describe. i don't cry easily. but becoming a u.s. citizen was like a cherry on the pie. i'm living the dream. >> reporter: americans spreading joy. giving each other hope. all yearlong. >> ♪ for the land of the free and the home of the brave! ♪♪ >> beautiful note to end on that is all in on this thursday night. thanks for watching. this thurs night. thanks for watching.

the people of greenland which he says is needed by the united states for national security purposes. and who want the u.s. to be there and we will. but, my friends, it did not end there. the president-elect goes onto extend his holiday wishes to the quote radical left lunatics. not the current president joe biden as sleepy joe. he calls a man who has absolutely no idea what he is doing. an ends by telling the 37 inmates on death row who had their sentences commuted by president biden to quote go to

hell. yeah. that is where we start today. joining me now, david jolly. former congressman. and host of the fast politics podcast. and author of the forthcoming book, a more perfect party. it is good to see you all, david, if you had someone at your family holiday who was sort of whipping through this grab bag of grievances, talking about a person who hadn't been president in eight years as though they were president today, you would say i think it is time for you to head home. i think this party is wrapping up now. instead, it turns out for the united states this party is just beginning. what do you make of what we heard from the incoming president? >> yeah, welcome to the next

four years, i'll take your metaphor a step further. if this guy was at your holiday party last year, you wouldn't have invited him back. this is a lot like what he did last year. i think you can look at this in two lenses. the more generous interpretation would be about donald trump's kind of discussing political strategy always. he can't be a hero if there is not a villain. at a time when joe biden is sending out messages of unity, donald trump can't have that. his message was relying on the right wing platform. so much of that is strategy. the more likely one if we don't overthink it is just the raw narcissism. we see him do this

look at me, i'm over here, i'm over here. and the way he does it is to fall back on his political strategy of saying we are not united. merry christmas, but let's get on with the fight. this is the next four years. >> i don't know if you can tell, wanita, i believe he's a preacher's son. i'm watching the blush rising her cheeks as he talked about anyone possibly being jealous of baby jesus. let's follow what david said here. let's go with the most generous interpretation of the naughtiness that is coming from the incoming president. in order to be the hero there has to be a villain. he has even settled on who the villain is. is that it would mean current president joe biden is somehow a villain. former president barack obama somehow a villain.

justin trudeau is somehow a villain. the chinese soldiers who are lovingly but illegally in charge of the panama canal, i suppose that those are villains too. this is not what we expect in the way of presidential leadership. but it would be one thing if it were just name-calling. but it is also the suggestion of policy and an imperial presidency. >> i want to emphasize that point about imperialism, alecia. donald trump doesn't want to be a president. he said on stage, on the campaign, i want to be a dictator on day one. and this linkage, these tactics mirror authoritarian behavior, which let's be real, something is perpetuated by the people donald trump looks to for examples, including vladimir putin. right? it's eerie to see it play out like this. and honestly, reading it, i was quite depressed, alecia. what i realized in reading it was that there really is no value in telling trump or his supporters that none of this is true, none of this is founded

in reality, none of this is founded in facts. and yes, you should learn the difference between a partner in a commutation. none of that seems to matter because they choose to reject reality on a regular basis. and so, honestly, that's what i was bracing for. especially as david points out, this is the next four years. >> it's obviously not the first time we have heard him suggest this ideas buying greenland. the sort of hot idea goes back to his first term in office. but i wonder what you make of the obsession. the fact that we are hearing quite a bit about it now. >> yeah. look, trump loves the hit. and we will see this again. he has a couple of things he's really stuck on, buying greenland has been something you will remember that we saw recording that it was actually a friend of his who had suggested it. the whole thing here is that he ran on making things less expensive and ending wars. so how he's going to expand, you know, the american empire,

quote unquote. this is the idea that america is somehow this roman empire. i don't think there's any path to that with these things. as much as maybe he's doing it for attention, who knows, maybe he's doing it because he thinks saber rattling will get people on the defensive. whatever it is, it is just functionally undoable. to think is an important data point when you're talking about those. >> can you pick up where molly left off? if you buy that the reason that american people voted him back into power was the price of eggs and was a desire to see costs come down and more affordable living, he's already admitted that he may not actually be in control of that. instead you see all of the promises he has made via social media. it's also a reminder that you're going to see a lot of diplomacy, leadership via

social media. so the fact that you have him saying that canada should start a, quote, draft wayne gretzky movement, i understand that the man thinks in terms of reality tv. he doesn't seem to understand the way any of this actually works. >> yeah. i do think, take the reality tv part of this, what his ethos is and what his brand strategy is is to project strength. frankly, if his followers see him as strong they care less about a weakened economy. and the care less about national security posture. they see their leader is strong. and so this idea with greenland, look, you must be a president that actually expands the continental united states, expands the territories of the united states because that happens so rarely historically, and greenland is of strategic importance to the united states. it's not like it's controlled by an adversary. it's controlled by the kingdom of denmark. and we have a cooperative agreement with greenland.

we use it for a lot of national security posture right now. but donald trump is fixated on getting it. what does he do for those voters that molly mentioned? ultimately, if he has any economic strategy is this. he's going to try to burn the economy white-hot. heroin into the veins for 2 to 3 years. and not care about the long- term consequences of how he does it. he wants to get money moving fast. he was to get interest rates down. he will try to crush the independence of the fed. we will see if the congress can go along with that. he will try to renew his tax cuts. he will renew the long-term consequences of the increased debt. if he approaches the independence of the fed he will ignore the fact that rattles international markets. the way he wants to do is get money moving fast and let people feel the strength that he projects. even though, ultimately, it's a weakness. because it's a mixture of this toxic masculinity with raw ignorance or with the responsible decision-making. but for the moment, i don't

feel great. >> anita, due to jolly reference to denmark. i want to read you this little bit of reporting this week. denmark has announced a huge boost defense spending for greenland. although, the danish government described the timing of the announcement as, quote, and irony of fate. indeed it is. juanita, i was up late at night on christmas on christmas, reading my advance copy of your book. which was a purely driving my husband absolutely bananas because that was a period of time that he was expecting to wrap all of the gifts for me. he was like, why are you not in bed? and i said, because i'm reading oliver's book and it's really good. the part of your core argument is that shirley chisholm was ahead of the curve on everything. right? she sort of understood that you needed to have dynamic and radical change. that you had to be a party that actually offered something to people. and that is where i think your argument dovetails with what david jolly was laying out about the incoming president. there is some appetite to just see a shakeup. right?

the shakeup people are going to get is not shakeup they think they voted for. but it does speak to this desire that you can go back in history, you can go back to your girl shirley chisholm. it is actually not necessarily a partisan idea. but that there is an appetite for that type of delivery on the part of the american government. >> only if it benefits the people. and nothing but donald trump is proposing realistically benefits any of the people that voted for him. and i do think one radical part that has emerged from donald trump's threats is these dynamic statements from world leaders. the prime minister of greenland saying again, just like he did in 2019, greenland is not for sale. the president of panama saying the panama canal belongs to panamanians. as was the president of mexico backing him up. i think with the world is prime for is a moment to push back against donald trump in unison in a way that diplomacy hasn't

seen in a long time. so i do think there is an opportunity for all of us to learn from global leaders who coordinate and align against donald trump in all of these asinine efforts he's pushing for. >> i was so struck. i don't want to gloss over it, contrast between the current president message at this time of the year. the fact that he and the first lady are working the phones, as they should, calling servicemembers around the world , thanking them for their service, showing gratitude, showing humility. when you've got the incoming president posting photos of himself and self-aggrandizing. really could not be a sharper contrast between the two. >> yeah. i mean, joe biden is a normal president who does this sort of normal. and by the way, there are traditional, almost nonpartisan christmas activities for presidents calling servicemembers, you know, doing

this. just sort of very standard stuff. trump has never been interested in doing that. and trumps people don't necessarily want him to do that. i think what's happening here too is that trump has been elected by a really big -- it has a lot of different desires. we are already seeing that. you know, there's this anti- immigration wing. and then there are these tech boroughs who desperately want to have skilled visa. people come in with skilled visas pics i don't think some of what's happening is that trump sees, already, these kind of fragments in his coalition. and he thinks that if he can kind of get an enemy and keep going that that will solve his problems. and again, i'm not so sure. really what we saw in congress, you know, with almost shut down was a sense in which maga is

many, many things. >> david, i don't know if you caught this because there was news that came in sort of right on the heels of the holiday. but this week trump announced that he's going to nominate stephen feinberg, a billionaire that supported his campaign for deputy defense secretary. as you know he, he has picked an unprecedented amount of billionaires, multimillionaires to be part of his administration. as you and i talked about, it's not that on its face. but is this preference for someone with that background over someone who necessarily has experience that matches the role that he is casting. i wonder what you make of it? >> look, donald trump sees wealth as a sign of strength. even if it's wealth you inherited. and tangibly lost some of that. like donald trump himself did. but i think the issue that we should all be concerned about may not be the wealth but the lack of experience. particularly when it comes to america's national security. the founders the constitution

intended for the united states not to be a state run by the military. a country run by the military. so we have the joint chiefs. we have general officers that lead the operational force and fighting force. they ultimately report to civilians and secretary staff structure. and those civilians to donald trump. in this case, donald trump is putting inexperienced leadership in the national security secretary positions, primarily of heat had -- pete hegseth were to be confirmed. between the nation's top generals, admirals and officers. and the president himself. that's the danger. donald trump, with the truth social tweet, could ignite a bomb somewhere in the world in terms of our national security posture. and he surrounded himself with civilian leadership and incapable of stopping them from doing so. >> right. a reminder, wanita, that we are currently in the only law we are going to get for a while. and then immediately we come back. congress gets sworn in.

they are going to have to choose a leader. we are bracing for whether or not that's going to be a fight and then we roll into these confirmation hearings. and i think there is still an open question about whether or not republican senators are going to go along with all of these nominees. >> right now they've been saying, at least give them a hearing. so we are getting to the way that they said was the threshold but they are also the ones requesting access to fbi records to review them behind closed doors for different cabinet members. so i am curious to see when they find out these things about these highly unqualified nominees to leave the fbi, to leave the dod, to lead the dni. i think that is the question. are they actually going to stand on sensible in terms of protecting this nation from these highly unqualified individuals and from donald trump? or are they going to fallen by donald trump? we saw with the government shutdown push the way donald trump and elon musk attempted

to leverage power, money and threats against members of congress within the republican party. i don't doubt that will show itself again in january, alecia. and that's the question that i think senate republicans are immediately going to be up against when they consider these cabinet nominees. >> david jolly, michael steele, this past week we are seeing, everyone go home, don't talk about politics this holiday. enjoy yourself. and there's a little part of me that's like, i mean, if your family includes a republican senator who may be on the fence about whether or not, you guys knock yourselves out. you see one of these folks at the diner, feel free to go up to them, let them know how you feel. because the decisions that they make, wanita is right. setting a new threshold. in all slowly gets them closer to getting these nominees over the finish line. >> that's right. look, i think the struggle of

engaging politically right now, certainly covering, if you are the media, there is the day-to- day distractions. but also, real questions about the presidents fitness. today is the perfect example of his tweets and truth social. but then, broader story is, are we a nation that's sliding into liberalism? are we a nation that essentially a lobster in a boiling pot? because if we stop engaging, if we don't approach our senators and members of congress, if we don't engage with our representatives, then we are going to complete that slide and not recognize the country when we come out of it. look, my hope for coming out of the holidays into the new year, i know a lot of people were dispirited by the election results. i think this is a period of fatigue and not the feet. because i think the same convictions people had before the election they have today. sure, they are tired. sure, they are beaten by the election results. but that doesn't mean that the fight is not there once they see donald trump and the people he's asking to lead the nation lead in a way that we know you

will. this might be a restful time during the holidays. but it's not a defeated time. and i think the contest will start again in the new year. >> stay in the fight and stay with us. because our panel is going to have a lot more to say. trump's unhinged messages during christmas. we will be right back.

new reaction now as the result of the presidential election reverberate. >> president-elect trump's return to the white house is shaken nato allies. is shaken nato allies. we are back with david jolly , molly and juanita. i'm not sure if you all saw this , but today former democratic candidate for president marion williams has announced she's launching a campaign to become the next dnc chair. she joins me with a field of candidates that are currently running for the seat.

molly, i wonder what you make of that choice and of the timing. >> i have some personal history with self help author marianne williamson. my mother was a second wave feminist who is friendly with her. she has long felt wounded by my criticism of her. look, dnc chair is an organizational job about building the party structure. you have a couple of people in this race who are sort of a known for building party structure. i'm thinking of ben winkler, who is the chair of the wisconsin democratic party and has done a really great job of building a structure. he has even said that he thinks that dnc chair should be focused on state parties, which seems like a winning message to me. there are quite a lot of people have jumped into that race and they will have a bunch of

forums and then there will be a vote. the people who are voting on this are members of, you know. they are democratic voters that are part of the infrastructure. they are likely going to vote for people who they know and like, which i think is not necessarily a bad thing in this case. >> right. i think there are 440 of them who these folks have to glue. i wonder what you make of mary williams candidacy, also the decision to announce it in the week of christmas. >> look, i don't know if she's competing with religion, as david said, about trump. but i do welcome, of course, a woman to this race. the first woman to jump into this race. a slate of all men thus far. and while i agree with her on her statement that the democratic party does require transformational change, i do note that she did make any statements of substance about what that change should be or how she will drive it.

she says she has expert experience. i only see a couple of failed presidential campaigns. she apparently sells a lot of books. i'm not sure where that matches up. when i think about this entire field, i fear that a lot of the recommendations merely nibble around the edges instead of driving that transformative change that's needed. they are saying, let's go on right wing airwaves and talk shows. let's invest in states. take it further. make sure that the dnc chair never sets a foot in d.c. for example. spend all of your time in the states. spend all of your time with state leaders and organizers and volunteers on the ground engaging with people. don't come to d.c. when it comes to differentiating with the republican party we mentioned how trump is stacking his cabinet with millionaires. reject all billionaires and ultra wealthy individual honey. start there. talk through these big things that recent her power with the people. i think another thing that would be very impactful in terms of emphasizing the transformational change is not

just a doing course toward him on 2024, but making sure that you are filling the vacuum in terms of what people need. trump is focused on greenland talk about all of the things that are impacting individuals on the ground level. of all of that, alesia, what donald trump and republicans have shown is that any election the democrats win will be contested in the courts at the state, federal and supreme court level. so make sure that you are developing a deep bench of legal minds who can help you navigate this. because that's what's coming in the future. the plan for the future with big differentiating goals. three of which i just named at any of the candidates are welcome to take in their platforms. >> david jolly, i would never be so foolish as to question the premise of someone as smart as my friend juanita. we talk about this. transformational change within a party. do you think the transformational change comes

from inside of the party structure in that way? does the transformational change actually come from the dnc, from the rnc? or does it need to come from somewhere else? who leads that move into the future? >> i think the responsibility of the parties, as juanita and molly both said, is to build the infrastructure for national party. that means you need to invest in state party infrastructure if you're the democrats. there's a lot of state bodies right now that need some help. and this gets harder for democrats, given the census in 2030, where likely more electoral votes go to florida, texas and other states get harder to win. the five-year project for the dnc is where we invest in infrastructure in the states. state party committees to make sure that we can win back the white house, win back the country and prepare for the 2030 census. i think the policymaking, the messaging will come down to very talented politicians within the party. we see the postmortems after the election. how do you communicate better?

i think it's pretty simple for democrats. you can give a tax cut to people making under $400,000. not just promise the taxes will go up. you can ban assault weapons, pay public teachers more and get corporate money out of politics. you start talking about that come of this policy issues while you are building state parties, you've got a competitive party. this race democrats nearly won. this is not the mandate donald trump or the length late -- landslide donald trump said it was. imports of the dnc, rnc, national parties is to build the infrastructure, to compete and win in future cycles. >> what juanita and dave were talking about, actually creating and sharpening a contrast between the two parties. if you are democrats. i think david sort of hit the nail on the head. which is you actually have to deliver some of these more populist policies and show that you are the ones that are

getting it done while he is off talking about the panama canal. >> one of the things that i have really seen is that i think one of the big problems in the biden admin was not so much the policy but the messaging. right? they didn't do interviews. they weren't forward facing the what donald trump was. four years donald trump basically ran for president again, whereas biden was not doing interviews, was very sort of careful about what he did, didn't do a lot of media. i think that was a really big mistake. because trump sort of really took all of the oxygen out of the room. so even though democrats were passing a lot of policy, the chips and sciences act is an incredible piece of policy that has revived the economy. i don't know that you could have asked for better policy. and a lot of it was passed.

i would say the problem was we would see her. remember, we would see her and say, that was an amazing policy that they just passed. are people going to know about it? and people really didn't know about it because they were not a forward facing, front word facing white house. and that really got them sort of behind. and they weren't able to catch that populist wave. because the truth is, a lot of the biden policy was very, very populist. it's just wasn't transmitted as populace. i mean, you had a joe biden marching on union, marching on a strike line with the union boss. he was the first president to ever do that. that's populism. that's pro-worker. but for whatever reason it was not translated and then some of the unions didn't even endorse harris. so obviously the system more messaging than a policy problem. i think of democrats want to

win they have to be front word facing. and we see this again and again. you have to go where the media is. that means going on things like joe rogan. otherwise, joe rogan's people will never see a democratic politician. >> friends, i feel like the gift of your time was one of the greatest gifts i got this holiday season. david jolly, molly, wanita, thank you all so much for being with us today of all days. coming up, we have the latest on the airline crash that killed dozens of people and questions over possible russian involvement. we will dig into all of that next. .

we turn now to the latest on the azerbaijan airline crash in kazakhstan. the video captured the video before it went up in flames. it's split into -- 671 board, 30 were killed, 29 others, including two children, survived. preliminary information suggested a bird strike. the kremlin said it would be incorrect to make any hypotheses before the investigation is over. but today a u.s. official echoed findings from aviation security experts that suggest a russian antiaircraft system may have struck the flight, adding that if that proves to be the case it would be more evidence of russia's recklessness in its war with ukraine. worn out from nbc news correspondent danielle in london. daniel, we have learned anymore

about the investigation to this crash. what is russia saying about it? >> russia saying, don't jump to conclusions. the investigation is underway. and as you said earlier, alesia, dimitri, who is the spokesperson for the kremlin, was asked this question today. he said it would be incorrect to make any hypotheses before the investigation is complete. azerbaijan has established a commission , sent delegates take as extend to start gathering evidence to paint the full picture here to figure out what exactly happened. they will be looking at a number of things. why did this azerbaijan airlines aircraft have to be divergent all the way on the other side to the caspian sea flying hundreds of miles of course? the speculation has been circling, swirling online for 24 hours. the russian state media had initially suggested this was caused by a bird strike but as

the video emerged online independent and industry experts started to look at the wreckage video. they have seen what appears to be holes and damage caused potentially by shrapnel. they also looked at the wreckage at the film, rather, video posted online shocked by some of the passengers while the plane was still up in the air. they looked and examined the airspace at the time of the event. and they also critically listened to the testimonies of the survivors who managed to literally walk away, stumbled away from this crash site because some did manage to survive walking away from it. and they reported hearing an explosion while they were still up in the air. they/rap will passing through the fuselage in the cabin area. all of this combined led them to believe that this was not caused by bad weather and this was not caused by a bird

strike, as had been suggested by russian state media immediately following the crash yesterday. >> daniel, when you talk about this passengers and survivors what more do we know about them specifically? the status of the 29 survivors. >> a number of them were taken to a local hospital. i believe it's 27 out of the 28. 11 of them, according to the latest official figures, remained in intensive care. two of them in critical condition. and some were expected today and tomorrow to be flown back to azerbaijan. it's still pretty incredible. you mentioned earlier, but it's worth noting, two of the survivors were children. alesia? >> nbc danielle, thank you so much. i want to bring in david, host of that deep state radio podcast. david, it's good to see you. the kremlin is saying that they are waiting for this investigation to play out. you've now got a u.s. official saying it was likely a russian

air defense system. ukraine also believes russia is to blame. the middle of the speculation you have nato calling for a full investigation. your assessment? >> i think it's always prudent in these situations to wait for the investigation. but i also think that we need to understand that it's very likely that the russian conclusions and facts may not line up exactly. you know, this is one of those things that illustrates some of the issues that we are going to face going into the trump administration. one, the recklessness of the russians, the dangers that they pose. and the fact that we don't control what happens here. so if trump is trying to present them pro-russian face and you encounter things like this that's difficult. but i think the other thing that's even more relevant in the near-term is when you have somebody like tulsi gabbard up for director of national intelligence, who has historically accepted russian

conspiracy theories, russian lies, and promoted them as the truth, in a situation like this you wonder what you are going to get from her. is she going to present the kremlin story or the real story that our leaders need to have? >> on wednesday had russia launching christmas day attacks on ukraine's energy infrastructure. more than 70 russian missiles. 100 drones. ukraine forces shot down more than 50 missiles. ukrainian president denounced putin for, quote, deliberately choosing christmas day, asking what could be more inhumane. when you talk about tulsi gabbard and the choice that republican senators are going to have to make about the extent to which they confront her nomination, i wonder if what we are watching play on the world stage adds an urgency or complication to what had otherwise been there posture. >> yeah, it certainly does.

i think tulsi gabbard was hoping to slide in under the radar with our history being exposed. and of course, the events in syria and her close association with the bashar al assad government. her defense of them brought her past behavior into focus. this does as well. and the same for others who are in the trump inner circle. putin is not going to dance to trumps dance necessarily. it's going to make it difficult. and i think there is a practical consequence of that, which is that there are some people in the republican party in the senate and in the house who are not sympathetic to the pro-russian view. and with the margins in the senate and house being so tight it's going to be very difficult to sort of force down the throats of the united states congress the view that is defensive of the kremlin. in

light of events like this. because it was inhumane and he continues 10 years of inhumane behavior in ukraine. >> we have talked about tulsi gabbard. i also want to make sure we talk a little bit about keith kellogg. he had president biden condemning russia's attack on ukraine. he had president-elect donald trump's russia ukraine envoy, the retired lieutenant general. he made it a point to add, quote, the world is closely watching actions on both sides. the u.s. is more resolved than ever to bring peace to the region. when we talk about sort of the inner circle around trump do you have a sense of the role that someone like keith kellogg is playing now and is poised to play moving forward? and what do both sides indicate to you? >> well, it is troubling. there are people around trump who have been historically pro- russian, including elon musk. and there are people around

trump who are clearly not going to stand up to him in ways that you might want them to, for example, pete hegseth. if he ends up being the secretary of defense. but the united states is not the puppetmaster here. the ukrainian people have a say in this. our nato allies have a say in this. and putin has a say in this. and putin's statements thus far have been very harsh and have suggested that he wants a maximalist position. and i think it's going to be very hard for even the pro-russian forces in the u.s. government to support that. and so you could end up with a standoff for some time. more killing, more violence, and increasingly questions about whether the united states is going to let ukraine suffer, whether our allies are going to let ukraine suffer. i don't think this is going to be resolved quickly, as

president trump said it would be. >> i only have about 30 seconds left. talk to me about the timeline. you said it would not be resolved quickly. what are we realistically looking at and for? >> i think the first thing you have to do is set up negotiations. that's going to take some time. then they are going to go to the table and exchange views. if the russian view is, we keep everything come you can't be in nato, that's going to be a nonstarter for them. you know, it's going to go from there. but i would expect this is going to be something that lasts well into next year if not beyond. >> david, thank you so much for being with us and bringing us your expertise. coming up, it's been 20 years since the deadliest natural disaster this century. the indian ocean tsunami. commemorations are taking place throughout the region. we will have more on that next.

for centuries deadliest natural disaster so far happens 20 years ago today one is to make crashing to coastal communities around the indian ocean. commemorations of the devastating tragedy are underway across southeast asia with the lives of an estimated 230,000 people killed or remembered. jenna fryer spoke to survivors about that day. >> reporter: it was the day after christmas, 2004. and resorts here in thailand were busy with tourists. >> it was a beautiful day.

we had gone kayaking that morning. >> we walked up to the beach and it was a few steps up, about six steps. >> by then disaster had struck across the indian ocean. a magnitude 9.2 earthquake near indonesia, lasting 10 unrelenting minutes. the power of it felt hundreds of miles away. there are hotels and resorts all along here and people were doing what they do. they were at the beach or swimming pool unaware of what was going to happen. first the ocean pulled back from the shore, revealing the seabed. then, a mountain of waves came crashing in. captured on video my people that made it to higher ground.

two american survivors vacationing at different resorts in thailand that day can still recall every detail. >> it was squeezing me. and i can't quite describe it. i heard after that the water was traveling 250 to 500 miles per hour. >> my body was being crushed and contorted. my right hand was essentially amputated. i mean, it was just an unbelievable moment to realize this is happening to you and that you are going to die instantly. >> wave after wave, at times higher than 100 feet, demolished coastal areas in 14 countries. within hours an estimated 230,000 lives were lost. from indonesia to sri lanka, india and thailand. >> i was calling out for my good friend and i didn't hear anybody's voice.

everything was silent. >> reporter: ables, from chicago, didn't survive. 20 years on life has in many ways recovered. and a shelter set up for orphaned children is a permanent home for kids in need. this is a place that has given me everything, says this man, who is 12 years old when this or not we change the course of his life. now, with two college degrees, he is running the orphanage where he grew up. raising 93 kids with help from donations and fundraising. i remember the goodness, he says, of the past. i always tell the children, if the tsunami didn't happen we wouldn't have this home to stay together. the worst tsunami in recorded history. survival brought unexpected second chances.

>> i was 34 years old. i had a life to live and i did not want to be disabled in any way. i'm the mother of three teenagers. i've had a wonderful life. >> i think one of the biggest things is to not blame yourself. if you have that survivor's guilt you've got to let it go. you truly were allowed to survive for a reason. >> here, every december, volunteers gather at the cemetery for tsunami victims that were never identified. they sweet, clean and remember the day the water changed everything. nbc news, thailand. >> so credible. we will sneak in a quick break. we will be right back.

still to come for us, a look ahead to the second trump administration, including plans to increase capital punishment. plus, incoming borders a new interview. the administration will bring back family detention as part of their crackdown. much more news at. ♪ liberty. libert libert♪

russia's warning and speculation that its forces could be to blame for bringing down a azerbaijan airlines flight. we will bring you the