today inside politics, the gop finds votes to come out on top. republicans pass a crucial bill that assures the u.s. is ready to fight wars, and they did it after putting a deliberate conservative stamp on it. jared kushner under oath, new report ing reveals that prosecutors ask the former president s son-in-law, did donald trump believe his own election lies. and iowa decides in six months. the countdown to the caucuses is on as donald trump decides to play hooky and skip a big summit. his bet, who needs iowa when you have mike tyson. i m dana bash. let s go behind the headlines and inside politics. up first, kevin mccarthy can keeps the republican family mostly together to win a culture war battle. last hour, the house did its job and cleared a must-pass defense bill. the final vote tally was 219-210. if that seems really tight for a bill that sets military policy, it is. the sennarrow margin is thanks a very heated back and forth over controversial add-ones to the
washington. glad to have you. here right now in south carolina, there are major developments in alex murdaugh s double murder trial. the prosecution now respond ing after the defense presented its closing arguments yesterday. defense attorney jim griffin made an emotional plea when wrapping up his presentation. there are two words that justice demands this thises case and those two words are not guilty. the oath you have taken in this case it requires a verdict not dwlt. on behalf of alex, of buster, on behalf of maggie and on behalf of my friend paul, i respectfully request that you do not compound a family tragedy with another thank you. just before closing arguments began, the judge remove d a jurr for discussing the case outside of the trial. diane gallagher is outside of the court in south carolina. diane, what more did the defense say today as they were presenting to the jury in these final hours of this trial? reporter: jim griffin spoke for about 2 hours and 15
top of the hour. a busy wednesday morning. we begin with breaking news this morning. cnn has learned that the fbi conducted a search at president biden s home in rehoboth beach, delaware. the search taking place this morning as a special counsel investigation into the president s handling of classified material picks up. mj lee is at the white house. paula, what more can you tell us about this search. was it expected? sfwlr it was absolutely expected. back when the classified documents were discovered in the office, his attorneys went and also searched his two homes. one in will mington. they say they did discover classified materials at his wilmington home, but they did not uncover any at this property. once this baim the subject of a special counsel investigation, ten days ago the fbi conducted its own search of the wilmington house. it lasted 13 hours and did uncover additional classified materials. so it was very much expected that the fbi would also go back to the reho
Good morning, everyone. It is saturday, october 21st. Im amara walker. Im victor blackwell. For the first two in time two weeks, muchneeded aid has been delivered to gaza, but groups warn those supplies are not enough. This morning 20 trucks loaded with medical supplies and food and water passed through the Border Crossing between egypt and gaza. A Spokesman Says none of the trucks carried fuel. In gaza, israel has demanded the immediate evacuation of the building ahead of a possible airstrike. The World Health Organization says such a demand would be impossible to carry out. The hospital currently haouses around 12,000 displaced people, plus hundreds of patients. And an American Woman and her teenage daughter are free following their surprise release late last night. They were visiting family in a kibbutz close to gaza when they were taken hostage on october 7th. The idf says today it believes 210 people are being held hostage in gaza. The group says the current priority is the return
today on inside politics, negotiators are racing to try toex tend the tempt the prayer truce between israel and hamas. with just hours left before the current deal expireses. a top official tells cnn he s hopeful they will be able to continue this pause. it comes as we are standing by for hamas to release the final group of hostages as part of the current deal. cnn is covering this past-moving story from all angles. i want to start with wolf blitzer in tel aviv. it s nice of you on again on yet another critical day. a very critical day indeed. israelis are very nervous. they want to see this temporary pause continued as well. they want to see more hostages coming back to israel. there s a lot of tension going on right now. they don t know what s going to happen. every day it seems the past several days there s nervousness. will there be more hostages coming forward, will there be a delay and there have been delays and previous days as we all remember. or will this go smoo