Morning Joe - GLP-1 use among kids rising rapidly

Episode Date: September 14, 2026

September 14, 2026: 8 am— GLP-1 use among kids rising rapidly To listen to this show and other MS podcasts without ads, sign up for MS NOW Premium on Apple Podcasts. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Okay, what did the scarecrow need? Do you remember? He needed a brain. What did the tin man need? He needed a heart. What did the colorline need? You need courage. And I had to laugh and I thought,

this is what's wrong in Washington, D.C. right now. We've got a lot of people up there. We've got a lot of people who have lost their minds. They're no longer using critical thinking skills to solve problems. They're not thinking for themselves. They're doing whatever their president or their party tells them to do. That's not good for Kansas. I'm looking at you.

even the Marshall fans, you don't look dangerous to me. You got to listen. You listen to your people. And when you do, you find a heart because you see people suffering. You hear their pain. And I got to do something about that. And I can't keep voting for things to take away 51,000 people's health insurance to the state of Kansas. How, a big moment from over the weekend in Kansas in the debate between the Democratic candidate, Reverend Adam Hamilton, and incumbent Republican Senator Roger Marshall.

That was something, Joe. Yeah, I really was. And the Rev is running an incredible campaign out there. It's a campaign that Republicans really don't know what to do with because they're so used to saying Democrats are anti-God and they're communists and they're this and they're that. It's actually when you look at what he's been doing over the past couple of weeks, in a race, it's much closer than anybody ever expected it to be. he's putting out ads that are showing that Senator Marshall actually going after his patients. Some of them in jail because they couldn't pay thousands and thousands of dollars of medical bills, single moms being chased and thrown in jail. Basically, I don't know.

A 21st century version of debtor's prison. And then yesterday, that clip started going around virally over. this debate that went over on the weekend. I mean, it's just, you saw it throughout the weekend, didn't you, Mika? Whether it was Ted Cruz on Sports Center, whether it was Mike Johnson, whether it was Roger Marshall, everywhere Republicans go out, man, they've got an audience that does not want to hear what they have to say. It reminds me so much of what Democrats faced in 2009 and 2010 before those midterms. Yeah, I mean, the big, beautiful bill that these Republicans voted for,

for is hurting the very people that they are elected to serve. And I think they're feeling it and hearing it from the crowds. We'll have more for you coming up. Also, President Trump, meanwhile, told reporters yesterday the war with Iran could end after the midterms. It comes as an effort to reopen the Strait of Hormuz has stalled. We'll bring you the very latest from the Middle East. Also, head will go through new comments from Anthropics, CEO, responding to a dire warning from a former employee that AI could wipe out humanity. And good morning and welcome to morning, Joe. It's Monday, September 14th. Good to have you with us. Also with us. We have the co-host of our 8 a.m. Hour. Staff writer at the Atlantic, Jonathan Lemire, Bloomberg opinion columnist and a contributing

writer for the dispatch, David Drucker is with us. U.S. national editor and columnist at the Financial Times. Ed Luce joins us. And columnist and a associate editor at the Washington Post. David Ignatius joins us as well. A great group for all the news that we have to cover this morning, Joe. It really is. And David Ignatius, you can talk about a really great tennis match. It's painful. We can do sort of a potpourri. Or you could you could talk about the end of humanity and AI. It's been fascinating watching over the weekend especially. Let's start with a great tennis. Okay, start with a great tennis.

I'll tell you what, Ben Shelton may not have won yesterday, but you can tell this kid has an incredible future, and he's going to be a champ one day soon. He is going to be a champ. He's got so much talent. Zverev is relentless. I was dreaming that Shelton would somehow break through. And my local DC player, Francis Tiafo,

who went out in the semifinals, he's got a great future, too. hope. But it's amazing how the U.S. Open has become this sort of mega event. Nothing in tennis quite like it. You know, part nightclub show and just incredible intense tennis rivalry. But the great thing about the match yesterday was that you know Ben Shelton will be back. And this next time, I don't think he's going to be the loser. Yeah, and I've got to say the semi between Tiaf, and Shelton was one of the most exciting tennis matches, I can recall, one of the most anticipated tennis matches I can recall in a very long time.

It was fascinating. But on the AI front, David, we've been hearing, of course, from Sam Altman and Open AI and anthropic talking about the end of humanity, that they're creating these tools that could end humanity, getting pushback from people like David Sacks, who runs AI policy for the White House, who's saying, wait a second, guys have a duopoly. If you really think that what you're inventing, what you're creating,

what you're developing is going to end humanity, you guys can slow it down yourself. I think what David Sachs is arguing, what a lot of people in Silicon Valley who don't agree with Sam Maltman are arguing is these guys are trying to engage in a practice called regulatory capture. So they control the industry right now. They want the feds to come in, much like, you know, Bell wanted the feds to come in, regulate it to such a degree that nobody else can get into it. So we on the outside, you know, I told a friend in Silicon Valley, he said, well, what's your opinion? I said, well, this kind of like in 2007, me trying to figure out exactly what the most advanced traders are doing on Wall Street with credit default swaps. We're just sitting out here looking through a glass darkly and can't really tell who's lying and who's telling the truth.

Joe, my sense is that this is not a mob bell moment in which an AI elite is trying to set rules for its own benefit. As I've watched this unfold, especially in the last several months, I've sensed that there is a genuine astonishment among the people who run these companies and how fast the models are improving and how quickly they're moving towards what they call general intelligence or. super intelligence in which machines begin to talk to each other and the something I call recursive self-improvement where they actually begin to write their own programs. Humans are not directing this in the same way that you'd imagine. That came to the fore in a really startling example in July where a test by Open AI of some hacking tools led the agents, believe it or not, to organize in a conspiracy, there were 1,200 AI agents who found a bulletin board where they could exchange messages and then began to pursue their own strategy, began to cheat by the

definitions of the game they were doing, began to cover up the evidence of cheating, and never informed any human being about what was going on. And I think that incident, Joe, as people who really understand these technologies, looked at the details, scared the heck out of people. So you saw Dario Modi lead this new moment that we're in with his statement that he just is not sure that we're ready to maintain control over these systems. The systems may be at a position to control us and we ought to slow down until we understand exactly what's there. And so I think that's where we are.

We had an unusual agreement between the head of Anthropic, the head of Open AI and Elon Musk on the same approach, slow down. So that doesn't mean the government. I will say. It does mean these key companies. Yeah, Elon Musk has been warning about this since 2014. He's been saying AI could bring the end of humanity since 2014. He's continued that all the way through 2026. Of course, you have Bill Gates doing the same thing. Other tech leaders been doing the same thing. I'm just curious, though. Well, no, let me just say I'm just skeptical, Jonathan Lemire that this White House is going to do anything. The president, obviously, early on made it a key goal of his politically to get all the money, all the support he can get

from Silicon Valley. It's worked out very well. You look at the hundreds of millions of dollars that Silicon Valley is pumping into these midterm elections, the overwhelming majority for that and crypto going all to the Republicans. So a real question on whether President Trump's going to do anything at all about this, his attitude appears to be what his attitude always appears to be. Don't worry, everything's going to work out just fine. Yeah, that's his refrain. And it was striking. He was asked about this over the weekend in the wake of these extraordinary reports and, you know, borderline whistleblower type statements in terms of the concerns about AI and what it could lead. And he was very dismissive. And look, there is no

out there is a rivalry with China, and he suggested that that was going to be front and center. He cared about that. I think we should also note the AI industry is really propping up the stock market and the economy. I think he cares deeply about that, although I suspect it may not be a great morning on Wall Street after these fears were expressed. You know, Trump and China's Xi Jinping have a summit at the White House in less than two weeks. There's been some push from the outside that maybe AI could be front and center at that agenda. We'll see. see. But Trump, at least to this point, really downplaying these concerns. But I will say, Mika, I saw a number of gatherings of the last couple of days. This is all anyone's talking about

right now, is these worries about AI. And we've already seen in extraordinarily rapid fashion, the political conversation about AI change over the last six months to eight months, but it focused on data centers and cost and noise and how it's driving up bills and the like and fears about what could take my job. And already, the American people really suddenly getting very skeptical about AI. But what happened in this last week is it went beyond that, like this idea that this could threaten everything. And I think there's a real concern here that the government, the industry is calling for the government to help to lead. They may not. Well, we'll watch that. There's another thing to watch with the two major wars going on and

some politics taking place here between them. President Trump is blaming Ukraine for record high diesel fuel prices. While speaking to reporters in Ireland over the weekend. The president said his administration has asked Ukrainian President Zelensky to stop targeting Russian oil refineries. Mr. Zelensky has to do one thing. He has to stop knocking out diesel fuel in Russia. Let him go after targets, but not diesel fuel, because he's causing a shortage of diesel. This isn't done by the Middle East. This is done by what's happening with Russia and Ukraine. So we spoke to Mr. Zelensky about it.

There are plenty of other targets. Don't hit diesel fuel because that's hurting the world. We don't want him to hit diesel field. Okay. Really important at this point to note, Ukraine did strike more than 20 refinery targets in Russia over the summer. But the main driver, as most people know, of the higher fuel prices, has been the war in Iran, which has virtually closed the Strait of Hormuz. blocking about one-fifth of global oil exports. The Wall Street Journal editorial board has a new piece on this titled,

Trump lectures Ukraine, not Russia. And it reads in part, quote, an armed Russian jet drone hit the engine of a passenger train in Ukraine near the Polish border over the weekend. Meanwhile, President Trump lectured Ukraine's president to stop hitting energy targets in Russia. Go ahead, make Vladimir Putin. Putin's day, Mr. President. President Trump had nothing critical to say about the attack,

which is part of Russia's daily bombardment of civilian and energy targets in Ukraine. Mr. Trump did find the time to warn Ukraine president, Volodymyr Zelensky, against Ukraine's targeting energy supply depots inside Russia. So Russia can fire away at any and all targets in Ukraine, but Ukraine must restrain itself in retaliating. In Russia, Mr. Trump is clearly worried about the price of diesel fuel, but blaming Ukraine amid Iranian and Houthi attacks on Mideast oil production and transport is political excuse-making on a grand scale. It also strategically is misguided as Russia and Iran help each other in their respective

conflicts. Mr. Trump seems to think he can put these wars into separate boxes every time he does He has adversaries in Moscow and Tehran smiling at their good luck. And Jonathan Lemire, the geopolitical malpractice aside, do you think people will truly believe Ukraine is the reason for their high diesel prices? They will not. And President Trump continues to mistake who the bad guy is in this conflict. This is a war of Russian aggression. Ukraine is fighting for its survival.

It is striking back. It has proven to be adept hitting deep in Russian lines. And that's not, though, why prices are high. The Strait of Hormuz is effectively shut. Now, the Houthis have claimed to more control of another important waterway in the Middle East. So prices are going to grow that much more. And yes, we're seeing the diesel seems to what we're focused on right now. And there'll be ripple effects because if trucking companies have to pay more for their fuel,

well, that's going to trickle down to so many other items of the economy, Ed Luce. So first of all, I don't think that anyone is going to buy this. but also it shows, again, Trump's misplaced priorities where he's scolding Ukraine, not Putin. Russia, by the way, blew up a train right near where Boris Johnson and the top German national security advisor, where David Petraeus were all on a train from Poland into Ukraine, just narrowly missed, getting struck by a Russian attack. We also have, of course, Trump refusing to warn China to stop supplying Iran with mapping information that Iran has used to target, you know, American assets and allies in the Middle East. Once again, Trump comes down on the side of his favorite authoritarian leaders. He does. And by the way, that train, this is an annual conference

that's called the Yes Conference that's held in Ukraine. So it's on the schedule and the Russians know about it. If that train had been hit, you know, this, this would have wiped out sort of half the American, sorry, half the European and some of the Americans of national security elites. follows on from President Zelensky's plane having a narrow miss with a drone a few days ago. Nothing from the White House about this. The same conference, incidentally, that these people were taking a train to attend, was addressed remotely by Jared Kushner. And in keeping with this asymmetric Trump administration view of the Ukraine-Russia situation,

And Kushner said that there would be a peace deal if only Ukraine agreed to give up the rest of the Donbass. He didn't say there would be a peace deal if only Russia would agree to stop fighting to gain control of the rest of the Donbass. He presented Ukraine as the obstacle to the deal. So President Trump now presenting Ukraine as the cause of rising diesel and global energy prices in general. I'm afraid this is all part of a piece where we have.

have these sort of false dawns where we think the White House has finally seen the light, that Russia is the aggressor and that Ukraine needs help, it needs Patriot Defense batteries, and these are false dawns. Trump does not deviate on this. He's sympathetic to Russia, and I think we delude ourselves if we think he's ever going to change his mind on this question. It's deeply baked in his worldview. Coming up, profiles in cowardice.

A new book calls out the people who failed to stand up against President Trump's power grab. We'll talk to the author straight ahead on Morning Joe. Coming up from Alicia Keys to Lenny Kravitz, some huge stars are coming to New York City for this year's Global Citizen Festival. It's taking place a week from Sunday, and we'll have a full preview when Morning Joe comes right back. I've shot there of the White House and accompanying construction cranes, 825. in the morning in Washington. The New York Times is out with a comprehensive new analysis about President Trump's attempts to stifle the freedom of speech and of the press during his second term, doing so by deploying federal agencies, executive orders, and personal lawsuits against journalists,

media corporations, and critics. Times journalist Maggie Haberman and Jim Routenberg detail several examples, including the Department of Justice's failed attempt to subpoena, New York Times reporters, an FBI raid on the home of a Washington Post reporter, Trump's lawsuits against ABC and CBS, and FCC chair, Brendan Carr's threats against broadcast networks. The peace states almost 20 months into Trump's second term, his long-running media clashes have grown into a sweeping campaign to control speech in America that stands out for applying so many levers so fast all at once.

The nonprofit group, Freedom of the Press Foundation, told the times the Trump administration's moves, quote, have certainly risen to the level where they're kind of off the charts. That's because government efforts to subpoena journalists and chill their reporting through threats are at the highest level since the foundation started tracking such incidents back in 2017. The U.S. now ranks 64th in Reporters Without Borders Press Freedom Index. next. It's lowest since 2002, just above Panama and just below Botswana. We should add to that. The Pentagon has thrown out reporters from the building there. The White House hijacked the press core and the pool in the building. The assaults go on and on deeply worrisome. Joining us now, the author Jacob Weisberg. He has a new book out tomorrow titled Profiles in Cowardness,

a study of collaboration in the Trump era. MS now contributors, Bob Lottoria, and Huma Abidina are with us as well. So, Jacob, congrats on the book, timely, to be sure, connected to that previous New York Times story here. Well, yes, indeed. We've never had a sitting president who filed personal lawsuits against journalists, let alone totally spurious suits based on nothing. Among others, he sued my book publisher, Penguin Random House for publishing a book by New York Times reporters. The suit's been thrown out once. he's back in court with it again.

There's so much of this going on that it's impossible even to keep track of it. Yeah, no, I agree. And your book details some of the media figures or being like Jeff Bezos, who owns Washington Post, you know, Night and Kelly and the like. We can get to more than a moment. But I want to highlight one that was excerpted in the New Yorker, I believe, in the last week or so. And I've always been struck by this. George W. Bush, I feel like might have been the one Republican had he spoken out against Trump at certain junctures in the Trump era, particularly post-January 6th pre-Trump comeback, where his voice would have had enough weight to maybe

convince others in the Republican Party to say, you know what, maybe we shouldn't go back on this Trump thing, but yet Bush stayed silent. John, I agree with you. I think it could have made a difference. I think it could have made a difference in 2016 and again in 2024. If he had said, this is not who we are as a country, there's still a non-maga wing of the Republican Party. and there are a lot of independence for whom I think that would have been meaningful. And you know who did it?

Dick Cheney and Liz Cheney. In 2024, they said this is too important. We're voting for Kamala Harris, who we disagree with about everything because this is a question about democracy. Yeah. And you point out he's entirely too busy painting. And as someone close to him put it to me once. He doesn't want to get booed next time he goes into a Dallas steakhouse

because he didn't want to alienate other Republicans. So he has stayed silent. So let's talk about some of the other. the titans of industry here that you have written about. And it was so strong, particularly those first months of the Trump term, the people who bent the knee who probably didn't have to, including heads of law firms and big, powerful CEOs. Yeah, I mean, it was so notable with the tech CEOs. I have a chapter about Jeff Bezos and a chapter about Steve Schwartzman, the co-founder of Blackstone. Bezos is sort of the perfect example, because in Trump one, he was an exemplary

owner of the Washington Post. He stood up to Trump in every way. Trump took away a $10 billion contract from Amazon to punish Bezos for the coverage of the Washington Post. And Bezos said all the right things and did all the right things. Trump, too, he's on bended knee at Mara Lago, making a deal to pay $40 million for the Melania documentary, which bears no relation to anything Amazon had ever paid for a documentary before. It's corrupt. And it was such a such a reversal that I think it creates a kind of mystery. Why so different and why more generally did the guardrails hold in Trump one and have not held in Trump two? Jacob, you mentioned Stephen Schwarzen, the CEO of Blackstone. Talk about the U.S. Open yesterday from afar. The whole point

of having all the money is so you get to call the shots, I was told, growing up. That was the promise of this country. And yet we see, speaking of bending the knee, someone like that, the CEO of one of the largest private equity firms in the world, doing this. When you put this all together in this book, what do you realize about why and how they do this? Well, I think people have different needs, different psychological needs. With Schwartzman, I think there's this almost desperate need for recognition. He wrote this interesting memoir years ago where he talks about how he got to college and felt like a nobody. And he had to show that he was a somebody. And clearly the way he's shown that he's a somebody is, on the one hand, he needs to

have the president be on the other end of the president's speed dial. It's really important to him to be the person, the president calls to ask, what does Wall Street think? But also, Steve Schwarzenman is the guys, anyone who lives in New York knows, you know, negotiates the size of the font for his name being carved in stone on the New York Public Library and all these institutions. So $50 billion, I mean, one of the richest people that, you know, one of the richest people in the world, you would think that would be FU money, as they sometimes say, but it doesn't satisfy him. And it's so, I think, disappointing that someone who is a sort of symbol for American finance doesn't stand up for the rule of law, the sanctity of contracts, the free market, free trade.

I mean, the basic principles in which they have a long-term interest. Capitalism, I thought, might have been an interest. You might love capitalism or you might not, but he does. and Donald Trump has attacked capitalism, American capitalism, in all these fundamental ways. I mean, demanding states in companies. You know, some people would call that socialism or corporatism. And you don't hear the business leaders saying,

this violates our principles. Well, Jacob, is there a throughline in this book with all the leaders that you have highlighted? Is it fear? Is it cowardice? Is it an economic justification? And has anyone benefited? Yeah, I think there are a bunch of macro factors.

I think there's actual fear of violence in a lot of cases because when Trump goes after people on social media, there's a kind of digital mob which can become a real mob and there's physical menace. There's also just like herd-like behavior fitting in doing what other people are doing, peer pressure, which is also, you know, a fear of ostracism for you ask why no Republicans are now standing up to Trump in any systematic way in Congress. I think the fear of being cast out from everything you know, from your friends, from your career is just sort of overwhelming. Those are some of them. The new book, Profiles in Cowardous, A Study of Collaboration in the Trump era, goes on sale tomorrow. We're a long way from profiles and courage to be sure. Author at Jacob Weisberg, thank you so much. Congrats on this.

Thank you, John. Up next year, Morning, Joe, the Global Citizen Festival is back, bringing together some of the biggest names in music, and the world of activism. Co-founder Hugh Evans will join us with what we can expect this year in the issues that the event will be spotlighting. Morning Joe, we'll be right back. The annual Global Citizens Fest is approaching.

This year's event takes place on September 26th right here in New York City. It'll be hosted by the legendary Hugh Jackman and features performances by an all-star lineup, including just check out some of these names. Alicia Keys, Lenny Kravitz, John Legend, and many, many more. Tickets can be

earned by taking action on the Global Citizen app, helping the organization work toward its mission of ending extreme poverty across the world. Joining us now, co-founder and CEO of Global Citizen, Hugh Evans, Hugh, always good to see you. And as you sat down here, and I mean this sincerely, every year the lineup gets bigger, bigger and bigger stars. But the other side of that coin is, I think it's because every year the need also grows. Absolutely. Well, firstly, thank you for having me on your program. program this morning. So, you know, when we set out with our mission of eradicate in extreme poverty within our lifetime, 52% of the planet lived in extreme poverty. And it is possible

to actually make enormous progress in the eradication of extreme poverty because prior to the pandemic, that was down to 12% of the world's population. So since the festival started, we've seen about 150 million people lifted out of extreme poverty. And how do you achieve that? Well, it's about investment. You need investment in global health, in education. in job creation. And what we're seeing right now is a reversal of that. We're seeing many governments retreat from their investment into international aid and development. But we really need to see public-private partnerships. And that's what this year's Global Citizen Festival is about. Everyone earns their ticket. You take action. You don't buy a ticket. It's all in exchange

for your charitable actions through the Global Citizen app. Looking at Bill Nye on the concert poster here. I'm excited to hear. I'm excited at his performance particularly. The science guy. Your story though, I mean, look, my family's from the Philippines, and now I am learning that this is part of your origin story as to why you came to this line of work. Yeah, absolutely. When I was 14 years old, I went to the Philippines, and there was one night where I spent a night on a slum in the center of Manila called Smoky Mountain, and I lay there with myself and Sunny Boy, a guy I met, and we lay there with cockroaches crawling all over us and the smell of rubbish all around us and it changed my life. And I decided that night I was going to commit myself to the

eradication of poverty. And, you know, you don't know exactly how the journey will unfold, but it's been an amazing journey since then. And we've now grown global citizen has become the largest movement of citizens taking action for the eradication of poverty around the world with 13 and a half million members. But really, it's all inspired by Sonny Boy. We keep in touch every single day. He messages me every morning, and we're still in touch to this day because of that beginning in the Philippines. Wow. Hugh, if you're hearing about Global Citizen for the first time, how do you get involved? The lineup is clearly incredible, but what's the ground zero to getting involved?

It's so easy. You download the Global Citizen app and you start taking action. All of your actions are new points, and you use those points to come to the Global Citizen Festival for free. And so, for example, this weekend, you can come with me to the Rockaways. We're going to be cleaning up the beaches in the Rockaways. You can volunteer by signing petitions, calling on world leaders. All of your actions are new points, and you use those points to join us in Central Park on September 26. And tell us just a little bit more. I mean, obviously, this is a weighty topic and good work must be done.

But the show itself, a lot of fun. A lot of fun. This year is going to be headlined by Lauren Hill and Wycliffe Sean doing the 30th anniversary of the score. Man. Then we have Lenny Kravitz, John Legend, Laini Wilson, Shabuzi, Tomorrow, Buy Together. And we just announced Alicia Keys. We announced Victoria Monet. And all of it is hosted by the one and only Hugh Jackman.

So it is going to be the most extraordinary gathering in Central Park, 60,000 global citizens. Huma, I hope you'll come with me. This year is our guest. And we're really, really excited by it. Pablo, no invite for you, I know. Notice that. Notice that. It's simply because Huma mentioned it.

I'll do the homework, Hugh. I'll do the homework. Bill Nile will be there. In honor of Bill Nguyen. The Global Citizen Festival takes place on September 26th in New York City. Co-founder and CEO of Global Citizen, Hugh Evans. Hugh, thank you and thank you for all that you do. Thank you, John.

Up next year on Morning, Joe, a growing number of children under the age of 12 in this country are using weight loss drugs. We'll get a report on what's behind this worrisome trend. Morning, Joe, right back with that. Welcome back. New data shows that more and more kids are using weight loss drugs to address issues with obesity. MS now's Alex Tabit brings us more. Are you ready? One, two, and three.

Across America, more parents are turning to GLP-1 drugs to treat childhood obesity. Lattrail, Gatlin, and Alex Wright are the dads of Caden and Aden, nine-year-old fraternal twins, born with a genetic mutation that affects how their brain signals when they're full. They would eat, but they were never satisfied. you know, they would always want more and more and more. Their dad say they promoted healthy eating and exercise habits. Going on family hikes, designating time on the elliptical and the treadmill, even encouraging video games to be played on vibration plates. But the twins were still getting weighed.

For us, it came down to our kids' sides and their mental health as well. They was feeling bully at school. Aiden would literally come home and cry. So-and-so called me fat today. or so-and-so called me chubby today, or someone so-and-so told me not to eat my lunch today. Their pediatrician, Dr. Jessica Riley at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta, diagnosed them as pre-diabetic with signs of insulin resistance two years ago. Without intervention and without addressing obesity as early as possible,

I can almost certainly say that their pre-diabetes would progress into type 2 diabetes. So she recommended Wagovi, a drug. not FDA approved for children under 12. What is the risk of long-term use of GLPs on brain development, on bone development? We worry about these concerns and adults. Now we're talking about kids, nine years of age. We just don't have the answers to those questions

because those studies are happening in real time. Dr. Vin Gupta says the use of these drugs with children is justified for certain cases. The risks of not treating far outweigh the risks of treating. There's dialysis, there's heart issues, liver issues, kidney issues, I'm trying to circumvent that. And if you judge that, I'm okay with that. These twins are not alone. A new study in the Journal of Pediatrics found more than 20,000 obese children ages 8 to 11, were prescribed GLP1 drugs in America in the last seven and half years.

And seven months into the GLP1 treatment while continuing their healthy eating and workout habits, the kids have lost about 13 pounds each. motivation have improved significantly their attitude have improved the grades have improved he will come out and be like dadda this shirt's a medium and I'm wearing it and I'm happy and I feel thin today

and just to hear your child say that to hear him vocalize his journey and that he's happy about his journey is like the biggest win that you could ever ever get MS now is Alex Tavittavitt with that report. Our thanks to Alex. So some of the other stories we're following this morning,

officials at the Kennedy Center are now warning that the venue could file for bankruptcy and be forced to close by as early as tomorrow. According to documents obtained by the Washington Post and the New York Times, the Kennedy Center's current leadership, which was, of course, installed by President Donald Trump, argues that the institution faces certain fiscal collapse

unless the president's name is added back to the building's facade. The Times reports that a draft resolution shared with trustees states the center is at a risk of bankruptcy and missing payroll, but that Trump has, quote, offered to step in and raise the necessary funds to save the center. The draft resolution gives 10 options for how to add Trump's name below the main signage on the front of the Kennedy Center, stating the board understands that without such appropriate recognition that it is unlikely the President Trump will provide the fundamental oversight of the renovation of the main building and lead the fiscal rescue of the center.

The trustees are scheduled to hold a special meeting tomorrow. In other words, Trump's saying, unless you put my name on it, I'm going to let it close. Also, the Wall Street Journal this morning has new reporting on China's support for Iran during the ongoing war in the Middle East. U.S. officials tell the journal that Tehran acquired high-resolution satellite images of a base in Jordan from Chinese entities before it carried out an attack that killed three U.S. troops there back in July. It's the clearest evidence so far that Chinese support for Iran during the war has had lethal consequences for U.S. forces, according to the officials who say the U.S. has indeed connected

the imagery to the attack. The journal adds that senior U.S. officials raised the imagery linked to the July attack with their Chinese counterparts who pushed back and demanded the proof. and publicly, senior Trump administration officials have played down the impact of any Chinese assistance to Iran. But this all deepens tensions ahead of next week's plan summit between President Trump and his Chinese counterpart, Xi Jinping. And Huma, Trump was asked about this over the weekend, downplayed it again. He is, it's not quite Putin-esque, but it's pretty close.

He rarely stands up to Xi. He wants a good summit. This would obviously rattle things. and there's a lot to discuss, including the suddenly new warnings about AI. Well, there's AI. There's the trade deal that's about to expire in November. There's this feeling that they have these talks amongst themselves that aren't substantive. And just it's all about, you know, what's in the headlines versus what we used to have is a strategic partnership with China.

We would talk at lower levels of administration and government officials. And I think they need that because AI, when you look at Sam Altman himself saying it's all you hear about in the news of the last few days, we need to be regulated. We need leadership to step in. And all Trump will say is it's a fight between us and them and we need to win the race. And he's unwilling to accept the fact that we have a real problem on our hands globally. Yeah, two things, Pablo, on AI, whom is totally right. It's the only thing people are talking about right now. And secondly, it's rare to see something shifts so dramatically in public opinion. as AI has, where about six to eight months ago, suddenly there was a real swing against it. But the concerns were more about data centers. They're expensive. They're loud. They take water. Electricity. Hey, they might take my job. What's happened in the last week or so is, hey, they might take my life. We could be facing a human extinction event. I have been noticing what it takes to cause a realignment such that Lena Khan and David Sacks are on the same side of an issue, which is what's happening with the idea of, okay, let's now scrutinize these kinds of. companies and use the power of law to prevent them from doing something that I think we all fear,

which has prioritized their own self-interest at the cost of ours. That is the story here. We've seen in Silicon Valley for decades, unintended consequences. They think that they built something that's going to change the world for the better. And spoiler alert, we didn't do enough to make sure that they were actually right. And so how to use the law actually to do that? And it does seem like there's some movement in Congress to do something, but Trump seems reluctant because of the rivalry with China, because AI's propping up the stock market, which is so important to him. And no matter what Congress does, it's not going to have teeth if the president doesn't sign on too. This is sort of the story right now. We, of course, will be following it,

including tomorrow at 6 a.m. Eastern. That does it for us this morning. Money, power, politics with Stephanie Rule is up next after a short final break here on MS Now.