Meet the Press NOW – January 16

If it's Thursday, will the Israel Hamas cease fire in hostage deal home? The Biden administration is expressing confidence and optimism even as Israel launches new airstrikes and Prime Minister Netanyahu accuses Hamas of remaking one part of the deal. Plus, President Biden delivers his final Oval Office address warning America of a rising oligarchy and the perils of disinformation. And TikTok's fate in America is in flux as the White House now looks to halt a ban on the Chinese owned app from taking effect on Sunday, despite the ban having been passed by Congress and signed into law by the President.

Welcome to the press. Now I'm Kristen Welker in Washington, where the difficulty of implementing the ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas is becoming increasingly clear. But the Biden administration is expressing confidence the deal will hold. The Israeli Security Cabinet is now scheduled to meet tomorrow to vote on the deal.

The delay on the ratification comes after the Israeli Prime Minister's office put out a statement accusing Hamas of trying to, quote, extort last minute concessions from the agreement. Although the office did not say what those concessions were. Hamas responded that it was committed to the agreement and accused Netanyahu of looking for excuses not to implement the ceasefire. It all comes after Israel launched new airstrikes on Gaza overnight.

At least 77 people were killed in those strikes. That's according to Palestinian officials. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken today telling reporters he remains confident the agreement will hold despite the 11th hour complications. I am confident and I fully expect that implementation will begin as we said on Sunday.

Look, it's not exactly surprising that in a process, in a negotiation that has been this challenging, this fraud, you may get a loose end. We're tying off that loose end as we speak. I've been on the phone one way or another all morning with Gerk, with our guitar friends, and I'm very confident that this is what this is moving forward and we'll see the start of implementation of the hearing on Sunday. Now it's worth noting that Lincoln press conference was notably interrupted multiple times by two people in the room who are critical of US Support for Israel.

Meanwhile, White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby today also expressing confidence that these last minute holdups will not derail the deal. There have been some, what I would call implementing details, that there was a kink in some differences here between the two sides. We do believe that we're going to be able to close those remaining gaps. This is not an issue that is going to derail the whole implementation of the deal and as Secretary Blinken rightly said, we fully expect and we're confident going to be able to get this deal in place by Sunday.

Now, phase one of the deal includes a six week cease fire that would see the withdrawal of Israeli forces from populated areas in Gaza as well as the release of women, elderly and wounded hostages held by Hamas. Israel would also release some Palestinian prisoners. Two Americans would likely be among those hostages released during the phase one of the deal. The agreement, if fully realized, could end a war that began more than 15 months ago with Hamas's October 7th attack that killed 1200 people.

According to Israeli officials. The resulting war has led to the death of more than 46,000 Palestinians. That's according to the Hamas run Palestinian Health Ministry. To get us started today, let's check in with NBC News chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel who joins me from Jerusalem.

And also with me is NBC News chief White House correspondent Peter Alexander, as well as Ambassador Dennis Ross, former US Envoy to the Middle east and now an NBC News foreign affairs analyst. For Richard, thank you so much for joining us. We've been following your reporting throughout the evening, overnight and into the morning. What is the holdup from the Israeli cabinet here?

What are you watching? Well, it seems that they are going to meet tomorrow. That's what we're hearing, that they're likely going to approve this deal. According to Hamas, the holdup is over prisoners.

It is over the kinds of prisoners who are supposed to be released from Israeli prisons. They want to have a say, more of a say of specific prisoners. The Israeli prime minister's office hasn't specified that, hasn't confirmed that's the hold up. But Hamas is saying it is over the prisoners issues and who ultimately gets to decide who gets out of jail and who doesn't get out of jail.

But there are no indications that we're hearing that the deal isn't going to go forward. Israeli officials are expressing confidence that it will be approved tomorrow. Hamas is saying that it is still abiding by the deal even though it is accusing Netanyahu of fishing for excuses to try to escape his commitment. So so far still on track to begin implementation on Sunday.

So that means on Sunday we could see or Monday potentially, but more likely Sunday the first batch of hostages coming out, aid flowing into Gaza. And to give you an indication how confident they are here that this will get over the line, the Israeli military put out a statement not long ago on X saying that it has already begun preparations to implement the deal, that it is gathering military personnel, military doctors to Provide support to the hostages as they come out, medical support, psychological support, that is ordering engineering teams and construction teams to start the laying the groundwork for, for the aid to go into Gaza to repair damaged roads and other infrastructure to allow the deal to go forward. So the machine that would be required to carry out this deal is already in motion. So Richard, this would be phase one of the deal.

There's a phase two, there's a phase three. You know, you've covered these types of situations before. Just how tenuous will the cease fire agreement be? And of course, it will be up to the incoming Trump administration to oversee these next phases in the implementation of all of this.

And I would love to hear from Ambassador Ross on it. He's lived and breathed this his entire career. He's been in the room as these negotiations have taken place and knows how they can fall apart. But just to outline how incredibly fragile this particular deal is.

Yes, as you said, it takes place in phases and these phases are not all nailed down at this stage. The first phase would be that as you outlined in the beginning, 42 days to release the first 33 hostages, the so called humanitarian cases, the elderly, the sick, the injured. And that while that is taking place, assuming that it takes place and continues smoothly, aid goes in, Israeli troops pull back and Palestinians are allowed more freedom of movement within the Gaza Strip. They can go from the south to the north.

Then phase two would begin at the end of that 42 day period when the rest of Israeli hostages held by Hamas would come out, including military age males. The temporary truce would be made more permanent. And then ultimately a phase three would begin when you would have a massive reconstruction underway in Gaza, really rebuilding the Gaza Strip, a process that could take years. And, and I was just in Telva back in Jerusalem now.

I was speaking to one of the brothers of a hostage who's expected to be released in phase two. And he says this is a terrible deal, that it's a terrible deal, even though he hopes that his brother is going to be released from it because it is step by step because there are so many pitfalls along the way. But he said he still welcomes it, it's the best they could get. He wants it to be implemented.

People in Gaza we've spoken to and Gaza is once again under attack. Fear that this deal may never be implemented as well. And they're very, very nervous tonight. So they're all, both the hostage families and Gazans are watching this very, very nervously.

Yeah, completely understandably, Richard. We open up the conversation perfectly To Ambassador Ross and Richard, thank you so much for joining us. Please stay safe there. Ambassador, answer Richard's question.

How do you see this? How tenuous and tentative are these, you know, implementing the first phase and then just making sure that phase two and phase three actually go into effect. For sure, Richard's right that it's fraught because there are all sorts of small details that can easily be interpreted differently by the two sides. One of the issues that came up before finalizing this had to do with whether or not Israel actually has a veto over certain kinds of prisoners to be released.

That's what this issue was, I think, held things up for today. There'll be a lot of other questions that emerge as well. There are wounded Hamas who are fighters, who are supposed to be able to go to Egypt, get medical treatment. So how will that work?

There are people from the south who are going to be allowed to return to the northern part of Gaza, and they're not supposed to be. They're not supposed to be checked. But then there's also supposed to be some mechanism for checking anybody who might be going with arms. So there's, there's a lot of different problems are likely to emerge.

Now, having said all that, I also think the chances of this actually being implemented through the first phase are pretty high because I think the truth is Prime Minister Netanyahu understands that President Trump wants us to go ahead. I think, you know, he found it difficult to say no to President Trump at the end. I think the. This was an extraordinary example of an outgoing administration, an incoming one, actually working together in a way that was quite effective.

I think that helps to ensure you get through phase one. Now, the critical issue here gets, relates to phase two. Starting on day 16 of phase one, negotiations begin to try to work out the terms so that what is a temporary ceasefire, which is what the first 42 days is about, gets turned into a permanent ceasefire in phase two. And that permanent ceasefire will lead to the withdrawal of all the Israeli forces.

Prime Minister Netanyahu is saying he hasn't committed to an end of the war. He's been saying that in part to try to ensure that two ministers representing two ministers, Ben GVIR and Smotrich, wouldn't leave the government. In fact, Ben Gabir has announced he's going to resign from the government if this deal goes through. Smotrich says he and effect that he might stay.

But if in fact this becomes the end of the war, then he would leave. The prime minister is trying to convince them that he hasn't committed to an end of the war. My own sense is we have seen a process that's underway where President Trump is going to expect that this will be fulfilled. And one of the interesting things, he referred to this as an epic agreement.

He talked about how Steve Whitcoffet played a very significant role in terms of moving the prime minister. And I don't think he wants to see this whole thing fall apart. So I, I think there's a dynamic here with all the difficulties, with all the details that are quite fraught in terms of ensuring that you see implementation. I still think the overall dynamic is going to move us in a direction where this actually does get implemented.

Well, it is just incredibly extraordinary to watch how this all took place. And Peter, take us inside your conversations in the White House. Are they applying additional pressure right now to Prime Minister Netanyahu to try to work through these last minute snags so in fact it can go into effect, which is Ambassador Roster said he anticipates will ultimately happen? Yeah, well, the White House anticipates, like the ambassador, that this is going to go ahead on Sunday.

They'll have the first hostages released there. What was striking is that a conversation with the senior national security official here about some of the challenges in each of these phases. I asked them about phase two and they said the challenge with phase two is getting to phase two. So they recognize the unique challenges they face right now.

I can't speak specifically the conversations between anyone here in Benjamin Netanyahu, but we do know, as Andy Blinstein, the secretary of state, that he has been in constant contact with his Qatari allies over the course of this day, trying to help keep this cease fire agreement in place right now. But clearly the pressure on Benjamin Netanyahu's options from this administration, from Donald Trump as well, who made very clear upon his victory, saying that he wanted to have this thing resolved, this war resolved, this deal reached before he came into office. That puts a ton of pressure on Benjamin Netanyahu to help with some resolution, to accept the terms and any pushback they may hear from Hamas and from others throughout this agreement. But what is striking, you know, as you put this against the backdrop of a very divided Washington, is that it's so rare to see these politically opposed presidents working in tandem, in partnership as they as they are right now for President Biden has the potential, if this deal holds, to be a final vindication before he leaves office a matter of days.

He hopes this is the end of the war for Donald Trump. Opportunity, Kristen, to move past this issue in many ways to get it, in effect, off his plate, to focus on other priorities just as soon as he takes office here. It's such a seminal point. And Ambassador Ruskin, you pick up there.

It is extraordinary that President Biden and President Elect Trump put their differences aside, got their teams working on this together. And I might add, it's a really sharp contrast with what we saw, for example, between the two administrations of the outgoing Carter administration and the incoming Reagan administration. They did not work together to get the hostages released from Iran. They were ultimately released after Reagan was sworn into office.

But this is a very unique situation, is it not? Well, it certainly doesn't have much precedent. I can't think of many examples where we have something like this. In the case of the Carter Reagan, how many wanted to humiliate Carter so he, he made certain not to have any of the hostages released until after the swearing in of President Reagan.

Here you have something different. Nobody's out to humiliate President Biden, number one. Number two, you have an interesting reality where I think the, the fact that you have the American hostage families dealing with both the Biden administration, but also going and meeting with, with Donald Trump as well during the campaign and then after the election and this, the emotional content of those meetings has had a huge effect on both the outgoing president and the incoming president. And the idea that he wouldn't be doing everything he could.

I mean, Donald Trump would be doing everything he could to ensure not only that this issue was, in a sense, put in a different place so that his task upon becoming president would be easier. The reality is, again, I bring it back to the. To the emotional reality of these hostage families. I've met many of them.

Their level of courage, the stoicism is unbelievable. The impact they have when you meet them is extraordinary. And I think we've seen it both with regard to President Biden, but also, I think, with incoming President Trump. And it helps to explain why you've seen a seamless effort of working together.

So much so that Steve Witkoff was in Doha with the American negotiating team, flew from Doha to Jerusalem to see Prime Minister Netanyahu on Saturday, and by all accounts, made it very clear to Prime Minister Netanyahu that President Trump expected that he would say yes to this and he would not say no. Yeah. All right, well, urgent hours as the world watches and waits to see what happens next and collectively hopes that the remaining hostages are released. Peter Alexander, Ambassador Dennis Ross, thank you both so much for your great reporting and insights.

We really appreciate it. Coming up, President Biden start warning to America in his final Oval Office address. Plus four more of President elect Trump's cabinet picks. Head to the Hill.

We'll have the highlights from today's confirmation hearings, including Trump's pick to implement his economic agenda. Stay with us. You're WATCHING THE PRESS now. Welcome back.

While delivering his farewell address last night, President Biden issued an urgent warning to the nation. While reflecting on his five decades in politics, defending his record and touting his accomplishments, the president also warned about the growth of big tech and the dangerous concentration of power in the hands of a few very wealthy people. Channeling President Eisenhower, Mr. Biden dubbed the threat the tech industrial complex.

Today, maligarchy is taking shape in America of extreme wealth, power and influence that literally threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedoms. And a fair shot for everyone to get ahead, you know, as farewell address. President Eisenhower spoke of the dangers of the military industrial complex. He warned his stand about, and I quote, the potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power, end of quote.

Six days, like six decades later, I'm equally concerned about the potential rise of a tech industrial complex that could pose real dangers for our country as well. President Biden went on to sound the alarm about the state of information consumption in America, lamenting the decline of traditional media and accusing social media companies for putting profit over truth. Americans are being buried under an avalanche of misinformation and disinformation enabling the abuse of power. The free press is crumbling.

Haters are disappearing. Social media is giving up on fact checking. The truth is smothered by lies told for power and for profit. We must hold the social platform accountable to protect our children, our families and our very democracy from the abuse of power.

Joining me now is NBC News White House correspondent Aaron Gilchrist and NBC News deputy tech editor Ben Goggin. Thanks to both of you for being here. Aaron, a lot of people were surprised. They were expecting a farewell address by President Biden that focused on his 50 years of public service.

Yes, he did reference that. He talked about what he sees as his big accomplishments. But boy, when he talked about an oligarchy threatening to take over the United States, a lot of people were stunned, surprised. Take us inside your conversation.

But in the White House today, what was behind his decision to make these remarks now? Yeah, I think stunned is a fair assessment, Kristen. Nobody expected the word oligarch to come up very early in the president's remarks after he talked about the developments in the Middle east where he suggested that there is an American oligarchy developing, where he didn't say directly President Elect Trump, but the inference here is that the billionaire Donald Trump, along with others who have been in his circle as of late, are part of this developing oligarchy where you have power concentrated in the hands of a very few people the president described as ultra rich people in this country. And he set out a warning about that, essentially saying to the American people last night that it was going to be up to them to make sure they're aware of what's developing, that they do the things necessary to combat it.

You talked about the tech industrial complex reference that the President made in his speech last night as well. Also something that was a bit unexpected to hear from them. At the same time, we do know this administration has been one that has been focused on artificial intelligence, intelligence in particular. And that was something the President referenced last night, saying that it represents great possibilities but also great risks if it's not cared for properly and proper attention isn't paid to it.

We did get some of the things that you would expect from a farewell address. This is a president who spent 50 years in public life and public service. And so we talked about the things his administration had done over the last four years as it relates to job creation and the economy, as it relates to infrastructure work that he's done and the work that he's done to shore up the environment as well. And he did say, Kristen, that it will take time to feel the effects of the work that his administration has done.

Something that we know really is sort of, I think, essential who this president is. He was sort of looking at the long game as he was going about policy development during the last four years. It's a great point, Aaron. And much as we just saw with former President Jimmy Carter, whose administration was remembered quite differently in history, clearly President Biden aiming for that same exact outcome.

Ben, let me turn to you now. You just heard Aaron talk about President Biden's reference to disinformation, misinformation. We've seen a lot of that in the headlines since Election Day. What's the trajectory right now in the tech circles, you follow?

Yeah. So what we've been seeing on social media platforms, including Elon Musk's X and Facebook and platforms is rolling back fact checking, which is facilitating a lot of misinformation, disinformation. Instead of having third party fact checkers where they're verifiable information sources, Meta Index have now switched to these systems that allow the community to vote on what they think is right, essentially. So sometimes the service is information, but oftentimes it can turn into just trolling or, you know, some good fact checking but some incorrect information.

So it's not the most reliable system. And then combines with providing creators new monetization screens, which Meta and X have done. Biden mentioned this. We are seeing people profiting oftentimes off misinformation.

So that is where things are going on social media. And I think that what Biden called out was correct. And Aaron, just going back to you, I mean, if you look at the polling right now, President Biden delivering this farewell address against a backdrop in which, according to a recent CNN poll, more than 60% of Americans are calling his presidency a failure generally. How do folks inside the White House's inner circle, how are they responding to this broader climate with which he prepares to leave office?

Yeah, I think they just don't see it that way, Kristen. And perhaps that's not surprising, really. The question was put to the press secretary yesterday about what she would list as the president's successes and failures. And she really didn't touch on anything that this administration sees as having been a failure.

We also heard just today President Biden just returned to the White House a few minutes ago from his armed Forces farewell ceremony at Dwind based Meyer Henderson hall across the river here, where the Department of Defense said their farewells. And we heard both the secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs, CQ Brown, General CQ Brown, really lavishing with praise for the work that he'd been the president, for the work that he's done as it relates to shoring up alliances around the world. The secretary of defense called him, said that he was he secured his place as the greatest foreign policy president in American history. We heard General Brown talk about the work that the Biden administration has done to increase pay for members of the military.

And so I think there are all these little things that different people in the administration will point to to say that this administration has been successful. As you know, to Kristen, history ultimately gets to decide here. And it will be some time before we can really have a full accounting of the Biden administration. The history books will record it.

Yeah, it's a great point. And farewell address is often written with the history books in mind. Aaron and Ben, thank you so much for great conversation. Really appreciate it.

Coming up next in developments in the battle over the looming TikTok band just days before Trump takes office. And speaking of the inauguration, two in Monday, the special coverage of the inaugural ceremony starting at 10am right here on NBC News Now. Stay with us. We'll be right back with more Meet the Press now.

Welcome back. An 11 hour effort to save TikTok from being banned in the US starting on Sunday is underway and it's being led by some of the same wingers who lobbied to ban it in the first place. Now, according to people familiar with the discussions, the Biden administration is now looking for a way to keep the app available for US Users if the ban goes into effect. The law banning TikTok unless its Chinese parent company began divesting from the app by January 19 was passed with broad bipartisan support and signed into law by President Biden.

Senate Democrats who also supported that legislation tried to pass a bill last night to delay the implementation of the ban, but failed. President elect Trump, meanwhile, is also reportedly looking at ways to use his executive authority to delay the ban when he takes office one day after it takes effect. Trump tried to ban TikTok in his first term, but now is vowing to save it after amassing 10 million followers. And this all comes as the Supreme Court says it will have wounds tomorrow, suggesting it could rule then on whether the ban is constitutional.

Joining me now is NBC News correspondent Savannah Seller. Savannah, thank you so much for being with me. I really appreciate it. What is notable, this seems to be a real reversal for both President Biden and President Elect Trump on their one time support for a TikTok band.

What are your takeaways as we await to see what happens? Hi, Krista. Thanks so much for having me. That is exactly right.

So the President Trump, President elect, I should say Trump one we've been hearing a little bit more about. Right. He's gotten very comfortable saying he wants to save TikTok. He has a warm spot in his heart for it.

But this Biden is significant. This is a significant reversal for the Biden administration. Keep in mind, of course, President Biden is the one who signed this into law. They're now looking for ways to delay what should have been inevitable with their law, depending on how the Supreme Court rules.

Here is a big shock. And here's what's so notable. The reason that this had overwhelming bipartisan support is because of what national security officials said was a serious national security concern because of TikTok's parent company, it's called ByteDance, their ties to China and essentially saying that China could potentially steal American users data or maybe more concerningly, manipulate the content shown to Americans within the app. None of that has changed.

Interesting. But what has happened what has materialized over the last couple of days is millions of TikTok users expressing their discontent with the fact that this app may soon be unavailable to them. Well, you know, Savannah, I guess the question becomes, what can actually be done at this point? I mean, if the ban goes into effect on Sunday, what, if anything, can the outgoing President Biden do?

Absolutely. So, Chris, we're actually breaking news literally right now as I'm on the air with you about exactly what they do plan to do, and I'll explain how they can do it. We are just now reporting that the Biden administration does plan to punt implementation to the Trump administration and that the way that they are going to do so is that they are not going to collect on the fines. That is the punishment described in this law.

So that is breaking right now as we speak. Let me explain that the penalty in this law, what effectively is effectively is the whole underpinning of this, is that the service provider. So that is someone like Apple, a company like Apple who is offering to Tok in its App Store, that's a company like Oracle, the data hosting server for TikTok. In this law, those companies are fined $5,000 per user, 170 million users.

It totals to about $850 billion in fines. That's the whole underpinning of this year. The Biden administration is just now telling us they will not collect on those fines. That means Sunday effectively no longer matters as a deadline.

And I think I go so far as to say it also kind of renders what the Supreme Court will decide not as important anymore. If the Biden administration is committing to doing that, that then means the next day we get into a Trump presidency. Trump has said that he has plans to immediately intervene. There are several different options that he has at his disposal.

Could he somehow organize some type of sale that then he, as the president, has a discretion to say, yep, that's a qualified divestiture. I'm good with that. Could he tell his attorney general to essentially do the same thing that the Biden administration is telling NBC News that they are doing, which is, hey, don't that don't collect on those fines? It'll be a really interesting question of Kristen to then see how the tech companies handle this.

If you're the general counsel at an Apple or an Oracle, do you tell your company, yeah, I think we're safe here. That's enough protection. Or could we still see those apps have lingering concerns? Wow, Savannah, incredible work breaking that here.

We really appreciate it. Thank you. Lots of colleagues involved yeah. Amanda Turkel, John Allen, everybody on the GCP as well.

But yes, just coming off right now. Good job to the entire team. Thank you for bringing it to us. We really appreciate it.

Savannah's underscores how dynamic this story is. And joining me to keep the conversation going is Illinois Democratic Congressman Raja Krishnamorthy. He is a member of the House Intelligence Committee and ragging member of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party. Congressman, thank you so much for joining me.

I really appreciate it. Thank you, Kristen. Well, you just heard that breaking news, but let me reiterate it to the best of my understanding for our audience and for you, Savannah. Just reporting that effectively the Biden administration will not enforce the fines on companies who do support TikTok on their apps, basically reversing the idea of a ban.

What's your reaction, Congressman? Well, my reaction is I'm waiting for the Supreme Court first to hand down its decision. So we know exactly how the law is going to be handled by the courts. I expect it's going to be upheld.

And then with regard to the Biden administration, my viewpoint is that needs to pick up the phone and answer a call from any number of suitors and bidders for the company and then seek an extension of the law. Under the law, under the provisions of the law, that would be the easiest and cleanest way to proceed right now. Are you surprised that President Biden seems to flip flop on this issue? I mean, he already signed the bill into law.

I don't think he's flip flopped. I think that what he's saying is, you know, basically for that one day he may not be collecting the fines. But on the other hand, we don't know the legal ramifications of that. And I'm not sure that the different third parties that were mentioned, whether it's the Apple or Google Play stores or others, are going to rely on that with regards to enforcing the provisions of the law.

Congressman, I want to play you something that Democratic Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer had to say on the Senate for they get your reaction. The law passed last year was intended to sever TikTok from the influence of the CCP while keeping the app available for Americans. It's clear that more time is needed to find an American buyer and not disrupt the lives and livelihoods of millions of Americans of so many influencers who have built up a good network of followers. Do you agree with Chuck Schumer, Congressman?

Yeah, I think there should be an extension of time right now, but I think that there should be a meaningful negotiation to trigger that extension of time. It's been 270 days since ByteDance, which is controlled by the CCP, has had to initiate negotiations. Any further extension without any meaningful progress on the sale of the company is not going to yield any different results. We need to see that progress right now to trigger the extension, and then we can kind of enable the law to be complied with and our national security protected.

It seems like, according to the Washington Post, at least, that President Elect Trump also looking to potentially sign an executive order to give TikTok more time to agree to a sale or an alternative deadline. What is your message and how concerned are you are there that there won't be a deadline? Well, I think my message is that an executive order can't undo a piece of legislation. This is the legislation that was passed by 360 members of Congress.

If Donald Trump wants to unwind the legislation, he can come back to Congress to repeal or revise it. But I've talked to incoming members of the Trump administration, including Mike Walls, my friend and colleague, who's now the incoming National Security advisor. They have the exact same concerns about TikTok that we do, which is that we want TikTok to survive and flourish, but not under the control of the CCP. The CCP has repeatedly, as the D.C.

circuit Court of Appeals mentioned, stolen tens of millions of Americans personal records, whether it's through the Equifax hack, the Anthem hack, or the Office of Personal Management hack. This is a loaded gun, and we don't need to wait for a smoking gun and a dead body in order to act right now. Let me change gears a little bit here. Congressman Mike Turner, who is the chair of the House Intelligence Committee, was removed by Speaker Johnson.

What is your reaction to that? I was shocked. I thought it was completely unacceptable what happened. I actually talked to Mike last night, and on one level, he was unceremoniously dumped, which is kind of not exactly the right way to handle somebody who has served on that committee with such distinction for so long.

But on another level, this is just dangerous for a national security person. You know, Mike, I don't agree with Mike on a lot of. He's a conservative Republican from southwest Ohio. But what I do agree with him on is we have to take an objective, bipartisan approach with regard to holding officials of the intelligence community accountable.

If you don't do that, then you're going to allow members of the incoming Trump administration, for instance, to do things that could endanger our national security. And we can't allow that to happen. This has to be a bipartisan concern. And I'm very, very disturbed by what happened last night.

You know, Speaker Mike Johnson said Congressman Turner's ouster was not President Elect Trump's decision. What do you make of that? No, this was straight out of Mar a Lago. This was a Mar a Lago Maga move.

Okay. This was absolutely something that Donald Trump engineered because, for instance, Mike Turner doesn't agree with him on Ukraine. He believes that we should do everything to assist Ukraine against the criminal invasion that Russia has undertaken there. Mike Turner said other things such as, for instance, you know, January 6, 2021, was completely unacceptable and the insurrection and the riots.

And so what I'm trying to say is that this was absolutely a move that was triggered by Donald Trump. And unfortunately, I hope it's not a sign of things to come with regard to the other business of Congress. Congressman Kristen Murthy, I have a bunch more questions for you. We're out of time, though.

Please come back again soon. Thank you so much for being here. We really appreciate it. Thank you, Kristen.

Well, we are digging deeper into the politics of TikTok and looking ahead to the Trump agenda. The panel, thanks for watching the press. Now stay with. Welcome back.

Let's get right to the panel. Sahil Core, senior national political reporter, is here. Maria Theresa Kumar, president CEO of Voto Latino. She's also an NBC News political analyst.

And Lance Trover, Republican strategist and former press secretary for Doug Burgum's presidential campaign. Thanks to all of you for being here. I watched President Biden's farewell address last night, Sahil, and was expecting this look back over his more than 50 years in office. He did do some of that.

And yet the headline I think was what he said, this dark warning that there's an oligarchy coming to the United States potentially replacing the nation's democracy. Yeah, that's right. I would break the speech down into two categories. There are things that President Biden wants to remember for as president that's increased in domestic manufacturing, clean energy infrastructure.

He talked a lot about institutions, checks and balances. He's very proud of giving Trump peaceful transfer power, which Trump didn't exactly give him four years ago. And then the second section of the warnings, this was very interesting. He talked about the tech industrial complex.

He talked about an oligarchy in the potential for abuses of power, structural problems of dark money, campaign finance. He went once, 18 year tournaments. A lot of these things he did not achieve. And I think that's part of what he's talking about.

AI was the most notable as well in this category. He was successful at forging by parts and coalitions on variety of issues. He was not successful at writing a message on AI even though there was a real life time Congress to do something. He talked about it as being both enormously powerful in ways that could be good, like curing cancer and also very dangerous.

It's not constrained. It's interesting. A Democrat texted me to say rich reason why is he talking about new policy proposals? Why is he not just sticking to what he accomplished?

Why didn't he talk about that on trail? Right. We all are. Well also this I think that would have brought in a lot of the country together for something that you mentioned that folks haven't really loved is this idea that Congress should not invest in stocks and bonds if they have precursor information that would have resonated in a really unique way.

But he never mentioned it on the campaign trail. So look, I think I do believe that he has been the most consequential president of the 21st century because he did not do one headline policy. He did a gazillion and it is going to take a decade for people to understand that he basically near short manufacturing, that he brought in infrastructure in a real way. He's modernizing the way companies have relationships with their workers because they brought in childcare inside the workforce.

So you are going to see it it's going to be too long and history going to remember him as the whitening credit or the person who's in that seat, which is often so I do think that that but I have to say it was also I think for us a moment of saying he was able to bring us out of a great pandemic. He was able to basically establish the United States again with relationships abroad. And what we're seeing now with someone that wants to increase tariffs, wants to go after immigrants, it's a stark contrast of this light in America versus are we going into isolationism? And we have to have that real conversation with each what does that look like for the next three years?

Lance response well, obviously I have a difference of opinion. You probably hear a viewer, right? I hear everything you're saying. I mean that all sounds well and good.

I mean obviously you've seen in polls out Today it's a 60% disapproval rating with the public. I saw this speech as a dour lecture to the American people. And I think from November 5th it's pretty clear voters are tired of being lectured on the dangers of Donald Trump and Elon Musk. They make that abundantly clear.

And number two, I just want to point this out. For this man to sit up there and talk about misinformation and disinformation when he and this White House lied to the public about his fitness to hold this office for the last three years I find hypocritical beyond words. I think it's a sad ending that started with 100 Biden carton several weeks ago and it's just a sad ending. I think one of the challenges and one of the reasons that he has such low approval ratings is in large part of the arguy that is controlling our media consultants assumption America's.

We are not tuning in to three stations. We are not getting the same kind of news. We are not. We're so silent, our information is so balkanized that you can have two people in the same household listening to and hearing completely two different things.

And I do think that that is this inability for us to understand and actually believe in what truth is. That is where the freedom of the press, the fourth state is going to be critically important to how do we communicate in a different way? Because otherwise these fractures that he's talking about is not anarchy over there. It's literally being piped into our bedrooms and interlin rooms every single day without fact checking.

And that is the great danger. I think that's one of the reasons why a slow progress people actually don't know all the work that he's been able to or the record inflation or the border spiraling out of control. The other reason is unpopular is age. The country doesn't believe she should have run for re election and a lot of Democrats don't believe she should run.

And it's not because you know we're around here talking about it because people have eyes because on TV every day and they just conclude that you didn't out of the four years. Well it is interesting we just saw with Jimmy Carter's funeral he was remembered differently than in the current moment. We'll have to wait and see how history remembers his presidency. Sahil Let me turn to force all this against the backdrop of the incoming Trump administration, a lot of drama unfolding on Capitol Hill, including the fact that House Speaker Mike Johnson just ousted the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Mike Turner.

And you just heard me talk to Congressman Christian Murthy who slammed it as did minority leave Jefferson, who said Mike Turner has robustly promoted the safety of the American people and the free world and has his unjustified ulcer is likely being applauded by our adversaries in Russia and China. Shameful. What are you hearing from the Hill? Well, a few things.

Firstly, this is an unusual move because he had only been in that role for one and a half term and Republicans have a three term limit for committee chair. So this was unexpected from that standpoint. And you heard Rogers Christian Murphy say this? I think Turner also suggested reporters that this was because of concerns from Mar a Lago.

What's he talking about there? Johnson of course denies this. He says he just wanted fresh blood in there, although he didn't explain why. But it's no coincidence, I think that Turner does not see Iowa, which Trump on a number of national security issues.

Turner is a major Russia hawk. He's a strong supporter of Ukraine, a visitor to meet with senior Ukrainian officials. He is a China hawk which led him to want to ban Tik Tok, which also Trump doesn't agree with. So it's also a coincidence.

I doubt it. Lance, to that point, what do you make of this ouster and really this divide in the Republican Party? You do have the Ukraine, Russia hawks, the China hawks as well as the America first foreign policy of Donald Trump who has made very clear if he wants to scale back support for Ukraine, among other things. Yeah, well it does not help my Turner or Democrats praising him.

I would say that helping with Republicans, number two, this is Donald Trump's Republican Party and he's the president who's coming in. Look, the speaker disputes that it was moral and those folks who put the work of the system it was, it's down from Republican Party. He has a different viewpoint when it comes to Ukraine. He wants to get this finished.

And so I'm saying even if it is a Trump thing, I mean it's a surrogate. What do you think of this moment? Well, I think that all this hope that there was going to be this ability for Congress to hold back the president's agenda demonstrates that that is not it, that they have the magaside Republican in the House in the speakership. And so this idea of any type of resistance to that is opposition to the president's agenda coming in is not going to be the case.

All right, you guys, great conversation. Thank you so much for coming in. Really appreciate it. Coming up after the break, progress being made in the fight against the wildfires in California in the long road to rebuild.

NBC, Ellis and Barber got a rare look at the scope of the disaster from the air. Joined us next. Stay with us. You watch.

Welcome back. Firefighters in Los Angeles are finally getting a handle on the wildfires that have been raging there for over a week now. The Santa Ana winds are dying down for now and the red flag warnings are expiring. But LA Fire Department Chief Person Crowley warned in this morning's press conference that the fire risk is not over yet.

We talk about the winds aren't necessarily here in the city, but with that we still have I gosh, a large amount of unburned dry fuel with low humidity. There are more extreme winds on the horizons like I said next week and our community needs to remain ready. It is important that you protect yourselves and your family by planning, planning, preparing and staying aware. Flying embers from a wildfire can destroy homes over a mile away.

And even as many people's focus is now trying to recover, the deaths will continues to climb. At least 27 people have been killed and 31 are missing. Joining now from Pasadena is NBC News correspondent Ellison Barber. Ellison, thank you so much for being here.

What is the very latest? They're on the ground right now again with a sigh of relief for a lot of people as those red flag warnings are officially ending in about an hour. They end at 3pm local time. This latest wind event, according to fire officials, that was caused no expansion of either the Eaten or the Palisades fire.

One brush fire that did pick up was quickly dealt with and halted according to the LA fire Chief. But as you just heard there from Chief Prowling, there are still morning residents to not let their guard down and to prepare in the event there is a red flag warning for Santa Ana Wednesday come Monday and Tuesday next week. She suggested residents try and clear any sort of dry brush around their houses out of the way at least 200ft, she said, away from their houses. I was talking to one of the fire teams that has been on the ground dealing with the Eaton fire all week texting with one of their Italian chief earlier and they said right now a lot of their work in addition to still looking for hotspots, has shifted to clearing debris and trying to prepare some of these areas for repopulation and residents coming home.

That being said, the LA County Fire chief said just this morning that ultimately while some residents of the franchises of the Eaten fire are being allowed to go back if they show their identification, most people will not be able to return home in these mandatory evacuated zones for at least another week. They say that simply because it is not safe to do so. We did have the opportunity two days ago to fly with Cal Fire over parts of the Palisades fire, the Pacific Palisades in Malibu. And Christina, hard to put into words how much destruction there is.

Over 12,000 structures have been destroyed by these fires. Over 38,000 acres burned from the Eaton Palisades fire alone. The road to recovery is going to be a really long one. Entire communities have essentially been wiped off of the map.

But today, Governor Newsom did sign an executive order trying to fast track some help for temporary housing. Alison? Barbara, thank you so much for your reporting. We appreciate it.

I'm back tomorrow with more meetup Press. Now the news continues with Hallie Jackson right now. Hey, it's Kate Snow, NBC News anchor and host of the Drink. This month, Demi Lovato is my guest.

The global superstar tells me that she is the happiest she's ever been right now. But getting there, it wasn't simple. Demi opens up about starting in Hollywood young and why she now thinks she may have started too soon. She talks about recovery, her new marriage, and the deeply personal reason behind her new cookbook.

The Drink is always about the journey to the top. And this was an honest conversation about what that takes. Hope you'll listen and follow the Drink wherever you get your podcast.