Top Story with Tom Llamas - Monday, April 22, 2024

Episode Date: April 23, 2024

Tonight's Top Story has the latest breaking news, political headlines, news from overseas and the best NBC News reporting from across the country and around the world.

Tonight, college campuses in chaos, the fury over the Israel-Hamas war on full display. Police arresting dozens of pro-Palestinian students at Yale University, days after more than 100 protesters were arrested at Columbia. Classes there moved online. Tonight on the first night of Passover, as Jewish students fear for their safety on campus, the threats one student tells us he faced at the hands of pro-Palestinian students. The major questions being raised tonight about free speech and when it crosses the line to hate. Trump on trial, the historical criminal trial, the former president, ramping up, both sides delivering opening arguments.

The first witnessed the longtime publisher of the National Enquirer, David Pecker, taking the stand, as the prosecution argues, Trump's hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels and efforts to conceal them were fraudulent and illegal. Trump's lawyers insisting he did nothing wrong that influence in an election is a form of democracy, our legal experts standing by to break it all down. The new faces of the border, a major immigration shift underway, a majority of migrants trying to cross into the U.S. coming from faraway places like Eastern Europe, India, and even China. Our team reporting along the border for the weeks, finding out what's driving this new wave and why it's unlikely to change anytime soon. Plus, the great meat debate, lab-grown meat generated from actual animal cells, cooking up some controversy. The producers say it's ethical and eco-friendly, so why are states like Florida pushing for a ban? We put that question to a company that makes cultivated meat in the U.S. And one of the lawmakers, also a cattle rancher that wants to meet out of his state.

And a heart-pounding carpool rescue on a Minnesota highway. Drivers racing to save a man trapped in his burning car, ripping the doors off open as the flames exploded. How they managed to get him out alive. Top story starts right now. And good evening. We begin another week here on Top Story with a crisis spreading through certain college campuses. Tensions over the Israel-Hamas war, stoking confrontations, pitting student against student, and reigniting a debate over the freedom of speech and when it goes too far.

Nearly 50 pro-Palestinian students arrested today at Yale University for criminal trespassing, for refusing to leave an encampment as they voiced their support for the Palestinian people and called for a ceasefire in Gaza. From NYU to MIT to Emerson to the new school, tonight those pro-Palestinian demonstrations are growing. The majority of them, though, peaceful. But the epicenter of the chaos has been Columbia University, which held classes online today after videos emerged from campus showing some demonstrators hurling anti-Semitic comments and displaying threatening signs. A rabbi at the university urging Jewish students to stay home as Passover begins until the situation calms down. The university deploying additional safety personnel to campus. NBC's Erin McLaughlin spoke to students on both sides of this issue and leads us off tonight.

Tonight tension across major American college campuses. If you do not leave, you will be arrested. Students setting up encampments from University of North Carolina to MIT. Harvard's yard closed until front. All of it is fury over the Israel Hamas war boils over. The students expressing fear for their personal safety and concern for anti-Semitic hate speech, raising new questions about the line between hate speech and the First Amendment. We're asking for the school to call for a ceasefire in Gaza.

This morning police say at least 45 pro-Palestinian protesters were arrested at Yale University for violating Yale's policies and instructions. Police say they were later released. In a statement, the University adding that Yale does not tolerate behavior that threatened to harassed or intimidated others. Meanwhile, at Columbia, today's classes were online only, with the university's president calling for a reset to de-escalate the rancor, while also adding more than 100 safety personnel to campus after more than 100 protesters were arrested last week.

But with videos like this, emerging online and another showing a young woman holding a sign pointing in the direction of Jewish students saying Al Qasam's next targets, Hamas's military wing. Students Andrew Stein and Alicia Baker say they don't feel safe. It was the most terrified I'd probably been in my entire life. On Saturday night, Stein says he was on campus for a pro-Israel counter-protest when this happened. You see him in the white sweatshirt filming as a group of pro-Palestinian protesters yell expletives against Israel.

They started saying in Arabic, Hamas, Hamas, our beloved, please bomb Tel Aviv. and then they started saying, we're coming for you. No Zionists on this campus, like get off campus. Stein alleges the situation escalated. Me and my friend has water poured, like physically poured in our face. My friend was actually abused in the middle of campus. On campus Monday, faculty from Bernard and Columbia came out in support of the pro-Palestinian students who were arrested and suspended last week.

We are calling for divestment. We're calling for a ceasefire. Students inside the encampment told NBC News they were unaware of any physical or verbal threats towards students on Saturday night. who makes any threat to any Jewish student. We oppose you. We do not associate with you. Meanwhile, at Rugger's University, police announcing a man has been charged with a federal hate crime for breaking into the university's Center for Islamic Life and destroying property earlier this month.

Tonight on college campuses across the country, students saying they don't feel safe. All right, Aaron joins us tonight from outside Columbia University. It's clearly getting scary and violent in some cases. colleges. Aaron, is the White House waning on these protests? Well, it is, Tom. In addition to the statement, the White House released over the weekend. Tonight, we are hearing from President Biden saying that he condemns anti-Semitic protests, but that he also condemns those who, quote, don't understand what's going on with the Palestinians. Tom.

Okay, Aaron, we thank you for that. Now to our other major headline tonight, opening statements in former President Trump's. Hush money trial. Prosecutors laying out their case against Trump saying he lied again and again in business records committing fraud to hide that alleged affair with Pornstar Stormy Daniels. While Trump's defense team says he did nothing wrong, Laura Jarrett has the latest. Tonight, prosecutors painting a stark portrait of former President Trump in their opening statements during his hush money trial, a case Mr. Trump has argued, is designed to derail his campaign. This is done as election interference.

But today, prosecutor said it is Mr. Trump, who is guilty of election interference by paying off an adult film star to silence her before the 2016 election, telling the jury, this case is about a criminal conspiracy to bury a story that could have cost him the presidency and then lying in his business records over and over again to cover it all up. The alleged scheme stretches back to 2015, a meeting at Trump Tower between Mr. Trump, his former fixer and attorney Michael Cohen, and David Pecker, the longtime publisher of the National Enquirer. This is where prosecutors say the trio hatched a plot for the tabloid to buy and bury any damning stories about Mr. Trump, a tactic known as catch and kill. Prosecutors say it was the release of the Access Hollywood tape that turned the campaign upside down in October of 2016. Lead prosecutor Matthew Co-Angelo reading Mr. Trump's most incendiary remarks from that video for the jury today. Arguing the former president was so desperate to contain the damage with female voters,

he directed Cohen to pay off Stormy Daniels so she couldn't go public about an alleged sexual encounter, which Mr. Trump denies. But it is not the hush money itself that he's charged with in this trial. It's how then-President Trump documented his monthly reimbursement payments to Cohen on internal. company records as legal expenses. Prosecutors telling the jury of seven men and five women today, it was election fraud, pure and simple. But Mr. Trump is not facing conspiracy or campaign finance violations, something the defense sought to highlight today. In opening statements, Mr. Trump's attorney describing him as a husband and a father, a person just like you and me, and is innocent,

saying the payments to Cohen were for legal expenses. Arguing. there is nothing wrong with trying to influence an election. It's called democracy, not a crime. The alleged crime he is facing a low-level felony, carrying up to four years in prison if convicted, but the judge could sentence him to probation. Mr. Trump today, noting the previous DA and federal prosecutors looked at this case and did not charge him. You got indicted for that? People under the court you said to me, I can't believe it. This is the case. So we did nothing more. Mr. Trump's attorney casting Cohen as the prosecution's only real witness, out for revenge, saying he's, quote, obsessed with Mr. Trump and wants to see him in an orange jumpsuit

because Cohen's entire financial livelihood depends on Trump's destruction. Cohen has pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations and lying under oath. The prosecutor is preemptively defending him today, saying he made mistakes in the past to protect his boss. All right, with court done early, Laura Jarrett joins us now in studio. So, Laura, it didn't take long for Michael Cohen sort of to get into this picture. Do we know how prosecutors hope to overcome some of his credibility issues? By confronting it head on. And we saw that today, right up front, acknowledging he has credibility issues,

acknowledging that he's not the ideal witness, but he is at the center of this. He is sort of the lynch fan for prosecutors, and they have to sort of eat that one way or another. It was also interesting to hear the defense go after him, but they're doing it carefully. They're sort of pointing out the fact that Michael Cohen might have an axe to grind without outright calling him a liar because they're going to be times, Tom, where they actually need to embrace the story that Cohen is telling. Oh, that's interesting.

They need him on both sides of the story up. And then what can we expect in court tomorrow and how are these proceedings happening? Are they going fast? Are they going normal? How would you describe it? So tomorrow morning, we're going to have a little bit of a waylay because the judge has to take on some of the things Mr. Trump has been saying on social media. The prosecutors want to hold them.

contempt for violating the gag order for attacking certain witnesses online on true social. Obviously, the defense contests that, but they're going to lay it all out early in the morning. They're going to do all that, and then they're going to bring David Pecker back in. And so in some ways, it's going in fits and starts because things like this keep coming up. They can't just have witness testimony because their judge has to also deal with the gag order violations. All right, Laura Jarrett, who will be back in court tomorrow. Laura, we thank you for that. For more on the first date of arguments in Trump's hush money case, I want to bring in former U.S.

Barbara McQuaid and Sarah Azari, a criminal trial attorney, an author of the book, Unprecedented, A Simple Guide to the Crimes of the Trump campaign and Presidency. I thank you both for being here. Barbara, I want to start with you. How would you assess the opening argument, opening statements, I should say, that the prosecution laid out today? Well, I think they did a very good job of framing this case because I think it has been described as being about falsifying business records or about paying hush money. And instead, what they said is this is a case. about a conspiracy to interfere with the election and then a cover-up. And the cover-up are the details

of these falsified business records. And so they're focusing solely on that crime. You know, early on, there had been some thought about whether it would be the filings of the FEC or the filings of tax records and other kinds of things. But they're really focusing on this one crime, which is a crime under New York state law, to conspire, to influence the outcome of an election. They did that. And then they talked about the records being the cover-up for that. So I thought it was a really clean and simple way to explain to a jury what their theory of the case is. Sarah, then on the defense side, how would you assess how they did today? I think no matter how you feel about Donald Trump, I think the defense also came in very strong. They humanized Donald Trump. He's another man.

He's a father, like Laura said, but he's also the 45th president. He is the law abider in chief, essentially. Also, it was a great reminder to let the jury know that he's presumed innocent like any other defendant. And I also thought it was really interesting that they said not only he's not guilty, but he is innocent, which is not what a criminal trial is really about. So that was really strong. There was also an unequivocal, Tom, denouncing of any criminality, that he was just in the White House. He had no idea what was going on with his books and no knowledge, no intent. That's, of course, flat-out defense. And then they had a Plan B defense, which is essentially that even if this was hush money that was paid, it was not to cover up, like Barbara said, this sort of voter deception

or election interference. This was really to protect his reputation, and therefore it's a lesser misdemeanor. So I thought they did a pretty good job. What I didn't like is that they went after Michael Cohen prematurely to say that he's going to testify in retaliation. I think it's a little too early to do that. Michael Cohn is a lawyer. He's going to be prepared for that, and he's going to show in his testimony that he has no animus. You know, Barbara, we're talking about attorneys here. There's been a lot of talk about this new legal theory that the prosecution is going to be testing in many ways charging these crimes as felonies. Is that a risky move testing out a new theory like this when we also know there are two attorneys on the jury? Yes, I think it's

always a possibility. You know, when you've got attorneys on a jury, I always knock them off because I worried that ultimately they would become a jury of one or two, I guess, in this case, because all of the other jurors would defer to them and not be fulsome members of the deliberation process. But I think that lawyers in a case like this are going to parse the case carefully. They're going to look at the elements. I can imagine the prosecution likes having attorneys here to the extent that this is a legal theory that someone's going to have to follow and help piece together for the other jurors.

On the other hand, I can see why the defense might want lawyers here. Lawyers are going to hold the prosecution to their proofs. It will not be a gut reaction kind of verdict. It will be a methodical element-by-element verdict here. And the bar here is, pros and cons. And the bar here is without a reasonable doubt, correct, Barbara? That is absolutely right. Yeah, beyond a reasonable doubt, which is a very high standard.

Sarah, as Laura laid out in the report, we just saw the first witness in this trial, this former National Enquirer publisher David Pecker. He's there to essentially corroborate the prosecution's argument that Trump was in on the catch-and-kill scheme to conceal any alleged affairs, including the one with Stormy Daniels. How is the defense going to counter this testimony, do you think? I mean, look, a cheap shot would be he was the editor of National Inquirer, not the New York Times. But substantively, you know, they're going to say that he was given immunity, essentially not prosecuted in 2018 when he testified about his involvement that he too was a co-conspirator.

But, I mean, if that alone does not really diminish credibility, otherwise I would be winning every trial in which there's a cooperator who's gotten some sort of a deal or immunity, I think we have to remember here that David Pecker, Michael Cohen, Stormy Daniels, other witnesses, and then Lordy, there are tapes here. You know, this is not, I think the prosecution, as much as it's a challenge to prove intent, it always is. I think that they have a pretty solid case, given that the testimony that we're going to hear is really documented. And so I think that we have to remember that Pecker is only a piece, star witness also like Cohen, but a piece of a larger puzzle. Barbara, you know, we do talk about the case here, right? And one of the Trump team's arguments today is that prosecutors are accusing Trump of trying to influence the 2016 election, but influencing an election is not illegal. You know, how would you respond to that? Because, I mean, I thought you had to make the case as simple as possible for the jury.

And yet it sounds like they're bringing in the election, right? But, hey, it's not about the election. It's really about this business fraud. Isn't that confusing? Yeah, well, I think in the jury instructions, they will see this statute that makes it a crime under New York law to interfere in the outcome of an election, to conspire to do that through illegal means. And so they will see that statute. And here's where it comes into, it can't just be a gut reaction case. It has to be an element-by-element case.

And so I think our gut is, well, this is just politics, right? This is hardball politics. People do stuff like this all the time. So I think that statute itself will play a large role here. And I imagine in jury's instructions, the judge will present it to the jury, and the lawyers for the prosecution will point to that as what makes this a crime. Sarah, something I did notice, there are no Trump family members, definitely not Melania Trump. that are coming to court with the former president.

Usually in criminal cases, you have the defendant's family there as well. And, you know, his attorneys were bringing up that he's just a family guy. The Trump's traveled together always. Do you think this is smart not to have other Trump family members there? Tom, I think it's terrible optics. You know, as a defense lawyer, I would say, sir, you've got five kids, and I don't know how many grandkids. Every single day, part of your family needs to be in court.

Maybe not all your family, but here I am arguing. that you are a man, you're a family man, your husband, your father, and not a single person is in court. Now, Tom, remember, his strategy is going to be, this is such a witch hunt that I don't want to, you know, my family doesn't have the bandwidth for this, and they're not going to give it any oxygen. But again, this is about that this jury knows every single one of the Trump of family members, and none of them are in court, and this is a really bad look for Trump. Sarah and Barbara, always a pleasure to have you both on incredible legal minds. We Thank you for your time tonight.

We want to turn out of the conflicts abroad, the House passing, a controversial $95 billion aid bill for Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan. The bipartisan agreement coming after months of delay from ultra-conservative Republicans, a move that could be costly to House Speaker Mike Johnson. We're going to have to wait and see. To break down all of this, I want to bring in Capitol Hill correspondent,

Ryan Noble, who's live there tonight for us. Ryan, great to have you on the show. So break it down for us just how much will be allocated to each country and what will it be for? So as you point out, Tom, $95 billion total, $60 billion of which will go to Ukraine, much needed in their war effort against Russia, where the situation there is stalled. Another $26 billion in funding will go to Israel, but $9 billion of that will be set aside for humanitarian aid for the people of Gaza.

And then finally, a little more than $8 billion also set aside for Taiwan and other Indo-Pacific allies. This is a massive package. It's one that Republicans and Democrats have been working on for some times. time, it was a small group of conservative Republicans that held up the process, particularly over that Ukraine aid. They lost this round, as Speaker Johnson has decided this was important enough to put his job on the line, and this will likely become law as soon as the end of this week, Tom. And then, Ron, I do want to ask you, you mentioned it there. The House Speaker defied

some intra-party demands to include stricter border policies in this bill to get a vote. Critics like Georgia's Marjorie Taylor Green saying this. Let's listen. he's already a lame duck. If we have the vote today in our conference, he would not be speaker today. Did she say lame duck? I couldn't understand her there, but what kind of jeopardy is he in? She might be right. He might be a lame duck, but that doesn't necessarily mean that he won't be speaker,

at least for the end until the end of this year. There is a very small group of conservative Republicans that are pushing to use this motion to vacate, which is this rule that the House established when Kevin McCarthy became speaker that allows just one person to call a speaker's hold on the conference into question. The difference this time around is that no one wants to go through all that drama that they went through back in the fall, which led to Mike Johnson becoming the speaker. So there's a real possibility that even a handful of Democrats counterbalance the handful of Republicans that want to boot Johnson from his speakership and allow him to preserve that job.

But we'll have to see when push comes to shove if Marjorie Taylor Green actually is ready to take this step because right now it is not popular within her conference either as most people just want to move on from this back and forth in the civil war inside the Republican Party. Ryan Noble is pulling a little double duty today anchoring earlier in the day and reporting live for us. Ryan, we appreciate that. Still ahead tonight, Mexico's deadly elections. Two candidates for mayor killed with less than two months to go until election day. At least 17 candidates killed across all races in the country so far this year. What authorities are doing to try to keep those running for office safe.

Plus, the incredible rescue. Have you seen this? It happened on a Minnesota highway. The drivers who risked their own lives to pull over and get this man out of his burning car. And if you've heard the story about George Washington chopping down a cherry tree, well, you're going to want to stick around for this one.

What archaeologists just found under his Mount Vernon home, you're not going to believe it. Stay with us. All right, we are back now with the Americas, where in Mexico, officials are investigating a wave of murders targeting political candidates. At least 17 local candidates have been killed, dozens of others threatened, with just a little more than a month left before Election Day. Juan Vanegas tonight on what officials are doing to keep those running for office safe. A wave of murders targeting political candidates sweeping across Mexico as the country prepares for the upcoming June 2nd election. Over the weekend, two candidates running for mayor found dead.

Noel Ramos in Tamaulipas and Alberto Garcia in Oax. This year alone, 17 candidates have been killed as the country prepares to cast ballots for more than 20,000 positions at local, state, and national level. What we're seeing is criminal groups in Mexico increasingly competing not just for control of drug transiting routes along a few key highways and border crossing. in the country, but rather fighting an all-out war for territory and control of different markets. The violence overshadowing a historic election year with one of the two leading female candidates likely to become the next president, yet current president, Andres Manuel Lopez-Obrador, facing pressure to find those responsible while protecting candidates seeking office. There is people that are

luching to make valer the democracy. Just weeks ago, Gisela Gaitan was killed in broad daylight while campaigning for mayor of the city of Celaya in Guantuato.

Gaitan was a member of the ruling party Morena and had requested protection just days before her murder. A recent report from Mexican political consulting firm Integralia, finding that by April 1st, 127 candidates or aspiring candidates had been victims of political violence.

Increasingly, it's mayoral candidates and sitting mayors who are targeted. Criminal groups start low. They need the tacit consent or even support of mayors in order to get local police forces on their side. President Lopez Obrador says much of the violence is the result of corruption and politicians that are sometimes backed by criminal organizations. He says, here's going to be the president of municipal, the companion. No, we're going to be in any other. Yet, the underlying issue of public safety continues to haunt Mexico and Lopez Obrador's presidency, during which criminal groups have horrorized the country and now threaten its political institutions.

All right, Guad joins us tonight from our studios in Miami at the Telemundo Center. So, Gwad, have authorities in Mexico, increased resources. to protect candidates or what have they done to help them feel safe as we still have more than a month left until election day? Well, Tom, they say they have added more resources. Now, we know that the federal government says they are protecting 250 candidates, but they also say that they protect candidates running for Congress, also for the governor's seats, and the presidency. But the most vulnerable ones, those in the local elections, the ones running for mayor, are the ones that really need that protection. And they have to get that from the state.

They got to go to the local municipal authorities or the state. So that's going to be quite difficult. You can imagine, for example, if there's an area with some type of corruption in a small town, and the mayor who's in charge of the police would have to offer protection to his opposing candidate. So there's a lot of issues, but the last time the president spoke about this, they did so that the federal government was going to offer some type of support to the states that need extra police or extra security. But they didn't specify how that extra help would come in. Tom. Guad vanegas, with that troubling news out of Mexico, Guad, we thank you. When we come back, the new faces at the border, a record number of migrants crossing the southern border from places as far as China and parts of Africa.

Our team on the ground at the border to find out why people are now traveling so far to seek asylum in the U.S. and if the country's immigration system can handle it. Okay, we're back now. Now with Top Stories News Feed and we begin with a home explosion rocking a Minnesota neighborhood. Officials say a suspected gas explosion leveled the home outside of Minnesota. At least one person was pulled from the burning home. She was taken to the hospital and is expected to be okay. The house was demolished because fire officials feared was likely to collapse from that damage.

Okay. Staying in Minnesota, a heroic rescue after a fiery car crash on a highway. New video shows a group of people look at this rushing to save a driver trapped inside a burning car. The group trying multiple times to open the door and eventually smashing the windows. They pulled the drivers safely seconds before the flames, fully engulfed the car. According to authorities, the SUV had run off the road and then hit a light pole. The driver is expected to be okay. That's great news.

And ancient bottles of cherries found at the former home of George Washington in Mount Vernon, Virginia. Archaeologists say the two glass bottles were found under a brick floor in the mansion cellar and are believed to be roughly 250 years old. They were intact, filled with liquid and cherries. Experts say they were probably picked in the area before the Revolutionary War and stored for the future. More bottles are believed to be buried in the estate, unclear if this came from George Washington's father's tree.

We're still waiting to hear about that one. Okay, now to power and politics in our new NBC News poll out this weekend with some encouraging numbers for the Biden campaign. In a head-to-head matchup, President Biden now trailing former President Trump by just two points, cutting his deficit in half from our January poll and still within the margin of error.

Another bright spot for the White House, Biden's approval rating now at 42%, up five points from the start of the year. For more on the new numbers and what they mean for the 2024 election, I want to bring in Jeff Horwood. He's a Democratic pollster and a partner at Hart Research Associates.

He is also one of the authors of our NBC News poll along with Republican pollster Bill McIntyre. Jeff, thanks so much for joining us here on Top Story. I'm pretty sure this is your first time on the show. So glad to have you here. Now, this poll has some optimism for President Biden as we laid out there, but at the end of the day, he's still a bit behind, and this is still looking like a very stable race, very tight race. What do you think is driving his uptake? It is, and Tom, thank you for having me. It's great to be here. What's driving is really Democrats and really core parts of the Biden coalition that it was successful for him to win the election in 2020 coming back home.

And we haven't seen this five-point increase in a president's job rating in their re-election year, going back to Bill Clinton in 1996, which was obviously a good election for the incumbent. And so we don't see this sort of shift in recent elections. That's a really encouraging sign for President Biden. It's still true that he is just at 42 percent and has a lot of work ahead of him. But again, at this stage, given where he was, this is heading in the right direction and showing that just how tight this race really can be. Jeff, some people looking at the calendar may point out that a lot of Trump's legal battles have really ramped up.

His New York criminal trial is now well underway. It was a second story in this newscast. It's all over cable news. It's really the only thing that's being broadcast now on cable news. So is that having an effect on the former president, you think? Well, I think at this stage it's too early to say. I think there are some signs here that both primaries are over. I think the primaries probably weren't a net positive for Donald Trump and really

winning across most of the board there, and in a way, that's over now. And so now he has to sit in the courtroom, and I think there are implications there. Again, I think it's too early to say what the impact will be, but we do see on some of the advantages that he had over Joe Biden in January, there is some movement to Biden's advantage on some of those key measures, and I think that is sort of thing we want to watch over the course of the next several months. Let's take a deeper dive here. President Biden is leading on a couple of key issues in this poll.

Let's put it up for our viewers here. On abortion, he has a double-digit lead on Trump, and voters also think he can do a better job of bringing the country together. But Trump is beating by it on almost all other issues we surveyed, leading the president by roughly 20 points on inflation and having the mental and physical health to serve. You brought up former President Bill Clinton, which is interesting, right? Because if we think about how he won his first election,

it was the economy stupid, right? That's what James Carville famously said. Do you see those issues inflation? immigration, the issues where Trump is leading, becoming more paramount than other issues where Biden is leading on, like abortion? So I think what we've learned a powerful lesson in listening to voters over the course of the 22 election, and since 22, and a lot of state-level elections, the power of the abortion issue. And I think that remains. We see that in our polling. I think inflation is incredibly

important in something that the Biden administration has to address. To have a 22-point gap there is just an untenable position. And so he's going to have to have to be. do more there and to close that gap. I think when you see the issues on abortion and inflation, I think those are really sort of will be central to the focus of this campaign about where voters are. We know that they're incredibly important for the country on inflation and in personal terms how important abortion is for so many voters and which really made the difference in recent elections. Yeah, as we go into November, right, right. They are definitely honing their messages on both those issues. Before you go, Jeff, I do want to ask you about RFK Jr., right, the wildcard

race, put up this graphic here. When his name is added to the field in the general election matchup, look at this. Biden actually takes the lead over Trump 39 to 37, and here's why 15% of RFK voters would otherwise vote for Trump, while just 7% say the same about Biden. And yet RFK is a former Democrat. He's still a Kennedy, and his record on issues cuts across party lines. What do you think we're seeing here? Yeah, I think what we're seeing here is that voters are starting to pay attention to who he is beyond the name. In a lot of ways, Democrats, in particular, see him as a, you know, sort of a Kennedy and name only. And his personal ratings with Democrats are 16 positive, 53 negative on our latest poll.

And with Republicans, he's 40 positive, 15 negative. And so I think when you start to, when voters are starting to pay attention to his views on reproductive rights, on January 6th, and on conspiracy theories in general, those don't align with Democratic voters, and most voters, for that matter. I think that's what we're seeing in this poll. Jeff Horowitz, such a pleasure to have you on Top Story. I'm sure we're going to have you again. being here tonight. Thank you very much, Tom. All right. Now, the top story's global watch and a deadly race car accident in Sri Lanka. Authorities say a race car swerved off course before crashing into a crowd of spectators during a competition in the country's Central Highlands.

Seven people were killed and 20 others were taken to the hospital. Local police have launched an investigation into the cause of that crash. And tens of thousands of people taking to the streets in Columbia's Capitol to protest economic and social reforms. Massive crowds forming the Plaza outside the presidential palace in Bogota, many of them rejecting proposed changes to the country's health care and pension systems led by President Gustavo Petro. The march has come after Petro directed the government to take over two major medical insurers, a response to the Colombian legislature's refusal to pass a recent health care reform bill.

Okay, now to the new era of migration at the southern border. For the first time, the majority of people arriving are not just from Central America. Instead, coming from continents as far away as Asia or Africa. NBC's David Noriega spoke to some who have traveled around the world to seek asylum in the U.S. while also reporting on the new challenges facing our immigration system. This desolate stretch of the border east of San Diego has become a major crossing point for migrants entering the country illegally. We're following a group of people who live in this area and I've taken to providing these migrants with humanitarian aid, food, water, blankets, that kind of thing. Sam and John Schultz are a father and son who own property nearby.

They give out flyers with legal information in 22 different languages. What part of India is that? Is it in the south or? North. In one day, we visit several campsites along the border, and we meet migrants from 11 countries across three continents. Roughly how many people are you seeing on a typical day? All together. I would probably say on average about 100 nowadays.

And where are they coming from? All over the world. Central America, South America. South America, Africa, Eastern Europe, China, India. The nature of migration to the U.S. border is changing. Before the pandemic, nearly nine out of ten migrants came from the four countries closest to the southern border. Now, for the first time ever, the majority come from elsewhere, from more distant countries

in the Americas, or from as far away as Africa and Asia. We have the world at our doorstep, in spite of our efforts to shut the door. CBP or the Mexican authorities come, plug up the hole with barbed wire, and then the smugglers just come and snip it open again. It's happened over and over and it'll keep happening. Near this gap, we see about 30 migrants, all from China, walking into the U.S. Last year, 37,000 Chinese citizens crossed the border, according to Customs and Border Protection, 10 times as many as the year before. A lot of the migrants that we've tried to approach are extremely camera shy. They're really nervous. Several groups have literally run away from us when we approach

them. That's what these guys are doing right now. We find one man willing to talk. How long have you been traveling? Oh, traveling. Forty-two days. Why did you leave China? Freedom. Was there something specific that happened? Yes.

COVID-19. My work, gone. What was your work? What did you used to do? Engineer. Electronic. How are you? Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas,

telling me this new era of my grand. is taxing a system that was already overwhelmed. Is the U.S. immigration system that you run, as it exists today, capable of handling this? The system has been broken for decades. We have a system that was last modified in 1996. We're in 2024 now. The world has changed not only in terms of migratory patterns, but our markets, our economy, has changed dramatically. Among those changes, a devastating global pandemic, and a booming transcontinental industry of smugglers fueled by digital technology.

For thousands of dollars, they guide migrants halfway across the world. Once here, migrants can count on a system at the breaking point. We cannot process these individuals through immigration enforcement proceedings very quickly. It actually takes sometimes more than seven years. People consider, well, wait a second, if I arrive, I can actually stay for multiple years, work, and years and years pass before the time of removal actually arrives. That's just untenable. Even if they do get a deportation order, deporting this many people to such faraway countries is extremely expensive.

And some countries, including China, don't even accept deportees, making this a reality unlikely to change anytime soon. person on American soil, and it doesn't matter how they got there, is allowed to start due process on an asylum case. So as long as that is true, people are going to attempt to cross the border and get on American soil. Why would it ever be any other way? Yeah, I have a feeling that we're going to see more and more of this as time goes on. All right, David Noriega joins us tonight from Los Angeles.

David, a lot of great reporting in that story, including that fact that China will not take some of those people who are deported from the U.S. back to their own country. You touched on this bit in your piece, but can you elaborate on why this new pattern is causing such a strain on border officials? Look, Tom, the U.S. immigration enforcement system, as it exists, is just not designed to handle this. I spoke to a senior CBP official who explained that there's only infrastructure in place to deport large numbers of people to Mexico and northern Central America. there is no infrastructure in place to deport the kinds of numbers that we're seeing to countries as far away as China, India, Russia, even some countries in South America pose a serious logistical challenge.

Even some of the more recent innovations in border enforcement policy that were put in place under the Trump administration like Remain in Mexico in Title 42 likely wouldn't work in a situation like this because they require cooperation from the Mexican government. And it's highly unlikely that the Mexican government would accept tens or even hundreds of thousands of people. who come from countries other than Latin American countries, who don't even speak Spanish. This is truly a challenge that the U.S. system is only beginning to understand. Tom? All right, David, we appreciate all your reporting. Coming up next, the great meat debate, cell-cultivated meat,

meat created in a factory, essentially, is emerging here in the U.S., but some states are moving to ban the practice. Up next, we speak to the man leading one of two meat cultivating companies in the U.S. who says it's an ethical and sustainable option. But also we're going to talk to a Florida cattle rancher who's against the method saying it could be harmful to consumers and farmers. Our conversations next.

All right, we're back now with a growing new debate. Now, this may look like your average chicken filet, but it's actually cell-cultivated meat, an emerging technique where meat is developed in a mail container just like this from a sample of animal cells and does not require killing animals. Proponents of the method say it's an ethical and sustainable protein option for generations to come.

They also argue there are geopolitical incentives to invest in the technology as the U.S.'s main competition in this space right now is China, which is ramping up efforts to improve their cultivated meat industry. But Florida Governor Ron DeSanjas is saying he's against lab-grown meat, and Florida should be as well.

Take a listen. I know the legislature's doing a bill to try to protect our meat. You need meat, okay? And we're going to have meat in Florida. Like, we're not going to have fake meat. Like, that doesn't work. So we're going to make sure to do it right.

And Florida Senate passed a bill last month banning and criminalizing the sale of lab-grown meat. Governor DeSantis is still yet to sign the bill into law, but the move comes as similar efforts to ban the product have been made in other states, including Alabama, Arizona, and Tennessee. For more on this growing debate, I'm joined tonight by

Tom Rosemissel. He's the head of global marketing at Good Meat, one of just two cultivated meat companies in the U.S. that have been approved by the FDA to sell their products. And Representative Dean Black, who is a Republican member of Florida's state legislature, but, in an important butt here, he's also a cattle rancher. We thank you both for joining Top Story tonight. I'm looking forward to a spirit of debate. Tom, I'm going to play a video for our viewers now that our great director is going to roll, and we're going to walk our viewers through what we're looking here. So the meat's built or assembled, I guess, in these metal containers. And then it comes out and it looks just like a filet, right? I mean, if I were to buy that at the grocery store, I wouldn't know the difference. And after it's cooked, look, it looks like a chicken filet.

My question to you is, what does it taste like? It tastes like chicken. I mean, it's real meat. It fries in a pan like meat. It smells like meat. It looks like meat. It's meat. If you're allergic to chicken, you'll be allergic to our chicken.

The nutritionals are almost identical, and the process starts, like you said, by taking a sample of cells from an animal, putting it into a bioreactor, which looks like a large beer brewery, as you showed there, and you let them cells multiply. You feed the cells very similar to what an animal would feed its own cells, so water, amino acids, lipids, vitamins, fats, things like that. And so Representative Black, I want to ask you, you're a rancher, as we mentioned. Obviously, lab-grown meat, not great for your bottom line. But in America, competition is what makes our products and businesses so strong. So what's your beef with this new beef? Well, it's unclear to me that that would have any impact whatsoever on our bottom line, because I don't think there's much of a market for it.

But the operative word in what the gentleman just said was that it's very nearly chicken. It's very similar to chicken. it's almost identical, and it's the almost that gets you there because it's not identical. There are certain micronutrients that exist in real meat that we know are important to human nutrition. And although the FDA has said that this type of product is safe, that doesn't mean it's healthy. And in Florida, we don't want our citizens used as guinea pigs. We think research and development is fine, but we think a lot of that needs to be done before we We say this is going to replace an integral part of the human diet.

Tom, what do you say to that? What's your response? Yeah, I mean, we spent three plus years working with the USDA and FDA to ensure that our meat is safe. We went through that process. We shared safety dossiers. We had a back and forth between regulators. We worked through a framework started by the Trump administration with the USDA and FDA

to get our product into market. We went through all of that to ensure that it's safe and healthy for consumers. The Florida legislature started this process. The number of questions we received from the Florida legislature is zero. So we didn't hear from them once about clarifying questions about how we make our product or what's in it. Because ultimately this isn't about safety. This is a culture war. This is politics.

And it's unfortunate for Florida. What culture and politics would be at play here? I mean, you should ask Representative Black. There are no credible safety concerns coming from the legislature about this. So, you know, if politicians want to say, hey, we don't like this meat, that may play well with some consumers. But, you know, ultimately consumers should decide what meat they want to buy or not buy. And then, yeah, Tom, is this, does the country? need this right now? And would your meat be more affordable? I mean, give me the top three reasons

why America needs this right now. That's a good question. Yeah, so the number one reason is environmental. So we're growing just the meat that is consumed by a consumer. We're not growing a beak or an intestine or fur or tendons or anything like that. So we have the ability to grow meat much more efficiently than the conventional way. And that's going to be really important. I mean, the protein requirements of the planet are going to double between now and 2050. So adding another tool to be able to sustainably make protein is going to be really important. It's not going to replace conventional meat. We're not advocating for that.

Certainly that's not being expected from the Florida legislature, but consumers should decide. They should be able to go to a grocery store and determine what type of safe and approved meat they want. Right now, is it cheaper or more expensive than regular meat? Yeah, right now it's more expensive. We've got a lot of steps in order to scale our technology. It's going to take a lot of time to get there, but that's true of all new industries. You know, when cars came out, they're very expensive. Cell phones, electric vehicles, you name it.

There's always a process when you're scaling up a new technology. Representative Dean, Black, I should say, I'm trying to understand what your biggest problem with this is, right? Because I know as a rancher, you obviously have a certain amount of cattle. You also have a certain amount of land. And turning over that grass and turning over everything else they eat, that's got to be difficult and costly all across this country. What's your biggest problem with this right now? So I will say this. My concern really is not around protecting the industry.

I have two broad concerns. One is safety. And I'd like to correct a misstatement made earlier. That was that the FDA had proven that it was safe and healthy. The FDA doesn't actually certify something as healthy. they will tell you that fried ice cream dipped in chocolate is safe. It's not necessarily healthy, though, if you make that a regular part of your diet. And that's where my concern comes in, because we have micronutrients that are part of natural beef,

they come from the plants that the animals eat, and these are nutrients that we're still discovering. The field of human nutrition is still an ongoing field of study, and we don't even know what all of these nutrients are, and it's therefore impossible for them to be replicated in vitro meat like this. We haven't studied what it would do to pregnant mothers, and I could just go on and on and on. There is a lot of research and developments still to be done, and I'll agree that in order for it to be competitive, it would have to be scaled up. And if you scale this up, that brings up my second objection, which pertains to China. Look, communist China and communist countries have a history of collectivizing agriculture and food production.

And they use that to control their populations. And for this to make sense, it will have to be concentrated in large factories. And look, we are in a very tense geopolitical time with China, North Korea, Iran. And if you concentrate your protein production in a few major factories, you're a few missile strikes from an instant famine right now in our agricultural production system. Our protein production is dispersed all across the country. It's impossible to take it all out. In fact, we've been the breadbasket of the earth during world wars. We help to feed not only ourselves, but our allies in wartime. I think we need to slow down. Three and a half years of

research is not nearly enough time to decide that we're going to take 6,000 years of agricultural history and throw it in the waste basket. We have health concerns, and there are real national security concerns that ought to be thought about. Tom, real quick, as we run out of town, I'll give you the last word here. Yeah, look, I mean, the USDA is equipped to answer these questions. The Florida legislature is not equipped to analyze the safety of every food product that enters our system. That's why we have to say that they did not analyze that and your job in doing research and development is to analyze the safety of it three plus years and we never received any questions from the Florida legislature. And then on national security, because I want to answer

your other question, on national security, it is a really important thing. China has this in their plan. They are actively developing this because they know we need more sources of protein. We're not looking to replace conventional meat production, but having another tool to to address rising demand for protein is a good thing for our country. It increases our food security as a country. Tom Rice, My Soul, Representative Dean Black from Florida. We thank you both for joining Top Story tonight. It's a fascinating conversation.

I know this is just the beginning. We thank you for joining us. When we come back, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame class, you won't believe, share who's been eligible since 1990, finally becoming an inductee. Plus, a look at all the other artists that made the list this year, from Ozzy Osbourne to Mary J. Blige, and the honor for the late and great Jimmy Buffett.

Stay with us. Share on a battle. Share on a battle ship, what a one and only share, singing her hit, if I could turn back time. After a career that spanned back time, after a career that spanned nearly 7. decades. She was finally picked to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. And this year, she joined several other music legends, including well-known rock stars like Ozzy Osbourne, as well as Dave Matthews bands, and artists from other genres, too, like R&B and hip-hop.

Priscilla Thompson tonight with the class of 2024. Tonight, a celebration of some of music's most iconic stars. The 2024 list of inductees to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, spanning air, air, and different music styles from funk legends cool in the gang to singer-songwriter Dave Matthews even hip-hop luminaries like a tribe called Quest and after more than 30 years of eligibility and numerous chart-toppers do you believe in life that's a love pop legend share finally getting her name on this list. Thank God, Cher absolutely deserves seven different decades. She's had a number one

song dating all the way back to when she was with Sunny and Cher. Her first ever holiday album helping her reach that milestone, tying a record only held by the Rolling Stones. After that feat, Cher joked on the Kelly Clarkson show that the Hall of Fame voters would have to turn back time in order for her to forgive them for years of snubs. That's incredible! Right, and I'm not in the Rock and Hall of Fame. Wait, are you serious? You know what? I wouldn't be in it now if they gave me a million dollars. Are you serious? I'm not kidding you.

Fellow inductees include Mary J. Blage and guitarist Peter Frampton, elated to be on the list. Writing, Beyond Grateful, and Somebody Pinch Me Please. I want to know what you love is. Foreigner's induction helped by this star-studded video campaign. Hey, rock and roll hall of fame. Open the door. Foreigners waiting outside. Let him in.

Allie Osborne. Ozzy Osbourne already in the Hall of Fame for his time in Black Sabbath, now an inductee as a solo artist. And the sad part here, seven acts were nominated in February that didn't make the cut. They're big names. Those who didn't make the cut include Mariah Carey, Lenny Kravitz, and Chenate O'Connor, who died in 2023 at the age of 56. It just goes to show there's just so many groups and how amazing you can be and how difficult

it is to make it in the Hall of Fame. But one artist who will be posthumously honored, Jimmy Buffett. Wasting away again and Margarita Bill. One of four legendary musicians cementing their place in rock and roll history. with the Musical Excellence Award. All right, congrats to the class of 2024. That does it for us tonight. I'm Tom Yamerson, New York.

Stay right there. More news on the way.