biden returned to the white house with one item at the top of his list -- getting his covid relief bill through congress. >> it's urgent that we get a lot of the current relief will expire the middle of march. the american people want to raise the minimum wage to a living wage. it is popular. it is what justice demands. here in texas, residents are experiencing some of the worst winter weather of their lives. >> i'm not going to sugar coat it. the next few days are going to be very tough. >> we did not make it through almost a year of a pandemic to lose people to a snow or an ice storm. >> announcer: this is "new day" with alliisyn camerota and john berman. >> look at that video of what people are experiencing through much of the country. welcome to our viewers in the united states and all around the world. president joe bide listen take part in the first presidential town hall tonight with cnn live from milwaukee. the president will make his case directly to the american people for his $1.9 trillion relief package to be passed next month when existing benefits expire. president biden is certain to face questions about vaccinations and the state of the pandemic. a bipartisan group of governors wrote a letter to biden saying that the administration's handling of the coordination with the vaccinations needs to be much better. how about reopening schools? that's also facing scrutiny. and while mr. biden is eager to move forward, it's clear that questions about the capital insurrection will continue. house speaker nancy pelosi will investigate this deadly siege similar to the 9/11 commission. senator from north carolina became the latest republican to be censured by his state party. adam kinzinger's own family wrote him a scathing letter say they're em bbarrassed to be related to him. they accused him to be related to the devil. tonight from milwaukee, cnn's jeremy diamond at the white house to give us a preview. jeremy? >> reporter: good morning, john. nearly a month after taking office president biden finally hoping to get the country and washington's undivided attention. washington itself is still very, very divided. and so the president taking his pitch for this $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package on the road. all of this happening as the clock is ticking down. 26 days until those federal unemployment benefits expire. >> reporter: president biden's agenda taking center stage this morning. in a washington no longer consumed by his predecessor's impeachment trial. looking to drum up support for his $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package, today biden is take his message directly to the public. taking his first official trip as president to wisconsin where he'll make the case for his relief package during a cnn town hall. and on thursday, it's off to michigan to tour a pfizer vaccine manufacturing plant. back in washington, the biden administration is still playing catchup on safely reopening more schools and boosting the national vaccine and testing plans. a group of bipartisan governors sending the president a letter asking for better coordination on distributing vaccines between the federal and state governments. an issue biden noted in a meeting with local leaders at the white house last week. >> what i found when i got here we thought was available in terms of everything from vaccine to vax nay tors was not the case. i thank them for the work they did in their cities and states in order to respond to the crisis. >> reporter: the president is also still struggling to get republicans on board with his relief bill. but with pandemic relief and vaccines on the line, democrats are growing impatient and ready to move forward without republican support. >> we are going to rush to get this done to help deploy more vaccine to help get kids back into school safely and provide the other important benefits in this rescue package. we'll work with those republicans who want to join us. >> reporter: another major hurdle a provision to hike the federal minimum wage to $15 a proposal opposed not only by senate republicans but also two democrats. and with enhanced pandemic unemployment to expire march 14th, senator bernie sanders says there's no time to waste. >> congress has to the go move forward vig lorously do what th president of the united states campaigned on and wants to do. to restore faith that government can respond to the needs of ordinary americans. >> reporter: and house democrats have been easy actually drafting this $1.9 trillion proposal into legislative text. this week the house budget committee expected to assemble all that into one piece of legislation. president biden not only wants to pass this quickly because he believes it's youurgently neede relief for the people because it's holding him back from pursuing immigration and infrastructure. none of those things can get done until president biden gets this passed through congress. while you can expect the president to talk about vaccines, talk about his coronavirus response and the need for this relief package during cnn's town hall this evening, you can expect him to look forward to the other policy priorities he has on his agenda. >> very interesting to watch how he lays things out before the american people. this is since the inauguration in a way his first chance to have unfettered access to the american people without quite so many distractions. nancy pelosi announced proposal for a 9/11 styled commission to investigate the deadly insurrection at the u.s. capitol. cnn's jessica dean live on capitol hill. do we know if nancy pelosi is going to put this in legislation? >> reporter: that's what it would have to do in order to set this commission up, john. this is considered the next step in investigating exactly what happened and how it happened here at the u.s. capitol on january 6th. and to your point, it would come in the form of a sta statute have to be passed by both houses and signed into law by john biden. this comes after a security infrastructure review by lieutenant general russell. and she says now knowing what she knows from that review, here is what she said in a letter to her colleagues just yesterday, she said it is clear from his findings and from the impeachment trial that we must get to the truth of how this happened to protect our security, our security, our security. our next step will be to establish an outside independent 9/11-type commission to investigate and report on the facts and causes relating to the january 6th, 2021 terrorist attack upon the united states capitol complex. of course, noting there she does call it domestic terrorist attack among -- on the united states capitol complex which is what it was here, john. we're also learning a little bit more about who would be on this type of commission. it would be not elected officials, not people within the government. so it would be people outside of the government and another important note is that pelosi in comparing it to the 9/11 commission she complimented the commission's work but said in this case there will be an eye on diversity. they want much more diversity with this commission to look into exactly what happened during this deadly insurrection. alisyn? >> really interesting details, jessica. thank you very much. now to this breaking news, at least three people are dead and ten others hurt after a tornado tears through a coastal town in north carolina overnight. search and rescue crews are looking for people who may be trapped at this hour. cnn meteorologist chad myers has the breaking details. so what happened, chad? >> alisyn, a storm came on shore on the warm side of our snowstorm and made severe weather. in fact, it's not the only tornado that was on the ground yesterday. but this one happened after dark. somewhere between about 11:45 and mid night when most people were asleep. zoom you right in. these are towns you talk about in hurricane season. little river, north meritle, myrtle beach, oak island. those are the areas we talk about when it comes to a land falling hurricane or storm surge. not a tornado during the month of february. but, there it was. it was a tornado on the ground for quite some time. there were a total of four tornado reports yesterday. and we're not done. today we take a break but as we move you ahead into wednesday there's more severe weather along the gulf coast. the humidity is down there. the cold air is back here. warm and cold don't mix, just like oil and vinegar. back up for thursday another chance of severe weather from the severe storms forecast center talking about the potential here. the brutally cold continues. more snow coming down as well. and ed will have more on that. >> oh, absolutely. how many people are freezing this morning. thank you very much, chad. so now to that this morning nearly 5 million americans are waking up without power for the second day in a row. after a huge winter storm paralyzed the south. in texas, residents are experiencing single digit temperatures and scores of them are without heat. cnn's ed lavandera live with more in texas. >> reporter: good morning, alisyn. well, it has been a brutal night for millions of texans across the state as you mentioned. temperatures in single digits and nearly 4 million people here in this state without power and the finger pointing is int intensifying about what has gone wrong. >> reporter: freezing temperatures and power outages are pummelling areas from texas through the plain states. more than a third of the country reached temperatures below zero on monday. texas is receiving the brunt of the storm with millions across the state left with no power and no heat. >> we all see the current situation. i'm not going to sugar coat it. the next few days are going to be very tough. there's a high chance the power will be out for these folks until the weather gets better, which will not be for a couple of days. >> reporter: the city of abilene that has a population of more than 100,000 residents was forced to shut off water last night due to power outages. the lacking infrastructure for these conditions is a major concern for hard-hit areas, with some families freezing in their homes. >> it's like a walk-in freezer. it's like 34 to 36 degrees i would say. >> it depends on which room you're in, 40 degrees is at the lowest end to 55 at the highest. >> reporter: in harris county, power outages nearly spoiled more than 8,000 coronavirus vaccine doses, moderna advised the county that 3,000 of those doses could go back into storage and the rest were distributed throughout the county. historic lows in dallas, oklahoma city and in kansas city, the coldest since 1989. the wind chill factor reaches temperatures as cold as minus 32 degrees. in tennessee, authorities reported two fatalities from the storm on monday. in kentucky, the governor is warning that another storm is on its way. he tells residents no t to run your gas ovens to generate heat. >> i can't stress the dangers of carbon monoxide poisoning which is absolutely avoidable. those are casualties we don't want to see. we did not make it through almost a year of a pandemic to lose people to a snow or an ice storm. >> reporter: alisyn, we can't stress enough just how dangerous this situation is across the state, as we mentioned. so many people without power. this is the dallas convention center you see behind me. it has been opened up as a temporary warm shelter for hundreds of homeless people here in this city. alisyn. >> oh my gosh, ed, when your house gets down to 55 or below, you can't get warm. it's bone chilling. i remember when that happened here on the east coast during hurricane sandy. 34 degree temperature in their house it is obviously a dire situation. so please keep us posted throughout the program. >> reporter: absolutely. president biden will make his pitch to the american people tonight for his pandemic relief bill and his plan to combat covid. what does he plan to say? 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does he need to explain it or what's he trying to accomplish tonight? >> it's mostly a matter of reassurance and consolation. the country has been through and is the middle of great trauma, not just all of those dire situations that you just reported out of the midwest, but also the situation involving the economic recovery that has yet to really kick into gear. a lot of people are really hurting. a lot of people have yet to mourn their loved ones they lost to the pandemic. there's still a lot of anger out there not just about what happened on january 6th and the attempted coup, frankly, but also the fact that we have incompetent government response up until now. people have every right to ask, what have we seen over this last year as this pandemic struck and how can we do better. so joe biden has to explain what all this means and what the path forward is going to be, alisyn. >> to me this is the president's first chance since the inauguration to speak to the american people on his own terms in his own way without the shadow of the other guy hanging over him now that the impeachment trial is over. anna, i'm just reading punch bowl news the a.m. report, you have new reporting out just now about where this big relief package is headed and how republicans plan to treat it. >> yeah. i mean, i think this is truly joe biden's moment to say, this is bigger than republicans and democrats. it's time to come together as a country. but what we're reporting this morning is he is going to face an uphill battle convincing pretty much any republican in the senate or the house. he might find a handful that do support this bill, but the vast majority are now coalescing around being against this bill. i think it's one of the few times where republicans are kind of in disarray post trump. they're trying to find a rallying point. and like the 2009 stimulus bill, they feel confident that they are -- in their attempt to block it or say this is too big and they're not going to support joe biden in this effort. >> i don't know, errol. it's not like fewer americans are suffering now. you know, i certainly understand the debate about whether to put the minimum wage in there and whether it should be $15. there's obviously debate on both sides of those. but in terms of americans, the food scarcity, the food lines at food banks that we have seen wrapping around. i mean, here is where we are, okay. so 11.2 adults in households went hungry in the last seven days. okay, compared to october that was 12% and in august it was 10%. nothing has changed. nothing has to happen now. >> well, that's right. you're thinking rationally and from the point of view of what will help the people. politician, of course, think very differently. and in this case you have republicans on sort of this kind of downward spiral into pure negativism, you know. this is what we saw after the mortgage crash in 2008 and 2009. the absence of any kind of a positive program they simply say no, right? so acting as the party of no, they delayed stimulus back then. they're going to do it again. back then, they got in the way of what would have been an otherwise really popular, according to all polls affordable care act. they fought and fought and fought and fought and tried to shut down the government over it. this is where they are. frankly, alisyn, this is the true crisis within the republican party. they have a lot of problems over there. they have a lot of problems that involve donald trump. we often get distracted by that. but at the core of it, the problem is there's no governing philosophy that enables you to take something like a pandemic, an ice storm, climate change, infrastructure needs, mass hunger, mass unemployment, they don't have any way to deal with it. they go right back to the same talking points which is always cut government and attack anything the democrats attempt to do. it's not a very sound policy. that's why in the last two years they lost control of both houses of congress and the white house. >> again, starting tonight we'll see how president biden, the white house, deals with this situation as this bill gets passed, which it likely will with democrat support but how and in what form will be interesting to see. anna, i'm interested in this 9/11 commission that nancy pelosi is calling for. if it is like september 11th, it will require a signature from the white house. how much bipart son support will this get and what are the potential vulnerabilities here. >> those are good questions. we have been reporting the last couple weeks this is likely she was going to take this step. but a couple big questions that i have in particular surround the fact of will this panel have subpoena power? that's an outstanding question that she's going to have to answer. i think a lot of people will wonder are they going to have the ability to refer what they find to the doj? there's clearly a big division among some republicans and where democrats are about wanting to actually dig in and find out what happened. we saw this with the impeachment. but what is the white house going to say? are they going to be on board with this? i expect that there will be large support among democrats for some style of a january 6th commission, but the actual details are going to be very important for how much they can actually investigate, how much they can uncover, particularly when it comes to finding out information around the capitol police, which is one of the most opaque police forces in the country. they don't have to be submitted to requests for journalists and a lot of other kind of transparency and sunlight issues that remain there. so it's going to be something we'll be covering very closely. >> if they don't have subpoena power, what good are they? >> well, listen, the known facts are mind boggling enough. if all they did was compile what we already know that would be -- put it in a nice bound volume, that would be a great service to the country. we've seen lots of different snippets and images of gallows and herd testimony from lots of people. we know hundreds of criminal court cases have been launched all around the country. just pulling it together and creating a kind of coherent timeline would, i think, really help people understand what happened on that day. the larger meaning of it, of course, as we have already seen will be adjudicated in lots of different forum. we saw one forum in the form of the impeachment trial. we'll see others in the form of these criminal cases that are going on around the country. and this will be a third form in which to have some kind of a discussion. it's going to take time to make sense of all of this, alisyn. >> one reason is to people don't deny what happened. i know you've been looking at what senator ron johnson of wisconsin said. >> senator ron johnson says i don't think this was an armed insurrection. what other definition could there ever be, senator? he doesn't think people brought firearms. well, they did. they were confiscated by police. they also brought spears and weapons and swords and their fists and, you know, all -- >> swords not arms. doesn't count as arms. it's a dnd exemption for ron johnson there. >> stunning. thank you both very much for all the insight. and be sure to join us tonight anderson cooper moderates the first presidential town hall with president joe biden. that's live from milwaukee, wisconsin, at 9:00 p.m. eastern only on cnn. for the first time in a long time the u.s. is seeing encouraging coronavirus trends. our next guest says he thinks we may be seeing a breakthrough moment. other experts say not so fast. who is right? that's next. when did you see the sign? when i needed to jumpstart sales. build attendance for an event. help people find their way. fastsigns designed new directional signage, and got them back on track. get started at fastsigns.com this is an athlete, twenty reps deep, sprinting past every leak in our softest, smoothest fabric. she's confident, protected, her strength respected. depend. the only thing stronger than us, is you. want to brain better? 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joining us now dr. paul offit the director of vaccine education center of the children's hospital of philadelphia and member of the fda vaccine advisory committee. it's a pleasure to get to ask you this question this morning, and that question is, why are the numbers going down? because you look at it and you see this as a possible breakthrough moment. >> i mean, it's mid february. this virus is at its heart a winter respiratory virus. we're in the heart of winter. it should be raging. we're largely inside. it's spread by small droplets. the weather is not humid. nonetheless, we have a drop in cases, hospitalizations and deaths. why? i mean, one possibility is you're starting to see some evidence for herd immunity or population immunity. here is why i say that. if you look on your screen usually you have 28 -- roughly 28 million people who have been infected in the united states. but that's just people who have been tested and found to be infected. there are a lot of people out there who are either asymptomatically affected or mild disease that never get tested. so the only way to know how many people in this country have really been infected is to do antibody surveillance studies to see who has been exposed to the virus and who hasn't. when those studies were done in november, that number was probably off by a factor of four. it's probably closer to at least 80 million people in this country who already been exposed to this virus and likely immune at least from moderate to severe disease, that's 25% of the country. we're starting to get vaccines out there. more than 50 million doses admin administered. that's another 10%. now you're roughly 35%. the people infected are the people by definition most likely to be infected and most likely to be hurt by this virus. it's hard to know, but i do think that one possibility is you're starting to see the first evidence of herd immunity, although know this, the only way to get out of this pandemic to achieve true population herd immunity is with a vaccine. we have to get a vaccine out there. we have to get about 3 million doses a day and then and only then i think will we be able to end this pandemic. >> i so want to believe you. i like your version. i like your philosophy on this, but as you know, it's at odds with folks like michael osterholm who think that we are in the eye of the storm and that we are experiencing sort of an article official lull and the dark storm clouds are on the horizon with the variants. let me play what he told us on february 4th. >> these variants are going to blow right by us. i think right now the b 117 or the uk variant surely could cause a major surge in cases over the next 12 to 14 months. the bottom line is it will take much more than vaccine to keep this variant at bay and not to have potentially a major surge in just the weeks ahead. >> he has predicted the next 14 weeks could be the worst of the entire pandemic. >> that would surprise me. we're getting more vaccine out there. the weather will get warmer. as far as the variants are concerned the b 117 variant otherwise known as the uk variant is not going to resist the immunity induced by natural infection or the immunity induced by the vaccine. that variant is close enough to the virus originally circulating in this country i don't think that's going to be a problem from the critical question will it evade vaccine or induced immunity or natural immunity. no. the other variant is this so-called south african variant b 315 variant. that is less susceptible to immunity induced by natural infection or immunity induced by our current vaccine. know this. that virus has not been able to infect people who were either naturally immune or vaccinated and caused them to be hospitalized. that hasn't happened. i think once that happens, once you find people who were fully say immunized nonetheless when infected with this variant are hospitalized that's when a line has been crossed around that line hasn't been crossed. i still try to be optimistic here. the other wild card is sort of the anti-vaccine activity. enough people say -- choose not to get a vaccine, that would be a problem. we're not there yet. >> one of the important things is that whether or not you have the glass half full view you have or glass half empty has the solution is exactly the same. the approach the country needs to take is the same which is what, exactly, doctor? >> we need to mask, we need to physically distance and get a vaccine when we can, mass distribute it, mass administer it, do all those things. i'm arguing i think we're starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel. but at best we're just it's a start. and i think we're a long way from the finish line and we need to be careful until we get there. >> wear your mask. double mask. all this stuff more important than ever. keep pushing it down. get the cases below 10 or 20,000. get the hospitalizations down to 10 to 20,000. we can do it if we keep at it. thank you so much for being with us. >> thank you. legal experts say the investigations that the former president is facing in new york might pose the biggest threat to him. why? how much of a threat? what is the likelihood of conviction? that's next. at jackson hewitt, we offer safe and easy ways to file with a skilled tax pro. securely drop off your documents, have them picked up, or upload them, and work with a tax pro online from home. safe and easy ways to file that work around you. [footsteps] so, are you gonna buy the car? please! if i could just go home, and discuss things with my wife- i've been here all weekend. you can leave anytime you want. no! ahhh! never go to a dealership again. well, that was painless. go to vroom.com, buy a car and we'll deliver it straight to you. so this morning ross garber def defended all kinds of impeachments says the former president's legal jeopardy in terms of investigations is a 10 out of 10 and the financial investigation here in new york might be the most treacherous of all. joining us now cnn legal analyst elle honeg. >> so the office that's investigating this case is the manhattan district attorney. the head of that office, the district attorney, is si vance. they're not part of the justice part. they're a state-level prosecutor charges levels of new york state law. the core theory of the case is that the trump organization would falsely inflate or deflate the value of their assets depending on the situation. for example, when they were applying for a large bank loan the theory is they would falsely inflate the value of their assets so they could get bigger loans but when it came time to pay taxes they would falsely deflate the value of their assets because they didn't want to pay as much taxes. the star witness could be michael cohen. we know he's talking to the manhattan d.a. spoke to them last month january 2021 and we have an idea of what he might be telling them because he testified about this in congress back in 2019. let's take a listen. >> it was my experience that mr. trump inflated his total assets when it served his purposes. such as trying to be listed amongst the wealthiest people in forbes. >> to your knowledge, was the president interested in reducing his local real estate bills, tax bills? >> yes. >> and how did he do that? >> what you do is you deflate the value of the asset and then you put in a request to the tax department for a deduction. >> so if this is proven out we could see new york state level charges for falsifying business records, tax fraud and potentially other crimes as well, john. >> how about those tax returns, trump's tax returns, we going to see those? >> this could be a really important piece of the case. of course this a long-running legal saga. they tried to subpoena these records. donald trump around his legal team jumped in. we have absolute immunity. you cannot investigate me. you cannot subpoena my records while i'm in office as the president. now, the federal courts roundly rejected that including the supreme court which last year rejected donald trump's argument they held that no citizen, not even the president is categorically above the common duty to produce evidence when called upon in a criminal proceeding. however the supreme court did say if you want to try again you can with different arguments. donald trump is trying to argue now that the subpoena is too broad or just intended to harass him. he lost already in two more federal courts and trying to get it back in front of the supreme court. we could hear that ruling very soon. and if so, those tax returns will be in the d.a.'s hands. >> he's also no longer president which could play into the whole thing as well. elie, in terms of what he could use as a defense, there are possibilities here. there are traditional defenses in cases like these. >> sure. you know donald trump is going to raise a defense. so the first thing he's going to argue is essentially, look, this was a large organization. we had all sorts of lawyers and accountants. i don't know what's going on. they signed the paperwork. however, michael cohen testified about that as well when he was in front of congress. here is what michael cohen said. >> there was nothing that happened at the trump organization that did not go through mr. trump with his approval. and sign off. >> rest assured donald trump will attack michael cohen. he already has and routinely called him a liar who holds a grudge in the media. also, i think it's a safe bet donald trump is going to claim this is yet another politically-motivated witch hunt. on the day he lost the supreme court decision last year, he tweeted the supreme court sends case back to lower court, arkts to continue. this is all a political prosecution. i won the mueller witch hunt and others and now i have to keep fighting in a politically corrupt new york. we know donald trump is not going to take this case lying down. it's a strong case overall but expect it to be a fight. >> what do we need to know about the d.a.? >> here is another wrinkle. an elected position. he's up for re-election this year and all indications are he's not running for re-election. there's a group of ten or more people vying to win that position. so what does he do? does he charge the case or decide not to charge the case before he leaves? does he leave the decision for his successor? so just in case there wasn't enough sort of politics flying around all this, there's one more wrinkle to think about. >> eliehonig, thanks so much. governor cuomo tried to cover up deaths in nursing homes. not everyone is satisfied with his explanation. the patented blend is clinically shown to help manage blood sugar levels. boost glucose control products contain high quality protein and key nutrients to support immune health. try boost. some say this is my greatest challenge ever. but i've seen centuries of this. with a companion that powers a digital world, traded with a touch. the gold standard, so to speak ;) my plaque psoriasis... ...the itching ...the burning. the stinging. my skin was no longer mine. my psoriatic arthritis, made my joints stiff, swollen... painful. emerge tremfyant™ with tremfya®, adults with moderate to severe plaque psoriasis... ...can uncover clearer skin and improve symptoms at 16 weeks. tremfya® is also approved for adults with active psoriatic arthritis. serious allergic reactions may occur. tremfya® may increase your risk of infections and lower your ability to fight them. tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms or if you had a vaccine or plan to. tremfya®. emerge tremfyant™ janssen can help you explore cost support options. new york governor andrew cuomo is defending his administration's delay on reporting of coronavirus deaths in long-term care facilities. and this morning state lawmakers are considering their response. athena jones joins us with the latest. what's happening? >> good morning. those democratic state leaders to be precise spent this past weekend in discussions about a bill to strip governor cuomo's pandemic response power. it's going to happen. this as the governor makes his first public comments in days pushing back on allegations of a coverup. >> we made a mistake. >> reporter: days after his top aide admitted their office with held data for months about covid-19 deaths of nursing home residents, new york governor andrew cuomo finally speaking out. acknowledging on monday that the data was not provided quickly enough. >> in retrospect, should we have given more priority to fulfilling information requests, in my opinion, yes. >> reporter: but maintaining his administration provided accurate data. >> to be clear, all the deaths in the nursing homes and in the hospitals were always fully publicly and accurately reported. >> reporter: approximately 15,000 long-term care facility residents have died in new york. that's about a third of all covid deaths statewide according to the department of health. but until late last month new york only accounted separately for people who died from covid-19 in long-term care facilities like nursing homes. the data didn't include the number of residents from those facilities who died after they were transferred to a hospital or elsewhere. >> i understand the public had many questions and concerns and the press had in questions about nursing homes primarily. and i understand that they were not answered quickly enough. >> reporter: the tipping point came during a private video call between the governor's top aide melissa de rosa and democratic state lawmakers. de rosa said the governor's office delayed giving information to them after trump's department of justice sent an inquiry about nursing home deaths in the state because, quote, basically we froze because then we were in a position we weren't sure what we were going to give to the department of justice or what we give to you guys was going to be used against us. her words and admission that the administration stalled on showing a true picture of just how many nursing home residents died. just as the governor was lauded globally for his pandemic response. >> between his emmy for his coronavirus press briefings to governor cuomo's book to his speech at the democratic national convention, governor cuomo has been held up as the model governor in his coronavirus response, even though new york was so hard hit by the virus early on. >> reporter: cuomo arguing monday, much the same as his top aide, that the request for data at the time was politically motivated. and came amid many other competing priorities as the state was struggling to contain the virus. >> there was a lot going on. everybody was working 24 hours a day. everybody was overwhelmed. we were in the midst of the dealing with a pandemic and trying to save lives. they were answering doj. >> reporter: but now he is taking heat from both sides of the new york legislature. you're only sorry you all got caught, tweeted democratic senator. other democrats are actively discussing drafts a bill to strip cuomo of his emergency powers. and republicans in the state going even further, declaring cuomo should be investigated. >> the gravity of this coverup cannot be overstated. >> reporter: and using the word impeachment. >> andrew cuomo must be prosecuted and andrew cuomo must be impeached if this evidence exists. >> reporter: now, state democrats say that bill to repeal the governor's expanded executive powers will likely be introduced this week and voted on early next week. they have also discussed an inquiry into why this happened and how to make sure it doesn't happen again. alisyn? >> athena, thank you very much for all of that reporting. at least three people are dead in north carolina after an overnight tornado. search and rescue workers digging through the rubble to find victims. we have the breaking details for you coming up. strength non-steroidal anti-inflammatory gel... available over the counter. voltaren is powerful arthritis pain relief in a gel. voltaren. the joy of movement. it's an important time to save. with priceline, you can get up to 60% off amazing hotels. and when you get a big deal... you feel like a big deal. ♪ priceline. every trip is a big deal. every veteran family deserves to fulfill their dream of owning a home ♪ and to continue living that dream throughout their lives. at newday usa, we have va refinance loans to do just that. from refinancing to lower your monthly mortgage payments to refinancing and getting cash for your family. whatever you need, we're here. keeping your oysters business growing has you swamped. you need to hire. i need indeed indeed you do. the moment you sponsor a job on indeed you get a shortlist of quality candidates from a resume data base claim your seventy-five-dollar credit when you post your first job at indeed.com/promo good morning! this is where everything started. the four way is engulfed in history. you're sitting in the place where giants ate. the four way is the heart and soul of the community. ♪ vicks vapopatch. easy to wear with soothing vicks vapors for her, for you, for the whole family. trusted soothing vapors, from vicks >> announcer: bleacher report, brought to you by -- so you all know how much i love tom brady, right? tom brady is very good at football. but in many ways he's basically a jv version of serena williams. andy scholes with more in the bleacher report. what she continues to do, andy, is mind blowing. >> at 39, yeah, it's so impressive, john. and serena, she's still looking for that elusive grand slam title number 24. she hasn't won a grand slam title since winning the aussie open back in 2017, but she is still looking good in this year's tournament. this morning in the quarterfinals, serena easily taking care of second seedsy simona halep winning in straight sets. next up a semifinal showdown between naomi osaka. the 23-year-old cruising to her 19th victory in a row this morning. osaka's winning streak includes a u.s. open title back in september, which was her third grand slam championship. so, osaka and serena have met four time. osaka won the first two matchups including the 2018 u.s. open title. serena won the last two matchups. these two will square off tomorrow night 7:00 p.m. eastern in the w a spot and the title match on the line. michael jordan meanwhile continuing to give back to his home state of north carolina. the hornet's owner donating $10 million to open two new health clinics near his hometown of wilmington. the health clinics are set to open early next year. back in 2017 jordan gave $7 million to open michael jordan family clinics in charlotte. those clinics have seen more than 4,500 patients and have administered nearly 1,000 covid-19 vaccines. so, props to michael jordan for continuing to do good in his hometown. >> what a great way to give back especially now. andy scholes, thanks very much. >> is he almost as good as tom brady? >> he won fewer championship. he has six, tom brady has seven. bill russell has seven. michael jordan can go sit at the table, but tom brady, serena williams, bill russell. "new day" continues right now. biden returned to the white house with one item at the top of his list -- getting his covid relief bill through congress. >> it's urgent that we get it done. a lot of current relief will expire the middle of march. the american people want to raise the minimum wage to a living wage. it is popular. it is what the people want. it is what justice demands. there's no question donald trump remains the dominant figure in the party. >> it's strange to hear organizations complain about cancel culture and seeking to censure republican elected officials who have done nothing more than told the truth. >> announcer: this is "new day" with alisyn camerota and john berman. >> welcome to our viewers in the united states and all around the world, this is "new day." a series of firsts for president joe biden. it's happening right here on cnn. his first town hall. his first real trip outside of washington as he heads to milwaukee to answer questions from voters. his first real chance to address the american people since the impeachment trial of his predecessor. now, we expect him to use the time to push the $1.9 trillion relief package that is working its way quickly through congress. another major development overnight, house speaker nancy pelosi announcing a push to create an independent commission to investigate the deadly siege at the capitol similar to the september 11th commission. now this would require legislation and a presidential signature. there are questions this morning about how much authority this commission will have to call witnesses and to get real answers. >> so overnight, senator richard bur was the latest republican to be censured by his own party for daring to vote his conscious by voting to convict former id