a closer look at the shadowy effort that's getting high-profile results getting the war in ukraine on to russian soil. we begin tonight with exclusive new reporting, the prosecutors investigating former president's handling of classified material have in their position a recording from the summer of 2021 in which the former president is telling people around him in a meeting at his golf rissoles or it in bedminster that he has held on to a pentagon document about a potential attack on iran. cnn's reporting this undercuts his argument that he declassified everything, and on the tape, as he spoke, it sounds like he was waving a piece of paper around, raising the question, was he holding the classified documents in question? which goes to what cnn's kaitlan collins asked him at cnn's town hall earlier this month. >> when it comes to your documents, did you ever show those classified documents to anyone? >> not really. i would have the right. two by the way, they were declassified -- >> what do we not? really >> not that i can think of. >> kaitlan collins shares the byline tonight's exclusive along with caitlin polantz can paula reid who joins us now. what is on this recording? >> let's set the stage. this was the summer of 2021 at trump's bedminster golf club. and in attendance at this meeting were several of his aides as well as two people working on an autobiography for from a former chief of staff mark meadows. meadows was not at this meeting but at this time trump had a habit of asking his aides to record conversations with journalists, writers, anyone working on a book. so this is not a secret recording. we are told on this recording trump can be heard disclosing that he had in his possession a classified pentagon document discussing a possible attack on the iran. as you noted, on the tape you can hear him it sounds like wrestling paper, waving something, but it's unclear whether he's waving the document itself or something else for theatrical effect. most significantly, for foreigners investigators, trump suggest he would like to share this document but there are limits to his ability to declassify materials now that he is out of office. >> so that's what's particularly important about this recording to federal prosecutors, that he is acknowledging he has limits about what he can declassified is talking about this as though it is a still classified document. >> exactly. and he has an attorney's, they put out these various contradicting explanations for how he did not intentionally withhold classified documents. they have argued that he had standing declassified order. anything that left the standing office automatically declassified. he said he could declassify things with his mind. 's attorney said a letter to congress, saying any reason he had declassified materials in his possession, because the end of his administration was so chaotic, things were inadvertently put in boxes. but what he said on this recording undercuts all those claims. also important, so far the focus in terms of classified material has been on what was discovered in florida, especially at mar-a-lago. but now this recording suggests there may have been potential mishandling of classified materials and another location at bedminster golf course to new jersey. >> what do you know about the alleged document mentioned on the recording, a potential attack on iran? i was the former president talking about in the first place? >> this was in the context of his frustrations with general mark milley. a new yorker article that he just came out in this document is described as a four page memo describing a possible plan to attack iran. as i noted, there were some people working on an autobiography of mark meadows in this meeting, and meadows, in his book, describes this document is having been written by mark milley. we are told he did not produce this document. also significant, we have learned that mark milley has spoken with investigators in the special counsel's probe and anderson that is significant. he is at the highest ranking national security official to be interviewed that we know of. but that's the key from this report. there is so much the special counsel has and has been doing the we are just learning about. now >> is the trump campaign responding about this? yet >> they are. in a statement the trump campaign said, in part, the doj's continued interference in the presidential election is shameful and this merit-less investigation should cease wasting the american taxpayers money on democrat political jet objectives. >> so they're not saying anything about the contact context about what we're reporting? >> instead they reverted to some talking points we heard from the former president over the last five or six years relayed when investigations. but calling it harassment, referring to it is a witch hunt. but there is no denial that this recording exists or a reporting on what it says. >> thanks. good to get a better handle on this. we're joined by three people with long experience with classified material. andrew mccabe is co-host of the podcast jack. jack smith's special counsel. with this as well cnn legal analyst and deputy former deputy -- and mark hertling. how big of an investigative breakthrough or how important could this be for federal authorities? >> it's huge. anderson, you can't overstate the significance here. to be clear, they have evidence to work with. we've seen investigations out of this. this evidence could be really impactful. as paula stated, it obliterates many of the defenses that he has launched over the last few months. conclusively establishes not only takes unclassified classified information, but also that he knew he had classified in information, and he knew it was classified and he was limited in how he could handle it or distribute it. those are really key elements of proof. and it is him speaking, supposedly, in his own voice, a recording i am sure will be played before the jury. that is very powerful evidence of wrongdoing. >> elliott, it's interesting that he is telling these people in the room, according to the reporting, that there is this document and this is what it is about, a possible attack, a plan for a possible attack on iran, but he can't tell them about it because it's classified. if he had magically declassified, it as he said, with his mind, or however he has in various explanations, that would not be the case. he would feel free to tell them about it. >> it would still be a crime, anderson. there is one crime in the federal code for sharing classified information, but number, one possessing government documents is itself a federal offense but more importantly possessing defense specific information is itself a federal and fence that carries with a ten-year penalty. so the mere fact that this might have been revealing or containing military information or troop movements, that itself makes it a crime. so we've got to get out of this framing of talking about classification versus declassification because for most of the crimes that could be investigated here, based on information that we have, don't have anything to do with classification and to back up andrew's point, what he has said here, at least assuming that it's a recording says what it says says, it's acknowledging he admitted he possessed the documents and knew they were in his possession and knew that they were sensitive. that is, there's no such thing is a smoking gun in the real world. but it is incredibly valuable evidence because it speaks to enchant, to knowledge, what he knew that he had. as far as evidence goes, it is very very powerful. >> general hertling, you have been involved in pentagon war planning. you know how classified documents like this are supposed to be handled. i don't know the contents of this document, but if it's about potential u.s. plans, what an invasion of iran would look like, it seems like it would be pretty important material. what do you make of what the former president allegedly did here? >> it seems pretty important. what andrew and elliott can talk about the criminality and the legal implications of all this, what i'm concerned about is the national security implications. there are reasons why we have stiff penalties, and there are reasons why we have strict laws on these kind of things, because it gives away our nation secrets. i would suspect that if there was a four page document that it was not a war plan. those things come in big binders with a lot of annexes. what i suspect this probably was was communication between chairman milley and the president in terms of potential courses of action. and the chairman of the joint chiefs is a potential courses of action when the president asked some. to some of the president was using this in any way that he was denigrating the chairman of the joint chiefs or he was uplifting his own credentials with a bunch of reporters, it is, it adds, to me, more criminality because it is, it is endangered our nation's national security, and especially if it was about iran. you can imagine who else might be interested in that. and it's a lot of people that president trump used to deal with. >> andrew, how would the justice department authenticate an audio recording like this? i guess that's probably not too difficult to do. and how critical are the witnesses who are in that room? >> well, the witnesses who made the recording would be critical to authenticate it. that's easy. you subpoena them to trial, they come in to testify about how they did it and what they did with that recording afterwards. elliott can walk you through that in great detail, i'm sure. but the interesting thing to me here is there are other witnesses, potentially, you can imagine a trial scenario and which every person in that room testifies at some point. for instance, the authors of mark meadows memoir, who were listening to this display will be able to say, what was in his hand at the moment he was saying this? you hear the stories in the background. it sounds like somebody is moving a piece of paper. did you see the president doing something at that point? what did you assume that he meant by waving a piece of paper? what did you think, was that the report he was talking about? there's all kinds of additional corroborate of detail that you could add to this rich picture of the misuse of classified information in front of a bunch of people who don't have any official access to classified information. >> elliott, if the classified document is on his desk in this meeting at bedminster and he's waving it around or kind of looking at it, or who knows, something else he's pretending to make a point, if someone is waving around a classified document in front of people, does that matter? >> well, it does if we see it. it really does, if they see it, because the disclosure of the information is itself a separate crime. if he shows up to somebody who doesn't properly have access to the information, pardon me, he could be charged with doing that as well. again, every single person in that room who is there can be used to authenticate that information and pile on the evidence of the crime. who did he handed to? where were you sitting? who saw it? who else saw it? what did he say at the time? and it's sort of showing one piece of evidence maybe not that persuasive to a jury, but six or seven witnesses saying largely the same thing, and something that, let's be clear, as been recorded on audio. we were talking about eyewitness testimony it's far less reliable. recordings are pretty reliable. when you have someone doing your recording, it's good evidence. in anderson, you and i talked about this when i'm on, a lot. it's rare that i say something is actually really good evidence. but this is quite persuasive if it is, look, i haven't heard it, but if it is as described, it could be devastating in a courtroom. i've seen it before when recordings come in. they can just be devastating. >> general hertling, according to reporting, the former president's time was upset about, i believe was an article, i think in the new yorker that had come out, or reporting about things mark milley may have said that the former, they have said people of pentagon about concerns of the final days the president might do something, and he wanted word if any orders were given that sounded extreme, and the former president was upset by that. if that's the case, and the reason he is having this conversation with these people at bedminster in with the biographers for mark meadows, for a book i don't think anybody actually read or bought, does that, does that add to this? if that's his motivation? >> i think it does. imagine, first of all, he's waving around a secret document in a golf clubhouse, with four reporters, someplace he shouldn't be. most of the focus on these classified documents as been at mar-a-lago. now we're talking about classified documents and another location, with proof. it's just an indicator of a lack of care of our nation's secrets. to me it makes a world of difference, and i tell you having been a court martial convening authority, if any shoulder soldier would do something like, that there would be an immediate filing of a court martial on those individuals. >> general hertling, people have been prosecuted for far less than this. >> well, absolutely. i could name some names. but yes, talking to biographers about classified information, showing pictures without markings on, get taken from satellites, reflecting on recordings that came in from signals intelligence, or a big dumps of things like wikileaks, certainly. there has been a lot of this kind of thing when people don't take care of the kinds of things that we call our nations secrets. >> and andrew, based on everything we know so far that has been reported, where do you think the special counsel's investigation is heading? >> a lot of signals, anderson, that they are reaching the end of their road. we see them bringing witnesses into the grand jury who are at the absolute operational lawns of those folks who would want to talk to. they have concluded many fighting claims of privilege and dragging those people into the grand jury, reluctantly. it appears to me that some of the witnesses they've been talking to recently look like mop up operations. the sorts of things you do to line up specific details that you think you might need a new indictment. so there's a lot of clues out there that they are probably getting to the end of the presentation. there's some reporting lately that they haven't been before the special committee since the start of may. i think it's probably imminent. at least the point in which they will make a decision, whether or not to indict, and quite frankly having already crossed the hurdle of piercing the attorney-client privilege between former president trump and his attorney evan corcoran months ago, it's almost unthinkable that they will not go forward and seek an indictment. and with evidence like, we've been talking about tonight, if they do seek an indictment it's likely to be very strong. >> gentlemen, i appreciated. next, with ron desantis on the campaign trail, more republicans soon to enter the race, what will the former presidents challengers to? as house lawmakers get ready to vote out of the debt crisis, speaking out against all day the vote this hour we expect, just ahead. wasn't me. narrator: said hillary, who's only taken 347 steps today. hillary: i cycled here. narrator: speaking of cycles, mary's period is due to start in three days. mary: how do they know so much about us? narrator: your all sharing health data without realizing it. that's how i know about kevin's rash. who's next? wait... what's that in your hand? no, no, stop! oh you're no fun. [lock clicks shut] if we want a more viable future for our kids, we need to find more sustainable ways of doing things. america's plastic makers are investing billions of dollars in new technologies and creating plastic products that are more recyclable. durable. and dependable. our goal is a cleaner, healthier planet for generations to come. for a better tomorrow, we're focused on making plastics better today. oh booking.com, ♪ i'm going to somewhere, anywhere. ♪ ♪ a beach house, a treehouse, ♪ ♪ honestly i don't care ♪ find the perfect vacation rental for you booking.com, booking. yeah. ♪ ♪ the biggest ideas inspire new ones. 30 years ago, state street created an etf that inspired the world to invest differently. it still does. what can you do with spy? ♪ ♪ >> the audio recording that special counsel jack smith now has of the former president himself acknowledging he kept a classified pentagon documents. they describe recording as significant and have been questioning witnesses already. documenting question is in front of the grand. jury we talked before the break about the legal and national security implications, and now the politics joining us with two commentators, in charlie dent. congressman, republicans endlessly won after hillary clinton for her emails. is this latest allegation or any of trump's legal problems something any of these candidates have the stomach to go after. >> we should go after him on this. i hope they handle the situation better than they handled the stormy daniels indictment a few weeks ago, where some of his, i think, pants and governor desantis both more or less defended trump and said he was a victim of a witch hunt, that the prosecutor was mean. they should be going after trump explaining why he is reckless. he absconded with classified material, he possessed it and apparently he disclosed to people without security clearances. they should be hammering hawn on this because he's likely to be indicted yet again and maybe one or two more times. to beat trump they have to draw hard contrast. >> but you're saying should morally, or politically? why? >> politically. i run a number of campaigns, anderson, in if i had an opponent who recklessly shared classified material to people who weren't authorized, i would just be hammering them. hammering that opponent with this. it's a gift. >> kristen, is there any reason to believe that any republican primary voters see the classified document investigation is a deal breaker? >> i don't think most of them view it as a deal breaker at this point, in part because things like the raid on mar-a-lago, it's etra. we saw this circling of the wagons type effect. at the same time, this is an audio recording with trump's own voice saying these things. again, i don't lean towards thinking that is definitely going to be the game-changer, but it's a little different than hearsay. it's different than he said, she said. if he's the one that said it. and to the point about hillary clinton, i am chloe curious, will any of these folks in the field finally decide the gloves are off? trump said this himself, so why don't we go after trump and say we criticized hillary clinton for this, why should we give trump a pass for pulling a hillary? >> to the congressman's point, is that something that it would be an advantage to any of these candidates? most of them are far behind trump. is there a political advantage to doing that? >> right now i think as a primary effect, as, do i want to vote for trump because of this allegation? i don't think you're gonna see many republican voters breakaway. but is a second order effect, donald trump had growing legal problems becoming a less illiterate thing for the party. if they look at the 2024 election and they view it as existential, which is something i see in all my research, that republicans view the 2024 election as about the survival of the country, if you view the stakes as being that high, why risk it on someone who is under so many different indictments, who is facing so many big challenges in the courts. so that maybe if not the offense itself but the drama around it that will turn some republican voters off. >> congressman, over the course of the former presidents political career, there are that multiple tapes coming, out some more damning than others, none of them seem to have knocked him off his course. >> that's correct. what he's trying to do here, he will say he is yet again a victim. the deep state, general miller out to get him. and he's gonna play the victim and hope to get some sympathy among primary voters. i agree with that. but as a general election strategy, this is devastating. again, as kirsten just said, we're talking about taking a risk on a guy that might be indicted three or four times between now and the republican convention. and so if you are a republican voter you have to look at this and say, if we're trying to beat joe biden and the democrat, can you beat him was a guy who paid off a porn star, absconded with classified material, tried to interfere with the georgia election results in 2020, i mean there's a whole host a litany of things that are so bad. plus the fact that he has been losing ever since 2016. republicans have underperformed in all these elections. so at some point i think republicans will care about winning again. they want to make winning great again. and he is not doing that. he's not doing anything to help the party. so i think this is another big barnacle on donald trump and, as was said, it is his in his own voice this time. >> kristen, in terms of polio time to focus groups, if the former president is indicted by the department of justice or in georgia, will that make a difference? >> i think you can expect that is soon, if the despite the invite indictment comes down, in the short term, a bump in his poll numbers from this rally around him kind of effect. i've heard this described as an antibody response, almost, a sense that trump is under attack, we must protect him. but that slowly wears away is people realize, wait a minute, is he who we are really banking the 2024 election on? that's what i would predict the polls will look like if an indictment does come out of this. a surge of polls followed by a trailing off, and we will find he's got a lower pole than we expected. abby philip we'll talk about tonight's exclusive reporting with trump attorney jim trusty, representing the former president in this investigation. that's the top of the hour, at nine eastern, right here on cnn. it is a busy night. we're just moments away from the house vote on the debt limit deal. a live report from capitol hill, next. introducing purple's new mattresses our unique gel flex grid draws away heat, helping you fall asleep faster. it relieves pressure for less “ow,” and more “ahhh.” and instantly adapts as you move, without ever disturbing your partner. amazing. sleep better. live purple. save $800 off mattress sets at our memorial day event. visit purple.com or a store near you. you need to deliver new apps fast using the services you want in the clouds of your choice. with flexible multi-cloud services that enable digital innovation and enterprise control, vmware helps you innovate and grow. this man needs updated covid protection. so does she. yup, these guys too. because covid is still out there, and so are you. and if your last vaccine was before september 2022, you're out there with fading protection. but an updated vaccine restores your protection. so you can keep doing you. get an updated covid vaccine and stay out there, safely. >> looking there in the capitol tonight, house members now speaking about the bipartisan deal to raise the debt limit and vote a catastrophic default. the vote on it, expected shortly, the question is does house speaker kevin mccarthy have enough support to get the bill passed. how is it looking? >> there is broad expectation that this bill will pass by a comfortable margin tonight, but this did not come easy, in fact the road has been very bumpy to get here. of course for months it was a standoff between house republicans and the white house, the white house refusing to negotiate at all, saying the debt ceiling, 31. 4 trillion dollar borrowing limit must be raised without any conditions. that would position rejects rejected by mccarthy, who forced the white house to negotiate days ago. those fraught negotiations took place. they broke down, it happened again, ultimately cutting a deal on saturday that included a range of concessions as well as some spending limits over the next two fiscal years. that all part of a deal to raise the debt ceiling up until january of 2025. we do expect this to pass, and the question now is how many republicans and democrats vote to push this over the finish line tonight. the big thing to watch, when the vote happens here in just a matter of moments, is whether or not kevin mccarthy is able to get a majority of the house republican conference. that is the goal. that is what the speaker has been pushing for. you told me earlier today that he does expect a majority of the conference. also its top negotiator, patrick mchenry just told me moments ago, that is the hope. one big reason is that if you get less or fewer republicans, if there's a minority republican supporting this, he could face more backlash from some elements of the right-wing of have conference who are already upset at the deal he cut with the white house. some even suggested that they could potentially force a vote, ousting him from speakership if he does not reach that threshold. mccarthy tonight very confident he will get there. >> is it clear how many democrats may vote for final passage? obviously mccarthy had help from other side of the aisle to offset republican defection. >> -- accepting the parameters for the debate on the floor, typically that doesn't happen, democrats voting with republicans, but there are 29 republicans who voted against that rule, showing there is some opposition on both sides of the aisle. but there are folks on the left to believe the white house conceded and gave mccarthy far too much in this negotiation. >> using this process to negotiate legislation in spending, which has never happened before, is unprecedented and unacceptable, and we can't support that precedent. >> instead of saying, padding is on the head and saying could have been worse, they could have said, this is the end of the fossil fuel giveaways. i'm pretty discouraged and frustrated that it has come to this. >> that last congressman referring to interaction he had with the white house earlier today where they said it could've been a lot worse but he was concerned about some of the energy provisions in. there it's onshore how many democrats will vote for this, but the democrats are expected to give up to support, to provide enough support to offset any republican losses to ultimately get the votes in a matter of minutes. >> and assuming, if it passes the house tonight, how likely is it to pass in the senate? >> it's expected to pass as soon as tomorrow night. that is where the push is for the republican leader, mitch mcconnell, in the senate majority leader chuck schumer. they want to get this done. but with the united states states own it you need to get all senators to agree to scheduling the vote. so anyone senator can delay the process, but the expectation is that this fight, this bitter fight, could come to an end in the house tonight in the senate, as soon as tomorrow. >> all right, manu, appreciate. it will come back to. you joining us is dana bash, also senior political commentator scott jennings, and david axelrod, former adviser to president obama. how are things going? >> it has been incredibly difficult to get to this point, but it looks like the house of representatives is at the point that speaker mccarthy and pretty much everybody else in private have been expecting, which is a true compromise that you don't see very often. what that means, generally is, you have a number of votes, a healthy majority coming from the center, democrats and republicans, and you have people on the left and people on the right who are upset because the party gave away things that, on either side of the aisle, extremes on both sides didn't want, and the question now is, in the short term, the political question for kevin mccarthy because he has such a small majority of republicans, is whether or not the ability that republicans have, that anybody really has, to vacate the chair, meaning oust him from the speakership, whether they're going to use it. it's not clear. i will tell you i was getting a text from a conservative republican, a fiscally conservative republican who supported mccarthy, who said the calls he's getting to his office are now more about kevin mccarthy than about the bill itself, and then if people are hearing that in these ruby red districts back on this weekend, that may change the dynamic when it comes to mccarthy. >> scott, how do you think mccarthy did guiding this carcass caucus through this process, and what do you think are the threats to the speakership? >> i think he did a great job. i remember the night he was elected speaker. a lot of people are on tv confidently predicting that going through the debt limit was going to be the thing that broke kevin mccarthy, and time and again he has overperformed expectations. people expect him to stumble and he keeps doing a good job. what he has done here is bringing together a broad coalition of the middle of republicans and it looks like the middle of the democrats to do something responsible, which is raise the debt limit. we've divided government which means the far-right of his party cannot do what they want to do which is two massive spending cuts and massive changes to fiscal polity. they ought not be mad at kevin mccarthy. the reason they're upset is because we lost the white house in the senate, it's not kevin mccarthy dot to be upset about, it's long trump. was divided government in everything the way it works in washington, i think mccarthy did a great job. maybe crazy to threaten his speakership over this. >> david, how do you think president biden did during the process? >> i think we'll. he was smart to wait to see if mccarthy could pass something through the house. once mccarthy did it signal that there needed to be a negotiation. i think biden came out pretty well in these negotiations. there are obviously things that are going to anger some elements of the democratic party, but the truth is that the core elements of his program are intact. the republican bill that originally passed the house tied to the debt ceiling hike would have decimated some of the things that he had passed last year through the inflation reduction act, including the big climate package. none of that happened. so i think he came out well in this. but i agree with everything that has been said. this is what a good faith compromise looks like in divided government. and this is what you can expect. and what you can expect in this vote is that there will be a lot of folks taking a free vote to express themselves, particularly to their constituents, that they fought this thing knowing that the votes are there to actually pass the bill and not tank the economy through default. that's really what has happened here. no one in november of 2004 2024 are gonna be thinking about this particular vote. but they would be if it went down into the country which are to default in the economy went spiraling. so i think biden did well to get to this point. >> dana, a number of republicans were portraying this as essentially a victory for republicans the democrats didn't really move the needle. they didn't really get anything that they wanted that the republicans didn't want them to get. do you think that's accurate? or is that's just how they are selling it to their people? >> i think that the leadership in both parties are selling this to their people the way that they know that there are people want to hear it. it just so happens the pretty much everything they are saying has a lot of truth to it. it is true that republicans kevin mccarthy and his negotiators who are talking to the white house, didn't give on several things. they got some things like a work requirement for those who are getting government assistance, taking back some of the covid money. it is also true on the part of the democrats that they were able to hold off on some really deep, deep cuts in social programs that republicans wanted to get forward. all of that is true. the question is, how they sell it, and the question is, how quickly they can, frankly, move on from this. there are always going to be, on the republican side, those who say that this was just not deep enough, that the spending is still way too high, and those on the democratic side who say that this is just unfair to those who need it most. >> scott, do you think it will be difficult for minority leader mcconnell to whip gop votes for the bill if there needed to offset democratic defections? >> i think it will pass with a lot of votes in the senate. big chunks of both parties. it's interesting, the only senate republican that's running for president that has a vote in this thing is tim scott. i did notice he said he was going to vote against it. and rick scott and some others. but he will lose a few. a lot will vote for. it democrats will lose a few. bernie sanders is against it. but again, what you're seeing is two different kinds of people in congress in both changer chambers. the governors in the grandstander's. what this has produced isn't ago she shun where the governors came together and it was right for the country, which is to keep the economy spinning, and let's have the big fiscal debate in 2024. i don't think we'll have issues in the senate, but like and how sulu some of the conservatives, absolutely. >> david, you said it was wise, you thought, for biden to wait on this before negotiating. why? >> first of all, i don't think, i think he would've had a more serious problem among his own supporters if he had started negotiating with no provocation. the fact of the matter is, it wasn't clear that mccarthy could pass a bill through the house. that would have set up a different conversation if he hadn't done that. once he did that, it became clear that it was time to start negotiating. but i want to make, scott mentioned, tim scott, coming out against this, so did several other candidates, including ron desantis, who was in the house in 2018 when they passed the clean deficit, i should say debt ceiling hike when donald trump was president, a quarter of the whole national debt was accumulated under the trump years. and the house voted three times to raise the debt ceiling. >> are you implying there is hypocrisy involved here? >> yes it's one of the rare times in washington that that happens, and we should note it. >> duly noted, david axelrod, scott jennings, dana bash. ahead, sounding the alarm on russia's border. russia's response, next. oh booking.com, ♪ i'm going to somewhere, anywhere. ♪ ♪ a beach house, a treehouse, ♪ ♪ honestly i don't care ♪ find the perfect vacation rental for you booking.com, booking. yeah. russian officials aren't hilar with the kremlin calling the situation in the belgrade region on the border with ukraine, quote, rather alarming. and saying they will approve their air defenses following yesterday's george back in moscow. governor in belgrade says more evacuations are set to take place, as chilling continues from inside ukraine. he also said that other districts have seen an increase in the cross border mortar and artillery fire in recent days. cnn's fred pectin has more. >> [sound of artillery] >> while the ukrainians continue to be -- drawn attack on moscow, a senior adviser to ukraine's presidency is warning the russians that the war is coming to them. >> [speaking non-english] >> >> translator: all this will increase and scale. there will be an increase in the number of manifestations of the war. or the territory of the russian federation. >> russia is not only feeling the heat around moscow the ukrainians appear to be ramping up the pressure in the vast border regions between the two countries. >> local authorities in the belgrade regions say heavy shelling damaged residential and official buildings there wounding several people. >> it was very scary, several bursts at once. this has not happened before. >> further south in the -- region. the russians say two oil refineries were targeted by drones, the surveillance camera video seeming to show an explosion of followed by a large fire at one of the facilities. and to the north, authorities in the bryansk area say they repelled a massive drone attack while the ukrainians believe the russians are so nervous they blew up a road and the border region nearby to try and stop any possible ukrainian advances. the u.s. says it does seem to condone attacks on russian territory. >> we have maintained our concerns about attacks on russian soil. but we have been nothing but generous and fully committed to making sure that ukraine can defend itself. >> but some of the u.s.'s allies are less concerned. >> ukraine does have the legitimate right to defend itself, but it does also have the right to project force beyond its borders to undermine russia's ability to project force into ukraine itself. >> [speaking non-english] >> translator: those remarks coil -- kremlin controlled tv as russia's security forces seem unable to prevent cross border raids. >> fred, what have you learned from ukrainian officials about the latest round of tax? >> either, anderson, well -- ukrainians are behind a lot of them. however, there is one senior ukrainian official who told me, look, when you see such a tax, when you see, for instance, a tax on oil refineries or even on ammo depots in occupied areas of ukraine. they are occupied by the russians and all of those are precursors for ukraine's large-scale offensive. which of course they have been planning for months. and what ukrainians now say it is eminent that it could start at any point. anderson? >> fred pleitgen, appreciate it. thank you. >> coming up, nasa holds its first public meeting on uaps, unidentified aerial phenomenon. they used to be called ufos. we will talk at all over with our harry enten next. pretty well. but on our way to tour this troll-themed town: we get into a dumb argument. hard to stay mad when you're literally surrounded by trolls in a place called trollstigen, but we manage it. that's when our tour guide steps in. we hear his voice float out from behind a troll statue, saying: “don't fight, little ones. you're missing the view.” haven't missed a view since. one app over 300 thousand experiences you'll remember. do more with viator. if you think you, a child in your care, or another loved one were harmed by endo or a related company, including par or ams, or their products including ranitidine, transvaginal mesh, or opioids like opana®, opana® er, or percocet®, your rights may be affected by deadlines in the endo bankruptcy. you may be entitled to payment as part of endo's bankruptcy, but you must file a claim by july 7, 2023. you may file a claim on behalf of yourself, a child in your care (including a child exposed to opioids in the womb), or a deceased or disabled relative. also, if you hold a claim or interest in endo, the deadline to object to the potential sale of endo's assets is july 7, 2023. for more information visit endoclaims.com oh booking.com, ♪ i'm going to somewhere, anywhere. ♪ ♪ a beach house, a treehouse, ♪ ♪ honestly i don't care ♪ find the perfect vacation rental for you booking.com, booking. yeah. today nasa's public hearing on uaps, unidentified aerial phenomenon, what are more popularly known as ufos. the pentagon revealed it is now pulling more than 800 cases of mysterious flying objects. 5200 new reports a month. today's for our televised hearing which was in the aim of transparency comes several months after nasa launched its own study into the unexplained sightings. their final report is expected to be lisa late july. joining me now is our own human uap, harry enten. so why the name change? what uaps? >> because we want to put the focus on -- >> who is we? >> part of the scientific community. >> are you? >> i did go to weather camp. i'd like to think so. >> it's true. >> we want to put the focus on what we see and not necessarily the objects. when you look at ufos you think of flying saucers out of a 1950s movie. we don't want to stigmatize it too much. >> it may not be an object itself, it may be a phenomenon. could be a phenomenon. >> could be a shining light that you see going from somewhere. >> so what does the data show? how many uaps are actually unexplained? >> it turns out that, you know, you mentioned that 800 number. but it turns out only about two to 5% of its truly are unexplained. most of these we are able to tell from senators and stuff. oh, this is something we can actually explain. but the fact that we have about 20 to 40 that aren't? >> some of those are moving so weirdly. >> yes, like the zigzags. >> in ways we can't even contemplate? >> that's exactly right. it blows my mind. this is why we are talking about. it because it was a lot of people's minds. >> how many people to admit to believing in aliens? >> turns out that it is more and more and more americans who are admitting, look at this change that we see. up to 66% now. it was less than 50%, about 25 years ago. younger people are more likely to believe it. and i think the reports, again, we are trying to discern ties it to maybe relief. >> seeing these videos of things on -- incredible. >> yeah we are able, the press is able to put it out there much more frequently, so i believe the police is rising. >> what do numbers show but how people will actually have contact with aliens? >> yeah, in our lifetimes or at any point really, most people believe we probably, it's about split 50/50. 49% say we never will. 7% say we already have. i wonder who those 7% are? another 39% say eventually. well i would like you think i'm part of the third percent. how about you? >> yeah, who knows. i don't know. >> that is the beauty of it all. the mystery. >> harry enten, thank you. >> we'll be right back, more ahead. everything looks so good. right?! i'm hearing the new google pixel is really great. and it comes with at&t best deals on all of them. this one looks nice. that's a house favorite and it's served with your choice of plans. thank you. there's gotta be a catch. no catch and no trade-in required either. ooh. oh. how do you know all of this? i come here a lot. love the service. at at&t, new and existing customers can choose any google pixel, with our choice of plans, and always get our best deal. ♪ [music playing] subject 1: cancer is a long journey. it's overwhelming, but you just have to put your mind to it and fight. subject 2: it doesn't feel good because you can't play outside with other children. subject 3: as a parent, it is your job to protect your family. but here is something that i cannot do. i cannot fix this. i don't know if my daughter is going to be able to walk. i don't know if she's going to make it till tomorrow. [music playing] interviewer: you can join the battle to save lives by supporting st. jude children's research hospital. families never receive a bill from st. jude for treatment, travel, housing, or food so they can focus on helping their child live. subject 4: childhood cancer, there's no escaping it. but st. jude is doing the work, continually researching towards cures, giving more than just my child a chance at life. interviewer: please, call or go online right now and become a st. jude partner in hope for only $19 a month. subject 5: those donations really matter because we're not going to give up. and when you see other people not giving up on your child, it makes all the difference in the world. interviewer: when you call or go online with your credit or debit card right now, we'll send you this st. jude t-shirt. you can wear to show your support to help st. jude save the lives of these children. subject 6: st. jude is hope. even today after losing a child, it's still about the hope of tomorrow, because. childhood cancer has to end. interviewer: please, call or go online right now. [music playing] you're doing business in an app driven, multi-cloud world. that's why you choose vmware. with flexible multi-cloud services that enable digital innovation and enterprise control, vmware helps you keep your cloud options open. ♪ ♪ make your dream car...a reality. mercedes-benz certified pre-owned vehicles are rigorously inspected to live up to the highest of expectations. ♪ ♪ ♪ >> thank you, anderson, good evening, everyone. i am abby phillips. a busy night tonight. we are watching capitol hill where the house is set to vote on the bipartisan deal to raise the debt ceiling and cut spending. so that the nation efforts are default next week. president biden and speaker mccarthy are defending the agreement as some of their parties are also railing against it. so we will bring you the results of that vote as soon as it happens. but first, to a c cnn exclusive. tonight reporting the federal prosecutors have donald trump on tape in his own words acknowledging that he took a sensitive national security document with him when he left the white house. that is what multiple sources tell cnn. and i will speak with one of the former presidents attorneys in just a moment. but we are told that trump's comments in the 2021 recording suggest that he knew that he kept classified material and wanted to share it but understood his limitations post presidency. in other news, he knew that this was likely false when he. . >> by the way, they become automatically declassified when i took them. >> and the same goes for this. >> if you are the president of the united states, you can declassified just by saying it is declassified. even by thinking about it. >> the incident is so serious that a special counsel investigating trump has now questioned the joint chiefs chairman general mark milley about it. sources tell cnn that the tape of a meeting between trump and people without a security clearance. it did not take place at mar-a-lago as well where the other classified documents were found. but instead they were at trump 's golf club in bedminster, new jersey. let me first bring in one of the journalists who broke the story. cnn's kaitlan collins. so caitlin, a huge thing here. what does this all tell us about what donald trump knew about the status? the classification status of these documents? >> yeah it is really significant reporting from our team. it was a team effort on this. and i think the biggest take away from it, likely the biggest concern for trump's legal team and trump's allies is the fact that it shows that he understood that he had retained classified information long after he left office. but also had an acknowledgment that he could not declassify things in this post presidency period. as you have noted that he has claimed many times as this investigation has gone on. and as he has been asked questions about this. and that has been the main defenses that we have heard from the former president and his legal team about this. which is why they've said they don't believe he is facing any legal trouble in this investigation. now it seems that that has changed potentially here. because we do have a source that tells us that they believe this is important piece of inference that jack smith's team now has in their hands. and the way this all got started was at a meeting in the summer of 2021. trump is that bedminster. so not mar-a-lago where the rate happens. where the search warrant was executed for those documents. but he is angry about the story. it has been published in the new yorker, talking about general milley's concerns that trump may take military action in his waning days of his presidency as he was disputing the results of the election. trump is angry about that, and what he has indicated to the people that he is speaking to in this recorded audio is that he has information that could undermine what milley is saying. you know, indicating that it is classified information. and