defending his decision to visit saudi arabia as he travels to the middle east next week against criticism and controversy surrounding the trip. the president set to meet with saudi crown prince mohammed bin salman. biden vowed to make saudi arabia a pariah. now as president he says his visit to the country is critical to u.s. security. that s right. washington post op-ed the president writes it s my job to keep our country strong and secure. we have to counter russia s aggression, put ourselves in the best possible position to outcompete china, and work for greater stability in a consequential region of the world. to do these things we have to engage directly with countries that can impact those outcomes. the president s trip has come under criticism because of saudi arabia s role in the murder of journalist jamal khashoggi. the saudi crown prince was said to be responsible for ordering khashoggi s murder. let s get some perspective on president biden s trip. a historia
reporter: and the rally was somber. it was emotional. it was also a time for this community to come together. organizers were asking for a couple of things. one of them being donations and support for the victims and for those that were injured. but the other thing they were asking for was legislative action. they say that is what comes next. boris, whitney? camila, thank you. new versions of the omicron variant are fueling a summer surge of covid-19 here in the u.s. that has health officials urging many americans to return to masking indoors. coronavirus infections nationwide are up 6% with more than 100,000 new cases reported every day over the last two weeks. cnn s nadia romero on where cases are rising the fastest. reporter: about a third of the u.s. population is now living in a county with a high
severe disease. in people who were fully vaccinated, particularly people boosted in the vulnerable groups, we re not seeing a rise in icu admissions, we re not seeing a serious rise in deaths. but what we are seeing are the gaps in immunity being exposed. nadia, thank you for that. it s not just covid case that is are rising, monkeypox cases also surging across the country. amid the growing numbers there is concern about a lack of testing and the vaccine rollout. what you need to know about monkeypox coming up. and, still ahead, cnn sitting down with some of the families of the uvalde school shooting victims. you ll hear their anger and frustration as they still struggle to get answers from law enforcement.