headquarters in new york, welcome to alex witt reports, i am cory coffin in for alex. developing at this hour, a diplomatic crisis is deepening this weekend after the u.s. military shot down a chinese spy balloon. in operation is now underway to recover the debris after an f 22 fighter jet took down the balloon, six nautical miles off the carolina coast. china is protesting the move and saying it reserves the right to make further necessary responses. today, biden ministration defending its actions. when >> the president called for this to be dealt with in a way that balanced all of the different risks, that is exactly what happened. as the u.s. has communicated, it is not acceptable at all that china sent this object into our airspace. but in terms of how to handle it, that is something that was done based on assessment of the risks, making sure that there was no risk that outweighed the risks in terms of any damage

that would come. and it was handled appropriately. >> and we are now getting a clearer picture of exactly how the u.s. response played out, at last saturday the balloon was first detected in alaska. on tuesday, it relented continental u.s. airspace, which is when the president asked for military options on wednesday, the president ordered the military to take out the balloon as soon as practicable. on friday, the president was briefed on an execution plan, and on saturday the balloon was shot down. now, the balloons eight-day track is sparking debate and political finger-pointing on capitol hill over the administration's approach. listen here. >> clearly this was an attempt by china to gather information to defeat our command and control, are sensitive mission weapon sites, and that certainly is an urgency that this administration does not recognize. >> the president and united states military did what they did, that is my opinion, very just and very defensible. so the president himself said that i ordered it to be taken

down, the military made a thoughtful decision, and i trust the united states military. >> now we have several reporters in place from washington to beijing to go over all of these new developments in this story. let's go first to deangelis, nbc news investigative reporter. dan, was the balloon able to keep scooping up information as it drifted across the u.s.? >> that is a really key question, and it looks like the answer is no. u.s. officials are telling nbc and other news organizations that, while the balloon was drifting across the u.s., they were taking what they call a u.s. counter intelligence measures. i.e., they were jamming it, preventing it from scooping up information or eavesdropping. so the argument that it was doing damage that is really an open question. if they were jamming it, then it really wasn't able to do much aside from cause a bit of concern, it was drifting across the u.s., it was not posing some kind of imminent physical threat. so the view from the administration is that they had

disabled its ability to cause any damage to national security. the other thing is, they don't know how much of this has gone on previously. there have been several comments now, both from the administration and from lawmakers, that this was not the first time that this had happened. and it may be that this has been happening more often over the trump administration, and because this information was classified, the public did not hear about it. >> okay so now where we stand, could this be seen as an embarrassment for china, given how much importance they had previously attached to the secretary of state blinken's scheduled trip to beijing? >> a lot of analysts to china watchers are saying exactly that, but this put them in a really awkward position. this visit by anthony blinken that was canceled was really important to the chinese as well. and they wanted it to go well, and this probably wasn't what they wanted to happen, and if they wanted to disrupt the meeting, it would've been easier ways to do that. and so it raises the question, where there are mixed messages inside the chinese regime?

and the former head of the joint chief -- mike millen addressed this, let's hear what he had to say. >> it is whether the right-hand knew with a left hand was doing inside china. the -- meeting was attempting to put a floor between the relationship because things have deteriorated to such a bad point, we have had staff talk since that time, and clearly this puts a big dent in the moving of that forward in a constructive way. so this was not an accident, this was deliberate, it was intelligence, and we need to do two things. we need to sort out all of the details of that. more importantly, we need to make sure we can get this relationship moving in the right direction. >> so, there you have him saying, did the right hand know what the left hand was doing? and i think that is really key question. also, the u.s. is now gathering up the debris and examining that and that will also indicate exactly what that balloon was doing, but on the side of the chinese they are

saying that the u.s. was completely out of order in shooting this down, they are expressing strong dissatisfaction, and saying that this was not at all a sort of international customary practice. but i think that what is really a question now is what will the u.s. to? they have a certain leverage at the moment, does the biden ministration sort of say to the chinese, okay, you have got to do x, y, z. you have to apologize or we won't have a dialogue. >> china is saying it was a weather balloon, which brings up even more questions, and it just gets curiouser and curiouser. very good points on the next moves on the administration, dan deluce, starting us off. thank you, dan. was the incident threatening to fracture that relationship? she has more for us, in beijing. >> the reaction here has been a mix of official outrage, nationalistic fervor, and

social media mocking. overall, china's view is that the u.s. overreacted by shooting down the balloon, and it has triggered threats of repercussions from the chinese side. in a statement today, the foreign ministry expressed strong dissatisfaction, and said that using force was a serious violation of international customary practice. note that they did not say it was a violation of international law. but, interesting lee, the chinese statement also says that china will safeguard the legitimate rights and interests of the companies concerned. and said that they reserve the right to further necessary responses. and there has been top on social media that maybe the u.s. should be sued for compensation. now, whether the chinese side wants to escalate a situation they described as accidental, is in clear. a>> a lot of the commentary hee is describing what the u.s. did as an attack, as provocation, but several days and now a downed balloon into this, at no

point has china given any information on who the boulogne belongs to, and what it was doing over the u.s.. and they also have not at least publicly demanded to get the debris back. this suggests that china's options for retaliation are actually limited. >> janis mackey, thank you, and joining me now to provide both the diplomatic and international security perspective, peter baker, chief white house correspondent for the new york times and msnbc political analyst, and tracey walter, former cia operative and fbi special agent. welcome to both of you. peter, first question to you, let's talk about that timeline. an eight-day saga beyond the concern of the falling debris, are there any other reasons the administration or that you are hearing the administration is giving for not shutting it down earlier? perhaps over a less populated areas? what went into the calculation?

all right, peter, you might be muted. let's give you just another second here to see if you can get your audio up. if not, we can move on to tracey. there we go, hi, peter. >> sorry about that, sorry. so the suspicion obviously is whether or not the administration held off shooting it down or even making it public because they didn't want to disrupt that, meaning that secretary blinken was going to have in beijing. but they did not want to cause an issue with the chinese that was public, and only obviously after it became spotted by people in montana and published by the press there did they actually take action. now, the administration says that it is not the case, that the president infected order military options and tell the military to go ahead and shoot it down when it was safe to do so, prior to it becoming public, but that is going to be obviously a subject i think of a lot of congressional hearings

and the kind of thing that you are hearing on sunday morning talk shows. >> you certainly are hearing it and you are hearing about the headlines of this chinese outrage now condemning the u.s. actions, especially as -- reported. now the balloon, their balloon, floated over the entire continental united states. do you think that this outrage is unwarranted or, rich, really given the circumstances from china? by the chinese? yeah. it's hard to imagine that they can plausibly complain, how dare you shoot down our spy balloon over your territory? that's pretty rich, as you say. no bill taken very seriously, outside of beijing. probably not even many people there. but it is their way of being aggressive, rather than defensive. apologizing rather than taking responsibility for their actions. rather than trying to seek any redress on their part for the violation of american airspace. they choose to go on the offense. that's pretty typical strategy by beijing.

i don't think it will win the many points out of their country. >> there are so many questions but the use of this balloon, tracey. some experts suggest the china satellites in the sky than collect intelligence far better than any type of balloon. what is your take on this? what a use is a balloon like this? and is it your thought or expertise on if china was able to remotely control it until the very end? >> so, given my background, i do not believe that this balloon was taking pictures. i think a lot of times, we think anything that's up in the sky is taking pictures. and yes, we have capabilities up in the sky to take pictures of things as small as a license plate. and i'm certain china has his capabilities, as well. what i do think this balloon was doing was collecting something called measurement and signals intelligence, or what we call massing for short. this would be things like nuclear radiation, sonar, radar. because if you remember, what is hovering over that montana area where we do have our nuclear arsenal? those are underground and they can't be seen from pictures. and that's what i believe that

this balloon was doing. i am not certain. i believe that as it entered into the u.s. airspace, that second time, from canada, i think china most likely lost control of the balloon. and that is why we were probably able to jam it signal so that it stopped collecting masks and, and we were able to shoot down of the ocean. >> all right. if anybody missed it, let's play the moment that a missile took down the spy balloon. >> oh my gosh, it's going straight for it. i got, literally, it's going straight for. it i can see it. here we go. oh, wait, it's coming down. it's come down on the ocean. all right, you can kind of see an objects falling to earth. tracey, i think we can learn anything? and just how much could we learn here from any of that debris? >> you know, i have to say, it

was shot down in about 47 feet of water. that's actually great news for us, in that we should be able to recover it rather quickly. i'm not talking about 48 hours, but in a matter of a week or so. and i do think because it went down over water versus land, it served as a bit of a cushion for our landing, and that really could be an intelligence boon for us. because now we have a payload out of this, and we can maybe see perhaps what china's intelligence capabilities were against us. and that actually could be a very significant thing for us in the intelligence community. >> going off of something that tracy just said, peter, the balloon flew over a number of u.s. military installations. any conventional wisdom here on if there is any chance it might actually damage u.s. national security? >> well, i think tracey would be better equipped to say than i would. i think you're right, though. that is one of the things people wonder, why wasn't there what was a trying to accomplish? the idea that it was looking for pictures is really

important, right? radiation detectors, air samples, that kind of thing. presumably, it could give them information that they wouldn't otherwise have. if they were jammed, then it may not be that big of an issue. the question is, when did the jamming began? it was a successful? was there anything they were able to transmit back to china before any jamming went into effect? that's the real question at this point. but it's not the first time this has happened. remember, we are hearing from the pentagon that this happened several times, including under the prior administration. so they've already been able to do this over our territory, it seems, like in the past. not for as long as this particular balloon seems to have been over american soil. but several times in the past. >> now, tracey, in a new column, the washington post david ignatius writes, this is also touching on something you just mentioned. quote, from an intelligence standpoint, pentagon officials believe that the strange weeklong balloon which was ultimately more of a benefit to united states then to china.

so, is that kind of the reasoning that you had mentioned about, if we could take any of the payload from this balloon? >> 100%. i completely agree with that statement. i view this as somewhat of an intelligence when, if you will. for us to be able to hopefully see this intact payload. and i agree with peter, this isn't the first time that something like this has happened and i would assume and hope that the intelligence community and the military was aware of these things happening and didn't know how to counteract its intelligence capability. so i am really leaning towards this being more of an intelligence win for us, and i do believe diplomatically, in this relationship, we may have the upper hand here now. >> okay, so, tracey, just math wise, when you add up the numbers, nothing that china could have possibly gained before the u.s. would have gotten control of that balloon, would surpass or equal what the u.s. could be getting from the

information once it gathers that debris. >> again, this is just my opinion. i obviously don't have actual access to knowing that. i do believe that we will be able to get more on them at this point than they would on us. i do believe that once it entered our airspace, we already probably knew what to expect. because we know that this was not the first time. we know there has been probably about three or four other instances, if not more. and so, my guess is that we were being proactive in how to prepare to counteract the signals, and what they were able to collect. but us now having this pay load, if it's relatively intact, it could be excellent for us. >> peter, what you make of the timing of all this? intelligence officials say that they don't know what might have prompted the chinese to launch such a mission on the eve of the antony blinken track. what's your thought on that? >> yeah, it's an interesting question, right? because if they did this knowing that we would find out, and there's a different chance this could become public, if

they would know it would disrupt the meeting. so the question is, was the authorized at the highest levels? if people know that and anticipating that this could disrupt the meeting. there's also the question that we ask, on if there is some rogue element within the chinese bureaucracy, and the security structure. did they do this with the idea that they could disrupt diplomacy, which they might be opposed to? we don't have, i don't have at least, a real sense of the opaque internal mechanism within chinese government. and that is a question i would be asking, if ideology need to find out the answer. >> all right, peter baker and tracey walter, thank you both so much for your insight this afternoon. we will have to have you back on as we continue to learn more about this chinese balloon that has now gone into the ocean. shot down by an f 22 fighter jet by the united states. why the goodyear blimp got mentioned this morning in the

back and forth over the shooting down of the chinese balloon, we will head back coming up. allergy relief! two pills relieve allergy headache pain? and the congestion that causes it! flonase headache and allergy relief. psst! psst! all good!

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capitol hill where there is growing fallout over that mysterious chinese balloon shot down off the coast of south carolina. right now, lawmakers are at odds over how the white house handled the situation. nbc's julie shirk is on capitol hill for us, julie, what are you hearing from both sides of the aisle today? >> well, look, cory, just minutes before came up to talk, to majority leader schumer was holding a press conference where he announced that he will be given the full senate to receive a briefing next week by defense officials, by senior administration officials. reminder, they did have everything planned for february 15th regardless before this balloon situation occurred, but now with this happening, schumer says that all senators will get to ask questions from the department of defense to

try to find out what happened. he said, quote, and hopefully non political way. he did go on to criticize republicans for jumping to what he said was, quote, premature conclusions. he said he has had regular briefings from military personnel on the operation that occurred. i want you to take a listen to what a republican, marco rubio, the top republican on the intelligence committee had to say earlier today. watch. >> act swiftly on these things. i think that is part of one of the things that the chinese are trying to message is that the u.s. had to see this coming, and they decided they couldn't or wouldn't do anything about it early on. if we were to do that, if we were to fly a balloon over china, if the goodyear blimp through over china, they would shoot it down. >> it sounds simple, i suppose if you don't think about it for more than a second. though the concern, of course, is how do you do it in a way that absolutely minimizes the danger to american lives on the ground and any kind of deviation operation. >> so you heard from the transportation secretary that there are two obviously saying that this was a complicated

matter and hopefully senators will learn more about this next week, but also in just the last couple of minutes, i am reporting now, hearing from sources along with some of my colleagues that house republicans are actually in the very early stages of the quote infant stages of potentially considering a resolution criticizing the biden administration and president biden's handling of the chinese spy balloon. i am told that this is still in a very early draft discussions, but if this happens it could potentially come up for a vote on tuesday, the date of the state of the union. this is definitely submit it will be living in the background as president biden takes the stand with speaker mccarthy behind him. >> it certainly will, julie, thank you. let's join now congressman mark veasey, he is welcoming in, congressman, now what is your reaction to how the president responded to the situation and, now that we are learning that he ordered it shot down as soon as practical on wednesday, do you believe that republican criticism is misguided?

>> oh, republican criticism is completely misguided. and they are just crafters waiting for an opportunity to criticize the president. and i can promise you that had president biden not followed the advice given by our u.s. military generals and he has shot it down over montana and people on the ground were hurt or killed or injured or property was damaged, then zinke and all the other republicans, rubio, that have been criticizing the president would have said, oh you should've follow the advice of our generals and waited until it could have been shot down over a safer place. and so these are people that are just looking for an opportunity to criticize president biden. they did the right thing by minimizing the risks to our airspace, and minimizing the risks to u.s. citizens on the ground, and i support the decision in the long term, we do have to think about how we are going to deal with the chinese. because clearly, i think that

all of this sort of acts that they are doing is in response to taiwan. >> in response, china has said that it reserves the right to respond. do you have any concerns over what possible retaliation could look like? do you believe it is all hot air, no pun intended. >> i think that we should be concerned moving forward with all of our relations with china. i don't think that this specific incident of us shooting down this balloon is going to warrant any sort of action from china, but i do think they clearly want us away from taiwan. they would like to see us completely out of asia, at least the parts of asia that are close to china. and we are going to continue to see them play these kind of games from here on out, because china sees themselves as a rise in power, and they want to show the u.s. and the world who they are. and so we have to think about

how they are going to respond from china here on out, and what is the responsible way to handle this without it escalating into something that could be very terrible for both countries. >> all right, let's turn to the other big news of the day, police reform. president biden and the congressional black caucus have agreed now to move forward on the issue. the chairman of the caucus which you are also a member, told reporters that lawmakers and the president are exploring all options, including some executive solutions. what would a legislative solution look like, in your opinion? >> it legislative solution would look like us passing the george floyd policing reform bill, and there are many amazing aspects of that bill. including things like ending no knock warrants and having a database of bad cops so they can't come from department and departments terrorizing citizens. and also, something that is talked about some that needs to be talked about more, and that

is qualified immunity. a lot of these police departments and municipalities around the country that disqualified immunity, and what they end up happening is that the case that we hear about that get covered on the news, there is a financial restitution for these families. but for the thousands and thousands of people that have been wronged by the police and harmed by the police that, never make it onto any news outlets, there is really no way that these families get in court. and we had a change that, because if they were being held financially responsible for rogue police officers, municipalities would do more to train their officers to make sure that we don't continue to just see these sort of tragedies happen over and over again. >> president biden is gearing up for the state of the union on tuesday, what do you want to hear from the president? >> i obviously want to hear him talk about police reform. we need to continue to work on

this, i would love to hear him talk about how he would like to see even more robust community policing programs from the doj. i honestly don't think we can spend enough money on programs like that, i want to talk about the successes that he has had early on in his administration. the infrastructure bill, all of the jobs have been created, republicans love to talk about the past, you always hear republicans talking about the good old days. lowest unemployment rate since 1969, since before i was born, he needs to talk about that. 800,000 manufacture drugs created that pay good money the president's talk about that. he is talking on his accomplishments. talk about some of these products that have been done and are being worked on because of the infrastructure bill, because he has a lot to brag on. >> all, right congressman mark veasey, we will leave it there, thanks so much congressman, we appreciate it. >> up thank you. >> a dramatic rescue, with a really wild plot twist.

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stories for today. the state department now confirming an american volunteer worker was killed in ukraine this week, 33-year-old pete reed was a former marine who had founded an aid group and had been helping to evacuate citizens when his ambulance was hit by a shelf. a 50 car trained real meant in northeastern ohio is forcing 2000 people out of their homes this weekend, after those train cars caught fire, many of them carrying dangerous chemicals, the thick smoke and toxic gas even forcing firefighters to leave the area and let those flames burned down. luckily, no one was hurt. take a look at this video here, it shows a massive wave toppling a yacht off the oregon coast. the man on board had already put in a mayday call that the boat was taking on water and a rescue swimmer drove straight into save the man, he headed towards the, boatful guess what, that yacht was stolen. the man is now under arrest and facing several charges.

all right, now to our other top stories this afternoon. right now, president biden is at camp david preparing for his second state of the union address. this comes as the country awaits a formal announcement about whether or not he will run for reelection. nbc's gary greenback is in washington for a, scary, what can we expect here on tuesday? >> hey there, cory, this is the presidents first big political since speech since the mid term it is going to be a little bit of a victory lap over the past two years. he certainly is going to talk about a legislation that has gotten passed and signed into law, including the infrastructure law, the inflation reduction act's, and the american rescue plan. and he has got a lot of convincing to do. he is told on this past week in baltimore, new york, and philadelphia tried to sell all of the legislation that got passed. but he has got some convincing to do. i want to show you some fancy graphic we show here that show a new abc news washington post poll out today, that shows an approval rating for the president at 42%, and if you dive into these issues a little bit more, it shows that most americans disapprove of the way he is handling most of the biggest issues in this country. the economy, he has a 37%

approval, emigration, at 20% approval and russia, he is at 38% approval. and, to that point, this speech is also going to look forward to the future a little bit. and what is to come over the next two years. there are things that he needs to get done like the debt ceiling and government spending, government funding, but he also thinks that he wants to get done, like police reform, assault weapons ban, immigration. so there is a number of hot topics them that not everybody agrees with that are going to be coming tuesday. we heard from transportation secretary, pete buttigieg, on the sunday show this morning. and he talked about just how unprecedented a time we are in. when >> when you think back in historic terms to what it means to inherit one of the toughest situations faced by any president since fdr, passed the most significant legislation on our economy in many ways since fdr, while facing the largest land war in europe since truman. achieving the second most

important health care bill since lbj and the most important infrastructure bill since eisenhower, as ron put it, and that was just the beginning of a list of accomplishments. but one of the things that we found is that this is happening simultaneously with some of the toughest circumstances ever, and we recognize that. >> and we are starting to get in the names of the guests that are going to be in the state of the union from congressional members, including brendan's eight of the monterey park massive court shooting hero, the mother of tyre nichols and his stepfather, and the former afghan ambassador to the u.s., roya rahmani. cory. >> all, right gary, thank you. now let's get the latest on the war in ukraine. right now, -- is recovering from a seat of airstrikes this morning and, left parts of the city and rubble. nbc's ralph sanchez is in kyiv, how is it responding to the latest attacks? >> well, cory, ukraine is on high alert. not just in those eastern cities like kharkiv, but also in kyiv, the capital, and also in ukrainian officials believe

that anything is possible as we head into the final two weeks before the one year anniversary of the start of this war, back in february, 2022. that anniversary, when it comes to be a moment of real pride here in ukraine, this is a country that is still standing one year on. remember, cory, people were predicting kyiv, this city, might fall in three days when the russians first invaded. here they are, a year later, and the anniversary will be moment of humiliation for vladimir putin. that his forces have not made up the grounds in which he calls the technical special military operation, what the rest of us call his unprovoked to creation of ukraine. we went to a press conference earlier of alexei -- he is the defense minister of ukraine, and i asked him how ukraine believes vladimir putin sees this upcoming anniversary, take a listen. >> do you believe vladimir putin has given his generals orders to capture certain areas

to complete certain objectives by february 24th? what are those objectives? >> the kremlin wants to reach strategic goal as minimum, to control administrative border of flu gonzaga and donetsk region, that is the crazy dream. it is my perception, and you will see that they concentrated armed forces on the east and on the south. >> now, corey, you've heard the defense minister saying that putin has a crazy dream that in the next few weeks, he will take full control of those two provinces, donetsk and luhansk, and he will expand his control out of this country down near crimea. ukrainian forces on the front line are going to do everything they can to stop that from happening, but they say that they are facing half 1 million fresh russian troops, who vladimir putin has pressed into service as he prepares to

launch this new offensive. cory. >> all, right wraps anti's for us in kyiv, raf, thank you. it's like the guy in the video said, boom. but they take too long for that to happen? next, a gut check on the chinese balloon episode. plus, making the case for 2024. what to expect from the presidents upcoming state of the union address. get all-day and all-night heartburn acid prevention with just one pill a day. choose acid prevention. choose nexium.

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the political finger-pointing is growing over the time it took for the u.s. to respond to the week-long chinese spy saga. >> the president taking it down over the atlantic's quarter sort of like the quarterback tackling the quarterback after the game is over. the satellite had completed its mission. this should never have been allowed to enter the united states. >> how late into january did they already know that there was this high altitude balloon and what its trajectory wasn't why it was headed? and why did they take action at that time? and why did it wait till wednesday to notify or thursday to talk about it to the american people, known people are gonna be seeing this thing. >> joining me now is don calloway, democratic strategist and founder of the national voter protection action fund. susan del percio, republican strategist, and david jolly, former republican congressman from florida. both msnbc political analysts. panel, welcome in, jon, first to you. what is your reaction to the whole chinese balloon saga and the response to it? >> you know, i think this

really epitomizes why, even in all of our partisanship, why we have to de politicize military thought. ultimately, this is a defense and pentagon actions, they were aware of it, it became on radar well before it entered american airspace, and they were certainly aware of it in true king its mission throughout its time over american soil. obviously, they have decided to come down at a time, what they found most safe for the american people. but, ultimately, we don't know that this is the first or only time. we certainly have no devices over china in a given time, this is probably the only one from what we understand that was low enough that it could be captured by civilian cell phones. so, ultimately, i would ask that this is just an opportunity that we try to de politicize and trust that the military did the safest thing for the american people, regardless of how uncomfortable it made all of us, including me, to sit here and watch and speculate about what could have been going on. this could was something that none of us really know about, and that includes former defense secretary pompeo and

marco rubio, who were not read into defense intelligence missions like that. >> exactly how much information was gleaned, if at all, by the chinese government. susan, several publicans criticize the biden administration's response. does give the appearance that they are more angry at president biden than china over this? how does this look to the country? >> well, there are those republicans who are just going to take shots at biden just to take shots at biden. doesn't matter what the issue was. what the biggest problem was the way the biden administration handled this. once again, we found out from the media, and there was questions. what is that big balloon in the sky. instead of the administration reaching out to the public, telling us what this is, probably they have 18 plants gotta take this down because it is not the first one they've seen, so they are very prepared, our u.s. military. and, then brief the public and say, we are aware of it, and

just go through, maybe not the classified information of what they are doing. but you are safe. and that would've taken a lot of staying out of this. >> david, today the trump administration denied a report, or trump specifically, denied a report that the the trump balloon came out three times during the last administration. >> listen to what senator cory booker said earlier this morning on meet the press. >> it is problematic when democratic republicans have won standard for one president in another stand for another president, we should remember that this is now known to have happened under the trump administration, multiple times. and so to create another stated for biden when trump, it seems, allow this to go over the united states is just a bit hypocritical. this is a time when we need to unite on both sides of the aisle, not engage in partisanship. >> do you agree? should more lawmakers be united

in their approach to china? >> they should. it is a present reminder that china is a growing adversary of ours. but i think the important thing here, if you take the factually known during the trump administration and this past rick this is a national security matter, and historically, republicans and democrats should work together in the adamant oversight. asking hard questions of the department of defense and our intelligence agencies, as to what is the impact of this kind of surveillance and how does it fit into the broader intelligence community strategies, both as we are surveilling other countries and as they are surveilling us. it is a national security matter. to jump so quickly to a political question, joe biden's answer was simple. i was following the advice of our most talented and skilled military leaders and i would do it again. donald trump probably did exactly the same thing. he followed the advice of the military. legitimate questions from congress to the military and intelligence agencies today,

but i think everybody moved too quickly to the political story here. >> let's turn to president biden's state of the union address on tuesday. it comes as a new poll finds that 42% of americans approve of his handling of the presidency, while 53% disapprove. in that same poll, 58% of democrats and democratic-leaning independents say that they want to see a democratic party nominee someone other than biden for president in 2024. don, with this in mind, how should the president approach his speech on tuesday? what could he say to install more confidence for another term? >> he has one mission, and that mission is that it has to be very, very clearly stated. what i have done for the american people. he has got a lot of victories. he has got a lot of really, solid accomplishments. it has been an incredibly substantive first presidency and from a legislative standpoint in order stone. he has to make the case of what is done to the american people. not only just dumb to democrats

that he can serve the american people, but also to republicans, if you are criticizing the, continuing to bash my accomplishments, it is not based in fact. he just has to lay out the case of what he has done and i think that could take up a full 90 minutes. >> susan, what should the president avoid saying on tuesday. what will republicans be watching for, what are they going to be picking up on antifa. >> they will try and pick up and rebut on just about everything. k >> but i think, just a follow-up on what don said, i think the president needs to not to say what he's done but what he is going to do. for example, the bridge in kentucky just happened, but what other infrastructure projects is he going to be seeing come to fruition next year. that would be important. the president, i think, should stay away from too much political divide. but as far as the issues go, he has been really good.

he is got infrastructure, he has got a strong economy, he has done very well on foreign affairs, and if he needs to fight someone, he can fight the republicans and say he will not cut medicare or social security. so it is a no-brainer. >> david, before we go, this is interesting. another part of that poll we mentioned found a few americans are excited about a rematch between biden and trump. very few, with 7% enthusiastic about a biden reelection, and 17% enthusiastic about a trump reelection. 30% say that they would be angry with a biden reelection, 36 say that they would be angry with a trump reelection, what is your take away here if you are president biden? to focus more or less on trump and maga policies? >> i would focus on your record. from the state of the union to november of 2024, it is pretty clear, it is the economy, the economy, the economy, the economy is strong. people are feeling the effects of inflation, he is working together under control to the extent that the president can much -- but the economy is strong.

and, secondly, joe biden and his administration want to give a voice and affirmed the dignity of every single american. as republicans chased culture wars because they can't hit biden on the economy, what they do is they demean marginalized communities. communities of color, lgbt key communities, migrant communities, joe biden is protecting an economy for all people and affirming the worth of all americans. if he stays on that message, donald trump doesn't have a chance, and rob desantis has to fight to try and take him on. >> david jolly, still percio, and don calloway, thanks so much for my esteemed panel, we appreciate the time. saving lives at sea. an inside look at what the coast guard is doing off the coast of florida. neuriva plus is a multitasker supporting 6 key indicators of brain health. to help keep me sharp. neuriva: think bigger. we really had our hands full with our two-year-old. so naturally, we doubled down with a new puppy. thankfully, we also have tide ultra-oxi with odor eliminators.

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of dangerously made home made vessels. nbc's, gwen venegas, it flew with the coast guard on that search for vessels, and joins me now from miami. guad, tell most what you saw and what these dangers these migrants are facing. >> cory, we've been waiting for weeks to go in the air with the coast guard, these planes used by the coast guard are essentially the eyes in the sky that work in the cutters in the boats that are in the ocean. it is patrolling a large area. so we know that this here we've seen an overwhelming surge of migrants arriving along the florida coastline. last month, the governor declared a state date emergency to make more resources available. meanwhile, the coast guard has been struggling to cover that area in the ocean. so these planes that go up in the sky for 56 or seven hours at a time are capable of spotting vessels miles away from the areas that they are flying. and, within an hour of getting in the air, in fact, we flew over a group of migrants that had to get rescued from an

island. they tell me this is something they are seeing much more this year since the surge began. this particular group of migrants got stuck in an island in the bahamas area, the coast guard had to send a boat to rescue them and then take them to a cutter. these larger votes that eventually then repatriate them back to haiti or cuba. but, then as we saw this, they were complaining about what their role is, and they were impressive to see the technology that these planes have to test bought the vessels and to communicate with the boots on the ground. but also to see what the members of the coast guard are thinking about. because they are not only trying to spot illegal vessels here, but they're also providing a very essential humanitarian support for the people that get stuck. here is part of the conversation that i had with the cold pilot during the flight. you >> had a case a couple weeks ago where we found people on nausea, the island we flew over earlier, and they basically have been brought there by human traffickers that had been asked to bring them to the mid states, to drop them

off there and left them. they had written sos in the sand, and i had happened to see it while we are flying by, and we were able to drop them food, water, or radio, so they can talk to us. and we could let them know, hey, we are going to have people coming to get you. and they were picked up within two hours. >> now, this particular flight we flew east into the bahamas, then we turned around and came down the coastline into the keys. it is a very large area, and it is difficult to spot all of these vessels, so you've got the coast guard planes as i mentioned trying to identify illegal vessels, but at the same time, they also have supplies. they have food, they have water, they have radios that they can drop these vessels to sometimes save their lives. so a very important mission we were able to see from the sky, corey. >> and able to bring that to us, guad venegas, thank you. coming up, was it too late or just the right moment, the back and forth today over what happened to the chinese spy balloon. balloon.

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headquarters in new york, welcome to alice what reports. i'm -- in for alex. we begin this hour with new fallout on the u.s. military down in a chinese spy balloon. the surveillance device was shot down by an f 22 fighter jet, fly in a 58,000 feet off the