hello and welcome. friday, september 23rd. 9 a.m. here in london. 11 a.m. in ukraine. voting begins today in the four occupied regions on whether to become a part of the russian federation. the areas make up about 50% of ukraine s territory. if they join russia many believe that will provide vladimir putin the pretexts to claim russian territory is under attack and escalate the war. it s prompting people to flee the country in all directions. a long line of cars backed up at russia s border with finland. the government in helsinki is thinking of new restrictions to keep russians from entering. they re crossing into armenia and turkey. according to one witness, traffic at one checkpoint stretched 5 to 6 kilometers. it was a similar scene along the border with kazakhstan. trucks lined up as far as the eye could see. ticket prices are soaring for flights out of moscow. most of which is sold out for the next few days. the kremlin calls reports exaggeration and fake news. the mobi
zaporizhzhia. people in the war torn regions are being asked if they wish to join the russian federation. ben wedeman is tracking the latest annexation live. how is all of this expected to play out, ben? reporter: well, i mean, it s a good question, christine, whether to call it a vote. this is going on from today until the 27th of september. the last day will be in person voting. before that people were getting many people in these regions will be getting a knock on the door and be presented with a ballot box. in some regions the ballot is only in russian. in other areas, in kherson region, 50% of the population has fled because of the war. so it s very dubious about how credible the outcomes will be. you called it a sham. most people are calling it a sham outside those russian occupied parts of ukraine. in fact, ukrainian officials are calling on people to boycott these referenda. the results will be announced several days after the closing of ballot boxes, if we can ev
good morning. welcome to way too early. this is friday, september 23rd. i m sam stein in for jonathan. special master appointed a review the document that s the fbi seized from president donald trump s mar-a-lago home has given the former president s lawyers until a week from today. they gave them that line to back up trump s allegation that the fbi planted evidence during the august 8th search. trump and lawyers have publicly insinuated multiple times that acts planted evidence during the search without providing any proof of that claim. special master also told trump s legal team they must state by september 30 if they belief the seized items were incorrectly described in the 11 page inventory list which stated some of the documents were highly classified. trump claimed he declassified the documents he found that were found in the search that were marked classified and highly sensitive. however, lawyers have not made the assertions in actual court. yesterday s filing ju
that s why the world works with servicenow. former president trump was interviewed by sean hannity on fox news and when hannity brought up trump s claim he declassified the documents at mar-a-lago, he gave an interesting explanation. is there a process? what was your process to there doesn t have to be a process, as i understand it. different people say different things, but if you re the president of the united states, you can declassify just by saying it s declassified, even by thinking about it. [ laughter ] hannity was like, i get it, you re going to plead insanity. now it s making sense. welcome back to morning joe. it is 6:00 in the morning tong west coast as you look at los angeles, 9:00 in the east on this friday, september 23rd. a busy hour ahead, including the new pressure on donald trump s legal team to prove in a court of law the allegation trump has been making in public that the fbi planted evidence at mar-a-lago. there is also new reporting showing
and tearful families saying good-bye to loved ones departing for training. putin wants 300,000 new fighters to help turn the tide as the russian military suffers setbacks in ukraine. russia is saying the call up would be limited to those with military experience but reports say civilians also now are being conscripted. the new york times tells the story of a husband and father of five who received a summons at a 4:00 a.m. meeting where a train had been organized to take him to a military center. many men are fleeing russia to avoid the forced enlistment. this is traffic as people escape to nearby georgia. russian airporting have been packed with people trying to get out of the country. one human rights group said more than 1,300 people have been arrested in anti-car protests in moscow and st. petersburg over the past few days. also today, voting begins in four regions of russian-occupied ukraine, in a sham referendum that could lead to the annexation of 15% of ukrainian ter