running ads distancing themselves from president biden. for lifting a trump era policy. plus, a warrant issued today for the alabama corrections officer last seen leaving jail with an inmate, charged with murder. cnn has an exclusive look inside his now empty cell. welcome to the lead, i m jake tapper. we start today with our world lead and the besieged city of mariupol, ukraine, where some civilians are finally finding a way out after weeks, months of a relentless russian bombardment. ukrainian officials say there were two planned evacuation corridors, one for people around the city who want to leave and another for those who had been trapped inside the azovstal steel plant. but it remains unclear if either of those corridors held. this is new video of a large smoke plume over the city of mariupol today, and a commander at the steel plant tells cnn the complex has been under constants fire since early this morning.
lead. this has been a very important state where control of the house and senate could be at stake by what happens here. that s again why you have seen the president and other top democrats spending so much spine here doing so much fund-raising? thank you very much. be sure to stay with cnn for live coverage of that event in philadelphia. president obama is scheduled to speak at 5:30 eastern time. we will, of course, bring it to you live. with just over three weeks to go, candidates are turning up the heat with their ads and in some cases democrats are actually running ads distancing themselves from president obama and speaker pelosi. one democratic leader said it s nothing to worry about. we re very proud of the fact that we have an ideologically diverse process. what they are doing is talking about their independence on certain issues. they are issues where they stood with the president and the speaker and issues they oppose