plus, tennis superstar serena williams, her major announcement about her future on the court. announcer: this is nbc nightly news with lester holt good evening i m tom llamas in for lester tonight we are getting new information on that hours-long search of former president trump s mar-a-lago residence in florida with heightened security, we see it right here, flanking the compound nbc news reporting the search was tied to classified materia trump allegedly took from the white house when he left in 2021 the former president claiming in a statement that the fbi broke into a safe, calling the search, quote, unannounced republicans raising questions tonight about the timing, pointing the finger at attorney general merrick garland for executing the search with less than 100 days until the november mid-terms, and fueling talk of trump s potential bid for president in 2024. we have team coverage tonight. kelly o donnell starts us off from bedminster, new jersey, where the form
down to earth uncontrolled. and kansas voters are set to become the first to decide if abortion rights should change in the wake of the roe v. wade reversal. you re in the cnn newsroom. well, in eastern kentucky, it is more dreaded news after days of heartbreak and anguish. the threat of more rain now hanging over parts of kentucky decimated by this week s deadly flash floods. a flood watch is now in effect, and that is raising concerns about the massive search and rescue operation wrapping up its third day. 25 people are confirmed dead, and that includes four children all from the same family. they were siblings between two and eight years old. kentucky s governor says he does not know how many are still missing but says the death toll could rise for weeks as bodies are recovered. washed out roads and bridges and slowing those efforts. and with at least hundreds of homes destroyed, the misery seems to deepen by the hour. it s hard to put into words just the amount of
around the clock to find families who still may be trapped, some residents losing everything. animals are without people. homes are destroyed. we need as much help, please, i m begging anyone who sees this, help my town, help my people. cnn s joe johns is live for us in hazard, kentucky. and the debris field is tremendous, joe, and we heard the governor there say they continue to look for people because so many remain unaccounted for. what are you finding? reporter: that s right, and they say it s possible this could go on for weeks, not days. so they say a picture is worth a thousand words, fred. and i just wanted to show you where we are. we are in hazard, kentucky. you look behind me here, there s the foundation of a house. believe it or not, before the flood there was a house there, a woman inside told us she started feeling the house moving around 1:00, 2:00 in the morning. she gets out, and then the rushing water essentially d demolishes the house and sends the de
this is still an emergency situation. we are in search and rescue mode. again, that count is going to continue to go up and we don t lose this many people in flooding. it is a real tough one. rescuers are working around the clock. the national guard from kentucky, tennessee, and west virginia are lifting hundreds from the floodwaters. more than 600 already. washed away roads and bridges adding to the already very complicated recovery efforts. cnn s evan is at a command center for the research and rescue efforts. how are they coordinating what, is going on? reporter: well, hi, fred, when they say command center, they mean a place people gather. this is a parking lot of a shopping center here in jackson, kentucky, that is in the middle of where the floodwaters happened and behind me agencies are coming from all over the country, all over the state to work to try to help find people who might be trapped or still need help in the floodwaters and they re also working with a
it s going to get worse, and i think that we will be updating it maybe even for weeks to come. we don t lose this many people in a flood, yet, there are still so many people unaccounted for. meteorologist gene norman is in the severe weather center for cnn. gene this is just devastating what has happened in kentucky right now, and as bad as it is at the moment, the flood threat is not over yet, is that correct? that is correct, jim. brand new flood watch is issued as new storms are beginning to percolate in western kentucky and western tennessee, and they re going to be marching eastward throughout the overnight. it s probably going to start raining in a place like hazard where the flooding was really bad. sometimes after midnight tonight. also seeing a bunch of storms firing up along a cold front. that front is going to lift northward. that s going to help these storms develop. new flood watch just issue that does include southern and eastern kentucky until monday morn