Readily identified by all sorts of people that you guys are willing to take responsibility for yourselves . Thanks. Let my say two things. First, with regards to the numbers, as youve seen by how i laid out how we get to the numbers of americans, this is both incredibly complicated and incredibly fluid. Any number i give you right now is likely to be out of date by the time we leave the briefing room. So what were doing is very carefully tabulating everything we have, cross checking it, using different databases. Well have numbers for the different categories in the days ahead and after this initial phase of efforts so bring people out of afghanistan. With regard to the second part of your question about taking responsibility. I take responsibility. I know the president has said he takes responsibility. I know all of my colleagues across government feel the same way. I can tell you that there will be plenty of time to look back at the last six or seven months, to look back at the last
Afghanistan. As the Pentagon Chief and other top leaders head to Capitol Hill to brief House Members. Good morning. Im Garrett Haake in for hallie jackson. Lots to get to this hour. We start with courtney kube, Kelly Odonnell and john hudson, national Security Reporter for the washington post. Courtney, walk us through what were hearing from your sources about that decision expected from the President Today and why he has to make it now with the deadline not actually until next week . Remember, even if the deadline is August 31st, its still going to take several days, somewhere potentially in three to four days to get the nearly 6,000 u. S. Troops out Of Kabul international airport. And then theres also the equipment thats there. The u. S. Has artillery, mraps, aircraft, helicopters. If they were to get all those people and Equipment Out it will take several days. You have to back time from the deadline of August 31st until, you know, three or four days back. That puts you at The End o
Lets just talk about bottlenecks. I talked about that a little earlier. Those that Depart Kabul and get to those staging bases, thats the coordination i was talking about earlier, to ensuring that we place, you know, evacuees in one of those bottlenecks, so the increased through put they are able to hold there, with the joint staff in that trance com, as we look as those At Kabul, theres no constraint of allowing flights to leave today. We expect the through put that We Saw in the last two days to be able to continue with no bottleneck at others, and we continue to monitor that on an hourly and minute basis so we know where to fly people to. Do you have enough people in the i dont have the exact number in kabul, but there are evacuees in kabul being processed there to be ready to fly. But you dont have the number . I dont have the exact number. We have folks ready to evacuate. We can get you the number that is on the airport now. As The General said, it literally changes by the hour. I
Will join us later this hour. Lets gun with afghanistan. Here to start us off with the latest, Nbc News white House Reporter and nbc national Security And Intelligence Correspondent And Nbc News Pentagon Correspondent Courtney Kube and Lieutenant Jern and Deputy Security Adviser for iraq and afghanistan. Thank you all for being here. Well start with you, mike, outside the White House. Talk about this decision to stick with that August 31st deadline. What led to that decision . Well, aaron, i want to start by noting that president s scheduled remarks that we were expecting initially at noon and then 2 00 p. M. Have just been postponed yet again. We now expect to hear from the president sometime after 4 30 this afternoon. If the president is watching as i hope he sometimes does, i say this not as a criticism but as the Data Point to really speak to what White House officials have been a dynamic situation. We do expect as White House officials and other Administration Officials have been
Approval to pfizers Covid Vaccine. Making it the first to secure that seal of approval from the federal government. Health officials hope it will convince more americans that the Pfizer Shot is safe and effective. Right now about 82 Million people still have not been vaccinated. And this is a critical moment. More than 1,000 americans, nearly all unvaccinated are now dying from covid each day. Thats the highest this number has been in five months. The urgency of now. Lets start with cnns Kaitlyn Collins live at the White House. What are you hearing about this from the White House . Reporter its exciting news. This is something the White House has been waiting to hear for a long time. Weve heard fda officials say the White House stayed out of their way when they were working on the Review Process and how lengthy it was as they were waiting to grant the full approval. Its significant for the first covid19 vaccine. But they are excited that this news came today. They had an idea based on