the fbi has had only eight senate confirmed directors. those directors all have a few things in common. they are all white men. they all favor a clean cut look, and each and every one of them, every senate confirmed director since the dawn of the fbi has been a republican. that includes current fbi director, christopher wray, who was appointed by donald trump. and you would not get that impression, given the way the director wray s fellow republicans attacked him and his agency during a hearing today. on capitol hill. when the court says that the fbi misled, that is a nice way of saying they lied. how many individuals were either fbi, employees, or people that the fbi could make contact with, to be in the january 6th entry of the capital? i m going to make the assumption is there is more than one, more than five, more than ten. i will say that this notion that somehow the violence at the capitol on january 6th was part of some operation orchestrated by fbi sources into
putin responsible for recent attacks in ukraine. but how? the lead starts right now. a global response as russia bombards ukraine with mass missile attacks for a second straight day. what the president just said about the aggression in an exclusive interview with jake tapper. also this hour, another cnn exclusive, one on one with senate minority leader mitch mcconnell. his take on republicans chances of winning a majority in the midterms, plus the one question he refused to answer about donald trump. and the worst is yet to come. the new recession warning as top economists also predict exactly when the economic downturn will hit. hello and welcome to the lead. i m john berman in for jake tapper. we begin with world leaders pledging to stop russian president vladimir putin s reign of terror in ukraine. an emergency debate today at the united nations and the g7 heads of government including president joe biden on an emergency call with ukraine s president today, vowing
the u.s. justice department warns the u.s. supreme court that classified documents seized from mar-a-lago are extraordinarily sensitive, urging the high court to stay out of the government legal battle with former president trump. and top republicans stand with herschel walker in georgia. closing ranks around their embattled u.s. senate nominee, walker lashing out at political opponents and speaking out tonight about the abortion controversy weighing on his campaign. welcome to our viewers here in the united states and around the world. i m wolf blitzer. you are in the situation room. this hour officials in ukraine are bracing for russia to strike again after two days of vladimir putin s new and widespread assault on cities across the nation. cnn s nick paton walsh is on the ground in the war zone. the second day of smoke over the capital in skies that had had been quieter for months. a power plant one of many hit today here by an iranian drone attack, officials said
campaign trial today. plus, in pennsylvania s senate race, dasha burns sat down exclusively with democrat john fetterman. what he is telling our team in his first in-person tv interview since his stroke. plus, in ukraine, president zelenskyy is asking for help from ukraine s allies in the west. military aid to be specific. better air defense systems and those massive russian strikes on ukraine s major cities continued today. and later on this hour, we re going to ask the national security council s john kirby if the white house is ready to give mr. zelenskyy what he wants. i am katy tur in for hallie jackson. we re going to start this hour with ali in carrollton, georgia, and atlanta journal constitution holly mitchell. what have you been hearing on the trail about walker and the folks who came out to support him? reporter: after i left you guys last hour, he spoke here at the podium with senator rick scott and senator tom cotton. they spoke for about 15 minutes. abor
president biden says he believes that s because of how terribly russia is doing on the battlefield. he used the word underperforming, how he believes the setbacks, humiliating and the draft that putin put in place is all factoring into this. it seems to be causing a real sense of concern for president biden tonight who said he believes the world is the closest it has been to the potential nuclear catastrophe since the 1960s. since the cuban missile crisis, of course, we are coming up on the anniversary of that quite soon. president biden said tonight we have not faced the prospect of armageddon since kennedy and the cuban missile crisis. he is talking about putin. a guy we know fairly well, he is not joking when he talks about the potential use of tactical nuclear weapons or biological or chemical weapons because his military is, as you might say, significantly underperforming. he made clear, don, washington is trying to figure out what putin s end game is going to be, what h