Late in his term was calvin coolidge. Reporter it would be back to work today to make America Great again. First item on the agenda a round of golf at his florida club. The president will focus on his agenda during his time in florida. This was the president last friday before leaving for florida. Ill be working very hard during that christmas because we have many things were talking about including north korea and including lot of things happening in the middle east. Reporter in addition to national security, the president s 2018 agenda includes a trillion dollar infrastructure bill to repair americas roads and bridges. And to revisit health care. President trump pushed congress to include a repeal of the individual mandate as part of the tax reform bill. This is a requirement that people buy insurance that they dont want and dont need. And that was one of the pillars of obamacare. And weve gotten rid of that. Reporter the president tweeted this morning that because of the individual mand democrats and republicans will eventually come together and develop a great new health care plan. Also on the agenda this next year, throwing a party. [ applause ] President Trump ended his first year in Office Without hosting a foreign leader for a state visit. The last president to do that was calvin coolidge. Meantime White House Press secretary Sarah Sanders says its not clear why the president has yet to hold a state dinner. Theres really been no singular issue but she says that the administration hopes to schedule one early in the new year. Well, we are getting through one of the coldest weeks of the winter season. Starting off with temperatures today only in the 30s. Highs 34 to 39 degrees. As we look at the three day outlook not much warmer anytime soon. Tomorrow a high of 32 degrees. Stray flurry getting past the freezing mark and most of us staying below freezing on thursday with the High Temperature right at 30 degrees. You will notice more clouds coming in thursday night. So thats what tops the weather headlines that slight flurry chance look for it anytime between 11 00 p. M. And 6 00 a. M. And then very cold wednesday night into early thursday morning. We also have a chance for snow this weekend. Lets show you that first chance for some flurries around here. This is today at 5 00 p. M. You notice the clouds coming in. They are mostly cloudy skies. By 7 00 p. M. And there we are between 11 00 p. M. And 6 00 a. M. You can see those scattered flurries just making their way in. Shouldnt slow you down too much but the chance is there so we do want to make sure that you are aware of it and then as we get into the feelslike temperatures when we look at that on futurecast, expect temperatures to feel like mostly in the 20s on wednesday. But by thursday morning, it feels like Single Digits. You can always stay informed with the first alert weather app. Just download the wusa9 app right now. All right, miri thank you ri much. Investigators are working to find out what sparked this blaze at an antiques store in alexandria. Flames broke out around 10 00 last night in route 1 in alexandria just south of buckman road. Flames could be seen up and down the highway as crews tried to bring the fire under control at the Mount Vernon Antiques center. Firefighters had to stay outside the building as it panelly collapsed. We could learn today whether the Montgomery County council will allow county residents to prepay their property taxes. The new tax bill caps deductions at just 10,000. So lawmakers in Montgomery County are looking at an emergency legislation to allow homeowners to pay their property taxes before that new law takes effect. Now if you want to prepay your property taxes for 2018, Officials Say that you need to let your Mortgage Company know right away that you intend to do so. And to also exact the county treasure contact the county treasurers office. Well let you know what they decide and post that information on our app. Tomorrow, the power of th down to a luck of the draw. A drawing will determine the winner for the 94th district race. A recount found democratic challenger Shelly Simmons and david yancey in a tie. Now depending on chance that will either put the house at an even 5050 split or the republicans will have a 5149 margin. Meantime, one Northern Virginia lawmaker wants to end a pretty obscure law in the commonwealth. Did you know its a crime to curse in public in virginia . If cited you could actually have a pretty serious fine. John henry reports. Reporter ever find yourself just minding your own business when all of a sudden a chair just comes out of nowhere . You might find the need just to yell out in pain [ bleep ] [ bleep ] or even [ bleep ] well, right now, in the state of virginia, that can actually land you in big trouble. That is because its a class 4 misdemeanor to actually curse in public. You can have a 250 fine. Did you know that was a law . I had no idea it regulate that,. Reporter but its possible this year that law could come to an end. Virginia state delegate Michael Webert introduced legislation to do away with the rules. Its been found to be unconstitutional. And we still havent removed it. There are counties like arlington that still have it on their books. And it needs to be removed. Reporter another one of his big concerns is that the existing law can leave an otherwise good citizen with a criminal record. We found a lot of supporters on the streets of arlington. Doesnt make any sense. Freedom of speech is one of the basic human rights that we have. And one of the fundamental freedoms of this country. I think also words tend to evolve over years. So things that may have been applicable several years ago just dont carry the same weight. Reporter that said not everyone is on board with the proposed change. Down in virginia beach, in years past, some have said the law should stay as it stands. You dont want to influence children that way and you there are adults and also you know, college kids go out here, that dont really take responsibility for what theyre saying. Reporter john henry, wusa9. All right, well, this is the third year in a row that he has proposed this legislation. He believes in the past that some lawmakers feared that they may look like theyre promoting indecency, however he thinks that this bill this year will actually find a lot of bipartisan support so well see if that happens. Meantime today is the first day of kwanzaa the holiday celebrates family, community and africanamerican culture. On each of the seven nights, observants light a candle recognizing seven Core Principles including unity, selfdetermination and faith. The week long holiday was first observed back in 1966. All right, well for those you not done with the Christmas Holiday just yet. Dont worry. Many of the big lights displays around town are actually staying up for another week or two. Theres zoo lights in northwest washington. Hundreds of thousands of l. E. D. Lights stale lit until about 9 00 at night. Theyre on tonight through saturday night and then encore will take place on the night of new years. Meantime a group of women in Prince Georges County are beaming with joy this afternoon. Last week, several Domestic Violence survivors told wusa9 that they were living in unhealthy shelter conditions. Volunteers heard those cries and stepped in when they learned the women werent going to have a christmas celebration. Heres wusa9s stephanie ramirez. Reporter the people who made all of this happen tell me they were able to do so in just two days. There was a huge collection of toys waiting for the children of these Domestic Violence survivors. More importantly, they all sat down as one big family to a warm Christmas Day meal. Were not showing their faces for their protection but i will show you angela angel. Maryland delegate. Im looking around and i realized you know, this is actually full circle for me. And im blessed that god gave me the opportunity. Reporter angel says she used to live in the same shelter. My marriage had gone from being really volatile to becoming violent. Reporter when she saw reports of the conditions, many of the mothers say living in. Saturday afternoon i sent out a call saying first i said i need a location where we can host about 40 women and their children. And pastor lee responded. He said he was going to host. Reporter the pastor is reverend tony lee. He leads the church in the basement of iverson mall. The owner opened up doors on Christmas Day for the families. Church members dropped off toys this morning. When i heard about the situation it was one of horror. Because you have people who have dealt with issues of victimization and now theyre going to a place that is supposed to be a place to help them. Turkey and stuffing. Greens, macaroni and cheese. Christmas before. Reporter it was so emotional one mother broke down crying. You all are moving up and when you all could be in my place next in the state house. In the white house. Its within you. Reporter the meal took place earlier today. Reverend lee says they plan to stay involved. Some of merser high been able to afford all of this otherwise. In Prince Georges County, stephanie ramirez, wusa9. Certainly a heartwarming story for the holidays. The county is investigating Poor Condition claims and the women and their children are staying at a hotel with the help from Prince Georges County states attorneys office. There are a lot of claims floating around online that chocolate cake is actually good for you. For your health. Sound too to do to be true right . Now the verify team is back. And of course were talking about that new winter coat you got for christmas is about to get a pretty serious workout. Miri marshall is up next with the look at todays forecast. And the rest of the week ahead. Getting to the truth can a pretty complicated process. Our team works day and night to verify the information you are getting and making sure that its true. And we verified the i requests that you have about things the questions that you have about things happening in the world. Sometimes its serious and there are other sometime l times when times when its pretty silly. The count down begins with number five. Reporter oh, have i got a big juicy verify segment for you tonight. Seems like every other day, the news is telling you some bs study you know that coffee helps you live longer. That red wine improves digestion or maybe even that pizza will help your sex life. Now i thought id seen it all. Until this. And this one takes the cake. Literally. Research shows that eating chocolate cake for breakfast is good for the brain and for the waistline. Sounds like lies, sounds like click bait. Who the they will is going to believe hell is going to whammo. I can verify that there are two legitimate Peer Reviewed studies that specifically discuss the Health Benefits of chocolate cake for breakfast. One, in the journal appetite. Lesli subscribes toe that one. The other in the journal steroids. I subscribe to that one. Now heres the main argument. That they make. One, if you eat cake in the morning, youll burn it off over the course of the day. You eat it at 9 00 at night its going to stay right there on the waistline. And two, they argue the chocolate has a positive effect on cognitive performance. Your brain. They say it improving your memory and actually helps you to work. Now obviously if this is true, the world just got a hell of a lot more awesome. But i needed to go deeper. Beyond just verifying that these studies were real. I needed to do my own study. So before i left work last night, six of my colleagues got a homework statement. They each got a 660calorie piece of cake with a set overstrikes. Eat the of instructions. Eat the cake with breakfast and take a video a few hours later telling me how you feel. Now mistake number one, feeding my three kids chocolate cake at 8 00 this morning. After my wife had left for work. They were in a word insane. So lets see what happened with me, lesli, topper, and our news at 11 00 producers. So this is my normal breakfast. Its oatmeal with blueberries and a protein drink. Its about 300calories. And this morning, were going to add in a 660calorie slice of chocolate cake. It could be delicious. It could be a disaster. Here we go. I ate almost all of it. Is its a very good cake adam. Okay adam. Mmm. Ahh. I ate it all. Yes. Very proud of myself. I got to tell you file like the sugar rush is starting to wear off a little bit. The sugar is coursing through my veins. Pretty good. Pretty energized. Dorothy and i got back from the second walk of the day. I feel like i kind of have a little bit more energy than i did yesterday. Just finishing up an hour and ten minutes on the treadmill. And im still ready to go. Cut the grass. Record time. Blew the driveway off. Record time. Weed whacked. Record time. Even trimmed a tree. Now four and a half hours after my 960calorie breakfast. And im dragging. I am starving. All i want to do is lay down. I need some coffee. I cannot stay awake. This after two and a half hours of field day. Reporter so what do you guys think . I found shortterm benefits, longterm oh my gosh what have i done. So mine started the wear off middle of the five as you can see. I was like whoa. And then it then it will like a few hours ago i was jumping on top of my desk looking over at your desk. Everybody thought i was kind of crazy. I think it curbed my appetite. I had no dessert after my lunch. I always have dessert after lunch and dinner. We ate that in the morning and i didnt eat anything else again for the day. It curbs your app title. If you have something you want me to verify on the social media feeds, you want to know if its true or not. You know hit me up anytime on twitter or facebook. We make it fun and we do it for real. Email me verify wusa9. Com. So miri i realize they were missing an important person and that would be the cookie monster here. Me and the cake queen. Im telling you i dont need a study. Cake is good for the soul. Look what did you have this i had a banana. I saw you over there. I had a smoothie and i had a and panera bread made how many deliveries to the station today . Two. Just saying girls got to eat. You know especially look with it being so cold outside you almost want to lit a president able bit more. Eat a little bit more. I had chili. Its so cold outside. 35 degrees. But its beautiful. Theres sun. There are clouds. Mixed in together. It looks lovely out there. Just really cold because it actually feels like 29 degrees when we factor in the windchill. That windout west make out of the west at 7 miles per hour. Making it feel much colder. That cold air is going to stick around this week. We have a slight chance for flurries. Very, very cold wednesday night when you wake up early thursday morning and step outside, it is going to foal like Single Digits ill show you that in just a moment. On top of that we have a chance for snow later on this weekend. Lets show taw first chance for flu you are that first tuesday 5 00 p. M. No activity here. It turns cloudy by 7 00 p. M. And then later on that night into early wednesday morning here you can see at 6 00 a. M. The scattered flurries popping up across the area. The rest of wednesday looks really nice. I mean we actually have a little bit of sun beginning to break out. At least the three day outlook. 32 degrees tomorrow and then thursday, after a really cold morning, we wont see temperatures getting past the freezing mark and a lot of spots. Most of us below freezing. Let me show you that feels like forecast. This is what temperatures will feel like the next few days. So wednesday by 2 00 p. M. , it already feels like teens and 20s at that point. As you get to wednesday at 7 00 p. M. , we start to feel like Single Digits out there. Because its going to be so cold and just the lightest of winds makes it feel much colder. So here we are thursday morning, at 6 00 a. M. Larry dont call out sick. 5degrees is what its going feel like in gaithersburg. Will feel like 7 in d. C. , feeling like 6 in leesburg at that hour. So really, really chilly as you step outside and en throughout the day on thursday. Well talk now about the weekend. Going to press fast forward here and get to friday because its active between friday and sunday when it comes to snow chances. Theres a brief one early friday morning. There is the european model. Saturday at 12 00 some scattered snow showers around the area that lasts through saturday evening and sat night at 8 00 p. M. Thats when it begins to break up according to the euro model. And then sunday heading into monday, looks clear of snow but theres always Something Else to look at Something Else to analyze. Thats what we do here. Gfs is going snow showers early friday morning and then a break saturday through sunday until we get to sunday night. When everybodys trying to hang out for new years eve. Were looking at the potential for the snow showers to come in and it wants to give us some snow showers early monday morning. And the gfs as ive been watching the model runs has been trending later and later with the snowfall. Not really ready to put it in for new years day. Lets hold off gfs a bit. We will go with that snow chance well keep temperatures in the upper 20s through new years day and hold off on the snow chance there. Theres still some wiggle room okay . The closer we get to this better well be able to get the information and let you know exactly whats going on. But well have more news and weather when we return. Welcome become. They are some the biggest trees on back. They are some of the biggest trees on earth in california, the redwood trees. Called the grove of titans. The large trees are not on an official park trail. Turns out actually someone actually posted their gps location and now more tourists are stopping by to see most of the roots of the redwood tree are in the first three feet or so and it kills the small roots where nutrients are taken up. Well, people Walking Around the trees are actually damaging the root systems and putting the life of the trees at risk. The redwood parks conversancy is now trying to raise 1. 4 million to build raised walkways for visitors. One final look at the forecast when we return. All right larry. Cold, cold and more cold. Well keep High Temperatures in the 30s through most of this week with the slight chance of flurries tonight and then another chance friday, saturday and sunday. Look at that larry. By new years eve and ne 20s. Oh joy. I couldnt be more excited. All right. [ laughter ] contain yourself larry. Ill try my best. All right friends thats going to do it for us, well see you back here tonight at 5 00 and were always on on our free wusa9 mobile app. See you later. Havertys furniture helps even when life isnt. T [sfx doorbell] can somebody get that . Uh uh, not me baby [sfx doorbell] homework its mommy time its daddy time i told you not to marry her. [sfx doorbell] seriously . alright. Whos next . Find year end specials now at havertys. Life looks good. Previously on the young and the restless