moaire dida twoo? -your data, too. there's even round-the- clock customer support. so you can be there for your customers. with comcast business, reliability isn't just possible. it's happening. switch to reliable comcast business internet with security and get started for $49.99 a month. plus ask how to get up to a $500 prepaid card. call today! it is good to be back with you on this second hour of "chris jansing reports." at this hour, we're live in north carolina with the desperate and devastating it scene, still unfolding. homes gone, hundreds missing. and the power is still out for 439,000 people with food and water also running low. the secretary of homeland security alejandro mayorkas will join me this hour.

plus, donald trump tours the georgia city that residents say looks like hell from blown out businesses to pitch black neighborhoods, our look at helene's after math as the death toll reaches 116. the security cabinet meeting amid growing signs that a ground defense could be imminent. we'll get a live report from the region. the alleged gunman accused of lying in wait to kill donald trump at his golf course returns to court to face a new charges of attempted assassination. our nbc news reporters are following all of the latest developments. in north carolina, the death toll alone stands at least at 44. mountain towns like boone are under curfew and classes canceled for 20,000 students at appalachia university. jay gray is in boone. talk about the scene you're witnessing. >> reporter: of course we want to give you a look right now.

i want you to take a look at what's happening here. you can see power lines down and across the roadway, clearly running across there, there's no more power running through these. look at what the water did. the creeks converged, pulling down this power pole. this area was covered entirely by water, and is now caked in mud. you've got homes that have been destroyed, and as you look over and tour the creek line, you can see that water picked up an suv, threw it into the tree there, and these types of scenes playing out all across these blue ridge mountain communities right now. power is gone. that's the biggest issue for so many right now. they are struggling to figure out how to restore it, especially in places like this, chris, where they got to cut away a lot of this debris and get in and then begin to restore things, and in some of the hardest hit areas, what they have been telling us is it's not days, it may be a week or more before that power comes back.

there are communities in the mountains as well cut off by rushing waters. there are clogged creeks that are pushing water over the sides because of all the debris, and so in those areas today they've started to chopper some supplies in, some essentials into those areas. they're running out of what they need. there's no gas in many of these areas. we talked about it. no power, and food is getting scarce, so they're doing what they can to help those they can, but, again, it's going to be a long and difficult road for so many in this area, who are struggling in the aftermath of helene. >> jay gray, thank you for that. from north carolina, we go to georgia where former president donald trump is surveying the storm damage. nbc's garrett haake is live in the hard-hit city of valdosta. we see the former president is behind the podium. what's he saying? >> reporter: that's right, chris. the former president got here a few minutes ago. excuse me if i use my golf

voice. a delegation of georgia officials are giving remarks about what he's seeing here so far today. he toured a command center, he met with the owners of the business mind me, which you can see has been hit quite hard in downtown valdosta, georgia. the damage is not as extensive as other part of the state and other parts of the country, but significant. power outages and a lot of downed trees and downed lines on a day that's approaching 90 degrees. a difficult situation for the folks who live here. trump is bringing in aid, bringing attention to what's happened in georgia. his earlier remarks at the airport were much more partisan, suggesting that the president and the federal government had been asleep at the switch on their response. brian kemp said that's not true. he spoke to joe biden yesterday, and in these remarks, he has been striking a tone about trying to help people in georgia than help his campaign. over his shoulder, franklin

graham, and a lot of members at samaritan's purse, his organization. this piece of the puzzle meant to be less political. the former president is keen to politicize the storm response in georgia and north carolina, critical swing states where he wants to argue that he would do a better job taking care of folks than the current administration. >> garrett haake, i'll let you go back to covering this. thank you so much. and coming up this hour, we'll speak to the secretary of homeland security, alejandro mayorkas about the recovery efforts. to the middle east, and a major meeting that could set the stage for a ground offensive. are you seeing signs that a ground offensive could be imminent, richard? >> we are hearing indications from israeli officials who have been tweeting out, been making statements, suggesting that a ground invasion could come soon, according to the israeli defense

minister. the israeli chief of staff just a few days ago told israeli troops that they would be crossing the border, that an operation would be planned, so for the last several days, israel has been giving indications that it has every intention of doing a push into lebanon. it says that it wants to take out hezbollah positions. it wants to attack hezbollah tunnels. it wants to attack hezbollah fighters on this side of the border, and now there is that security cabinet meeting. no indications that we're seeing at this stage that it could come imminently, but that has been the suggestion, that it could come in the next few hours. it could come in the next few days. it could come in a week. it depends on what you consider imminent, what you consider soon to mean. but the fact that they are meeting tonight, the fact that each day they are making more and more suggestions about crossing the border.

the u.s. state department has said that it has been informed by israel that israel does plan to do an incursion inside lebanon. the u.s. state department spokesman saying it, describing it as a limited incursion, not far from the border. but, again, what is limited, what is close to the border? israel has described its military objective as clearing out hezbollah from all of south lebanon, pushing them north of the latani river. if you look at a map, the river is not that close to the israeli border. it is roughly a third of this country. it divides the country roughly into one-third. so it would take a -- if israel were to create a buffer zone or demilitarized zone, then it either clears militarily of

hezbollah or tries to clear of hezbollah or occupies, israel would be occupying a significant part of what is a small country. i can tell you, people here in lebanon are deeply concerned about what could be coming in the next few hours or next few days. i was just in downtown beirut, i'm now, as you can tell, not far from the coast, but in the center of the city where i was just a short while ago, there are people who have left parts of the south and they're sleeping on the street. they're sleeping on the sidewalk. they're sleeping in and the mosques. a hezbollah stronghold, in fact, most people have left because for the last several days, since the attack in that neighborhood that killed the leader of

hezbollah, hassan nasrallah, there have been drones looking for hezbollah leaders, look to go assassinate them as israel is trying to systematically take out first the top leader, now all of the commanders and then potentially the groups weapons and ground force in south lebanon. >> richard engel, thank you for that. the suspect in the assassination attempt against former president trump has now been arraigned on new charges. nbc's ken dilanian is following this for us. what can you tell us happened in court today? >> this was a fairly routine hearing, chris. ryan ruth was only in the courtroom about five minutes. he pleaded not guilty to all the charges after telling the judge he understood them when they were read to him. ruth was shackled and wore a tan prison jump suit and glasses. at one point he motioned with cuffed hands that he wanted something to write on, and he appeared to nod to the courtroom sketch artist. the gun charges that have been filed, he was charged with

attempting to assassinate a former president, a charge that carries a life term in prison. his lawyers opted to not have the full indictment read in court. ruth's case has been randomly assigned to judge aileen cannon, who dismissed the special documents case earlier this year. the justice department is appealing her ruling. the magistrate judge under her presided over this hearing, not judge cannon. chris. >> ken dilanian, thank you. coming up in 90 seconds, the countdown to the show down, how two mid westerns, miles apart on just about everything are preparing for a debate that could provide the last big tv audience before election day. ecy

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prepare for dog fights and childless cat ladies. tomorrow, tim walz and j.d. vance will go head to head in the last debate scheduled before election day. the host, cbs, says it will be up to the candidates themselves to fact check each other, and the mics will stay hot for them to do just that. joining me now, stewart stevens, chief strategist for mitt romney's 2012 campaign. here with me in studio, former campaign manager for julian castro, maya rupert. cbs says it reserves the right to mute, but the plan is to let them have at it, what are you expecting? >> you know, i really don't know. when they made the decision not

to fact check, obviously that means there's going to be a lot more back and forth. and i really think it depends on how -- i will say i think it depend on how j.d. vance is going to show up. i think if he is going to echo trump's approach in this race, if he is going to repeat a lot of mistruths, i really do think that what we're going to see is honestly a lot of fireworks on the stage, which i think makes for interesting tv but not super helpful for independents, who are watching this, trying to understand what everybody is going to do. so i think there's an opportunity, and i think both of them want to come in and make an affirmative case, but i fear without any fact checking, we're going to see a lot of the need to do that in realtime. >> yeah, and you never know how those swing voters are going to react to something that's aggressive. what defines overly aggressive. nbc news reports that j.d. vance's team has been honing his debate strategy for more than a month with these, you know, you've heard them before, murder

boards, they work through the tough questions. we got a preview of his strategy from minnesota congressman tom emmer who has been playing walz in debate prep, take a listen. >> he's so good at being this folksy, nice, kind of down-to-earth guy, until people get to know him and his policies. once he understands that tim walz is going to try to deflect and, he'll hold him accountable. i think j.d. will do a good job. >> how aggressive do you think he can be against walz, he has this coach, folksy, dad demeanor about him. i don't think anybody is expecting him to just, like, lie down and take it? >> yeah, look, i don't work for the harris campaign. i don't have to worry about lowering expectations. i would if i was working for him. i think walz is going to crush this guy. >> really? >> j.d. vance is a very unlikable human being, the more you see him, the more you don't like him. >> he was very aggressive against tim ryan in the last senate debate they did, and i

mean aggressive. i went back and watched it. and he won. >> well, he also got 400,000 less votes in the top of the ticket, which is pretty extraordinary. i've never really seen that happen before. perhaps the top of the ticket realized that if vance won, he would be out accusing springfield of killing pets. look, i think that it goes back to what is the premise of the campaign that trump and vance are running? what is it? what is the bargain their striking with voters. that's really the message that j.d. vance needs to deliver. ideally, he'll be in a situation where he's reminding voters. this is what you get. this positive that you get with me. and they have failed to establish that. they don't have anything. project 2025 has filled that gap. i think it's not a bad thing to spend some time watching these debates with the sound off.

i think you're going to end up feeling much more comfortable with walz than with vance, and that's hugely important. >> the walz team is calling this debate the north star, camp north star because they say he just has to be himself. but, again, what is himself? i mean he can't come off as somebody who can't stand up for himself, who can't stand up for kamala harris and their policies? >> right. and i think what we've seen of him, and what we will see is that despite the fact that he does have this very affable demeanor, he is coach, i mean, that's all real. he has never shied away from defending vice president harris against attacks, putting forth the affirmative case for their campaign, so i think he actually really is in, i think, a pretty enviable place about talking honestly about what they have

been doing. j.d. vance has a lot of work to accomplish on this debate stage, and i just don't know if he's up for it. >> j.d. vance has had, let's say, multiple controversies since he was named the vice presidential running mate. none as lasting as the comments about women, and childless cat ladies. his wife has been involved in debate prep. i wonder when you expect him to say what she has said, he was actually saying it could be hard to be a parent in this country. what are you going to be watching for because you know he's going to be asked about it? >> we know a couple of things. it's a really good question. we know he can't contradict trump. trump won't allow that. he can't try to explain something for trump because trump would hate that. so their whole theory of politics is never back down. so i don't think that he's very likely to say that he didn't mean this. he might say the media

misinterpreted it. but, you know, just to step back and give them advice. if trump and his debate or advance did this, they went out and said, look, donald trump had never been elected to office before, he was a tumultuous president, but he's going to be a much better president next time. he's learned a lot. that would open the door to a lot of voters who might be tilting their will. but they can't do that. they're incapable. >> what's the chance that happens, 3%, 2%, 1%? >> possibly not that high. so that digs them into a strategy. and, you know, ultimately debates, i think, are sort of cases in front of a jury. and ideally, you ought to be able to end with your open, which is to say ladies and gentlemen of the jury, i'm going to prove to you the following. if you ask, what is it that vance is going to try to prove

about harris/walz, that they're communists, that they're extremists, that they're people that want to have illegal immigrants have free transgender surgery every, you know, every minute or something? i mean, there's no sort of coherent argument there. and i think walz is, you know, he's a more experienced politician than j.d. vance, he's debated a lot more than j.d. vance. i would not underestimate his ability to come back at j.d. vance with some very effective rhetoric. >> there is a controversy that has involved governor walz, as you well know, about his military service. he did serve decades, but he said he carried weapons of war, and then had to say, i misspoke, is that a believable defense? >> i think this is the kind of

misspeaking or gaffe that we were sort of formerly used to. he wasn't trying to take credit for military service that he didn't serve. there's no argument about what he has done, what his service record is, and i think he can -- >> well, there was a suggestion he served in afghanistan when actually it was italy. >> sure. right, but the point he was trying to make was -- he made those comments, i think, talking more about the use of these kinds of weapons, right? so i don't think that the issue there is that he was trying to take credit for a type of service, as much as he was saying, you know, as someone who has been in the situation, i can speak to this, right. so i think, again, these are the kinds of things that on a debate stage, you can say, this is what i said, this is what i meant, this is the point i was trying to make. that's what debate -- i think like that's actually what this kind of thing is best for. people don't know everything about him.

it is his chance to go up and say, i misspoke. i think, again, when we're talking about bans, the controversies he has been involved in, you can't say those words. he wasn't misspeaking, he said what he meant, and it's why it's been so impossible to unwind these comments. he very clearly believes the things he has been saying. >> maya rupert, stewart stevens, thank you both. tomorrow is going to be interesting. and, in fact, rachel maddow and team will lead the special coverage and analysis of the debate between vance and walz. tune in at 7:00 p.m. eastern right here on msnbc. still ahead, diminished and in disarray with many of hezbollah's top leaders wiped out. the big question is will iran respond? an expert weighs in next. the new poll that could spell trouble for kamala harris, and how it's translating in one of the biggest battleground states, pennsylvania. states, pea ♪♪

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hezbollah's acting leader is vowing to continue the fight against israel, warning that the terror group is ready for a long war even after a series of devastating strikes wiped out much of its top command. that includes hassan nasrallah, hezbollah's long time leader killed in a blast in beirut on friday. here's secretary of state antony blinken earlier today. >> hassan nasrallah was a brutal terrorist, whose many victims

included americans, israelis, civilians in lebanon, civilians in syria, and many others as well. during his leadership of hezbollah, the group terrorized people across the region, and prevented lebanon from fully moving forward as a country. lebanon, the region, the world, are safer without him. >> joining us now, matthew lev it, director of the sign program on counter terrorism and intelligence and author of "hezbollah, the global foot print of lebanon's party of god," it's so good to you. they've lost nasrallah, their headquarters, multiple commanders, they were reeling from the walkie-talkie and pager explosions. what is the status of this terror organization now? do you see them recovering? >> thanks for having me on the show. look, hezbollah that existed

eight, nine days ago, does not exist anymore. it may be able to recover in time, but that would take a significant amount of time because we're not talking about a decapitation strategy here. we're not talking about just the loss of nasrallah himself, we're talking about open heart surgery, the loss of their headquarters, command center, we're talking about not just the top but the second, third and fourth tier of their operational commanders gone. we're talking about the loss of significant amount, that we don't know how much, but a significant amount of their launchers, and their rockets, their communications. they are not as prepared today as they were just a few days ago to fight a full scale war over a period of time. and it's not clear that they will recover and become kind of the pearl in the network of iranian proxies that they have been until just a few days ago. and so they're very dangerous, they have been shooting rockets at israel even in the past few

minutes. there's a potential for iran to get in the mix, but the hezbollah we knew no longer exists. >> they have been sending more than 100 rockets a day into israel. almost all are shot down by the iron dome. what is the extent of their capabilities. do we even really know? >> no, we don't. we know that hezbollah had extensive tunnel networks and some have been destroyed. we have no idea how many. the commando units to southern lebanon, and reports today that the idf plans to go across the border and take out hezbollah capabilities in the villages and towns there where they have built up infrastructure over the past few years. we know that the israelis have gone to great lengths to take out their rockets and launchers. we have no idea, i don't know if the israelis have an idea really of how much of that they have taken out. even if they have taken out 50% of the capabilities, that leads 75,000 different projectiles. what the israelis want to do is focus on the medium and long

range rockets which are the larger strategic threat to israel, than the shorter range ones they have been using over the past 11 and a half months targeting northern israel. >> you mentioned iran, and hezbollah was built in part to defend iran, and for years it was considered the most powerful iranian proxy. but according to "the washington post," the assassination of hassan nasrallah, quote, eviscerated decades of myths and assumptions about hezbollah's military might and the stature on the organization as a regional power house. what does it mean for iran's so-called axis of resistance for hezbollah to be so thoroughly humbled? >> iran helped great hezbollah in the get-go in the early 1980s, but not to be the defense for iran. that's a misnomer. it's the opposite. it was intended to be exported, and that started with hezbollah. over the past few years in particular, hezbollah has become

a leader of iran's axis of resistance, as they put, their network of proxies, providing support to shia militias in the iraq, to houthis in yemen, militants in syria, of course hamas, islamic jihad. losing hamas is one thing, losing hezbollah is something different and literaly is taking out the crown jewel from iran's proxy network, and suggests the degradation of the capability of that network. quite far away from israel and iraq. >> your expertise is invaluable right now, thank you so much for coming on the program. we appreciate it. >> i appreciate you too. thanks for having me on the show. a new poll shows that members of the second biggest voting bloc in america are increasingly fleeing the democratic party. kamala harris has a 14-point lead among latino voters,

according to the nbc news telemundo poll, but that's not nearly as big an advantage as democrats saw in the last four presidential election cycles, and it's raising concerns for democrats in key battleground states like pennsylvania where more than 580,000 latinos are eligible to vote. they could prove pivotal. nbc news senior washington correspondent is live in hazelton, pennsylvania, where the number of eligible latino voters has exploded in recent years. so christina, i wonder what voters there are telling you about their leanings, their priorities, how many of them do you think really haven't decided yet. >> reporter: not a lot, chris. we have been speaking to voters, we have gone to the churches to the evangelical services yesterday, to the stores, and what they have basically told me is they have the same concerns and the same divide that the rest of the u.s. population has. there is not a latino vote. it's not monolithic, and they're all thinking differently why

they are going to the polls in five weeks. and let's listen a little bit to what they have to say and to hear that divide that we found. >> she values what women value. she values women's rights. >> for me, it's trump. it's trump. if you investigate it like the past, they helped the immigrant people. >> what are the issues that move you towards trump and move you and your community towards donald trump? >> mainly the transgender and also the abortion right. >> reporter: and you would say most of your community is choosing donald trump because of that? >> yes, yes. the majority, yes. >> you're scared of donald trump? >> i am scared, very scared. so i'm worried for him because we are living here for many

years. and we know it's not for me. >> reporter: what is atypical about hazelton is that you do not see the margin in favor of kamala harris here. most of the latino population has voted for donald trump. the majority have. he's won in the past two elections, and those numbers are expected to go up come november 5th. chris. >> thank you for that. and still ahead, the secretary of homeland security, alejandro mayorkas will join me live to talk about the recovery efforts for a storm already estimated to have caused $160 billion in damage. illion ie they're like my best buddies. yep, had them my whole life. c'mon bo! so we got him and he is a, an absolute joy. daddy's puppy. once we got on the farmer's dog he just attacks it, it's incredible.

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the national guard is in florida setting up emergency stations to kick start recovery from hurricane helene in pinellas county, the hardest hit area in that state. >> we're going to have a lot of response agencies out there, you know, we don't want lots of people. if you really don't need to be out there, please do not go out there. >> helene killed at least nine people just in pinellas and today residents are returning to homes that don't have working water, sanitation or power. for people who do have electricity, the lingering storm surge can make the situation more dangerous. look at this video shared by the county, a tesla bursting into flames in a flooded garage.

nbc's guad venegas is reporting from the ground in pinellas county, i know you have been behind the scenes, what can you tell us? >> reporter: i want to show you what the storm surge did. you can see a large tree behind us. one of the main things that caused the dang here is the storm surge. the storm made landfall 100 miles away from the tampa bay area. but the storm surge here was as high as 5, 6 feet in this area where on treasure island, this is part of the barrier island area, the barrier islands. all of this sand that you see behind me, chris, is sand that came in with the storm surge. this is crazy, it almost looks like when you get a snowstorm in the northeast, and then the infrastructure comes in and pushes snow over to the sides, that's what it looks like. they have been pushing a lot of sand to the sides.

now, a lot of these properties are buried under the sand. we were escorted by the national guard to be allowed to come into this area. all of these communities have been blocked off to the general public. they're allowing residents, homeowners, business owners to come in and assess some of the damage, but you can imagine for people that live on these properties, they've got to hike up these sand dunes, essentially, and try to get them to their homes to see if there's anything they can still find that hasn't been ruined. most of these places, the first floor was under a couple of feet of water. this is one of the communities here, treasure island, again, we also have some debts that were reported here, and this is some of the damage that suffered in tampa bay. there's eight counties in tampa bay that make up this area. just in this county alone, officials are saying that they have maybe between 12 to 13,000 residential structures that suffered major damage. we spoke to one of the residents from down the street earlier

today, and this is what he had to say. >> it's devastating. all of these little mom and pop hotels around here, don't know if they can even rebuild or whatever they're going to do. but they're demolished a lot of them. one of my friends that lives a couple of streets down, it hits so fast, and the water started rising. he was on a paddle board with two dogs inside of this place, hoping, and we couldn't get out to save him because there's 6 feet of water on the road. >> reporter: just tragic for a lot of these residents and these communities, and i want to show you this view of one of the roadways here, like i mentioned, it almost looked like a snowstorm after a snowstorm passes, and the snowplows come through and push everything to the sides. that's essentially what they're doing, and they can allow residents to come in with their vehicles. many residents that are returning, they have to walk for more than a mile or two miles because they can take their cars up to a certain point, and then they have to walk here, and the

temperature is in the high 80s. it feels like the mid-90s with the humidity. these are the issues they're dealing with. i should add there's no power and running water. authorities are going to be working on getting services established after they can get all of the sand and pick up a lot of the debris, and all of these communities, chris. >> beyond a nightmare, guad venegas, thank you for that reporting. from florida to georgia now, where the governor says at least 25 deaths can be attributed to hurricane helene. today donald trump is there. he's meeting with officials, and blasting the biden administration's response. >> we do need some help from the federal government. they have to get together. ideally with the governor. the governor needs to -- he's been trying to get them, and i'm sure they're going to come through, but he's been calling the president, hasn't been able to get him. >> well, we should note that the republican governor of georgia, brian kemp said just the opposite at his press conference today. he said he spoke to president biden yesterday, confirmed that

the government has provided everything he needs for now, and says the president told him to call back directly if he needs anything else. i want to bring in homeland security secretary alejandro mayorkas. thank you so much for being with us, and i wonder what you're hearing from officials about the scope of the need for the people in places like georgia, florida, north carolina. the president said today ten different states impacted by helene. >> chris, thank you for having me. the impact of hurricane helene is historic in the tragedy that it has wreaked. it has stretched a distance that is unprecedented and it is very very important that individuals impacted by the hurricane listen to their local officials and provide and follow the guidance that those local officials have provided. our hearts break for the families who have lost loved

ones. we are still very much in a search and rescue mode. we have our search and rescue teams on the ground at multiple locations, more than 3,600 personnel have been deployed. a thousand or so of which our -- are fema personnel. we are in close touch with state and local officials. we are co-located in local emergency operations centers. we are deploying all sorts of assets and resources to the impacted communities. we are very engaged and will be increasingly so as the hours unfold. >> well, we know that it is extraordinarily difficult in a situation like this to get good numbers, but we are told that there are hundreds of people yet unaccounted for. do you have a good sense at this hour, mr. secretary, if that's simply because people are off the grid or maybe do we think that there are a lot of people still waiting to be rescued. what do we know?

>> chris, we have to remember, the devastating impacts are still being felt by the hurricane. we have communication systems down. so it's very difficult to reach people. we also have to remove debris that can thwart access of the search and rescue teams, which is why we're also using air assets. we're still very much in the midst of this. we have done a tremendous amount, though, already. we have rescued hundreds and hundreds of people. we have delivered 1.9 million ready meals. we've delivered 1 million leaders of water. 95,000 tarps. we are surging all resources, not just federally, within the department of homeland security, but at the president's direction. from the department of defense. the department of energy. the environmental protection agency.

health and human services. the army corps of engineers. this is an all-of-government effort with critically, the state and local governments, the first responder community. >> we hear time and again, and we have heard it over the last couple of days, mr. secretary, from folks who say they have lost everything but they feel lucky to be alive. they feel grateful they and they family are safe. not everyone has that luxury, for lack of a better word. i want to read something the mayor of canton, north carolina, said, talking about the frustration that a lot of people feel about the lack of communication. here's what he said, it is unacceptable and disgusting that in our time of need, cellular service for the entire region is blocked out. there's no excuse for that. i mean, we knew the storm was coming. i can't believe this is a normalcy. is this a systemic problem? is this something that is going to be more and more normal as we see more and more devastating

storms? what do you say to people who are desperate to find out whether people they love are still alive? >> i well understand the concerns that are expressed. these are people in the midst of a tragic hurricane. that is precisely why we and others have been deploying communications resources to ensure that communication is reinstated as quickly as possible. the reality is that the severity and frequency of extreme weather events are only increasing. and it is precisely why our infrastructure is in such need of improvement and strengthening, which is why the historic infrastructure funds that the president has delivered for the american people are so incredibly crucial, especially at this time, as we build for the weather of today and

tomorrow. not according to the weather of yesterday. >> so in the short term, in the shorter term, you have people still without power. no cell service, no running water, no gas. there are people who are going to places where they knew they might be able to get cell service, but then they ran out of gas. it's just one story after another, after another. heartbreak, frustration. do you have a good sense now of, for example, as you say, you are surging resources there. how long it might be before at least the basics are in place for most people? >> chris, this is a incredibly difficult situation, it is a very tragic situation. there are areas where we have to clear the path to be able to reach people, debris removal is an urgency, as i mentioned at the very outset. we are still in search and rescue mode, and some areas that

have been devastated by this unprecedented, this historic hurricane. we are doing everything that we can and more, and the president has communicated directly to all of us that we are to stop at nothing. there is no limitation to every ounce of energy that we should dedicate to the people impacted by hurricane helene, and that is, indeed, what we are doing. >> we are just about out of time, but i do want to ask you if you feel you have the resources you need right now? >> we most certainly do, and we are dedicating those resources. we have major disasters and provided available resources to three of the six impacted states. we have declared emergencies in all of the six states. people can access assistance right now, both immediate needs

and restorative resources. >> secretary mayorkas on an extraordinarily busy and trying day for you and the other folks working on this. we appreciate you taking the time. thank you. >> thank you. coming up, time running out to avert a strike that would shut down u.s. ports from maine to texas. how it could impact how much you pay for popular items and whether you can get hot presents, including toys with the holidays fast approaching. indigestion iberogast bloating iberogast thanks to a unique combination of herbs, iberogast helps relieve six digestive symptoms to help you feel better. six digestive symptoms. the power of nature. iberogast. my name is brayden. i was five years old when i came to st. jude. i'll try and shorten down the story. so i've been having these headaches that wouldn't go away. my mom, she was just crying.

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libraries around the country are calling themselves book sanctuaries and making banned books available to readers. lisa robinson from our nbc affiliate in baltimore visited the first one in maryland. >> reporter: wednesday's story time was an lgbtq book for kids. library officials say many of the typically banned books are about gender identity, same-sex marriage and race. >> during this banned books week, we stand here united in our commitment to one thing. protecting your freedom to read. >> reporter: this bookshelf contains commonly challenge and banned books. they will be here for people to read. the library ceo says the nation's libraries and l librarians are under attack.

>> the american library association reports in 2023, public libraries saw a 92% increase in the number of titles targeted for censorship over the previous year. >> reporter: here in maryland in the last five years, more than half of the state's public libraries faced book challenges. there's been a 600% increase in staff threats and 11 bomb threats. patiences we spoke to say they support the library's decision. >> it's wonderful. the idea of banning book is so archaic. i think that's important that our children especially are able to read books about people other than themselves. >> books like "to kill a mockingbird" which tells a very important story about racial relations in the south at a certain time in our history. it's unbelievable to me that there are people who would not want our children to be able to have access to these books. >> reporter: the county executive took the effort here one step further and declared

the county a book sanctuary. >> thanks to lisa robinson for that. that's going to do it for us. join us for "chris jansing reports" 1:00 to 3:00 p.m. eastern on msnbc. our coverage continues with "ka "katy tur reports" next. "katy tur reports" next.

let's say you're deep in a show or a game or the game. on a train, at home, at work. okay, maybe not at work. point is at xfinity. we're constantly engineering new ways to get the entertainment you love to you faster and easier than ever. that's what i do. is that love island? ♪♪ good to be with you. i'm katy tur. the israeli