Reporting that trumps daughter and soninlaw are trying, perhaps, to push mike pence off the 2020 ticket. All of it as the 11th hour gets under way on this thursday night. Well, good evening once again from our nbc news headquarters in new york. Day 959 of the Trump Administration and we are tracking Hurricane Dorian as it crawls up the coast of the carolinas, where the folks there are just starting a long night. The National Hurricane center has just released its 11 00 p. M. Eastern time update. Our own meteorologist bill karins will have the new forecast specifics at the board for all of us in moments. The headline right now, dorian still a category 2 hurricane, sustained winds at the core of 120 miles an hour, gusts to more than that. Center of the storm just off the coast of wilmington, North Carolina. Forecasters still warning of lifethreatening storm surge, dangerous winds all along the carolinas. Were approaching a high tide, just after 1 00 a. M. Eastern time tonight. That will affect many of the places in the path of this storm. These were the conditions several hours ago. This is 34 miles off the coast of cape fear, North Carolina, on the Old Coast Guard light tower and helipad known as the frying pan, as the storm closed in and old glory was struggling to hang on. And look at this graphic. This is the go satellite image from noaa of dorian as the sun set tonight. It shows just how massive this system is. Put it this way. If you live in boston, new york, west virginia, western pennsylvania, its cloudy where you are tonight all because of this one huge storm. From florida to maine, the cloud cover stretches along the east coast now. While the hurricanes eye has remained offshore, the storm has already caused so much damage in the carolinas. Charleston was battered, heavy wind and rain today. Parts of the already lowlying city saw heavy flooding from the storm surge. Multiple tornadoes also reported in both north and South Carolina. This video taken in north birlt bea myrtle beach, South Carolina today. Were also still following the increasingly dire situation in the northern bahamas tonight. The death toll there now stands at 30, but its feared to be in the hundreds if not worse. There is catastrophic damage on the abaco islands, hard hit by the category 5 storm over the weekend. Remember, it was parked over them for days. And the situation for survivors there grows more desperate by the hour. Our own Morgan Chesky was able to make it to the battered Great Abaco Island today. Will he join us with a full report in a few minutes. As we mentioned, the new National Hurricane center forecast is just out. For that, we have our own meteorologist, bill karins, who is extending his day into our broadcast tonight. Hey, bill. Thanks, brian. The new advisory is in. No big surprises. We continue to watch the storm moving right along the coast. Weve been saying that, what, four days now . This is the eighth day in a row weve been calling this Hurricane Dorian. We have about 12 hours left, then it will move past the outer banks. Up to this point, i would say most people in the carolinas, in florida and georgia would say this has been a minor hurricane, you know. Well wait and see tonight as we get a possible landfall. It has one little punch left for the outer banks. 100mileperhour winds, maximum sustained. Possibility we could get gusts of 110, 115. Were finally moving this thing. Northeast at 13 miles per hour. Its going to begin to accelerate toward Morehead City and outer banks. In about 12 hours it will be past cape hatteras. In the hurricane center, had it making landfall Morehead City to cape lookout, beaufort area. Now theyve shifted it a little offshore. Were not even guaranteed that were definitely going to get that landfall. Doesnt matter as much. Only reason to be concerned about that is some of the strongest winds are right in the core of the eye. 90mileperhour winds 6 00 to 8 00 a. M. In the morning, weakening down to a category 1. Outer banks can deal with a category 1. Theyre used to getting hit by these storms once every four years and the building codes are very strict. I would not see a lot of wind damage from a category 1 on the outer banks. Myrtle beach has been in the 50s for hours. Its like a Tropical Storm that will never end. No extreme winds. Wilmington, not bad at all. Youre only at 43mileperhour winds. Notice we keep saying the core of the storm. This one buoy gusted to 80 miles an hour. That would be enough to do damage if it was on land. The core is offshore. Well have to see if this band of heavy rain on the outside of it will rotate inland later. Youre 48 to 55, maybe scattered power outages. Throughout the night, this is paused at 6 00 a. M. We have that path south of this region, the heaviest stuff heading up toward cape hatteras. We could still get gusts 75 to 95 miles an hour. By the time we get to about 10 00 a. M. , it will start to head out to sea. Still obviously some very heavy rain. As you go throughout the night tonight, how much ray rain falls, how quickly, and do we get that flash flooding with this storm . Brian, i would say overall, especially when you see whats happened in the bahamas, were faring pretty well. As the storm continues to weaken, and i think theres a lot of people are thankful it wasnt worse. Were not done. Well wait and see if we get that landfall overnight. Bill karins will be with us as part of his live extended coverage. Thank you for that. 11 00 p. M. Update. For the latest on the storms impact right now, lets go to one of the places we just mentioned. Wilmington, North Carolina. Nbc news correspondent cal perry is there, standing by for us. It looks like youre getting the precip that was promised. Three inches of rain in the last three hours has officials a little bit concerned. Im undercover here. 46mileanhour winds, not bad, like bill karins said. Not a lot of dramatics here from this live shot location. Look, part of the story here, brian, is two hurricanes in less than a year for wilmington. It was a year ago next week when we saw Hurricane Florence come. And thats been instrumental in how people have prepared for this storm. A number of people have chosen to stay in wilmington. A year ago, the flooding went on the interstate. The city was cut off for four days. This city became an island, separated from the rest of the state that. Is on the minds of people who couldnt get back to their homes a year ago, which is why weve seen not only boarded up stores, but a lot of people staying. Not out of the woods just yet. Officials still want people to hunker down, but clearly as we get more and more news out of the bahamas, it seems as though this storm, staying offshore, is certainly good news for wilmington and the county. As cal pointed out this is not their first rodeo, hurricane coming up the coast for them concerned. With dorian continuing to track north, we want to hear more about the damage that the storm left behind in South Carolina. Weve been talking about that for two days. On the phone with us tonight, the mayor of myrtle beach, Brenda Bethune. Mayor, tell us about your trees, your power lines, your streets. And because we have to ask this, has anyone there done anything stupid or have people heeded the warnings . Well, im assuming youre asking about the stupid part because of the red jeep found in the ocean along the beach. There was that today. Brian, we actually fared very well in myrtle beach. We experienced a lot of wind, more than expected rain, but you know, what we were used to with Hurricane Florence last year, we didnt have the flooding that was surrounding us and we were very grateful for that. We actually did very, very well. We have crews that are already out, assessing the damage and cleanup crews are lined up to get out first thing in the morning and get our beaches back up and open for visitors to come. It was eerie. I saw some live reporting from myrtle beach on the eve of the storm. People who dont know myrtle beach, its a place where you can have just about the most fun on the east coast and this, however, this week after the labor day weekend, it was absolutely empty. And im imagining youre proud of the fact that you did heed the warnings and you got people out of harms way, especially these tornadoes were looking at. Absolutely. People paid attention to the governors request. Actually, the governors order. Thats very rare for here. We get so used to these storms coming that we take it for granted sometimes that it wont be as bad as what were told. But this time, people did leave, and especially our visitors. And we are very grateful for that. But now were ready to recover and get back to normal, open our doors back up and help those around us who did not fare so well. Okay. You mentioned the jeep. I wasnt going to say anything. But it was one of the images we watched on cable news this morning and into this afternoon. What have you been able to find out about how it is a perfectly good vehicle ended up on a stretch of your beach . That someone got a whim to drive on the beach, check it out before the storm and they ended up driving in an area that had been washed out and got stuck, and that is exactly why we dont allow vehicles on the beach. Well put. Everyone is safe except for if youre put it this way. If youre looking at the used car market and find a really good deal on a slightly used, dampseaming red jeep, ask questions about the vin number. Mayor, thank you. We are so glad that myrtle beach appears to have weathered this and we will repeat your plea to our viewers that in short order myrtle beach will be open for business. Mayor Brenda Bethune on the back end here of this Hurricane Dorian for them. And as dorian lashes the carolina coast to the political intersection of this story, we go. President trump is now on day five of insisting Hurricane Dorian was on a path to hit alabama. Late this afternoon, rear admiral peter brown, who is trumps counterterrorism and Homeland Security adviser think about that for a moment said he briefed the president multiple times on sunday about dorians arrival, issued a statement appearing to take the blame for trumps warnings, certainly giving the president muchneeded air cover. And we quote. I showed the president the official National Hurricane center forecast, which included the cone that projects the potential path of the eye of the storm. The president s comments were based on that mornings Hurricane Dorian briefing, which included the possibility of Tropical Storm force winds in southeastern alabama. In fact, from the evening of tuesday, august 27th until the morning of monday, september 2nd, the forecast from the National Hurricane center showed the possibility of Tropical Storm winds hitting parts of alabama. Trump defended himself five times on twitter just today, insisting he was right all along about alabama, which thankfully has been spared tonight, thanks to the president s quick action. Here for our leadoff discussion on a thursday evening, three top reporters covering this white house. Ashley parker of the Washington Post, Jonathan Lamere of the Associated Press and nancy of politico. Welcome to you both. Ashley, whats left to say about this except what your newspaper has added to the reporting tonight . This is in the Washington Post and they say flatly by the way this is the work of two of your colleagues. It was trump who used a black sharpie to mark up an official noaa map, which he displayed during an oval Office Briefing on wednesday. According to a white house official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. No one else writes like that on a map with a black sharpie, the official said of the map, which added alabama into the hurricanes potential pathway inside the loop of the marker. Ashley, we said this last night. This is minor in the scope of the u. S. Presidency. This isnt family separation. It is far short of a declaration of war, but this is another one of those firsts and, as they say, as they said in the 60s holds true today, the whole world is watching. Thats true. When we first saw that doctored map, there was a lot of suspicion that it was the president who had doctored it. The sharpie in that sort of big scrawl is his trademark. Thats what we reported this evening. And to sort of give you a sense of the mood inside the west wing and how officials are handling this, on the one hand when that map was shown, they had taken it and put it sort of behind where the president was. This wasnt something they wanted him to broadcast to the world. And he was top of mind, he asked for it to be brought back up and showed it. But again i was over at the white house today and, look, white house aides would tell you privately, they wish the president would stop tweeting about alabama. Its not particularly helpful. But this is also, at this point, somewhat routine. There was not panic or mayhem or scrambling. It was basically business as usual against the backdrop of the president making what initially seemed to be a wellintentioned but honest mistake, and then doubling, tripling, quadrupling, octoupling down on it. What do white house aides make of the president s choice to keep this issue alive and bubbling on and perhaps what it means were not talking about and covering . Thats right. To follow up on ashleys point, this story was born of an innocent mistake, corrected by the National Weather service, remains a pretty extraordinary thing. It could have died just then and there. It was labor day weekend, didnt have much media attention. The story would have ended there spl weve never seen the National Weather service feel the need to correct a sitting president in the history of the organization. Another norm shattered by this administration. I think nine times, whatever that might be, he is still keeping this alive. There is some frustration, as ashley said, of people around him. Plenty of people are just rolling their eyes, too, but i dont think we want to lose sight of something here. On one hand this is sort of a silly story and its a president who can never admit a mistake, who has said, written in his books and has preached this in practice, never saying he was sorry, never saying i was wrong. The president s words matter. Any president s words matter, whether in a tweet or declaration in the oval office. They move markets, can rattle Global Markets and potentially frighten people who live in a state that wasnt in any danger from this hurricane. Weve seen time and time again that after he says something, he then sort of relies on government resources. He calls upon the power of the white house to almost reverse engineer what he said into reality, to try to cover for him. We saw it with he claimed there were millions of illegal voters in 2016. He rigged an Election Commission to look into it. It didnt find any evidence of that. When he declared that he had the largest attendance of any inauguration, he made sean spicer go out there and lie from the podium. He made sean spice r do that again from that latenight tweet. To release a memo, taking the blame and giving the president cover for what was simply a mistake. Nancy cook, somewhere theres an elderly couple tonight scared out of their wits, without power on a windy, rainy night on the coast of North Carolina, perhaps in a single wide that is rocking back and forth. No words from the president about the victims of this storm, the grievous, rising death toll to our neighbors 50 miles to our east in the bahamas. Also somewhere tonight theres a Trump Campaign official trying to chart a course, realizing that its the daily grievance that we are covering. Its the daily grievance that sooner or later passes for the direction of a presidency. I think that that came up several times in conversations i was having today with people about this story, just that the president , as you said, did not acknowledge the people who had died in the bahamas, did not acknowledge the devastation there. Some of the senior station officials i spoke to today did talk about that. That wasnt top of mind to the president. He was really tweeting and retweeting and doubling down on this whole alabama controversy. And i talked to the president of the union, of the National Weather service organization, who represents hurricane forecasters, and this person was making the point to me, you know, its very dangerous when the president is sending out mixed messages on the path of a hurricane. Its just very confusing. The president needs to support the National Weather service and their factbased evidence that showed very clearly throughout the day that the hurricane was moving towards the carolinas, South Carolina and North Carolina, and was nowhere near alabama. And by continuing to draw attention to alabama, the president was, in a way, both undermining the National Weather service but also just confusing people whoglued to twitter or the tv and maybe a supporter of the president and is,000 confused about what is actually happening and whether they need to evacuate. As a weather matter, as we look at this storm, if you are in the path of this tonight, tornadoes are spinning off, traveling