that's true. >> okay, one more. i'm curious what this all means for the georgia election interference case. has fulton county d.a. fani willis indicated at all she could drop those charges? >> the short answer is no. right now we're looking at an environment there's kind of a holding pattern. there's supposed to be a pretrial hearing this week. fani willis has canceled for reasons unknown. the case is very much alive. so there's still a possibility that case will proceed although we know in all likelihood the likelihood of having a sitting president sit in georgia for a criminal count is unlikely, but that case will continue. next to that remind your viewers there's a whole bunch of codefendants in that case who

a very good day to all of your from msnbc world headquarters in new york. that was quick. welcome to alex witt reports. we begin with 31 days to go until inauguration day, with donald trump already sparring with world leaders. 2 million prime minister justin trudeau today wrapping up a surprise visit to mar-a-lago, just a few hours after donald trump threatened to impose a 25% tariff on imports from both mexico and canada. >> was it a productive meeting with the president-elect? >> also new today, the new york times is reporting on a 2018 email written to trump's secretary pick, pete hegseth, by his mother, accusing him of mistreating women for years. miss hegseth said she later

disavowed those sentiments and apologize in a follow-up email. his lawyer declined to comment and said in a comment that miss hegseth quickly regretted her emotional statement and apologize. msnbc has not obtained either email. there is also a new warning today about robert f kennedy junior's, trump's pick for help czar. here is trump pick for commissioner and pfizer boardmember scott gottlieb. >> i think if arce follows through on his intentions, and i believe he will and can, it will cost lives in this country. you're going to see measles, mumps, and rubella vaccination rates go down, and like i said, if we lose another 5%, which could happen in the next year or two, we will see large measles outbreaks. and some new details today on trump's mass deportation plans for trump's pick for deputy chief of staff policy, stephen miller. >> he is going to use the state department, the military, the justice department, and every other department of government

to fully feel that border shut and to ensure that all threats to the safety, security, and survival of america are repatriated back to their home countries. it will be the largest national program that we have seen in this country and generations, and under president trump's leadership, it will be entirely successful. meanwhile, the fbi is invested getting a spate of bomb threats targeting democratic lawmakers over the holidays, days after bomb threats and swatting attacks were launched against some of trump's cabinet and administration picks. and president biden today is wrapping up his holiday in nantucket where he commented on the trump transition and the challenges ahead. >> i want to make sure this transition goes smoothly. all the talk about what he's going to do and not do, i think maybe a little bit of an internal reckoning on his part. congress across-the-board, it's

going to require what usually happens in this case, compromise. and on this small business saturday, the president is celebrating 20 million new business applications as he took office. we have a number of reporters ready to go over these two elements for us, we are going to start with nbc's allie rappa in west palm beach, four. donald trump today choosing a family number to serve as ambassador of france. what are we learning about this new pick? >> reporter: yeah, alex, in a statement explaining his decision to appoint charles kushner as ambassador to france, president-elect trump says, quote, that he is a tremendous business leader, philanthropist, and dealmaker who will be a strong advocate representing our country and its interests. and if that name sounds familiar to you, it is because that is the father of trump's's son-in-law, jared kushner, the husband of his daughter, yvonne could trump.

and if confirmed, he brings to this position a controversial past. you'll remember that in 2005 he pled guilty to charges of tax evasion, witness tampering, as well as making illegal campaign donations. he was then sentenced to two years in federal prison and then in 2020 president trump pardoned charles kushner. this election really following in the pattern and history of choosing those loyal to him, choosing family members to serve in his administration. like i said, this is a position that is still required to be confirmed by the senate in order for him to take this role. so that will be something to watch out for during those senate confirmation hearings that are set to begin in january. alex, another of trump's's cabinet picks that is in the news today is his pick for defense secretary, pete hegseth. that is because the new york times, overnight, published a 2018 email by hegseth's mother in which she writes, in part, quote, on behalf of all the women, and i know it is many you have abused in some way, i say get some help and take an

honest look at yourself. penelope hegseth telling the times that after she wrote that email to her son, she immediately apologized to him in a subsequent email and she says she no longer stands by her comments. we should note that nbc news has not seen or obtained either of these emails . the trump transition team is continuing to stand by hegseth, stand by this pick by the president-elect, and they are calling this new york times report quote shameful and out of context. but alex, the big question now is whether this will have any impact on hegseth's confirmation. like i said, those are set to begin in january and he has so far been able to, as you will remember two weeks ago, he was on capitol hill talking to lawmakers, trying to smooth out any difficulties he may have during that confirmation process in january, but this is something else that those senators could bring up when those hearings to begin. >> 100%, it could definitely offer a new wrinkle.

thank you for that. right now, a powerful winter storm is dumping deep snow in the great lakes. in fact, some areas could get up to succeed in the coming hours. despite that, tomorrow night's buffalo bills home game is still a go. as long as fans help with the shoveling, i think. let's get to george solis in buffalo part. he spent some time today at high mark stadium. back to you, and welcome. it looked like a winter wonderland on the field when you were there, but you are being told this game is happening. >> yeah, it is happening, and the bills mafia will surely make it happen as they prepare to come with shovels to dig high mark stadium out of that potential six feet of snow. we are currently just outside of orchard park right now, this whole area to give you a sense, it is sort of like a snow globe when you have this lake effect snow. you have one area that is getting coated with feet and feet of snow, and another area just outside that is completely dry right now. it is kind of ridiculous, you

have blue skies ahead, but if you look behind me, that dark gray cloud, that ominous looking thing, that is where all the snow is falling. that is slowly creeping up into this region, into the northern parts of town, but we might see flurries that have not started to stick on the ground. it is coming. that is really the danger in all of this as the snow accumulates. it stays like that, dumping those buckets of snow, and slowly starts to creep up. the hope for so many here is that it does not get too bad in the downtown buffalo area. really disrupting traffic. but i've got to tell you, spending time with the public works crews today, they've been clearing these roads, they have had people working around the clock to make sure these roads are passable. we spent the day with erie county officials today as they look to assess where they need to send these screws. we heard from public works officials in the county, take a listen to what they said about the acute relation. >> in the central area of the county, depending on where you are, you can get anywhere from two feet to three feet. if you are in southern erie county, you might even get over

three feet. i think it is important for people to understand where they are geographically, and the impact that could have. >> reporter: again, really crazy, when you think about the area we are in right now, no snow. and in town, they are getting those three feet, maybe even up to six feet of snow. again, to your point about the bills mafia, about high mark stadium, we know later tonight some of those fans are already showing up for the tailgates for tomorrow. they have shovels in hand. that game, that kickoff surely happening. >> if you say so. will be watching. thank you for that. let's turn now from winter weather to holiday shopping with millions of americans hitting the malls, the stores, as well as the internet on this busiest shopping weekend of the year. nbc's marquise fracas has been talking to customers at a mall in northeast new jersey. it is a big mall, it is a lot of fun and activities there. so give us a sense of what people are looking for today.

>> reporter: absolutely. as you mentioned, i am just across the water from manhattan, east rutherford, at american green. i spoke to a host of shoppers, and it is a mixed bag, with a lot of them just as excited to take a picture with santa claus as they are to actually do shopping. those who are looking to shop, i talked to them about what they are looking for and a bunch of them told me clothing and apparel, as well as electronics. with one man telling me he is looking at deals up to 80% off. he was actually wearing a sweater that he just bought. on the flip side of things, there's other consumers who are a bit skeptical that these holiday specials are as good as they are this year as last year. i spoke to one shopper, and here's what she had to say. >> do you feel as though black friday, small business saturday deals are as good as they have been in the past? >> small business deals, yes. black friday, no. i don't think there such thing as black friday anymore. it used to be when we were gung on electronics, i want that tv, but now you get a tv for $100.

so no, not really. >> reporter: as you mentioned, this mall has so much. indoor theme park, indoor waterpark. so many different food courts and stores galore. so this mall may be an outlier in terms of why people are coming in, whether to spend time with family or to do actual shopping, but it also attracts consumer insights that say over 50% of americans are actually looking to get clothing this holiday season. so, with so much happening in this one mall in particular, they are looking to do it all. >> i don't know, some might be shopping for ski pants or something, isn't there a ski run? an indoor ski run? >> absolutely. there is an indoor ski run. i've been seeing people carrying snowboards. i'm not much of a scare myself, but i think after this hit i may have to get on the slopes myself. >> i highly recommend it, my friend. thank you so much. meantime, joining me here on site to further break down the holiday shopping numbers, we have editor-in-chief, caleb

silver. huge figures. let's look at some of these. we have over 10 billion in sales, caleb. significant growth for online shopping. is black friday still the day, is it the best day to get the best deals? >> well, this is been a rolling black friday, really all the way back to september. that is a way for started hearing about holiday sales, but this entire week is big for deals and sales today. small business saturday, go out and support your small business. we send deals all the way back for a couple of weeks, don't forget there are fewer shopping days between thanksgiving and christmas, so the pressure is on for retailers to lure people in. a lot of people looking for clothes, some people looking at electronics where they know they are cheap. that is where the biggest discounts are, because retailers know they pushed a lot of these sales forward, so they are doing a lot of discounting now to make people to make those purchases. >> but there are those out there who say are these the best deals? you just mentioned, if you

started pushing these things, or the business departments started pushing these things since september, how we know that what they are doing in september is better or worse than it is today? how do you gauge that? when is the best time to buy? >> when you find the best price drop alert for the thing you want to buy, that's the best time to buy. a lot of people like to go shopping, like to go to the mall for the experience, but we know there's a ton of online shopping. it is up 10% last year, lots of online shopping going on right now, and people are very price sensitive. so they probably do have price alerts. if you look to your phone lately, every other email you're getting or text is from some retailer reminding you that it is black friday, small business saturday, cyber monday coming up, cyber week next week. there's deals everywhere you look because retailers, this is the time where they make their hay. >> this shopper spoke with brian cheung, and she is a little bit skeptical of all these sales and how they compare to one another. play what she said, i want to get your reaction. >> it says 20% off, but that is the price it has been all year. i think that some brands may say it is on sale, but it is the same price, and they take the prices higher and say it is on sale.

>> i mean, she is saying it's kind of always on sale. is she on to something? >> she's absolutely on to something. things are always on sale. it's just how you frame it. it is the language that retailers like to use. sometimes they will let you bundle a couple things to make it a little cheaper. things have been on constant sale, it seems, especially with electronics, appliances, apparel, basically since september. the holiday season keeps starting earlier and earlier. retailers know we are a lot more price conscious. we've been through four years of inflation. they know we are price conscious so they have been dropping prices or alluding to the fact that prices have dropped, whether they actually dropped them or not remains to be seen. probably not as much as you think. >> amazon workers in at least 20 countries are striking right now. they are protesting, going from lack friday, cyber monday, right now there is a strike that is on. how does this impact the holiday sales? >> yeah, this the big amazon case strike by a bunch of labor unions, union global vision and the progressive international union, and this is, in many

countries, this is the fifth year this is happened. amazon is well prepared for these types of strikes. it has about 1.2 million workers out there in the world. it can easily fill in. if you go through an amazon site right now, there's no notice of it, no warning that your packages will be delayed. they can handle it, they are a massive retailer with a lot of different solutions to this problem which they've been facing basically since they came in. >> so consumers should not feel the strike. >> i don't think they will feel the strike at all. amazon is been putting things on sale, they had two prime days all the way back in october. they've been ready for this for a long time. not the first time this strike has come up, not the last time we will see it, either. >> let's talk about tariffs and the way that trump has threatened, and you have to wonder if his threats are just kind of the way he negotiates, because look what is happened. you have had reaction from the mexican president, you have justin trudeau making his way down to mar-a-lago, saying we had a really good conversation and is spending it rather positively. whether things go from here,

though? when it comes to the fact that he has said 25% tariffs. do you think that's legit? >> i think the big threat, i think it's a negotiating tactic and every body knows that. trump just put in two very reasonable, very smart people at commerce and treasury know the impact of tariffs in terms of inflation and productivity. i think a lot of these people is to scare the countries into working with the u.s., whether it is on fentanyl, shipments from the united states to mexico that trump claims china is behind. after member, when trump was in office the first time he actually created the canada mexico trade agreement to replace nafta. they are our biggest trading partners, and china is the third. so half of our trading goes through, our exports go through those countries. you are hurting american manufacturers when you put these tariffs on, and ultimately consumers, because what happens on the flipside? those countries that tariffs on us and that cost us more money.

>> is that a short-term pain? is it a long-term pain when it comes to tariffs on the consumers? >> yeah, there've been some estimates that if you put any of these on, or some of the ones he has declared, we would see at least a half percent or percent slowdown in gdp over the next year or two. why? because productivity goes down when you race tariffs. with about the s&p 500. the 500 biggest companies in america, half of their sales are outside the u.s. so you are hurting share prices, hurting sales and companies that operate in our domicile appear, and ultimately putting that price to consumers. because what do companies do? they pass it right on us. they have totals already they are going to do that. >> caleb silver, thank you. we will see what happens after the inauguration. thank you so much. how many times can they say no? when many of their political lives rest on his happiness, the quandary facing the senate in the face of the president- elect's cabinet picks. we are back in 90 seconds. . asthma. does it have you missing out on what you love,

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new pressure building on capitol hill for president- elect donald trump's cabinet choices. senate republicans realizing the fate of trump's nominees is in their hands, and what comes with a lot of convocations is all of this. we are going to talk about it right now with mark leibovitz, staff writer for the atlantic, msnbc political contributor, and author of thank you for your servitude, donald trump's washington and the price of submission. so, we just got the news today which i want your reaction to, the development of donald trump naming his son-in-law's father as the next ambassador to france.

charles kushner was pardoned by trump in 2020 after serving a prison sentence on federal charges. what is your response to that? him now being the top representative of the united states and france? >> well, a few things unpack here. first of all, ambassador to france as a huge, on the investor list, that is always right at the top for donors, for close associates of the president, i guess you could say top diplomats and so forth. it was very strategically important. charles kushner, as you just said, president trump pardoned him in the final days of his first administration. obviously he is jared kushner's father. look, this is sort of an extension of the middle finger, frankly, to everyone who could possibly question and put a check and balance on him. and it is also another kind of dare, invitation, whatever you want to call it to the republican-led senate, do you

want to be the one significant check and balance here? because obviously republicans control the house, the senate, there's a great deal of indulgence from the courts. trump hired a great many loyalists to his cabinet, all over the place, it seems to be the number one quality. so look, we will see. obviously there are a lot of reasons why you can look askance at this. the question is, as it is for so many cabinet picks, will the republicans in the senate do anything meaningful here? >> so let's broaden this out. we saw matt gaetz just evaporate as the attorney general pick after eight days. but there are other candidates that are still in the mix. they are also controversial. we all know who they are and what their issues are. and so do senate republicans. so can or will senators reject all the unqualified picks? won't they have to start saying yes, even if they have reservations? >> i mean, not necessarily. look, you can step back and say that anytime republicans have

been called upon, with some exceptions, to stand in the way of donald trump they have almost, without exception, just caved and been the need to him. so i think you can assume until proven otherwise that we are going to see this in this case. matt gaetz never came to a vote. it never got that far down the road. so yes, there were a lot of backroom whispers, a lot of off the record whispers, a lot of noise around his candidacy. that did not really let it get to the rubber hitting the road here. yeah, i can totally see a scenario where a number of republican senators, maybe four or five, lock arms and in some way say we are going to try to uphold some level of standards here. and obviously there is a top hierarchy of problematic nominees, starting with gaetz, no longer nominee, but also kennedy, tulsa gabbard, and maybe some others. we could see something we just haven't yet. she might you want to give me one name that you think this is the hardest confirmation? >> that's tough. i would say probably hegseth

at this point, just because defense is so strategically important. you know, the department is so big. and he obviously had a lot of baggage. really starting from the get-go . i think you would probably come under the most scrutiny. but really, you can pick and choose a number of them here. >> okay, i want to ask you about the president-elect's transition plan. because his team is refusing to sign an agreement with the general services administration that would give it more than $7 million in government funds. instead it is going to use money from private donors. his team is also promising to be transparent and says that it will disclose the name of the donors and it is not going to accept any foreign money. it released an ethics pledge that may not be compliant with transition rules. can you tell us what's going on here? >> well, yeah. transition rules, it could be, you could view that in the pantheon of any number of rules that donald trump has and probably will completely disregard again.

i mean, it probably strains credulity to think that some kind of ethics rule in a transition process, that any number of people can analyze differently, will be something that actually keeps a check and balance on the administration coming in. i think right now we are in this limbo period. i think transitions, by definition, they are neither here nor there. we are still trying to get over the election in many ways. we are trying to analyze it. we are in the holidays. and you're trying to speculate on who is going to be making up the government. but i think for the most part we are really not going to know what this will look like until really january, when donald trump takes over. i don't know, i don't see this as being a big stopgap between donald trump and whatever it is he wants to do. >> okay, let me just further this a moment, because the trump team did not say when donors names will be made public, or if the donation amounts will be released. it says the decision to opt for

private funding is saving taxpayer dollars. are you listening to this and thinking it is a serious answer? because is there any concern about private donors expecting something in return? >> there absolutely should be, but i think in the world we are living in right now, say they never disclose it. say it never comes to pass. we are in march. someone raises the question, some spokesmen says that's been covered, that's old news. it is not like the house is going to impeach him over this. you have to think about what the consequences could be, i mean, he seems to be operating under an environment where he doesn't expect there to be any consequences, and really, any check on him doing whatever he wants. >> extraordinary. we are going to have you back again, my friend. thank you very much, good to see you. a look now at tel aviv where we are seeing protesters in the streets, there is new urgency to this demonstration. we will explain all that next. shingrix is a vaccine used to prevent shingles in adults

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we have breaking news in the middle east today. hamas just today releasing a new video of israeli-american eden alexander, who has been held hostage in gaza since october of last year. in the footage he calls on president-elect trump to secure his release. it comes on day four of a very tenuous cease-fire deal between israel and hezbollah in lebanon that appears to be holding. and as syrian antigovernment rebels today took control of most of the countries second-

largest city, aleppo. there's a lot to get through. joining right now to do it, joining me from jerusalem. so, first, what you tell us about the hostage video, and let's get to the very latest on the cease-fire between israel and hezbollah and how firmly it is holding. >> reporter: so, i just spoke to the mother of eden alexander. she is at hostage square in tel aviv and i believe we have live images coming to us from tel aviv where you have protesters ready much every saturday since october 7th gathering to demand from the government that they do more to release the hostages. yeah alexander essentially told me that she was in shock since she saw the video, that it has been 421 days, and as you mentioned, she is calling on benjamin netanyahu to do more to release her son and the other hostages, and also saying that president-elect trump

should be working on freeing her son now and not wait for his inauguration, so that he should be working with president biden. eden alexander is 21 years old. he turned 20 in captivity. he was an idf soldier posted outside of gaza when he was inducted by hamas fighters, and he has been there since october 7th. in the video he cried several times, he spoke hebrew english, and obviously this is filmed under duress, this is a hostage video, and we are not going to show any of it except for the first few seconds of it. but essentially, asking on the prime minister of israel to do more to get all of the hostages released, alex. >> okay, let's move on to the fragile peace. it largely hangs on the lebanese army. it is text with ensuring that hezbollah keeps its end of the bargain. the last time it was tasked with enforcing a cease-fire was in 2006, it clearly failed.

is the army up to this task? >> well, there's a lot of hope here that has been, at a lot of expectations placed on this pretty week lebanese army, it has to be said. weaker, by all accounts, then hezbollah, which is in iran backed militia, which has surface-to-air missiles, cruise missiles, as well. so, is it up to the task? that is the big question. the u.s. has poured money into the lebanese army. gulf countries have done the same. france has sent a few hundred million, as well. so it all pretty much hinges on that. there are some u.n. troops, as well, that are trying to keep the peace by trying to get the parties to respect the terms of a u.n. resolution that ended the 2006 war between israel and

hezbollah. so it is an open question. it does seem this time as though there is a bit more momentum, and crucially, more support from the overall population for the lebanese army's mission to try to, essentially, occupy that buffer zone between the two sides. but there've been a few infractions and violations to the agreement already. so it is still a very tense environment in the south of lebanon, alex. >> okay, a few questions about syria and the takeover of aleppo by opposition forces. could this attack reignite the long dormant civil war, and could this lead to get another front opening between israel and its enemies in the region? >> so, all great questions. i will start first with how this is connected to october 7th. october 7th, especially, essentially, i should say, started a domino effect that eventually led to hezbollah being tremendously weakened by israel's attacks and its

infiltration of the supply chain. we all remember those pager attacks. so, hezbollah is not there to prop up the regime of al assad. and these rebels for eight years have not reached the perimeter of aleppo, syria's second largest city. saw an opportunity for a lightning strike. but frankly, i don't think anyone was expecting them to take syria's second largest city in a matter of days. and it is not just aleppo. they are now going south. there are reports that they have taken at least parts of,, another big syrian city. as far as the risks of this turning into another civil war, of course, that risk always exists, because the ingredients that led to the civil war in 2011 and 12 are still there. i think in aleppo, and i've been in touch with people who are there in aleppo, the big concern is going to be will the

regime respond with airstrikes? because once it does that, no one can mitigate risk. you can be in a building anywhere there are rebels nearby, and you could become a target. you could end up in a building that ends up being targeted airstrikes. so there are so many open questions, and i think anybody who is trying now to predict what will happen tomorrow in syria, let alone in six months, is taking huge risks. i certainly am not, because i did not see this lightning strike coming at the speed and the speed at which the rebels managed to take aleppo. so it is a wait-and-see situation. but syria, this is a high risk moment for that country, and it will affect the entire region, alex. >> i'm glad your eyes are on it for us, though. thank you so much for your reporting, much appreciated. the president-elect targeting the media again. the plans for covering the second donald trump term next. .

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the fbi is investigating a spate of hoax bomb threats against democratic congressional people over the holiday, in addition to hoax threats and swatting attacks against some of donald trump's new administration takes. joining me now is alexi mcammond, host of the in sync with alexi podcast. welcome. what are you hearing about these threats, and since lawmakers on both sides of the

aisle were targeted, would you expect a bipartisan approach to solving these? >> yeah, it's really unfortunate. i think back to the number of surveys we saw before the election that said majorities of americans expected some sort of violence after the election, no matter who the result. and we are kind of immediately seeing some sort of political violence that has erupted after trump's election. just a couple of weeks ago. i mean, you are reporting on the black folks around the country who were receiving those crazy text messages from people saying that they were going to round up slaves, and now we see, unfortunately, the same type of nasty behavior being directed at folks, i think to your point, the fact that it is on both sides of the aisle really just speaks to this violent moment that we are in, in which people don't know how to express, whether it is politically motivated or otherwise, their feelings, without taking it to this extreme level. >> i guess we will see if there

is a bipartisan approach to it, because apparently it is affecting people on both sides of the aisle. so, let's move on to what trump did on social media, which was say that mexico's new president, claudia shane bomb, agreed during their phone call to stop migration and promised to close the border. but then she wrote on social media that mexico's position is not to close borders, but rather to build bridges between government and people. she even told reporters there will not be a potential tariff war. how do you interpret her framing of their talks, and how do you expect donald trump to react? because it would seem as if they didn't come to an agreement, they seem to have polar opposite interpretations of what they discussed. >> yeah, and with an issue as big as immigration, you don't want to leave it up to a he said she said situation, which is sort of what we find ourselves in. now that he has been re-elected as president, i am reminded of how he likes to use twitter were now truth social, in this case, to declare policy or personnel decisions, to really

give the accounting of what is happening in real-time. but it is only according to him. that, of course, makes the journalists jobs more important. but what is problematic is this strongmen approach that trump takes, not just in person with other world leaders, but over the phone, and then trying to back them into certain policy positions. that obviously does not work. we all remember the last time trump said that he was going to build the wall, and that mexico was going to pay for it. that mexico had agreed to pay for it. of course, that is not the case, and that is not happening. so we will see if he is able to get what he wants by way of tweeting or posting online, but so far, according to her response, other world leaders are not going to let them be backed into a corner by his takes. >> you mentioned journalists. we know that trump is targeting the media again, demanding an apology, this time, from the

new york times for writing stories about him. while right house reporters, they are bracing for his return and they are resolved to tackle whatever comes their way, vanity fair quotes peter baker, saying if trump kicks us out of the white house briefing room, we will still cover from the outside. i am curious what your colleagues are telling you about all this. >> yeah, i mean, folks are certainly used to the chaotic nature of a trump presidency, and being used to covering friday night news dumps and having their weekends upended by trump announcing these last- minute decisions, but i think what is alarming to most journalists and folks that i talked to this time around is that trump basically feels emboldened to do what it is, that he wants to punish journalists, comcast, or retired cable news networks because he either disagrees with the coverage, or because reporters are reporting on leaked information from folks around him. i was thinking earlier today, back in 2017 when he reportedly told then fbi director james comey that he wanted to put

journalists in prison just for a couple of days, if they were reporting on leaked classified information or otherwise, to show us a lesson, basically, to teach us that it is not okay to do our jobs. so now what is concerning is whether he goes beyond amending an apology and really acts on those instincts that he has for punishment. >> will be watching to see, that is for sure. alexi mcammond, thank you so much. next, a remarkable tour inside the notre dame cathedral, five years after the devastating fire.

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of giving back. this is exciting. today we are getting our first look inside the meticulously restored notre dame cathedral. french president emmanuel macron visiting yesterday to see the new interior himself after the devastating fire five years ago. nbc's cara simmons reports from paris. >> reporter: even more beautiful than before, resident mike rounds description, leaving the world cameras through the doors of notre dame for the first time since its restoration. and it is stunning. gleaming white walls, newly bright colors from stained- glass windows, to now vivid murals. they have created a modern altar for this medieval cathedral, and a gold setting for the crown of thorns, a transformation from the devastation wrought by the inferno just five years ago.

admiring the new oak beams, this time fitted with fire doors and sprinklers. outside, with restoration remaining, there is still scaffolding. truly this was a race against time. nbc news has had occlusive access throughout the mammoth undertaking. inside the cathedral, and 300 feet above it. >> so, this is the spire that went crashing down. >> exactly. >> we all watched it, all around the world. >> 2000 craftsmen and women helped with millions of donated dollars, including from the u.s., using medieval techniques just like the cathedral's original construction workers. >> sometimes we asked how did they do it? yeah, they did not have the techniques we have. they do not have the technology is or the scaffold. so that is hard. >> reporter: mccrone thanked the people behind this historic

undertaking, telling them you have healed the nations wound, calling at the project of the century. nbc news, paris. how troubled north of the border could impact your holiday shipping. ahhhh! what is — wow! sinex. breathe. ahhhhhh!

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these three men you are about to see high surf warnings with waves topping 30 feet. look at those waves. that is pretty extraordinary. and then all that is left of a connecticut mansion are charred remains. today authorities say a fire broke out when residents tried to fry a turkey inside the garage on thanksgiving, despite firefighters battling that blaze for over 16 hours, that house collapse. fortunately no one was hurt. and the u.s. coast office is currently not accepting mail bound for canada amid a strike by the canadian union of postal workers. americans will have to find another route to save holiday packages to our northern neighbor until this strike resolves. also today, vice president harris is doing some of her

holiday shopping, visiting a small bookstore in washington, d.c. on this small business saturday. my england has been talking to small business owners for us and also some shoppers ahead of the big day. maia joined me now. let's talk about the expectations for shop owners today. what they think is going to happen? >> i'm sure most business owners are hopeful they will see some more foot traffic today, but it is been a challenging year for many of them, as consumer spending has slowed down. now, small business saturday actually started back in 2010, and since then, entrepreneurs have been working hard to keep the enthusiasm alive. this year the u.s. chamber of commerce says that though american consumers are excited to spend 23% less than they did last year, 82% of small businesses say they are respecting to maintain or increase their holiday shopping revenue this year. it really all comes down to where people are deciding to knock out the holiday shopping lists. >> listen, that's good for the small business owners. what are they doing to try to differentiate themselves from big online retailers? >> when i spoke to the two business owners at two toy stores for this reporting, the haymarket in new jersey, they tell me it is actually the

memories and magic inside these toy stores, not the toys themselves, that really have a lasting impact for the families and keep them coming back. on top of that, some of them have turned to viral videos and brand building on social media. the march hare is actually selling hoodies and tote bags for people around the world who want to support their small store but maybe can't make it to new york. >> and i saw santa, that is a good selling point for some. and foot traffic they think is up, there hopeful, crossing fingers. >> there crossing fingers, for sure. we will be able to tell us all we can is over. >> after work i'm going to go to my hometown and see how things look, because there is free parking outside of the small businesses there, so i'm going to take advantage and had on inside. anyway, thank you so much. i'm listening to what you told us and we are going to support small business saturday. thank you so much. that's going to do it for me, because apparently i have to get shopping after this edition of alex witt reports. i will see you tomorrow at 1:00 p.m.