just gotta say ♪ ♪ nothing is everything ♪ talk to your dermatologist about skyrizi. learn how abbvie could help you save. as an independent financial advisor, talk to your dermatologist about skyrizi. i stand by these promises: i promise to be a careful steward of the things that matter to you most. i promise to bring you advice that fits your values. i promise our relationship

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56 past the hour. the homeland security secretary has extended temporary protective status for haitians already in the u.s., meaning haitian nationals that entered the country before the 6th of november can apply for legal protections, and haitians who arrived after november 6th, it does not apply and they are subject to removal. the administration says it should cover about 100,000

people. >> that's right. it's a large group because so many haitians have fled the dire situation there, and so tire that the u.s. has not run flights there, and there are gangs there and carrying out violent acts on the street as they try to dismantle the current government of haiti. what the u.s. government is doing, and this comes after many advocacy groups called for this, and haitians who have been here since november 6th, they can live here and work here at least for the next 18 months. as tps usually works, they say anybody that comes after that date or comes now won't be eligible, and that is try to deter anybody from making that journey now thinking they can come and live and work in the united states. if they leave now, they could still be subject to deportation. as we also reported here, josé, we know the biden administration is preparing for what could be a

mass exodus from haiti when that country does finally get its fuel supply back, they could see people powering up boats and leaving haiti, and for now those who are here for november 6th can stay and work and live here without fear of being deported back to the violence. >> and for salvadorens and nicaraguans? >> when there's a dire situation, they are able to protect people here and not deportable them back to the situations, and also it relieves the government of having to make the decision of how they would deport somebody back to a country like haiti where they could be attacked on the tarmac,

or they could attack i.c.e. agents on the tarmac, and this really allows them to protect people that are already here and try not to attract more people to make the journey to the united states. >> thank you so much for that update. really appreciate it. that wraps up the hour for me. i am josé diaz-balart. you can reach me on twitter or instagram @jdbalart. also, watch msnbc tonight starting at 7:00 eastern, 4:00 pacific, for live coverage of the georgia senate runoff as results start coming in. thank you for the privilege of your time. yasmin vossoughian picks up with more news right now. everybody, good tuesday morning to you. i am yasmin vossoughian here at msnbc headquarters in new york city. we are juggling a lot at this hour. any minute