let's bring in josh letterman who is jefferson parish. a distribution point, what's the scene there? i see some workers bind you and what's the need? what do folks need the most? jeff, it is going on day eight here there is really clean water because it is still on a boil advisory. no working refrigerators for most folks. the needs are basic. it is things like ice. they are unloaded it into trucks. they are calling out numbers because you get a certain allotment of supplies based on how many people are in your household. they are handing out water and food. we're talking meals ready to eat like what we have in a war zone. vegetable crumbles with pasta. this is chicken chunks. this is life in jefferson parish for the moment. i spoke to the president of the parish who said look, for now, if they can, they're it is very difficult to live here right now. again everybody has to make a personal choice. i know it is hard to stay away. we're trying to get out information about what our systems are like. >> one of the ironic things is the equalizi

josh letterman is in harvey, louisiana with more. reporter: on a normal day, this would be lunch hour at helen cox high school. instead, students are gone. it is still busy here. instead, folks that are here are lining up for basic supplies. they're here looking for food, water, tarps, as they get their lives put back together. meantime, those students will be out of school for the indefinite future. schools are not planning to open anytime this week, possibly not even next week either. that's obviously creating all kinds of additional challenges for parents who many of them are starting to have to go back to work. we are now upwards of 50% power restored. you have businesses back up and running, people going back into work. students not in school and they're not like they're back on zoom classes like they were doing during covid. it is no learning at all now because frankly, the internet infrastructure isn't ready to handle that now. you can see it is starting to rain hard here. the national guard guys are doing their work, handing o

and josh letterman is in la el paso, seems s in la el paso, seem la place. they can't get a break there. so talk to us about two simultaneous events. the clean upefforts and any view of preparations and possibility of this thing becoming a hurricane? >> reporter: yeah, talk about a perfect storm. you have this new tropical disturbance brewing in the gulf of mexico, you've got still all this damage from ida, an oil spill now reported off the coast. it is raining today, so anyone who didn't get a tarp over their damaged roof is now getting more water coming in. and add on top of that you still have this going on, you have workers all across the city trying to put up power lines that are down. more than half a million people still without power in louisiana even as about a third of new orleans residents have gotten their power back. so those are the lucky ones. but in the meantime, it is hot. it is 105 degree heat index today. a lot of these folks have been out of power now for a week, no ac, maybe they had preparations, they had supplies for three, four days,

. >>> josh letterman is in louisiana. josh, welcome to you. how do things look like they are now?st around the efforts to try to get power to the folks there? >> reporter: power is coming back but very slow. about a third of residents have gotten their power back. the recovery mission enters a new phase. we spent the morning in the home of ja flrks ice homes here who is without power. tlth damage over the house. i asked when these things are happening year after year, do you think about moving somewhere else. this is what she had to say. >> where do you go? every we, this storm here hit from here to baton rouge and further. this is the worst area, to me. this is the only place i've been. where do you go? fires in california and earthquakes. whatever part of the united states you go to, it's something. >> reporter: these folks behind me, they are the ones doing that critical work in the home of janice homes and others here in louisiana. they are called the minutemen disaster response. they rolled in with their own trailers full of cots for their own workers to sleep in. these are t

nbc's josh letterman now josh, what's the plan to evacuate these afghans and remaining americans? i mean, we hear they're going to, but how are they going to with no troops on the ground >> well, the plan is do everything they'd normally do from the u.s. embase in kabul but instead more than 1,200 miles away in doha, qatar. a team is already on the ground running as a virtual embassy lead by the number two u.s. d diplomat economic activity, political engage engagement with the taliban and of course getting u.s. citizens as well as allies out of the country. it's not unprecedented for the u.s. to have to run a diplomatic mission without having anyone on the ground in fact, the u.s. has done it for years in failed states such as somalia, yemen, libya, where it was just not safe to have diplomats on the ground. and in other countries where we don't have diplomatic relation like iran and north korea, the u.s. has instead been represented on the ground by foreign interest sections within the embassies of foreign nations like switzerland or sweden but foreign ambassadors to places like

morgan chesky and josh letterman, thank you for your reporting. >>> back now to preparations for a potentialdown. the white house is now telling government agencies to get ready for what could be the first shutdown of the u.s. government since the pandemic began. if a new spending bill isn't passed. its future tied to the debt limit increase something republicans say democrats need to pass without gop votes. joining me now is democratic senator patty murray. thank you for your time. the "washington post" reports democrats are privately beginning to acknowledge they're unlikely to prevail in the face of a gop blockade. is there a plan b and does it mean the government shuts down and defaults? >> this is an unbelievable made-up crisis that the republicans have put on us. we pay our bills, just like every family should. we have a process that we do that, that we have a vote in the senate. we have always worked this out to make sure that our economy doesn't collapse, and we aren't known as the country who doesn't pay their bills, to our businesses or to anyone else. we need to do this job and ge

we mentioned gabe gutierrez is in manville, josh letterman is in indiana. tell us what the president has on the agenda the next 24 hours. it will be a busy one. >> reporter: right. he is at his home in wilmington, delaware for the labor day holiday. he was there over the weekend. you mentioned starting tuesday he is going to head to mansville, new jersey and queens, new york to survey damage from this storm. of course, it was just on friday as you alluded to, we saw the president in new orleans doing a similar thing, surveying damage on ground, in the air, meeting with local officials, talking about the federal response to people in the communities. you can probably expect to see something similar on tuesday. i would note two policy things to watch for in this visit tomorrow like we saw friday. the first would be to look for the president to link the devastation, increase in severe weather events to climate change, try and personalize this and humanize the consequences of climate change for people. and secondly would be to look for an opportunity to sell hi

josh letterman is with us.hat diplomat had a lot to say in his resignation letter. >> he did, shep. this diplomat's dpeparture the opposite of diplomatic daniel foote writing it remains, quote, deeply flawed and my recommendations have been ignored and dismissed. he says he wants no part of the biden administration's inhumane counterproductive decision to deport thousands of haitian refugees the state department firing back at one of its own. wendy short-terming saying foote wanted to send the u.s. military back to haiti and calling that a bad idea but this resignation is putting a spotlight on deep divisions within biden's administration and his own party about this migrant crisis facing uncomfortable questions about whether this is the come kpagset approach to immigration that he come pained on a fellow campaign saying he shares concerns about the biden administration and he wants foote to testify on capitol hill this is really put the biden administration on the defensive over these devastating images we are

josh letterman is in one of thosen centers of the devastation. la place, louisiana. getting people back on their feet is a her cuelyian task. josh, what's going on there. >> you look at the skies here, it's going to start raining any second. that is really increasing the urgency of this relief effort, with so many homes with roofs that were damaged or destroyed. you drive around a place like la place, which was so hard-hit. the lucky homes are the ones that have those blue fema tarps already put over them. we spent the morning with one of the groups doing this important relief work. you can see them behind me. the minute men disaster response group. they have been going around home to home. they have gotten more than 3,000 requests for help. but they can only do three or four homes a day, even with multiple crews working on different shifts. that just speaks to the scope of the challenge here, especially when you have a lot of residents like some of the ones we saw here today who are elderly, who can't do this work themselves, even if they wanted to. i spoke to the he