NBC Nightly News with Tom Llamas - Saturday, October 19, 2024

Episode Date: October 20, 2024

Harris enlists Lizzo, Usher on campaign trail as early voting ramps up; Trump campaigns in Pennsylvania after audio issues at Detroit rally; Boeing, union reach tentative deal to end machinist worker strike; and more on tonight’s broadcast.

Tonight, the race across the battleground states for both candidates as Vice President Harris pulls out some serious star power. Pop star Lizzo pumping up voters in Detroit ahead of the Vice President's speech there. Usher with her tonight in Atlanta. And former President Obama sweeping through Arizona and Nevada as Harris slams Donald Trump. He's becoming increasingly unstable and unhinged. And the blockbuster early votes so far in North Carolina. Elon Musk campaigning for Trump as the former president goes all in on Pennsylvania amid technical difficulties that derailed his rally for nearly 20 minutes.

We're going to sue him. Also breaking, union leaders say they have struck a deal with Boeing that could end the five-week strike at the aerospace giant. Will union members approve it? An attack drone from Hezbollah fired towards Prime Minister Netanyahu's home. He's calling it an assassination attempt. Crisis in Cuba, nearly the entire country without power, and now a hurricane heading straight for the island. And dramatic footage of a teenager lost at sea, treading water, clinging to his kayak overnight,

finally rescued. How an off-duty lifeguard saved him far from shore. This is NBC Nightly News with Jose Diaz-Balart. Good evening. With just 16 days to Election Day, the pace of both campaigns is accelerating. But Election Day has already begun in states across the country, and Vice President Harris today is focusing on getting that early vote out. She's pulling out some star power to do it. That's pop star Lizzo in her hometown of Detroit today campaigning for the vice president. Early voting started there today. Former President Obama is campaigning on Harris's behalf tonight in Nevada, which also started its early vote today. And after a record first day of voting in Georgia last week, Harris is there tonight with some hometown star, Power Usher, trying to lock in that early vote there.

Former President Trump has his own big names. Elon Musk is once again in Pennsylvania today, a state that has become central in Trump's strategy for victory. We're with both candidates tonight, and we begin with Ali Raffa with the Harris campaign. Pop superstar Lizzo today in her hometown of Detroit revving up the crowd. I'm proud to say that I voted. I voted early and I voted for Kamala Harris. The Grammy winner lending her celebrity to Vice President Kamala Harris as early voting began today in Detroit. We're going to go vote today. We're going to remind people to vote. We're going to register folks to vote.

What time is it? It's voting time! Rallygoers headed straight from the event to the polls. I wanted to get out early and get it done. Harris going after former President Donald Trump's fitness for office. He's becoming increasingly unstable and unhinged. And hitting two battleground states today, heading from Michigan to Georgia for a rally in Atlanta alongside another celebrity, R&B and pop star Usher. The Harris campaign leaning into star

power to shine a light on the vice president. I'm thinking about my friend John McCain. Former President Obama making another appearance as a super surrogate for Harris last night in battleground Arizona, embracing her campaign strategy to target Trump skeptical Republicans and conservative leaning independents. We seem to have set aside the values that people like John McCain stood for. Obama set to stop in another Sunbelt state tonight, holding a rally in Nevada on the state's first day of early voting. Polls in the state showing a tight race. It's time for a change. Go back to Donald J. Trump. A surge in early voting is already playing out across several states,

including North Carolina, where a record number turned out to cast ballots on the first day of early voting, even as people there continue recovering from Hurricane Helene. And Ali is in Atlanta tonight at that Vice President Harris rally, where Usher will be. And Ali, President Obama heading that way, too? That's right. Harris will campaign with President Obama for the first time together here in Georgia on Thursday. And then Michelle Obama will join her in Michigan on Saturday. Jose. Ali Rafa in Atlanta. Thank you.

Meanwhile, former President Trump is gearing up for an all-out blitz in Battleground, Pennsylvania today. It comes after he battled technology at his rally last night when his audio dropped out for about 20 minutes. Dasha Burns is with the former president. Former President Donald Trump rallying his supporters in western Pennsylvania tonight at a campaign event outside Pittsburgh. Hello, everybody. Hello, Pennsylvania. Soundcheck at the event more scrutinized than usual after Mr. Trump's microphones last night

in Detroit failed the candidate. It's not love. It's not respect. The Republican nominee spent nearly 20 minutes walking around the stage, appearing frustrated. Hello. And when the sound system came back on, Trump threatened to sue. If it goes out again, I'll sue the ass off that company. We're going to sue him. Then they'll say, what a horrible guy Trump is. He's a terrible guy. The scene, the second unusual moment at recent Trump rallies, including when the candidate held an impromptu music listening party for nearly 40 minutes at a town hall in Pennsylvania. Tonight, Pennsylvania in focus again and seemingly priority number one. Trump and

Vice President Kamala Harris both making more visits to the state than any other since July. Given how much time both candidates have been spending here, is it Pennsylvania or bust? We are certainly campaigning and working as if it's Pennsylvania or bust. High profile Trump backer Elon Musk is also holding his own campaign events across the state. I can't emphasize enough that Pennsylvania is, I think, the linchpin in this election. Dasha Burns is in Latrobe, Pennsylvania tonight. Dasha, Trump really seems to be going all in in Pennsylvania. Oh, yeah, Jose.

And tomorrow, the Trump campaign is holding a black men's barbershop talk in Philadelphia. Then Trump himself will host a town hall in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. And we just learned moments ago that he'll then head back to Pittsburgh to attend the Steelers football game. Jose? Dasha Burns in Latrobe, Pennsylvania. Thank you. And don't miss Kristen Welker's exclusive interviews

with Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro and South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham on Meet the Press. More than a month after tens of thousands of Boeing workers walked off the job, tonight their strike against a troubled aerospace company may finally be wrapping up with a promising new deal on the table. Jesse Kirsch joins us with the very latest. Jesse, good evening. Jose, good evening. Today, the Striking Workers Union announced that Boeing

had made a new proposal that included, quote, several key improvements, among them a 35 percent bump in general wages over four years. That's 10 percent better than what the company had offered when the strike began in September. More than 30,000 unionized workers still need to vote on Boeing's latest offer. But a deal could end the strike, which has brought most of Boeing's aircraft production to a standstill and cost a combined billions of dollars, according to one estimate. Jesse, this is not a done deal yet. Exactly. For its part, Boeing says, quote, we look forward to our employees voting on the negotiated proposal. That vote is expected on Wednesday. But even if this proposal gets the green light, it's still not clear exactly when those workers would return to the job.

Jesse Kirsch, thank you very much. And now to the Middle East and what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is calling an assassination attempt against him. Hezbollah firing a deadly drone toward his residence. Alaa Gharani reports from Tel Aviv. Tonight, a drone fired toward the Israeli Prime Minister's residence. Benjamin Netanyahu's office says an unmanned aircraft sent from Hezbollah in Lebanon targeted his home north of Tel Aviv. The IDF said a drone struck a building nearby,

causing no injuries or significant damage. The prime minister calling it an assassination attempt on him and his wife and, quote, a grave mistake. Meantime, a Hezbollah rocket hit an Israeli apartment complex in Kiryat Atta, and shrapnel from a rocket barrage nearby in Akkar killed one person on the ground. While the Israeli military continues to pound southern Beirut with large explosions reported in the afternoon hours. And the Israeli military tonight releasing this video, it claims, shows the former leader of Hamas, Yahya Sinwar, killed in a battle earlier this week, taking his family and supplies into an underground tunnel just a day before the

October 7th attacks he orchestrated last year. Those attacks leading to Israel's bombardment of Gaza, where in the north, conditions continue to deteriorate for the civilian population. In northern Gaza, Palestinian officials tonight say more than 100 people have been killed in the past 24 hours in new Israeli strikes. Hala joins me from Tel Aviv. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is headed to Israel next week. Hala, what do we expect from that trip? HALA GURANI, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken. Well, after the killing, Jose, of Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas leader, earlier this week, many had hoped that there would be a deal to end the fighting and free the hostages.

But those hopes remain low, as the warring parties have vowed to continue the fight, Jose. Hala Gharani in Tel Aviv, thank you. In Cuba, back-to-back nationwide blackouts sparked by power grid failures has left millions again in the dark. George Solis has the latest. Tonight, Cuba is a country in crisis. At least 10 million across the communist nation without power for the second time in 24 hours after one of the island's major power plants failed on Friday. The blackout putting angry residents closer to the brink of catastrophe amid repression and already growing shortages of clean water, fuel and food. Because there is no one who can stand this, says this visibly frustrated resident.

Regime officials blaming the problem on aging, crumbling infrastructure, already the source of regular rolling blackouts across the island, and on a shortage of fuel imports. The outrage pouring onto streets. The chants of, we want electricity. The government declaring an emergency shutdown in a last-ditch effort to conserve what little energy was left. This is a fatal blow of the failed policies, the failures of the Cuban regime on the Cuban people. Amalia Dache is a scholar of the Cuban experience at the University of Pennsylvania.

Is there any reason to believe that the Cuban government is going to be able to resolve this issue? No, I don't think they're going to be able to resolve the issue. I believe they're going to continue to blame the United States for its problems as it's done for the last 65 years. Cuba's president has vowed there won't be any rest until the power is back on. But a new hurricane on the horizon, expected to hit Cuba tomorrow, could only deepen this disaster. George Solis, NBC News. We have an update on a story we told you about last night. A five-alarm fire that sparked evacuation orders in Oakland, California, is now 50 percent contained. The Oakland Hills fire burned two homes, spread to 15 acres. The city's fire

department says crews are working aggressively to put that fire out. Still ahead tonight, what one swing state is doing to speed up the vote count and how soon we could find out who wins the White House on election night. Plus, a dramatic rescue at sea after this teenager was stranded overnight. We are back with a closer look at two critical battleground states that could decide who wins the White House in November. Michigan and Wisconsin both counted ballots late into the next day back in 2020, but this year only one of them is making moves to count the vote faster. Shaquille Brewster reports from both states. There are two battleground states, Michigan and Wisconsin,

whose late-into-the-night vote counts four years ago descended into chaos, but only one has made major changes to help avoid this. Stop the count! What we see here is essentially an increasing mob-like scene. Protesters harassing poll workers in Detroit, scrambling to count the surge of absentee ballots. My life was threatened. My staff's life was threatened.

Now a new law in Michigan gives clerks a head start, allowing them to process absentee ballots well before election day. I think it would show voters that the process is clean, that the process is open. The changes will likely limit a so-called red mirage on election night. That's what happened in 2020, when many cities reported in-person voting results first, which tended to favor Republicans. But absentee ballots, which were more Democratic-leaning, took longer to count. 100 percent reporting didn't take place until Wednesday morning. Trump's lead in Michigan vanished later that morning when Detroit's Wayne County

reported nearly 150,000 votes, predictable changes that were used to fuel false claims of illegal ballot dumps. And then, boom, all of a sudden, I go from winning by a lot to losing. With this new law, when will Detroit have its results posted? We'll have our results posted by 11 o'clock news. 90 to 95 percent of our results will be posted by then. In the week before Election Day, you'll actually see these envelopes opened and the ballots put into vote tabulators here in Michigan. While here in Wisconsin, you may see results come in later. That's because absentee ballots stored here

cannot even be opened until election day. Regardless of the efficiencies we make, just the sheer number makes us be one of the last people, if not always the last jurisdiction to report results. In 2020, Milwaukee finished counting at 3.42 a.m., pushing Biden ahead in Wisconsin. Do you have any projection for when Milwaukee will have its vote reported this year? I don't. I think what we should expect, though, is not before midnight. 43 states allow clerks to process ballot envelopes before election day. But despite bipartisan efforts to change election laws, that doesn't include critical battlegrounds,

Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. If the American public wants to see our results sooner, there has to be legislative change. A change to speed up the count in the most competitive states. Shaquille Burster, NBC News, Detroit. Now to a dramatic rescue off Hawaii's coast after a 17-year-old kayaker got separated from his high school group and spent 12 hours treading water and clinging to his kayak. Tonight, that teen and the off-duty lifeguard who saved him are speaking out. Maggie Vespa has more. This grainy black and white video from the U.S. Coast Guard in Hawaii shows a teen stranded at sea after clinging to his capsized kayak all night. He's then saved by a family friend who joined the frantic search.

You call this a miracle rescue. Yeah, it's a miracle that he survived that night. Authorities say strong winds and currents off Honolulu's Waikiki Beach separated 17-year-old Kahiau Kawai from his high school paddling team Wednesday, leaving him stranded without a life jacket. The U.S. Coast Guard launching an exhaustive 12-hour search. Also visible in that video, Nolan Keolana's boat. The off-duty lifeguard heard Kawhi was missing and raced out on his own, combing more than 100 miles of open sea. I felt like I was looking for my own son. You felt like you were looking for your own kid. Yeah, that's what I, that's what I run through my

head. Following wind patterns, he ended up in the exact right spot when that Coast Guard plane spotted Kawhi and dropped a flare to guide Noland. I yelled his name out like, Kawhi, and then he replied, he's like, yes. And I'm like, I was just like, I went into shock and I turned into a big crybaby. You started crying? Oh, yeah, immediately. Kealana pulled the exhausted teen from the water. I was glad to see a familiar face. Kawhi, suffering from extreme dehydration and exhaustion, reunited with his mom and taken to the hospital. Uncle Nolan is a great waterman.

That really like was what saved me. One man's determination turned miracle rescue. Maggie Vespa, NBC News. When we come back, there's good news tonight about all the hard work that went into this powerful salute. There's good news tonight. You know, so often the good news doesn't get as much attention as the bad news so every saturday we highlight the people who spread joy and love and these are just some of their stories this week how's this for a halftime show? That's 12-year-old Landon Monter. All right, Landon, ring the bell! Wowing the Washington Commanders' crowd.

Ringing the bell on the field to mark his remission from Stage 4 cancer. His energy, his joy, giving everyone in the stadium a reason to celebrate. And here's a guy who knows a thing or two about teamwork. When Dr. Shane Naidoo was racing towards the finish line at the New Jersey Half Marathon, a fellow runner, Crystal Reinhold, couldn't breathe and collapsed. Dr. Naidoo stopped to offer aid, even riding with her to the hospital in the ambulance, before coming back to finish the race, and later cutting his medal in half, splitting it with Crystal.

The two forming a lasting friendship. How could I go about looking at this medal and not sharing this with someone that made it so significant for me? It's just so symbolic. For not finishing the race, it is by far my favorite medal of all my races. There really are a lot of good people in this world. In North Carolina, that sweet dog there, that's Tucker. And he just helped save 11-year-old Jamie Parker's life.

Jamie was trapped under this rubble following a mudslide triggered by Hurricane Helene. But Tucker stood on top of the pile where Jamie was trapped, barking to alert rescue crews who finally got the boy out. Their bond unbreakable. Just a few years ago, Jamie used his allowance money to save Tucker from a shelter, rescuing him. But this time he rescued me. At the Navy officer development graduation in Newport, Rhode Island, medical officer Patricia Weinstein ran to greet her proud family, shocked to see a special guest.

That's her hero, Patricia's 91-year-old granddad, Alan Jacobson, a Navy and Air Force veteran in full uniform, finding the strength to stand and salute his granddaughter. And what did it mean to you to have him there? Everything. I was absolutely shocked. I was absolutely blown away. I had found out he'd been practicing his salute and physical therapy so that he'd be able to give me a proper salute. And it was probably one of the best moments of my life. What about him and his life and his sacrifice for our country inspired you so? He's dedicated his life to service,

and my main goal is to make him proud and to serve my country the same way he did. And Patricia's looking forward to once again saluting her grandfather next year when she graduates medical school. That's NBC Nightly News for this Saturday. Holly Jackson will be here tomorrow night. I'm Jose Diaz-Balak. Thank you for the privilege of your time.

Good night.