florida from hurricane ian. majority in lee county where officials face questions whether evacuation orders should have been issued earlier. this morning fort myers beach is closed entirely, even more residents, so crews can search for survivors. power could be out for a month. there s been nearly 2,000 rescues in southwestern florida since hurricane ian hit the state. a man in naples says he swam nearly a mile to save his wheelchair-bound mother. feels like i m swimming forever. we re arriving at grandma s. or i m arriving at grandma s. what s the time? 5:41. when he arrived he found his another neck deep in floodwaters. needless to say, thrilled to see him. it was a sigh of relief. as i was approaching the house, i couldn t get through the front door. water up to the windows, and i heard her screaming inside, and she was actually on the phone with my youngest son who was giving status updates to her, and it was, it was a scare and a sigh of relief at the same time.
101 people across florida across 11 different counties. ian s wrath is also blamed for at least four deaths in north carolina. right now, search and rescue operations remain under way. 2,000 rescues have been carried out across florida. the red cross housed 2900 people in their shelters sunday night. the state has 2.3 million meals and 83,000 have applied for assistance. this morning, fort myers beach remains closed. crews are searching for survivors, working around the clock. 400,000 people there remain without electricity. and an official warns it may be weeks or months for some to get it back on. well, tomorrow, president biden fresh off the tour of hurricane-ravaged puerto rico is set to visit florida. let s begin in florida with anchor and fellow correspondent boris sanchez. boris, good morning. thank you for being with us. that is a really significant jump in the death toll from when we spoke to you yesterday morning. at the same time, officials haven t given up hope
members of the far right extremist group talking about bringing weapons to the capitol to, quote, fight for former president trump. this was months before the insurrection. and the fbi was alerted. we ve got it all covered, but we begin in florida where the race to find the missing is entering a desperate critical phase. let s go first to boris sanchez in fort myers. and boris, update us on the search efforts. reporter: ana, this is an arduous process for this community. it is still classified as search and rescue, but it is slowly becoming a search and recovery operation. we heard from the sheriff of lee county just a short time earlier today and he shared with us the difficulty that his crews are having as they comb through communities that are now unrecognizable, sifting through debris and uncovering bodies. here in lee county there are at least 55 fatalities because of hurricane ian. this county makes up the bulk of all fatalities for the state of florida. still the she
morning. we re probably still another three to four days left in search and rescue and recovery, so that s a rough time frame that could go in either direction. these are not numbers. this is family members, people didn t just lose their homes. we can rebuild a home. we can get another boat, but when you lose a loved one, there s just no words that can describe how we feel for that family. so we hope and pray those numbers stay as low as possible. more than 430,000 people remain without power across florida, and some in places like fort myers beach and sanibel island could be without power for more than a month. crews are already trying to reconnect the hurricane ravaged barrier islands to the mainland, a temporary gravel bridge to pine island could be done by the end of the week. cnn s boris sanchez is there in lee county. boris, we know that it will take months, if not years to put these communities back together. what s the latest on that path that you know now? re
could be cut off from electricity, get this, for another month. also tonight, ukrainian forces are making stunning gains on the battlefield, reclaiming territory illegally annexed by vladimir putin just days ago. we will get an update on the war from white house national security official john kirby. welcome to our viewers in the united states and around the world. wolf blitzer is off today. i m pamela brown and you re in the situation room. we begin our coverage tonight with new developments in the mar-a-lago investigation. an emergency appeal from former president trump to the u.s. supreme court. trump s attorneys are pleading with the justices to intervene in a dispute over more than 100 documents marked as classified. our senior crime and justice reporter has more on this filing. kaitlyn, what exactly does the former president want from the high court here? reporter: well, pamela, what he is asking for is essentially he wants to turn back time. he wants to go