Likely. Were following the legal and political implications. Plus a warning to Donald Trumps legal team from the judge overseeing the election interference case, saying more inflammatory statements will require a quicker start to the trial. We are live outside the court. And the death toll as they have yet to even start searching the hundred of burned out buildings. Well take you live to maui. Were following these major developing stories and many more all coming in right here to cnn news central. Another controversial investigation that could have some pretty big repercussions for 2024 is escalating. Today a Special Counsel was designated in the federal probe of hunter biden. Attorney general Merrick Garland named david weiss to the role. Weiss has been leading this investigation. Yes, he has. Hes been leading the investigation into hunter biden for the past five years, in fact. This week he asked himself to be elevated to that role of Special Counsel. Were following that in realtime.
Its all of that and we need it. Yeah. Head Start Program for the Coa Coastal Habitat in florida. Jeff, thanks for hanging in there. You worked your shoulder and bicep muscles by holding up that device. I did. I was diving this morning, urgent care, but at least i get to spend some time with you. Id so glad, too, and weve done a little bit of work on our biceps, too. Im not injured for diving. Im glad youre not. I cant wait to hear that story. I hope the best for your friend that was there. Thanks for inspiring me to do that story. Youre so sweet. Thank you. You inspire us all the time. Thank you. All right. Hello again, everyone. Thanks for joining me. We begin with a new deadline for Donald Trumps lawyers after the historic indictment against him on 2020 election interference. Now the trump team has until monday, 5 00 p. M. Eastern, to respond to a request for a protective record by Special Counsel jack smith. In a court filing last night, Special Counsel jack smith soug from sharing
everyone. thank you for joining me. i m fredricka whitfield. a deal to avoid a debt default is about to be revealed. president biden and speaker mccarthy are finalizing an agreement to raise the debt limit. president biden saying this earlier today. i m about to go in and call mccarthy now at 3:00, make sure all the ts are crossed and the is are dotted. i think we re in good shape. house leaders expect the bill to be voted on as soon as wednesday. speaker mccarthy is confident the deal will pass. february 1st i sat down with the president. i said let s work together to be able to raise the debt ceiling but curb the amount of spending, to let mark be able to work again, cut red tape, get some work requirements to help people get back into work. i think this agreement frames all that from limit, save, grow. it doesn t get everything we wanted. we did a conference call with our conference and over 95% were overwhelmingly excited about what they see. they re getting a text
before the u.s. defaults. not everyone is confident a deal can be reached, with at least one top republican negotiator warning a deal could come together as soon as today or fall apart entirely. what is the mood on capitol hill right now? reporter: good afternoon. the mood is more optimistic than we ve heard in days. negotiators here this morning are saying they think they re closing in on a deal and really it s all about having an agreement on the agreement and hashing out the remaining sticking points, which we re told are on work requirements and spending caps. we heard speaker mccarthy came to the capitol shortly before 10:30 a.m. this morning. he says he feels more confident than he has and they ve made progress, but some sticking points remain. i asked him if he thinks he would be able to get his full conference behind whatever deal they re able to strike, and he said he does think that will happen. he also said he thinks a deal could potentially come together as earl
round-the-clock negotiations are on in washington as america faces the very real chance of a potentially catastrophic debt default. house speaker kevin mccarthy saying today he sees progress, but there are still major sticking points that need to be ironed out on everything from spending caps to work requirements. one top republican negotiator warning a deal could be reached as soon as today or they could collapse completely. meanwhile, the national deficit is growing every second, and with no deal in place the u.s. could run out of money to pay its bills, which could have a disastrous impact on the economy. the treasury secretary now saying that could happen in just eight days. cnn s covering all of the angles. what are the obstacles reaching lawmakers from reaching a deal? negotiators were in the capitol until 2:30 a.m. this morning and now they re back in house speaker kevin mccarthy s office meeting virtually with the white house as they continue to try and hash out the