Meet the Press NOW — March 20

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Conditions apply. Offer includes 1% loyalty rate reduction for qualifying customers. Visit HyundaiCanada.com or your local dealer for details. Welcome to Meet the Press Now.

I'm Gabe Gutierrez in Washington. As the war with Iran nears the three-week mark and the Pentagon appears to be ramping up operations amid new attacks today across the region, including in Jerusalem's Old City. All of this while President Trump continues to suggest the war will be ending soon. Just moments ago, the president speaking to reporters about the ongoing war while leaving the White House.

Well, I've been hitting them awfully hard. I mean, I don't know if you can possibly get hit harder, but these are thugs and animals and horrible people. But you can't hit anybody harder than we've hit them. Do you think Israel will be ready to end the war when you're ready?

I think so, yeah. The president. The relationships are very good ones, I think so. We want more or less similar things.

You know what we want? We want victory, both of us. And that's what we've got. Well, look, we can have dialogue, but we don't, I don't want to do a ceasefire.

You know, you don't do a ceasefire when you're literally obliterating the other side. When the war first began, President Trump suggested it would last just four to six weeks. And as we close in on the start of the fourth week, President Trump has repeatedly said in recent days that war will be over soon. That will take out the leadership.

That won't be long. And we're going to have a much safer world when it's wrapped up. It'll be wrapped up soon, but we're not ready to leave yet. But we'll be leaving in the near future.

We'll be leaving in pretty much the very near future. As soon as that war is over, which will be soon, your prices are going to drop like a rock. And it's going to be over with pretty soon. But despite those comments, the Pentagon is accelerating its deployment of thousands of Marines and sailors to the Middle East.

That's according to two people familiar with the decision. These images show some of those U.S. service members departing San Diego for the region. Meanwhile, in the Middle East, Israeli emergency crews are scrambling after a major attack on Jerusalem's Old City.

This was the moment of that strike when falling missile fragments hit. The IDF says bomb squad and border guard soldiers are at the scene to collect evidence. NBC's Richard Engel is making his way to near where that strike happened in Jerusalem and will join us shortly. But joining me now is NBC News White House correspondent Monica Alba, as well as NBC News senior national security correspondent Courtney Kuby.

Monica, I do want to start with you. As we mentioned, the president has repeatedly said this war will be over soon. But is it clear right now what soon means? No, it's really not, Gabe.

And the president kind of is giving this answer over and over again and has for the last 10 or 12 days. He indicated at one point when he was down in Florida that he thought it could be wrapping up, quote, within days. And again, that was about 12 days ago. So it is really unclear what the president means when he says this.

And he started off this week sort of trying to project that again, saying that this was potentially wrapping up. But you also see the president taking decisions and making important decisions about potentially these additional resources that are going to be sent to the region, which suggests that the president is also obviously considering options that would mean that this ongoing massive military operation could last a little bit longer than that. So the president, on one hand, does want to seem to project that this could be winding down. But we don't know, on the other hand, what soon means.

And originally, of course, the timeline was supposed to be somewhere in the four to six week timeline. And the president also likes to say and just said moments ago, he believes he is weeks ahead of schedule. So if we're at about the halfway point of that, but also ahead of schedule again, the president hasn't totally been able to put an exact timeframe on what he means by soon. And Monica, oil prices continue to creep up as Iran continues to target energy infrastructure in the Gulf.

And there are still, of course, major concerns about the Strait of Hormuz. What are we hearing from the president about that situation? Yeah, he's trying to also there project that the reason for concern shouldn't be that high. He even is trying to argue that he believes that the price of oil would be even higher, that he doesn't believe it is as high as he thought it could go based on what we're seeing.

But you also are seeing the Trump administration take this pretty seriously and talk about some potential ways in which they can mitigate the oil prices. You saw this week the waiver of the Jones Act, that 100-year-old statute that essentially makes it a little bit easier to use other vessels to move goods, which means that this can more freely flow between U.S. ports to be able to transport that, which, again, might help eventually. But people aren't going to see the short-term gain or effect of that in the coming weeks.

And the White House, the vice president, for instance, has admitted that he believes this is going to be a rough road for the weeks ahead, calling it a temporary blip and trying to brace people for the reality that it is going to be a little while before those gas prices come down. OK, Monica Alba at the White House. Courtney, I want to shift to you. What do we know about this newest deployment?

We saw in that video some U.S. service members leaving San Diego. When are they expected to arrive? What else do we know?

So this is the USS Boxer that we just saw with Marines and sailors on board. It's part of another one of these ARGs that we've talked about before, the amphibious ready group, Marine Expeditionary Unit. Basically what that means is it's three U.S. Navy ships with several thousand U.S.

sailors plus about 2,200 to 2,500 Marines on board. And those are Marines who are very specially trained for missions like amphibious landings. So landing on an island that's potentially hostile or contested and taking a piece of land. They're also good at seizing ports, seizing airports, those sorts of things.

So they just left San Diego. And according to several officials we spoke with yesterday, they said they're actually headed to the Middle East. But amphibious assault ships like this one, they don't move very fast. So we're probably a couple of weeks out.

Well, potentially landing on an island. The gas field? It's, I mean, what these Marines and these sailors do is they bring options for President Trump. They give him the option for, there's another AMU that's on its way there.

It's much closer, actually coming from the Asia Pacific. Now, if there are two Marine Expeditionary Units there, that is thousands of Marines who have this very highly skilled specialized training. And they operate as a unit and they're very self-contained, meaning they have their own aircraft. They have their own abilities to sustain themselves.

It gives the president options for more boots on the ground, should he decide to do so. And potentially, what does that mean for the Strait of Hormuz? Could these perhaps escort tankers? I think escorts are probably less likely at this point, but other, there are other options that they could use boots on the ground that would help potentially open up the Strait of Hormuz.

Because the threats still exist right now. And so what they have to do is just slowly degrade those threats. They've gone after some of the anti-ship missiles. They've gone after some of the drones.

They've gone after some of the mines. They still have the mosquito fleet, you know, these small fast boats. Those still exist, but they're trying to take those down too. They really need to degrade that threat capability before they could talk about any kind of boots on the ground.

So we're days out. Before I let you go, yesterday the president confirmed, and also Secretary Hagseth, talked about asking Congress for more money, potentially some $200 billion to help fund this war. How fluid is that number, you think? And what did you make of the Republican hesitancy on Capitol Hill?

Unclear, you know, where this goes, whether there will actually be some backlash to President Trump, typically on the Hill there isn't. But in this particular case, how fluid do you think this will be? Could we see a much higher number before? I can't envision a scenario if this war continues for weeks more where that number doesn't go up more.

Because what this is largely paying for is replacement of munitions and weapon systems and things. And by the way, Iran has taken out quite a bit of U.S. military hardware. We don't have a whole lot confirmed, but there's reports of radar systems and communication systems in the region.

We know they've taken out a number of drones, expensive drones. We saw here a few hours ago. It only takes one incident for this war to become emotional, a holy site that is hit, a building that is hit full of people. We saw the world's tallest building in the world in Dubai almost hit by a drone.

Any one of these kind of incidents that turns it from a war where the leaders think they know what their objectives are into one that is very hard to control and becomes emotional and self-sustaining. Richard Engel reporting in Jerusalem for us. Richard, thank you. And joining me now is Israel's Ambassador to the United States, Dr.

Michael Leiter. Ambassador, thank you so much for joining us here on Meet the Press Now. We really appreciate it. Good to be with you, Gabe.

Thank you. Ambassador, I want to get your reaction to this news we're getting out of Jerusalem with those missile fragments that are impacting the old city. What's your reaction to that? Well, not surprised.

Just two days ago, missiles from Iran hit very close to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Now they've hit very close to the Dome of the Rock. They don't care where these missiles are hitting. They try to kill as many people as possible and damage sites that are holy both to Islam, Christianity, and Judaism.

Ambassador, I also want to talk about President Trump saying that he instructed Prime Minister Netanyahu not to hit gas fields after that attack on that massive facility. Is that something that, was that a commitment that Israel will continue to keep if Iran keeps attacking your country? Gabe, we're in this together. This is a collaborative effort.

We've been planning it for many, many weeks. We're implementing it together. Now the President of the United States expresses an interest that a certain site will not be hit. We, of course, honor that.

The President and Prime Minister said that in his press conference last night. We acted alone in attacking the gas field. And by the way, this gas field does not affect international prices, global prices. This is an energy site for the Iranians.

And the intention was to put pressure on the Iranian regime, not to spike oil prices around the globe. And you have repeatedly said, you've repeatedly talked about your close collaboration with the United States. I've watched many of your interviews and you just said, essentially, you're working lockstep with the U.S. If that's the case, why did you go and hit this facility without telling President Trump, as he says?

Well, there was an initial report by the White House that it was in tandem. The important thing to understand is that we acted alone, and the moment the President said he doesn't want it hit again, we, of course, conceded and ceased the attack. So NBC News does have reporting, according to a U.S. official, that Israel did give the United States a heads-up about this attack.

Do you dispute that? Look, I'm not disputing anything or, you know, disputing anything. The issue here is that we're collaborating very closely. We are flying wing-to-wing and shoulder-to-shoulder.

There are hundreds of planes in the air at the same time. We have a division of labor over the skies of Iran. And this operation, both Roaring Lion and Epic Fury, is proceeding according to plan together. Prime Minister Netanyahu said yesterday that regime change in Iran would require some kind of ground component, although he wouldn't elaborate.

Does Israel believe that the goals of this war could be achieved without boots on the ground? We think there have to be boots on the ground, but Iranian boots on the ground. The people of Iran have to topple this regime. We have to set the stage.

We have to make sure that we have a situation in Tehran where there's not a regime which is producing nuclear weapons. I mean, just imagine, if we're hit, your first question, we have missile hit very close to the Dome of the Rock. Imagine that was nuclear-tipped. Imagine that the missiles being fired into all of our neighbors in the Gulf, the Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Oman, were being hit with nuclear weapons.

They hit Cyprus. They hit Turkey. Imagine they would be hit with nuclear weapons. So we need a regime that is not producing nuclear weapons, is not producing thousands of ballistic missiles that can hit its neighbors, and is not funding proxies around the region.

Now, President Trump a few moments ago was just asked if he believes that Israel will be willing to end this war when he is, and his response was, I think so. What's your response to that? Well, who am I to comment on the President's statement? But I think so, too.

We have planned this together. We're implementing it together. And the grand finale will come together as well. Well, top officials, top intelligence officials yesterday on Capitol Hill, they said that Israel and the U.S.

have slightly different goals when it comes to this war, especially when it comes to regime change. The objectives that have been laid out by the President are different from the objectives that have been laid out by the Israeli government. The President's objectives with respect to Operation Epic Fury did not include regime change. That may be different from what Israel's objectives were.

So will Israel continue any military action against Iran if there is not a new regime in place? Let me try to finesse that a little bit. There are primary objectives and secondary objectives. The primary objectives are absolutely in tandem.

The primary objectives, as I said, no more ballistic missiles, no more nuclear-tipped enriched uranium, no more support for proxies. Can that be achieved without a regime collapse? We don't think so. So we need at least for the regime to collapse.

Change must come by the Iranian people themselves. So we're not into regime change. We're into regime collapse. What will your message be to Republicans on Capitol Hill?

Because now that the President yesterday confirmed that his administration will ask Congress for some $200 billion to fund this war, some Republicans, of course Democrats, but at least some Republicans have seemed a little hesitant at that price tag. They say they're going to look into it. What would you tell those Republicans on the Hill as they look forward to potentially funding this war to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars? If I'm asked about the war, I'm certainly not going to wade into a financial issue here on the Hill.

But if I'm asked about this war, I think if in the 1930s we would have invested in preventing Adolf Hitler from launching the Second World War, we would have saved a hell of a lot of money and a lot of lives. 65 million lives were lost. The new Nazis of today are the Ayatollahs of Tehran. And they will launch a war which will take the lives of millions and millions of people.

They have to be stopped. And if there is a necessary investment now to stop this march of tyranny by this regime, this brutal regime, it's a worthwhile investment. Ambassador, I want to turn now to Lebanon. Our team in Lebanon is reporting that there are growing fears in the south of Lebanon that Israel may be preparing for some sort of ground incursion into Lebanon, given the fighting there.

What is Israel's goal in Lebanon? We have one goal. No Hezbollah missiles fired into our towns and villages. Last Sunday, there were plans of the Radwan forces of Hezbollah to try to penetrate our northern border the same way Hamas did from Gaza on October 7, 2023.

We have to prevent that, Gabe. We're not going to allow our citizens to be fired upon by Hezbollah missiles at their whim. So there is already a ground incursion into Lebanon by our forces. And we're going to be there just a few kilometers in to prevent Hezbollah from firing anti-tank missiles.

They fire anti-tank missiles into residential buildings. Just imagine that. We can't allow that to happen. Now, if the Lebanese Armed Forces would move down south and would prevent Hezbollah from doing it, we're out of there.

We have no interest in being in southern Lebanon. We want peace with Lebanon. We can have a marvelous peace with Lebanon with trade and with tourism and with financial institutions. We want peace with them, but we can't have Hezbollah, which has raped their country, which has taken it over, sapped up its strength, and basically is dominating their foreign policy, which is firing missiles at Israel.

Ambassador Dr. Michael Leiter, we thank you so much for your time. Good to be with you, Gabe. Thank you.

And coming up, up in the air. We're live at the nation's busiest airport, where travelers are facing extremely long TSA lines. And the Trump administration warns it may have to shut down some airports as the Homeland Security shutdown drags on. Plus, we'll head to Capitol Hill, where if you squint really hard, you may be able to see signs of optimism that this shutdown could have an end date.

With another round of bipartisan talks happening today, you're watching Meet the Press Now. Stay with us. Drive off in a new Hyundai Elantra today with zero dollars down during the Hyundai Advantage sales event. Take advantage of the $1,000 Spring Drive bonus and lease the 2026 Elantra Essentials for just $73 weekly at 4.99% for 60 months.

And you're covered by Elantra's best-in-class five-year new car warranty. Now that's the Hyundai Advantage. Conditions apply. Offer includes 1% loyalty rate reduction for qualifying customers.

Visit HyundaiCanada.com or your local dealer for details. Welcome back. We are now more than a month into the Department of Homeland Security shutdown. And for the second day in a row, Border czar Tom Homan is set to be on Capitol Hill later today to meet with bipartisan negotiators.

That's according to two sources familiar with his schedule. As it all comes after the group's meeting yesterday, seemed to yield little progress on an agreement to end the shutdown. The discussion in progress. Any progress?

You feel good about it? We'll continue talking. I'm glad that the White House was here, Something on identifying labels, curtailing raids at sensitive locations like schools and hospitals. What Democrats insist they still want movement on is requiring judicial warrants for raids and busting into homes and masks for officers.

Gabe, just a few minutes ago, the Senate voted 47 to 37, another failed vote on the existing DHS funding deal, which Republicans want without reforms to ICE and CBP. You know, and, what would you rate the likelihood is that Senator Schumann cancels recess in this moment? It's plausible, but I don't want to say it's likely yet, Gabe. These are usually threats made by the Senate Majority Leader, one of the favorite tactics of someone in his position to try to get senators to move toward compromise.

It often works because no one likes to have to cancel their recess. And look, it would be a bit embarrassing for the Senate to go away for two weeks on Easter while the chaos at airports gets worse and worse. But at the same time, you've settled into a stalemate the two parties have here where Republicans say, fund DHS in full and negotiate changes to ICE and CBP on the side. The Democrats say, no, fund TSA and the various other components of it that they agree on, including FEMA, including CISA, including the Coast Guard.

And they say keep ICE and CBP for a separate issue. So despite all of this airport chaos that everyone says is unacceptable, the two parties have very different ways to deal with it, which is why, ironically, the worse things get, the deeper the stalemate has gotten here on Capitol Hill. Yes. So is there a sense that that frustration at the nation's airports, those images that we saw in Aaron's report, do you think that that could become a real breaking point if it drags on further into April, if we keep seeing it over the coming weeks and these lines, you know, this isn't just Atlanta and Houston, but even more airports throughout the country?

Yes, it absolutely will ultimately have to push lawmakers toward a deal. And the worse things get, the more they're going to be hearing from their constituents. And by the way, the Senate yesterday, by unanimous consent, passed a bill to eliminate all preferential treatment for lawmakers to avoid the TSA usual lines. So they're clearly feeling the pressure from constituents.

But again, the two parties are dug in on their own very different approaches to how to deal with it, Gabe. That is currently the problem and they need a deal to resolve it. And we'll see how intense that pressure gets. Sahil Kapoor live for us on the Hill.

Sahil, thank you. And up next, pumped up prices. It's been a wild week for gas, oil and the U.S. economy as the war with Iran rages on.

We'll break down what to expect in the days and weeks ahead. You're watching Meet the Press. Now, stay with us. Let's kickstart your wellness journey with the Start Today app.

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It's more context and clarity from the reporters you trust. Download the NBC News app now and subscribe for more. Hey guys, Willie Geist here reminding you to check out the Sunday Sit-Down podcast. On this week's episode, I sit down with one of the biggest bands in the world, Mumford & Sons.

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Turning now to the economic impact of the war against Iran. Gas prices continue to soar across the country as the war shows no signs of letting up despite the president's insistence that it will end soon. Take a look at this chart showing the national average for a gallon of regular gas over the last three months. It's jumped nearly a dollar in just the past few weeks.

Earlier today, the Energy Secretary said the Trump administration is looking at removing sanctions on some tankers carrying Iranian oil in order to boost supply. Let's listen. Yes, so I think that most of that oil will be absorbed in the next 30 to 45 days. See, what we have is an interruption of flows outside of the Persian Gulf.

But yet, as Secretary Besson said yesterday, we've got over 100 million barrels in crude tankers that's on its way or floating, waiting to unload in China. That oil is already going to be sold. It's going to show up in China. So look, I think prices are probably discounting that, although there's interruptions of flows from the Straits of Hormuz, the world has a lot of oil today.

And for more on all of this, let's bring in NBC News business and data correspondent Brian Chung. And Brian, I want to get to some breaking news. Another rough day on Wall Street. It's been, what now, four consecutive weeks of losses?

How bad is it getting? Yeah, four consecutive weeks of losses. And just today, you can see on the market board ahead of you, the Dow Jones down 1 percent, the S&P 500, a measure of the broader market at large, down 1.5 percent, tech stocks down 2 percent. All of this because of the headlines that we've been seeing around Iran.

You can imagine that with the geopolitical tension continuing, arguably as intense as it was when this war first started, you have a lot of market strategists saying this is more prolonged than we thought it was going to be. And for that reason, we're going to dump some of our stocks here. Now, when it comes to the overall story, you also have to remember the Federal Reserve, arguably the most important economic policymaking institution in the world, saying just earlier this week that they really have no idea how all this ends with the fog of war clouding their economic outlook. You had Jay Powell, the chair of the Fed, saying nobody knows how this ends.

That type of uncertainty is a big reason why we saw, as you pointed out, yet another week of selling the S&P 500 now year to date down 5 percent, Gabe. Well, Brian, we were speaking about this in the introduction to this segment. But how much of an impact will the unsanctioning of this oil have on gas and consumer prices? And I think to answer that question, you have to take a little bit of a step back here, because I think a lot of people on the surface are wondering, why would the United States respond to its own war with Iran by unsanctioning Iranian oil?

Now, there's two reasons why the United States would do that. First off, there's this weird side effect of the closure of the Strait of Hormuz and all of this, which is that higher oil prices, especially on those commoditized barrels of oil, has the benefit of serving more profits to the country of Iran, because you could sell a single barrel of oil for way more than you did prior to this war began. Now, the United States, by unsanctioning that oil, hopes that the flow will lead to less profits for the Iranian government and the Iranian regime. But also they hope that that will lead to lower prices for overall global indexing of where these crude oil prices are and then hopefully leading to lower consumer prices for us at the pump as well.

Now, again, whether or not that's going to actually happen remains to be seen. You heard Chris Wright sort of talk about how he might be surprised by the fact that the markets aren't discounting that decision more. But again, we'll have to see how all this plays out. Brian Chung, thank you.

And after the break, Trump change. What do we know about the government's plans to start producing a 24 karat gold coin featuring President Trump's image? This is Meet the Press Now. Welcome back.

Joining me now is our panel, Shelby Talcott, White House correspondent for Semaphore, Amisha Cross, Democratic strategist and former Obama campaign advisor, and Stephen Hayes, editor and CEO of The Dispatch. He's also, of course, an NBC News contributor. Thank you so much for joining us here. Shelby, I want to start with you.

We're 35 days into the partial government shutdown, the DHS shutdown, which we were talking about. What do you think is going to move the needle here? Is there some signs of optimism on the Hill, the meeting with Homan? Does it get us anywhere?

Yeah, I do think that there's signs of optimism. I think that Homan is taken pretty seriously by both sides. He has been able to sort of de-escalate situations for the White House in the past. So I think it's notable that he is going to the Hill now and clearly trying to do the same thing that he did just a few months ago when all of this really ramped up.

But at the same time, I do think that there are red lines that the Trump administration is just not willing to cross. And so the big question is, are those red lines too far apart from Democrats' red lines? And at the end of the day, I think what's going to happen is both sides are going to realize that in a shutdown, nobody wins. Right.

Americans are saying they want, meanwhile you're demanding billions of dollars for a war Americans are strongly against. You have a problem. Quickly, before we go, speaking of money, the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts has approved a commemorative coin to mark the country's 250th anniversary that features President Trump.

You see it right there. So Stephen, what do you make of this? Look, it's, not surprisingly, a very large coin, three inches. I believe that may be the largest that the Treasury could make, significantly larger than any other coin in circulation.

Really? I mean, in some ways, it's sort of the perfect commemoration of Donald Trump's presidency. It's bigger than everything else. He pushed it.

He's, you know, not known for his immodesty. He pushed it and nobody uses coins anymore. So it's a throwback to an era of times that people don't, don't even use it. He got rid of the penny.

The only shot could be the final work. No, absolutely. I was gonna say the same thing at the end of the day, if he was just making a commemorative coin, who cares? But this, when, you know, you can't even get coins at the grocery store when you're trying to get change, it's pretty wild.

All right. Well, thank you all so much. We really appreciate it. Shelby, I'll let you weigh in next time on the Dominican coin, but we're out of time.

Really appreciate it. Thank you all for being here. And instead of coming, a rare look at daily life inside Cuba and the challenges facing everyday Cubans as the island's energy crisis deepens. That story's next on Meet the Press.

Stay with us. Welcome back. A rare look now at what daily life is like inside Cuba. The island in the midst of an energy crisis as the U.S.

has been effectively blocking all fuel from reaching the country for one and two months. NBC's George Solis is in Havana speaking to Cubans about what life is like right now. With a smile as big as the bow on her head, four-year-old Ariani Cesar has spent half of her young life in this bed at Havana's premier cancer hospital. She's a kidney cancer patient.

She's already lost one kidney and the other now has a tumor. The hope that she can handle her treatment when it's available. Mom, Arlenis Martinez, tells me from travel to treatment, things have only gotten harder. They're here multiple days at a time because back home, there's often no power, no food, no gas.

Her biggest fear, it's her daughter who'll pay the price. When push comes to shove, what do I do with my little girl, she says. Where does my little girl end up? Her plea to Havana and Washington, keep these innocent kids in mind.

They didn't ask for any of this. Meanwhile, doctors caring for these children say it's only getting harder. This year has been terrible, pediatric oncologist Yolemi Romero says. It's not just hospitals in the heart of Havana.

Pharmacies are virtually empty. We stopped by four, all of them with mostly bare shelves, forcing many to find medicine on the black market. Either my family sends it or I buy it from people selling online, this woman tells me. When I needed medication, my daughter in the U.S.

sends it, this man said. Also on the black market, gas, last week going for as much as $40 a gallon. And take a look at this, cab drivers, hundreds of them waiting here all night for simply five gallons of gas. If they get it, they need this government-issued card.

Jose Menendez slept in his pink 1952 Ford convertible. What do you do if you can't drive people around? This is not the first time we are in great difficulty, so we have managed to always have a plan B. Lines also forming at the street market for food for those who can't afford it.

Today is the farmer's market and I can't buy anything because I have no money, this mother told me. Now this is something that's very interesting. The potatoes here are $350 pesos. They're imported from the United States.

But you'll notice there's a longer line here. Over here for sale, Cuban potatoes at $200 pesos. And we saw it can get tense. A brief argument breaks out over someone accused of jumping the line for something as simple as a potato.

In central Havana, I met Giovanni Rafael Peleta, who's worked at this upholstery shop for the last 15 years. He's grateful the lights are on today after Monday's national blackout that lasted more than a day. It's like having a rope around my neck, he says. They keep squeezing, squeezing.

He welcomes help from any country, including the U.S. Things are just too dire, he says, to keep throwing stones. Nelson Perez is a barber with two small boys. He tells me there's an urgent need for change.

He's fed up and using social media to post messages of protest demanding profound democratic and economic changes in Cuba. Back at the hospital, Arlenis Martinez dreams her little girl will grow up to live in a better world where Cuba and all of these children in this hospital can prosper. And George Luis joins us now from Havana. George, thank you for your reporting.

I know it can be sometimes tough to get Cubans to speak freely on camera, but did you get a sense that, you know, from some of the people you talked to that do they blame the U.S. for the escalating fuel crisis or are they willing to lay some of the blame on their own government? Yeah, good to be with you. We got a mixed reaction.

Some of them, of course, vocal against the president here, President Diaz-Canel. Some of them critical of President Trump. A lot of them saying it really doesn't matter. What matters to them right now is putting food on their table, how they take care of their kids.

A lot of times when I talk to people, they said, I don't know much about La Política. I don't know much about the politics. What I know is that I'm hurting. My family's hurting right now.

And I need to know what's going to be done. As you heard from that one gentleman there who works in that furniture shop saying, I do feel that any intervention is welcome right now if it means keeping the lights on here, steady income and food for my family, Gabe. You know, and George, that barber you spoke with, it was interesting to see him, you know, talking about putting protests on social media. What role has social media played in the ongoing fuel crisis there?

And, you know, how have things changed in the last decade or so? It wasn't that long ago that Cubans did not have access to that amount of social media or that, you know, that Internet access. Yeah, social media seems to be proliferating. That barber Nelson Perez showing us a number of images he was posting to family and friends here and abroad.

Even one with the Statue of Liberty saying, you know, this is what I hope for. I hope for some freedom. I hope for some independence. I hope for a more prosperous Cuba.

Gabe. George Luis with some rare access inside Cuba. George, thanks to you and your team. And we should note, Kristen will have an exclusive interview with Cuba's deputy foreign minister on Sunday right here on Meet the Press.

And thank you for watching. I'm Gabe Gutierrez. We'll have more news coming up on NBC News Now. And also join Kristen this Sunday where she has interviews with Scott Bessant, the Treasury Secretary, Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut.

And as we mentioned, Cuba's deputy foreign minister. 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 podcasts.