NOW Tonight - Feb. 6 | NBC News NOW
[Music] good evening I'm yamichaux Center coming to you from the NBC News headquarters in New York and here are some of the stories we're following now tonight Rescuers are still combing through the rubble desperately looking for survivors after a powerful earthquake felt across six countries leaves thousands dead the U.S and China engage in a diplomatic war of words over the Chinese spy balloon shot down by the Pentagon what China did was unacceptable we protected civilians and we gain more Intel while protecting our own sensitive information and neo-nazis fresh out of prison is arrested for plotting to blow up a Baltimore power grid embattled Republican Congressman George Santos has been accused of sexual harassment by a former aide and Beyonce tickets go on sale will The Beehive suffer the same fate as the swifties and wait online for hours only to have tickets disappear from their carts [Music] rescue efforts are underway in southern turkey and neighboring Syria after not one but two massive earthquakes hit the region early today the first was one was a 7.8 in magnitude the second one was 7.5 in magnitude nearly 4 000 people have been killed in nearly 15 000 have been injured in both regions the test toll is expected to rise dramatically in coming days you can see some of what crews are dealing with out there buildings crumbled streets covered in debris and dust and an unknown number of people trapped in the rubble the earthquake was felt across the Middle East with tremors felt as far as Egypt and Israel turkey's president announced the country will observe seven days of national mourning meanwhile Aid is pouring in from dozens of countries including NATO the European Union and the United States today President Biden said he is quote deeply saddened by the loss of life and Devastation caused by the earthquake a state department spokesperson also confirmed earlier today that the U.S will be sending
search and rescue teams to Aid turkey in coming days two teams uh to rescue and Recovery teams that will be traveling to Turkey in the coming days two teams of 78 individuals it is our fervent hope that the rescue and Recovery effort is able to save as many lives to pull people from the rubble uh to focus on that near-term priority to stabilize buildings to pull people uh and to again potentially save as many lives as possible teams from Virginia and Los Angeles are being deployed right now to assist turkey according to usaid NBC News foreign correspondent Matt Bradley has more from Turkey well I'm induced your turkey we're actually at a highway rest stop we're driving down towards that earthquake zone and we are not alone as a matter of fact here at this rest stop we've been seeing Earth movers and essentially mobile homes that are on their way down to that earthquake zone we've even seen with like a fleet of ambulances this whole country is mobilizing to try to help out the people who have been affected uh and who are actually many of them still underneath the rubble of this historically awful earthquake this is on a par with some of the worst earthquakes that have ever been recorded in Turkey but we have to remember while the epicenter was in this country much of the shock waves and much of the effects were in neighboring Syria a country that has now been hit twice first by more than a decade of war with saw hundreds of thousands of people displaced and many of those people have now been displaced once again by this horrific earthquake now there are lots of things to worry about even for those who have survived or have been rescued from the effects of this earthquake one of the main ones are the aftershocks and we saw another Aftershock about 12 hours after the initial one that was almost as powerful as that incredibly powerful first hit but now we're also seeing as you can see here very wet snowy very cold winter weather that's going to be a challenge for rescue workers who are trying to recover people from the wreckage and also for those who have survived not just here in Turkey where there are a lot of resources available for people this is a country that is used to earthquakes and natural disasters but more so in neighboring Syria again a place that has been ravaged by War that's a country where people will be twice homeless in a place where rescue workers and where International Aid agencies would be struggling to meet a rising demand and a sky-high casualty toll Matt Bradley NBC News turkey just devastating and so heartbreaking to see that Matt thank you so much for that report and two new videos have been released in connection with the deadly shooting of a double amputee in California 36 year old Anthony Lowe was shot multiple times by Huntington Park police last month in one of the videos released today we got a new angle of the confrontation between low and responding officers at the time low was carrying a knife as he tried to hobble away officers claim he quote threatened to advance or throw the knife that knife was used in an earlier stabbing the second video released today appears to show that stabbing low appears to Lunge out of his wheelchair with a knife and stab a man in the chest shortly after these videos were released Anthony Lowe's Mother spoke at a news conference questioning the actions of officers they supposed to protect this Fireball and they shot myself 11 times and they never saw me and told me anything about what happened to my job they go home midnight with their families and I have to know that the people about to protect the service kill myself I just want truth and justice I'm clearly a heartbroken mother there so naella Charles joins me now so niella tell us what are the police saying what's the latest about the investigation what more do we learn from these videos yeah I'm gonna use the video Huntington Park police released today from a nearby business shows a fuller picture of what happened thus new footage shows the key moment Anthony Lowe a double amputee and stabbing suspect was killed in it you see officers approach low and pull the wheelchair out from underneath him he appears to move away from officers then faces them appearing to swing a knife twice before officers fatally shoot him that part where low faces officers is not visible in the social media video shared last week that Sparks Nationwide outrage officers say leading up to the shooting they deployed two separate tasers twice in an attempt to stop him but the tasers were ineffective and they also released the video of the stabbing that spurred all of this it shows low minutes before his confrontation with police stabbed someone on the sidewalk while out of his wheelchair at last check police say that stabbing victim is in stable condition that that victim whose lung was punctured spoke to Good Day LA exclusively and said he didn't know low yamiche just a tough situation Nyla and I wonder if you could talk about Low's mother who says she called police hours before all of this took place tell us more about that call Los family says he was suffering from mental issues since losing his legs just months ago those mother tells us the morning of the shooting she called police because low was off she says they spoke to him for half an hour then told her he just needed some fresh air she says after that load took off in the stabbing and shooting happened this is what she said after the police press conference that they wouldn't allow family to attend and also important to know this was the first time Family saw that video today as well take a listen I want him to go to jail I want them to lose their job with no faith the police chief says the involved officers are on paid administrative leave yamiche there's so much more we want to know about this I know that this shooting sparked a national outcry against the use of force against a person with disabilities we saw multiple protests over the weekend so how are organizers planning to have more demonstrations what are you what are you hearing about what people are talking about and planning to do well we haven't gotten any word of any future demonstrations yet but some Community activists are still saying the shooting wasn't Justified and we know the family's attorney is still arguing that too they're also calling for the Huntington Park Police Department to get body cameras since they don't have any the police chief says an investigation by a different law enforcement agency will determine if officers actions there were Justified and the district attorney will determine if those officers will be charged yamiche it's so great to talk to you as you of course break all this down it's such important reporting thank you so much and good news out of Ohio today Norfolk Transportation says it successfully performed a controlled chemical release on the train that recently derailed hopefully preventing a dangerous explosion now officials were really really concerned about this crash because at least five train cars contained a highly flammable and potentially cancerous chemical known as phenyl chloride which is handled improperly could be deadly the Train derailed near the Village of East Palestine late Friday night evacuations began for everyone within a one mile radius of the crash after a massive fire erupted the evacuation included people in parts of Ohio and Pennsylvania earlier today Governor Mike dewine made it clear that evacuations were absolutely mandatory the controlled release of the toxic chemicals also has the potential to be deadly if inhaled those in the red area those in the red area are facing grave danger of death NBC News correspondent Ron Allen joins us now from Columbiana Ohio so Ron how did this controlled chemical release go it went well according to the railroad company they say the operation was successful basically what they did was they used some small explosive charges in the five cars in question now it's a it was 150 car Train 50 of those cars derail but there were five of them that contain this hazardous chemical Vinyl chloride that was the concern they said it had become unstable for the last 72 hours officials here were concerned about a massive explosion that they said could have spread shrapnel for more than a mile and toxic fumes as well and during those days they were hoping that this would situation would essentially resolve itself there are release valves in the train cars that weren't working and so essentially they released the material with explosives setting off a huge plume of smoke and the material leaking out of the car the train car into ditches that they had dug and that they turned into fire pits and and that's what's been going on for the past number of hours they're letting this material burn off in a controlled way and apparently this is the end of this crisis we haven't gotten it all clear yet but this was the hope this is what they were trying to do because there was a lot of concern if left unattended or emergency workers couldn't get to the the train because it was so unstable thought to be so unstable that they had to take matters into their own hands and this is what they did and they said it's been a success this sounds like a potentially dangerous situation so explaining to folks what is vinyl chloride and what special precautions in particular that authorities take to try to handle it well they we saw guys and hazmat suits we saw the workers that couldn't get to the train and were keeping their distance from it for the last number of days because this this chemical is so volatile as I understand it it's it's a bit made for it's used to make Plastics like PVC pipes uh and um the vinyl material in some cars and utensils plastic utensils that you would get at a restaurant or somewhere that's the kind of material but there are warnings that prolonged intense exposure to this material could could cause cancer according to the CDC so that was the fear that this spoke from this fire walting out over this community was a potential Hazard they created an evacuation zone of a mile and they were very serious about it a mile radius or from this train there were police going door to door in recent days telling people to get out they were telling families that children if you don't take your children away we could arrest you because this is so serious and then when they did this controlled explosion controlled release operation the governor here said this is a matter of life and death because essentially they were because they were releasing this chemical into the ground into the ground and causing smoke and Fire and Flames so it was a controlled explosive they did it uh they wanted to do it during daylight and when the weather conditions were appropriate they said there were people here from the EPA from the the National Guard from the dod the Department of Defense here was helping as well it was such a serious situation remember this is a massive train there were literally hundreds of thousands of pounds of this chemical in these cars and these train cars and that again they have been warning about a potentially catastrophic explosion and that has apparently been averted what an incredible situation there and as you said a matter of life or death hope everyone stays safe so thank you so much Ron for the break a look at the U.S and China's deflating relationship that's right I said it we're talking all things balloon after the break today Naval teams off the coast of South Carolina are searching a seven mile radius for debris from the Chinese spy balloon shot down on Saturday that debris could unlock clues about what exactly China was up to the U.S is confident the balloon was designed for surveillance to monitor sensitive military sites that China maintained this was all a big accident and that Downing the balloon is quote an obvious overreaction in a serious violation of international customary practice meanwhile the political Fallout is escalating on Capitol Hill some lawmakers are demanding more information and others are expressing outrage that the president seemingly waited days to act NBC's Kelly O'Donnell has more from the White House good evening yamif the White House is dealing with a Fallout after the Downing of that Chinese spy balloon and there are lots of different areas here it's the U.S diplomacy with China and already tense relationship it's the domestic issue of the political situation the president has been facing criticism namely from Republicans over this and today we've been learning more from White House officials about what was happening behind the scenes what did they know what were they evaluating and how were they trying to gain Intelligence on the Chinese once they identified this spycraft in the air now the president was facing criticism over the timing of his decision he was very direct with reporters over the weekend saying he had notified the Pentagon of his decision on Wednesday that they should shoot it down as soon as that was safe to do and the response from the Pentagon was that that needed to happen not while it was over land where it could potentially cause damage on the ground perhaps the loss of life we learned today just how large this by balloon was where officials described it as holding the space of 15 football fields by 15 football fields also weighing 2 000 pounds a considerable size that they were trying to stress if that were to come down in a populated area there would clearly be damage and also damage to the equipment itself that they were hoping to pull some intelligence from and learn about the Chinese program the Republican criticism that was coming over the weekend from senators and members of Congress has been about the president's timing and judgment and here's some of what Republicans had to say foreign the U.S had to see this coming and decided they couldn't or wouldn't do anything about it early on imagine how this would have played out if nobody had taken any pictures of the balloon if nobody in Montana had looked up and noticed this giant balloon the president was paralyzed for an entire week by a balloon the president taking it down over the Atlantic is sort of like the quarterback sort of like tackling the quarterback after the game is over Chinese spy Fleet of these balloons for some time and had in fact been briefing Congress including a briefing last August about the existence of this program from China and so some members of Congress according to the White House were aware of the existence of this program and also During the period of time when the the White House was aware that this balloon had moved into the potential of U.S airspace that some of
the top leaders on Capitol Hill had been notified and now officials here say that they are also planning further briefings to bring Congress into the loop on what has been learned so far and what they hope to discover one of the other things they've told us is that they have learned after the fact that the balloon program was in existence during the prior Administration when President Trump was here and that there were incursions of these Chinese spy balloons during his presidency but that was not known until after he left office so the White House is White House is preparing to have limited briefings with key former leaders of the Trump Administration to share what intelligence they now have about what was happening during their time in office so there are a lot of developing situations here when the president came back from Camp David today I asked him a question among the reporters gathered on the south lawn would he plan to shoot down this spy balloon under any circumstances or did he only do that because it became public this of course was a secret a spy kind of program nothing that we had been aware of until people saw it saw it with the naked eye saw it on video and he said no it was always his intention to shoot it down and he said that was his plan all along those are some of the developments we've been following here from the White House yamiche back to you definitely lots of politics when it comes to this balloon Fallout so thank you Kelly O'Donnell for that report now let's bring in Colonel Jack Jacobs he's a Medal of Honor recipient and an NBC News military analyst so thank you for being here so first question really is on National Security did this balloon definitively compromise U.S national security or maybe do we not know that uh we don't know that we won't know for sure until after we will have recovered some of the debris from the debris field in the Atlantic Ocean we do know that the these balloons are used to listen to radio tele telephone conversations and generally take photographs and send all this information back to China um we don't know what they sent and we won't know until we get to the get to the equipment uh if we can on the other hand we have the capability of of uh blinding these things and jamming their radio Transmissions back and so it's entirely possible that they didn't get all the things that they wanted to get definitely a lot of questions there I also want to play for you Ned price who's a spokesperson for the U.S Department of State take a listen to what he said we know it's the most consequential we know it's the most complex relationship we have in all of our bilateral relationships we suspect it's also the most consequential and complex bilateral relationship on the face of the Earth so strong words there and we know that the secretary of state has already postponed maybe even canceled his trip to China where does the United States and China go from here well this is a difficult period actually for she he's just at the peak of his uh career having just been extended for uh an unprecedented third term he's probably going to be in charge uh for as long as he cares to be or people who work from care him to be we have a very close relationship economic relationship with China and that's also complex uh the United States is now going to play very very cagey with China and use this as a uh and a proper pretext for ensuring that our security is not uh is not compromised again we heard that these balloons have been going on uh going over the United States before uh at least three times don't forget they can't it's very difficult to detect these things except visually they have a low uh radar signature they don't have a very strong or they have no infrared signature so it's extremely difficult to detect them you can only detect them usually visually from the ground or from satellites above them you can bet that we're going to have satellites they're going to be focused almost exclusively on the transit of balloons like this across the Pacific so that we can intercept them before they get uh get to American American soil but in the relationship with China this is an extremely interesting and difficult time for China they have a lot of problems internally and when they have a lot of problems internally in the past they frequently struck out uh against their perceived adversaries so these will be interesting times for the certainly for the next few weeks it's certainly interesting times and as you reported that you talked about that there are this isn't the first balloon NBC News can report that there are at least three Chinese spyballins Flew Over the US during the Trump Administration and political reports that the Department of Defense tracks hundreds of balloons every day so I want to dig in here how common do we know this could be how common could this be uh very common indeed the large majority of balloons that are sent Aloft are benign they're sent by a variety of nation states and extra governmental organizations their research balloons weather patterns doing geographical analysis uh and so on and they're benign usually we discover these kinds of objects and are concerned about them when they're maneuverable increasingly unfortunately even benign balloons or become have become maneuverable and so it's it's extremely difficult to distinguish between those that are benign and those that are not we can it's easy to pick up aircraft fixed wing and rotary winged aircraft a lot of them have to register and so on and the reason to pick up with radar and other means balloons are much more difficult and the more they be more technology makes them more maneuverable the more difficult it's going to be to pick them up just an incredible and fascinating development that we're talking about these these Chinese spavolins and the fact that there are possibly hundreds of them I thank you so much for your Insight and your analysis uh Colonel Jacobs and after the break a foiled plot how authorities prevented an attack on Baltimore's power grid plus Congressman George fix Santos facing yet another allegation this time of sexual harassment we have a report from Capitol Hill and it's time to get in formation today all eyes were on Ticketmaster for the Beyonce tour we'll look at what changes were made to avoid a repeat of the Taylor Swift chaos that's all just ahead [Music] it's time now for some of the big headlines we're watching tonight first up the attic Murdoch double murder trial today the judge ruled the evidence of his alleged Financial crimes will be allowed to be used in this trial that's a huge win for the prosecution team who argued Murdoch killed his wife and son in an attempt to cover up his financial misdeeds Florida lawmakers will vote this week on the future of the ready Creek improvement district that's a special tax District that Walt Disney World currently sits within giving Disney a lot of power and you might remember last year Republican Governor Ron DeSantis poised his criticisms over the district a new bill would keep it going as an oversight District it would be managed by five people hand-picked by the governor himself in a major calendar shake-up South Carolina will now be the first state to hold presidential primaries for Democrats come 2024. the Democratic National Committee voted to approve the change this weekend the throning Iowa and New Hampshire from their previous first stop positions the decision aims to promote more diverse States earlier in the primary process and we're learning more about a closed call at the Austin Airport over the weekend two planes narrowly avoided Collision Saturday after air traffic controllers cleared the arriving and departing flights on the same Runway Federal officials report the planes were within 100 feet of each other and Google announces its artificial intelligence chat bot it's called Bard and it's expected to rival chat GPT the widely popular AI service created by open AI Bard will be first released to quote trusted testers before rolling out to the General Public the FBI says they have stopped a plot to attack the power grid in Baltimore prosecutors say one of the suspects is a known Neo-Nazi today in court prosecutors say suspects Brandon Russell and Sarah Clinton Daniel were planning to shoot multiple electrical substations in the Baltimore area with the intent to quote destroy the city both suspects are being charged with destruction of an energy facility which is a felony officials describe the plot as a racially motivated one of the suspects Brandon Russell is the founder of a Neo-Nazi group that aims to cause quote collapse of civilization according to the Southern Poverty Law Center the arrests come after several successful attacks on power grids across the country late last year NBC's senior legal correspondent Laura Jarrett joins me NASA Laura thanks so much for being here so how did the FBI track down these suspects and ultimately stop this plot which seems like it could have been catastrophic yeah yamiche I think that's fair to say this was a serious plot if it it had actually come to fruition it would have been devastating for the people of Maryland it appears that Federal authorities really zeroed in on this pair through the use of a federal confidential informant something that is used every day in law enforcement and in this particular case proved to be quite helpful to their case they were having a number of conversations with this person dating as far back as last summer at least in the case of Brandon Russell he was laying out plans giving instructions encouraging this person to Target critical infrastructure as you laid out using basically just open source material using Google Maps but also providing instruction and then through this other person that he met while he was in prison on totally different charges Sarah Clan Daniels she's actually having conversations about procuring a gun ammunition she also has something of a Manifesto she doesn't call it a Manifesto but authorities found it through the process of a search warrant where she says things to the effect of the perfect time to hit some sub stations and knock out power so the accusations here are quite serious they are facing a conspiracy charge as you laid out which carries up to 20 years in prison if convicted yamiche such serious things that they were planning how close do they get to actually carrying this out do we know it's one of the open questions here and one of the other ones is sort of how exactly they zeroed in on them some of the conversations that you see from the criminal complaint today are from the January February time period really late January if you will but it's unclear exactly what was the spark what steps they took which authorities managed to let them zero in and decide this was the time to arrest them we know that they were arrested without incident at some point last week they made their first appearance in court today but other than actually talking about buying the guns it doesn't appear that they actually did buy one in connection with this it appears at least one of the suspects was armed but again it's unclear exactly what made them act right now and Laura I want to ask you also about the context here in December two electrical substations were attacked in Central North Carolina at the peak of outages more than 45 000 homes and business businesses were in the dark that incident was followed by attacks and four electricity substations on Christmas weekend near Tacoma Washington um is there any connection here what more do we know about whether or not this could be a bigger or even people sort of working across state lines here yeah that was one of the other questions for authorities today at the press conference and they were asked in that specific question and they said these these two this pair didn't seem to be connected to some sort of larger uh plot but their investigation continues we know that those North Carolina shootings obviously devastating for the tens of thousands of residents who were left without powder and I should mention those suspects or suspect are still on the loose in that case in fact the FBI just put out a bulletin last week offering fifty thousand dollars for any information for anyone who can come forward with information on those shootings in North Carolina but this particular pair does not appear appear to be connected so far yamiche and as you said the investigation in the Baltimore Case is continuing conspiracy to destroy an energy facility is a serious federal offense so what more do we know about what comes next legally here how much jail time they could possibly be facing if found guilty yeah it's a serious offense it's a felony up to 20 years in prison if convicted but we are a long off long ways off from there I should say they just made their first appearance here they haven't entered any plea they just got public defenders so we still have a long road to go here but the next thing you will see is what's known as a preliminary hearing in which the prosecution essentially has a put up or shut up moment where they will have to explain to the judge why these two people have probable cause to be held so look out for that in exhumation we'll definitely keep looking out for that and keep looking out for your reporting thank you so much Laura Jared sure Tonight George Santos the Republican freshman congressman from New York is facing new allegations he is now being accused of Ethics violations and sexual harassment by Derek Myers a former perspective Congressional Aid that is according to this letter sent to the house Ethics Committee by Myers which he also posted on Twitter himself thus was first reported by the New York Times and NBC News has not independently verified the claims yet and the letter Myers is accusing Santos of groping him when he worked in his office as a volunteer he is also requesting an investigation into where the correct procedure was followed related to his work as a volunteer in the office NBC News senior Congressional correspondent Garrett hake joins me now so Garrett thanks for being here there's obviously a lot we don't know about this allegation but what do we know so far and what's the house Ethics Committee saying we wish everything about this story is bizarre Myers describes being hired on kind of a probationary basis he says he was working on an unpaid basis as a volunteer in Santos's office when he was groped on a couch while discussing legislative correspondence with Santos all of this came out sometime later after Myers says he was let go from the office over unrelated claims about concern over his past work as a journalist where he faces wiretapping charges in Ohio he the only reason we know about this claim at all is because he tweeted about it although a member of the House Ethics Committee has confirmed that they've received this letter they don't confirm they're investigating it we do not know the status of any investigation by the house Ethics Committee they tend to keep things very close to the vest but obviously a serious allegation here one added on top of so many of other Santos problems both legally and politically since he joined this Congress this year and Garrett you say there's a lot of allegations here um of course this is a new allegation coming from this this volunteer what has George Santos or his office said about this particular allegation well Santos was asked about this by a CNN producer today and he said he denied it a hundred percent he called the allegations comical now I don't think Santos or anyone in his Camp is laughing about them given the seriousness of their nature here and the challenge for Santos is that he has denied so many other things that have later been found to be true he has a problem uh with credibility on other issues but in this case he denies it outright says it's 100 not true we will see whether the Ethics Committee or perhaps Capitol Police take further action on this but again neither body is confirming any kind of Investigation tonight yabish well serious situation thank you so much Garrett hake and the Beehive is buzzing if you're one of the lucky Beyonce fans who nap tickets today will put your hands up today thousands of Lucky fans were given pre-sale codes put their faith in Ticketmaster in order to secure a ticket according to Ticketmaster fan demand exceeded available tickets by more than 800 percent in certain cities that prompted Beyonce to announce additional tour dates I'm not mad at that and many fans went into the pre-sale incredibly concerned after the pre-sell for Taylor Swift's upcoming tour left thousands of fans unhappy and even prompted Ticketmaster to cancel the public sale the Beyonce pre-sale also comes on the heels of a big night of wins for Queen B the singer was awarded her record-breaking 30-second Grammy Award NBC News technology correspondent Jake Ward joins us now and Jake thank you for being here tell us of course how did the pre-sales go for Beyonce was it better or worse than the Taylor Swift Fiasco well you know yamiche we were all of course you know fingers crossed sort of white duckling it going into this and I'm sure the leadership of Ticketmaster felt the same way and today it seems to have gone more smoothly Ticketmaster seems to have ironed out some problems we've heard reports that for the most part it was pretty simple this is not to say of course that people were able to get tickets in every case Ticketmaster reports that you know huge numbers of people wanted these tickets as much as 800 percent more people wanted them than tickets were available that said it seems to have gone pretty smoothly so far really interesting that it's gone more smoothly I wonder if you can talk a little bit about what Ticketmaster possibly did differently this time well I mean on the one hand it is a technological Improvement right in that basically last time with Taylor Swift they sort of flooded the market they just released all the tickets for all the shows and all the cities all at once and as a result flooded their own servers that's what analysts seem to have you know have pointed out to us so that's on the one hand a tremendous Improvement the other way to think about it is you know the job is just selling what people want to buy you know what I mean and so was it that much of a technological Improvement to actually have been able to deliver on what the market was asking for not exactly clear but you know at this point it seems as if this idea of creating a multi-tiered system in which you you know just sort of sell in waves City by city rather than just letting everything go all at once and and the consequences be damned seems to have been the technological fix that hopefully will be the model going forward and even though obviously as you said this looks like it's going to maybe be the model going forward Ticketmaster it doesn't it isn't out of the woods just yet and for those who know Taylor Swift that was that was a Taylor Swift pun that being said the Senate Judiciary Committee it held a hearing last month to examine the website Ticketmaster's website um and their dominance over the ticketing industry so talk a bit about the Monopoly that it seems like they still have well this is the thing right that everybody has been watching for I mean in this country we have a certain tolerance for a certain category of Monopoly right these permitted monopolies like let's say you know the utilities that you and I uh pay for providing electricity or water and the rest of it those are monopolies but they are permitted because they provide this very essential function that requires huge huge infrastructure and so they you know are allowed to operate but under very very tight regulations and price caps and the rest of it Ticketmaster is not like that right Ticketmaster in theory operates in a free and open market but it enjoys a 70 to 80 percent Market dominant position I mean it is impossible we've been working all day to try to figure out who is the second player in uh the list and it is not entirely clear they are so huge and so dominant and because of their merger between with Ticketmaster and Live Nation which is the venue company between them you know they they own what you know an academic would say is a vertical trust right that's the thing that any trust in Monopoly law is all about like you're not supposed to be able to own the ticket selling and the venue and you know the management of the bands and the rest of it so as you mentioned the Senate the the Senate Judiciary Committee took a very hard look at this after the Taylor Swift Fiasco and when the Beyonce sales began here they actually tweeted at Ticketmaster and said we are watching so this was a very big deal for Ticketmaster today and we'll see whether or not having done a much smoother job with this one gets them out of hot water or if another problem is just on the horizon and as a result they'll wind up back in front of Congress again well a situation will definitely keep covering and I'm I should say congratulations to all the fellow beehive members who got their tickets today Jacob Ward thanks so much for being here coming up Snapchat and Fentanyl families who lost loved ones to the drug to drug overdoses now blaming social media the key question now how responsible should apps be when it comes to cracking down on drug deals but first honoring black history tonight we remember legendary tennis player Arthur Ashe who passed away on this date in 1993 he became the first African-American to win the US Open on September 9 1968 and the first to win Wimbledon on July 5th 1975 off the court Arthur Ashe is remembered for his extensive work to educate the public about HIV and AIDS this was after Ash became HIV positive from a blood transfusion during his heart surgery age patients are not to be pity none of us want Penny we do want compassion Snapchat is facing a growing legal battle families who lost their children after they took bills containing fentanyl are accusing the company of making it easy to buy drugs due to the platforms disappearing messages reporter Eric Wilkinson from our NBC affiliate in Seattle has more attorneys say Snapchat has become the delivery system of choice for drug dealers pushing their products into young hands oh yeah there we go one year ago an overdose Survivor showed us just how easy it is finding a connection on his cell phone in just a matter of Moments One willing to deliver to his house it was pretty much Amazon for drugs the Snapchat app permits dealers to deliver drugs directly to teens anonymously everything from Adderall to Oxycontin many of the pills though are counterfeits containing deadly doses of fentanyl there's counterfeit Percocet counterfeit Oxycontin counterfeit Adderall one of those pills killed Carol schweigert's son Trey for the past five years she's been fighting for awareness but it hasn't come easily there's lies lost every single day and the battle's been uphill according to the CDC fentanyl kills 150 Americans every single day now a Seattle Law Firm is going after the company with a class action lawsuit saying this isn't a social media problem it's specifically a Snapchat problem fentanyl is so poisonous Matthew Bergman with the social media victims Law Center says his firm is representing the families of 52 children who've died from fentanyl overdoses he says all of them got the drug via Snapchat that's not an accident that's because Snapchat is explicitly designed to evade oversight and parental responsibility good morning everyone the campaign to clamp down on Snapchat and other social media companies is being spearheaded by Washington congresswoman Kathy McMorris Rogers she's seeking to narrow liability protections for tech companies and widen them for children we must take an all hands on deck approach to preventing the sale and transfer of these illegal drugs on these platforms to prevent one more child from dying so we we just keep working at it every day this is moms like Carol schweigert continue their Relentless battle burning on the home front it will never bring back our loved ones but holding people accountable is important to do because otherwise it's just going to keep going on Eric Wilkinson King 5 News really important reporting Eric Wilkinson from our NBC affiliate in Seattle thank you and it's a familiar story he wanted something romantic she on there on the other hand said she only saw him as a friend here's the unfamiliar part he's now suing her for two million dollars because she friendzoned him this is happening in Singapore according to Doc according to court documents the man claims the rejection has quote caused him sustained trauma leading to a dip in his earning capacity the woman is contesting the 2.3 million dollar lawsuit which is scheduled to be heard by in Singapore's high court next week the Washington points post points out that quote the lawsuit illustrates a challenge faced by women around the world that men sometimes feel entitled to their affection it's an incredible situation Kristen Kristen Gibbons fendin is an MSNBC legal analyst and she joins me now Kristen this is a confusing and sort of hard story to even understand that it's in the courts what are the chances of this man seeing a dime from the legal action he's taking against this woman for simply not wanting to be in a relationship with him you know based on your last segment I think I might have a better chance of scoring Beyonce tickets than this man getting a dime out of this lawsuit and that's because there simply is just no merit here there is no legally recognized harm in being placed in the friend zone and quite frankly this lawsuit is so ridiculous in the states and even as it is posed currently in Singapore that if it wasn't a victim on the other side being harassed and being intimidated the Maryland nature of the suit would be laughable I mean it's it's so true that there really is someone that's being that's being targeted here um I want to ask you though that there's this a gender advocacy group in Singapore that's calling out this man's sense of entitlement and says that he really believes that his act they believe his con his actions constitute harassment at this point has this crossed the line and canned the courts in Singapore do anything about it you know the one the court according to Something About It by throwing out his prior lawsuit but looking at this case on an individual basis I wouldn't be surprised if the court did dismiss this lawsuit just like it did the prior one but what we really want is an Institutional change and I think that's really the shift that people are looking for in the last five years for example the prime minister of Singapore was actually successful in two defamation suits that he brought against two of his critics so unfortunately in Singapore and quite frankly in the states as well the claim of defamation is often weaponized through silence and intimidate victims and survivors just like what it's doing now um we're hopeful that you know the courts will keep dismissing it but again it needs to be an Institutional change not just an individual change and you bring up the issue of intimidation um I'm wondering what More We Know About This Woman's thinking whether or not she's concerned remember even that there should be concern there that this might turn into something even more Sinister given the fact that she had to already get a restraining order against this man yeah you know we have little knowledge of The Facts of everything underlying this but the fact that she was she went and sought out a restraining order is indicative of how fearful she feels for her own personal safety and that is extremely important think about it this way not only did this man weaponize the court system once against her but twice and she knows him from being in a friend relationship with him so she knows what's best for her personal safety and her actions indicate such yeah yeah well this is I mean a case we're gonna have to definitely keep watching MSNBC legal analyst Christine Gibbons fendin thank you so much for making the time to be here my pleasure and before we go tonight's inspiring America A daughter's mission to complete her late father's bucket list [Music] [Music] thank you finally tonight meet the woman who continued a powerful bond with her father even after his death thanks to a chance discovery Michael Carney Stash's bucket list in a brown suede bag 60 things to complete in his lifetime but he never had the chance to finish it at 54 years old he was killed by a distracted driver so 13 years later when his daughter Laura found that list it was just like this feels important and this feels like something I need to do and as soon as I thought of it I saw my dad's face in the back of my mind just smiling and nodding several items on the list were checked off but 54 remained so Laura got to work swim the width of a River Drive a Corvette Skydive she crisscrossed the U.S visiting several cities that made her way across the Atlantic to do the same I started developing this level of confidence in myself because I I had this feeling like my dad's not going to let me fail for some items Laura a New Jersey native was able to stay local down the street from her home Laura planted an apple tree in this Park which is still growing even though my dad's list is over that's always going to live on 5. one of the most daunting items she
says have five songs recorded how many miles away she even traveled to Georgia to speak with former President Jimmy Carter in office when her father wrote the list it felt momentous it felt like my dad was there it took six years but Laura Finally checked all the boxes and is writing a book about her experiences what did it feel like when you finally completed this entire list you know I felt calm I felt fulfilled I could let go of my father in the way that I wanted to I'm also embracing my future such an amazing story and that does it for us I'll send her for now tonight the news continues right now [Music] thanks for watching our YouTube channel follow today's top stories and breaking news by downloading the NBC News app
2023-02-12 16:20
