with christmas eventually cancelled in bethlehem, we ll get a live report from that region coming up. former president donald trump releasing a new ad in states where primaries are set to begin in weeks. could he be worrying about his opponent s gaining ground? plus, 2023 was a year of weather extremes. record heat across the country, with phoenix sweltering for 31 days with temperatures over 100 degrees. and from blue ivy to barbie, some of the moments that blew up on social media this year. all that coming up. we begin with the escalation in the israel-hamas war. right now, the israelis are fighting on multiple fronts. first in gaza, where idf forces are taking casualties as ground and air operations killed dozens of palestinians, including civilians caught in the cross fire. israeli troops are also taking fire to the north in fresh exchanges with hezbollah forces while iran-backed militants in yemen ramp up attacks on u.s. military and commercial ships, all signs
i m going to attempt, and i probably regret this, i m going to attempt to make sense of the current debt ceiling situation. instead of having someone come on who doesn t know what s going on, i thought i don t know what s going on, i can just guess and so, we re gonna do a little bit of that. and i will advance a theory that joe biden is doing everything right. there is a theory that i landed on it today that joe biden is doing everything right. i reserve the right to take my mind tomorrow. [laughter] listen, lawrence, i will put my money on you being able to not only explain this but make sense of it, and have a plausible theory for all of it so i m eager to see what you have to say this evening. it s one of the things that i know will sound good while i m saying it. i don t want anyone to think about much after i say it. okay? [laughter] [laughter] let s see what the news is tomorrow. you ve got to get the 10:59. right, yeah! it is given some until 10:59, and
default on january 1st, if a deal is not reached on the debt ceiling. the pressure weighing on president biden and house speaker kevin mccarthy ahead of their next meeting which is now just hours away. our nbc news reporters are following all of the latest developments. i want to go to first nbc s garrett haake on capitol hill ahead of the critical meeting between biden and mccarthy. we just heard from mccarthy moments ago. what did he have to say? reporter: this comes after negotiators from the white house had been meeting for three hours this morning. mccarthy took some questions from reporters about the outlines of these negotiations and i asked him specifically what he would need to see to feel like there was real progress today in his meeting with the president. here s what he told me. decisions have to start being made. it s been days now. the president has to be serious. i have been very clear from the very beginning, we are in this problem because when the democra
thank you alex! have a great show. thank you. well this is the breaking news that i m holding in my hands. this is a letter from donald trump s attorneys to attorney general merrick garland. the letter to the attorney general says, we represent donald j trump, 45th president of the united states in the investigation currently being conducted by the special counsel s office. they go on to propaganda rise about hunter biden which acquires makes no sense. and then they say what the letter is about in the final sentence of there s a very short letter. we request a meeting at your earliest convenience to discuss the ongoing injustice that is being perpetrated by your special counsel and his prosecutors. thank you for your attention to this matter. so there it is tonight, the trump lawyers asking merrick garland, attorney general of the united states for a meeting about special counsel jack smith s criminal investigations of donald trump which of course includes the documents
tonight, the important days ahead and washington tie to our nations that. president biden said to sit down with speaker mccarthy tomorrow was the threat of defaulting hangs in the balance. and republicans continue their investigation into president biden s family. they just need to top down their conforming first. and a preview of tomorrow s hearing on artificial intel events. it s congress prepared to regulate this technology? as the 11th hour gets underway on this monday night. good evening once again, i m stephanie ruhle. treasury secretary janet yellen is sounding the alarm yet again. in a letter to the speaker top lawmakers, she wrote, the united states could run out of money to pay its bills, quote, if congress has not acted to raise or suspend the debt limit by early june, and potentially as early as june 1st. that means congress has less than three weeks to act or risk an unprecedented debt default. in congress, their only inception a fraction of those three weeks.