good morning. i m victor blackwell. you will see amara walker later this afternoon. it is the last day of 2023 in the u.s. but look at this. it s 2024 already in new zealand. fireworks there at the sky tower lighting up auckland. let s take a break and listen to what s happening there. happy new year! woo! you hear the oh ohs and aahs. fiji is up next. then australia coming. so we will see the fireworks in sydney at 8:00 eastern. of course, we are 18 hours away on the east coast from 2024. we will be together for the next three. let s go through the news now. new court filing special counsel jack smith is laying out one of his first goals of the new year, to get donald trump s immunity claims thrown out for good. he is asking an appeals court to move quickly. he writes that the arguments the former president has been making threaten to undermine democracy. cnn s zachery cohen picks it up from here. reporter: special counsel jack smith is arguing that the former pr
tracks. carolyn manno, thanks so much. happy new year. coming up, we speak with morgan more artie with a look ahead to the massive college football matchups between alabama and michigan, texas and washington. so stick with us for us for that. all right. next hour of cnn this morning starts right now. good morning to you. 7:00 here on the east coast. we ve got, what, 17 more hours until we hit 2024. so happy new year eve to you. we start this morning with a new court filing from special counsel jack smith. he is urging an appeals court to reject former president donald trump s claims of presidential immunity in the 2020 election subversion case. jack smith, quote, says he threatens to license presidents to commit crimes to remain in office. trump s lawyers says unless he is impeached and convicted by the senate. let s go to cnn s zachary cohen. he s got more for us. reporter: perez special counsel is arguing that the former president donald trump is wrong in claimi