moment. that is it for us this afternoon. the lead with jake tapper starts right now. the state of our union is the lead is starting right now. president big tonit s address before a died congress and country to tout his accomplishments. and perhaps lay out his case for another term. but how might his message land with the american people who according to polls disapprove of the job he s doing. rare cries of joy as a little girl and her younger sibling are pulled from the rubble alive. a small bit of good news amid the growing death and destruction from the earthquake in turkey and syria. the death toll now soaring to more than 7,200 people. then, if you ve flown in the past few weeks, you know the skies are not very friendly. cancel takeoff clearance. delta 1943, cancel takeoff clearance. an i-team meltdown, one airline grounded during the holidays, two runway near misses, now lawmakers want answers. welcome to the lead. i m jake tapper on capitol hill
lab in chiwuhan, china. and in east palestine, the new technique to track contaminated water from that city. and the growing concern to other cities taking in truckloads of contaminated soil. and an image in oklahoma, cnn is on the scene. welcome to the lead i m jake tapper. we start with the groundbreaking assertion with the u.s. energy department that the covid-19 pandemic likely began from a lab leak in wuhan, china. this all comes after the energy department updated its 2021 report with this claim, saying it made the new conclusion, based on new evidence coming to light. two sources telling cnn the department is issuing the report with, quote, low confidence. that s a term that doesn t mean that they don t believe their own conclusion. it means that the evidence as of now is only circumstantial. the new assertion reveals that the u.s. intelligence community is more divided than ever on how the pandemic began. four other agencies in the u.s. government said the outbr
and look to show solidarity and dismiss talks of cracks in ukraine s firewall. plus, full disclosure. senator john fetterman checks himself into the hospital for clinical depression. and new text messages reveal top hosts at fox the same hosts who carried water for-donald trump s election lies knew his claims were, quote, really crazy. up first the diplomatic battle field. right now the united states and its major western allies are in munich as the war in ukraine is about to hit the one-year mark. ukraine s president zelenskyy opened the global security meeting with this plea. goliath must lose. there is no alternative to ukrainian victory. there is no alternative to ukraine in the eu. there is no alternative to ukraine in nato. there is no, no alternative to our unity. zelenskyy wants allies to step it up and bring a quick end to the war. nato shows no sign of wavering at least right now but germany s chancellor in an interview with cnn s christiane amanpour says the
very dangerous, and i hope that as the nation watches that we to say we should sound the alarm across the nation we re entering dangerous territory. that was one of two democrats in tennessee that was just expelled after participating in a gun violence protest on the floor of the statehouse. we ll have much more on this partisan punishment just ahead meanwhile on capitol hill one of donald trump s most vocal allies in congress sends a subpoena to a former prosecutor in the manhattan district attorney s office we ll explain why this move may backfire on jim jordan, and we ll dig into a bombshell report exclosing years of lavish vacations taken by supreme court justice clarence thomas, all paid for by a gop mega donor all right, good morning. and welcome to way too early on this friday, april 7th. i m sam stein in for the irreplaceable jonathan lemire. republican legislators in tennessee voted yesterday to expel two black democrats from the statehouse over their protest o
the top of the hour here on your friday morning. i m erica hill. i m jim sciutto. there are deep concerns as china s president xi jinping is preparing to meet with vladimir putin in moscow, and the summit is not a surprise, but washington is on edge to see if china makes any move in particular to provide weapons for the war in ukraine. and this st. patrick s day guest in washington, and it is ireland s prime minister. and also, the wild week on wall street comes to a close, and the major company that just filed for bankruptcy. we will get you caught up on that ahead, but we want to begin with the news with that meeting between xi jinping and vladimir putin. will ripley is joining us now with more on that and what is on the agenda for this face-to-face meeting? well, there is the official meeting, and also the agenda that the u.s. is concerned about which is lethal support from china to russia. vladimir putin needs chips can, ammo and all of the tools that he can get t