these are live pictures, you can see them on your screen right there. live pictures of demonstrators calling for thee1e1 governor of puerto rico to step down. they re calling on him to step aside despite that promise on sunday not to seek reelection following the controversy over his leaked and offensive text messages. there are also, and have been for some time, widespread reports of government corruption on puerto rico. nbc s gabe gutierrez remains in san juan for use1 this morning. hejf%oins me now on the phone. gabe, what s the scene on the island right now? reporter: hi e1there, craig, you can see from the live pictures we are see a that is larger than any that we have experienced sincee1 this scanda broke a little more than a week ago. protesters have shut down the main highway here. i will say all of this is
detroit, how big of an issue there hiwa the president s remarks been? well, craig, it s interesting, the theme of this conference is when we fight we win.e1 and so all the speakers have had exactly that tone in address( the president and his policies.q it was really onlye1 tlaib who took on the president directly over hise1 attacks on the so-called squad. she wasted no time in doing it. as soon as she took the stage. take a listen. hello! yeah, i m not goinge1 nowhere. not until i impeach this preponderate. it s beyond just the four of us, the squad is all of you. and craig, even as i me1 speaking to you the speaker on stage behind me just made another reference to the squad, the idea that all folks here need to stick together essentially to oppose this president. tlaib spoke to reporters after she left the stage but unfortunately we missed the president s tweet. it came a few minutes after she left.lp but absolutely not backing down
good to havet(xd you, gayle. what else is tehran saying about all of this? hi,xd craig, at this briefin this morning they were quick to point out that since donald trump came to power and since gina haspel was appointed cia chief the u.s. hast( considerab ratcheted upfá its clandestine activities in iran by recruiting a fairly large number ofxd irann assets to spy for them and to conduct acts ofthháp!otage in in f.á them. theyfá wanted to make it very clear that no surreptitious actions infá iran go undetectedy the intelligence ministry. they re saying that they have eyes everywhere and they will catch people that are trying to pull moves like this. now, even though secretary pompeo said thatxd much of this was oklies, the iranians did release an awful lotfát( of information today and on the surface it seems legitimate. we do need to do a lot more
we re looking at these pictures here, gabe, we can see major, major roadways appear to be shut down entirely impassable, i know a number of businesses as you reported earlier many of the businesses there on the island have shut down. do you get the sense, gabe, afp talking to some of these demonstrators and government officials as well, do you get thet( sensee1 that there s any compromise that could be reached, short of governthe gov stepping down?t( reporter:xd hi there, craig, it s a little difficult to hear you, i believe you saidehgo i gt a sense the governor is planning on stepping down? yesterday tá% the pressure and that he would step downñi aheade1p,of today s protests because they have been so anticipated. many business owners were fearful of what could happen