hello and welcome to bbc news. washington has accused beijing of acting irresponsibly after a chinese surveillance balloon was detected over the united states. the us secretary of state, antony blinken, has postponed a much anticipated trip to beijing over the incident. china says the balloon is a civilian airship which had deviated from its planned route. however, us defence officials argue the balloon, seen above sensitive areas in recent days was a high altitude surveillance device. our security correspondent gordon corera reports. i.have no idea what this thing is. a strange object in the sky, filmed by a member of the public in rural montana. and for those of you who think this mightjust be the moon, it is not the moon, the moon is off to my right i can see it. it s not the moon, nor a ufo, but, us officials claim, a chinese spy balloon. it seemed so brazen and just so insane to me, it wasjust, like, this thing is so visible. and it s now sparked a major diplom
let s go the white house on the breaking news. lucas tomlinson, i understand you have new reporting the share. lucas: that s right, senior official confirms that the u.s. government is weighing options on how to shoot down this chinese spy balloon when it crosses the atlantic, safely off the coast of the united states. now earlier in syracuse president biden was asked to do on the balloon and he said all options are on the table and this is what he said exactly. the chinese balloon we will take care of it. lucas: this morning former defense secretary chuck served under barack obama said this balloon should be brought down gently to exploit it. we don t know what the pentagon is going to do and what the president will ultimately decide and once it gets out over open waters i d be surprised if we would allow this balloon just to float back to china. lucas: both countries spawn each other, of course, just over a month ago the pentagon says fighter jet came to american sp
i ll stop them. i have a veto pen. try to pass, i ll stop them, and if they send me a ban on the national right to choose, i will stop them. within the past hour, president biden delivering fiery remarks to the dnc, amid fresh new signs of economic recovery in america. also tonight, the trial balloon, the secretary of state postpones his trip to china after a suspected chinese spy balloon is spotted over the u.s. so why not just shoot it down? plus, the fallout from the vote to remove congresswoman ilhan omar from the foreign affairs committee, with one conservative congressman overheard calling it the stupidest vote in the world. good evening, everyone. i m michael steele in for joy reid. and we begin tonight with a track from the jackson 5. now, if you are of a certain age, you surely remember the song never can say good-bye. and if you don t, the lyrics go a little bit like this. i m not going to sing it so just calm down. never can say good-bye. every time i thi
and filed against him in the state of new york. phil mattingly history. this is the first time a current or former president has ever been indicted . he will now go back to face that. and while as you noted, this certainly isn t something. that perhaps he wanted or was ever thinking about when he moved down to mar-a-lago full time. it is certainly something that he seems to be embracing in every way that the former president often does both for political benefit. he is a 2024 election candidate already, but also for his supporters as he tries to work whatever is happening right now, in this moment history and certainly something that wasn t necessarily expected by he and his team to his benefit. we are also at this point. gonna toss to our pal who s in new york city, where the president is on his way. former president is on his way at the moment, the collins yeah, historic first, of course of the president coming here to be arraigned tomorrow, but they re going to be many oth
good day. i m andrea mitchell in washington. we go directly to the pentagon and the briefing on the china spy balloon. because we do not have internet or phone capability in this area of the pentagon for a variety of reasons, our normal call-in options will not be available. for those who have had to call in, we apologize for the inconvenience. however, we will aim to get our briefing transcripts and the audio up as quickly as possible. we will aim to answer your questions through our dod press desk when you send them to us. moving forward, we will look at ways to improve our briefing operations and the facilitation and expect that our regular press briefings will resume in the press briefing room in middle to late may. again, we appreciate your patience and flexibility and extend our thanks to the department of the air force for allowing us to use airman s hall as our temporary briefing home. secretary austin returned yesterday from a very productive series of meetings in