[Music] we are coming on the air with the race to find survivors in Baltimore that horrifying video I know you've seen a cargo ship sending this bridge collapsing into the water below the big questions about who was on that bridge when it happened where the search stands now and when this critical Port can reopen we're live from every angle on the ground and in the air in just a minute we're also live outside the Supreme Court with more on why the justices sound kind of ready to reject a challen
ge to the abortion pill Plus in NBC News exclusive just one day after those raids on Diddy's homes we brought you live here as breaking news last night now the producer accusing him of sexual assault also accusing another actor of the same thing the new details in just a minute then in tonight's original Tennessee taking new steps tonight to fix a law that's stressing out some third graders there who say they're worried their reading skills we'll get them left behind we'll explain hey there I'm
hiy and tonight we start with that catastrophic bridge collapse in Baltimore and the desperate race happening as we speak to find at least six people still missing in that frigid River some 15 hours after the bridge came down it is this horrifying and almost unimaginable scene we're showing you here one of the more iconic bridges in the Mid-Atlantic snapping after a cargo ship you see it there on the left side of your screen obviously crashes into it you can see the bridge come Crashing Down eig
ht workers had been fixing potholes on I 695 on that bridge when this happened that ship out of one of the busiest ports in America was on its way to Sri Lanka apparently losing power but putting out a Mayday call before hitting the bridge the whole thing to so many heartbreaking and shocking I would have never thought in a million years that would happen when I got the phone call I thought it was fake I know it's going to take a big effect on this whole uh whole city the president promising lat
e today the federal government will help Baltimore rebuilt we're going to send all the federal resources they need as we respond to this emergency and I mean all the federal resources and we're going to rebuild that Port together everything so far indicates that this was a terrible accident well we may know a little bit about how this happened there's still a lot that we just don't know right now like why that made a call apparently stopped cars from getting on the bridge but didn't get the cons
truction workers off of it in time like whether or not this bridge should have been able to withstand a hit like this now the transportation secretary late today is pointing out the unique circumstances to have a ship this size essentially lose control more on that perhaps in the weeks to come and then when might ships be able to go through and get to this port again it's a Lifeline to thousands of jobs in and around Baltimore and to trade not just on the East Coast but around the world what's t
he economic Fallout we've got team coverage George siss and Tom Castello on the ground in Maryland Tom yamus getting a look at the aftermath from the air but Tom Castello I want to get to you first because we just just heard the governor in the last couple of hours say this is still very active here an active search and rescue mission right yeah that's right I mean listen they still have six people unaccounted for since 1:30 this morning and so while they call this a search and rescue off effort
they're very realistic about the chances for survival in the very frigid Waters here uh in Baltimore nonetheless those six construction workers filling potholes on top of the bridge when it was hit by the ship at 1:30 in the morning and and they're still missing and we've had divers on the water fire department rescue teams and uh local Coast Guard teams also searching the governor's making this point that they did pull two people out of the water one of them declined any medical intervention t
he other one rushed to a local Trauma Center where he is still being treated uh but the impact here on this community and on the greater Port is substantial the port REM remains closed one of the busiest in the country and the airspace remains closed above us only right now for search and rescue efforts local police and local fire and as well as the the Coast Guard efforts underway right now hie uh and Tom we also heard as you know from the head of the NTSB as you've referenced there about the s
teps to come it sounds like the entire Focus as you know is on that search and rescue but at some point there will be a discussion about how this could have happened perhaps a data recorder right on that ship that's typically sort of standard procedure here yeah yeah that's right so there are 24 NTSB investigators on the scene and they will look at a long list of factors that might have contributed so I asked the ntsp chairwoman a short time ago what about the the data recorders the so-called bl
ack boxes we hear about on planes what about those black boxes on board the ship here's what she said can you speak to what type of Records may be on board the ship and what do you hope that they what information might they provide we chose not to board the vessel today uh to allow some time for the search and Recovery which we did not want to interfere with the bottom line is they haven't yet had access to the ship they're going to wait until the search and rescue efforts have been completed an
d then they need to make sure that that ship is stabilized and safe before they board and that means the 22 crew members who are on board that ship will will remain on board we're told that they are of Indian Nation it but when you come into any Us Port by the way you must bring on board a local pilot who helps navigate through the waters because that local pilot knows those Waters a local pilot was on board so we simply don't yet understand the timeline and what may or may not have happened wit
h that local pilot also on board the ship and Tom I just have to ask you quickly I see just a crush it looks like of other reporters behind you there that has been the staging area where you are at the base of the bridge for for what since what 2:00 in the morning right and that is considered atic that's right I mean I got here at about 5: this morning and it has as you would expect mushroomed ever since and these images have gone around the world uh we have media from all over the world coverin
g this leading their newscast from around the world anecdotally you know my wife is Belgian she was talking to her mother in Belgium who immediately brought up the bridge collapse in Baltimore and said how is it possible how could that happen the point being this is an international Global story because every country that has Bridges like this might be significantly worried as well about whether their Bridges might also be vulnerable Tom Castello thank you so much for being there for you're repo
rting I know for 13 hours straight running now appreciate it our Tom yamus is also in Baltimore just moments ago he sent us this look from up above of the stunning scene in Baltimore hie we're about 2,000 ft over the Patapsco River right now and just to my left here I can see the doll that massive cargo vessel that crashed into the Key Bridge from this high the first thing that sticks out is just how massive this vessel was we're talking about 950 ft that's almost the same size as the Empire Sta
te Building but one thing you do notice is that on on the surface right on the deck there is not an inch of space it is container after container after container it's stack 10 high I point that out because a long shoreman who I spoke with earlier today who actually helped load the dolly before it took off from the Port of Baltimore said to me you know those container ships are filled with all types of cargo including cars so you know when we talk about 8 knots that's how fast the dolly was trave
ling that's only about 10 mph that may not seem very fast that it would be able to crash into a bridge and this whole thing would collapse but the thing is you have to remember is that that cargo ship was filled with cargo so it weighed so much so when it hit that bridge you're talking about just tons and tons of weight impacting the bridge essentially not knocking that those pillars and that's why it collapsed from up here the other thing you notice is the amount of sort of boats that are still
in the water a lot of Coast Guard boats uh a lot of boats from uh Maryland County officials that we can see here Maryland state officials I should say um it's hard to tell whether a rescue operation is still underway um we know that they're still hoping to to find those six people that are missing at this point from up here it it doesn't look like it's too active but there are things also that we can see there there are are maybe teams still in the water trying to search for those people Andor
those Vehicles trying to find whatever they can um what you do notice right away though is is that this bridge is completely gone uh I I I heard from someone it took I think 3 years to build this bridge if not longer it's going to take a long time to repair this and this is a major artery uh here in Baltimore in the greater Baltimore area and it's completely gone right now and and moving that ship and getting that cargo off that ship and also any of the bins that actually fell into the river as
well it's going to be a massive undertaking that's the very lat us from where we are right now flying over Baltimore hi I'm going to send it back to you in the studio uh in Washington our thanks to Tom yamas for that George I want to get to you now in Dundalk Maryland so the reaction here obviously with so much focus on these six people unaccounted for in just the last 10 minutes or so our colleagues at telmundo spoke with the wife of one of those missing construction workers who says she is jus
t devastated that their hearts are breaking now as they're waiting for news it's just a nightmare for them absolutely hi and here we are in Baltimore County on the bsco river and these are a lot of homes that heard this Collision before they actually saw it the image is of course stunning and here once day broke we had arguably one of the best vantage points here on the ground that I can show you right now take a look you can still see that container ship as Tom pointed out there in the aerial s
hot in the Francis Scott Key bridge right there partially submerged there in the water and talking about just the emotional impact that this is having here in this community a lot of people grew up with that bridge this was built back in the 1970s it is named after the author of The Star Spangled Banner which of course is a big deal here in Baltimore we talk about the Commerce side of things we talk about the transport side of things this is part of the Baltimore beltway so of course the traffic
headaches are only just beginning while we talk about the construction but of course as we heard throughout the day today this is about those six Souls that are still presumed missing in those Waters and the reaction today from this community that has come out to get a glimpse of this and the disbelief is something you have to hear this is literally the road I travel almost on a daily basis to go to my brother's house just a real loud boom and then my bed started shaking my grandma woke me up s
aid the bridge is gone and again speaking to that point again hiy this this was such a large crash that people's homes actually shook it woke them out of bed and then when they come out and they they saw here they couldn't even believe it and again it's a little bit of a cliche but this has played out like a bit of a Hollywood movie especially from the bandage point that we've had we've seen those boats in the water we've seen helicopters so low to the ground and we know how crucial of an asset
that is as they are beginning uh these search and rescue offer efforts and one other note I did speak with Baltimore city office of emergency management officials a little while ago who again reaffirm that right now they are still calling this a search and rescue operation hie George soise live for us there in dundock lots of developments throughout the day more to come perhaps tonight we're going to look for you again next hour as we get more of those George thank you let's bring it back to Was
hington now where the Supreme Court is seeming to Signal today it's going to let people keep access to abortion pills with some heavy skepticism from the justices about a push to restrict that access here's some of it just to confirm uh on the standing issue under federal law no doctors can be um forced against their consciences to perform or assist in an abortion correct this case seems like a prime example of turning what could be a small lawsuit into a nationwide legislative assembly you need
a person you need a person to be able to come in and meet the Court's regular standing requirements who's your person who's your person so we're going to come back to that thought in just a second they're talking about as you see it here m prisone one of two pills used in nearly two-thirds of abortions in this country no decision today of course right so we're talking about Tea Leaf reading not about ual decisions but as you can see the oral arguments Drew tons of people crowds of them rallying
outside Court chanting with megaphones many of them in favor of abortion rights yamish elendor joins us now okay so yamish why so skeptical why are these justices seeming and sounding so skeptical of this argument trying to restrict access to these pills H this skepticism really comes down to one word science these justic is over and over again really we questioning whether or not the FDA as an agency that is not just a leading agency in the States but really around the world why the Supreme Co
urt would really second guess that and there was a really telling exchange between Justice Alo was of course seen as a conservative justice as well as the lawyer for the manufacturer of Mr priton was of course is this medication abortion take let's into that exchange the statement was made that no court has ever previously uh second guessed uh the fda's judgment about access to a to a drug right and it's never second guess that that that's correct you think the FDA is infallible no your honor no
w over and over again we heard the lawyer for the anti-abortion groups who sued the FDA to really stop the the access to this medication abortion to be more widely available they said over and over again that this was really putting women at risk and that this was really also um forcing doctors into a position that would go against their conscience but the FDA as well as the lawyer for Mr pstone they really did Hammer home at the idea that the FDA had a long rigorous science-based process that t
hey every single step that they took including including of approving the the the pill decades ago but also opening up that approval and letting people have it by telea Health as well as by mail over and over again they were really looking at the science here so that's why justice has sounded skeptical and you heard that over and over again from conservative Justice is asking questions about the medical procedures here saying overall that this would not really change even if loss the medical iss
ues here would not change it would just be the accessibility issues hi so we know that June tends to be kind of the big moments for the Supreme Court towards the end of the term when some of these really high-profile decisions tend to drop obviously we don't know for sure that's just you know how past precedent has worked that said even if this ruling comes down in June or whenever and even if it is what everybody thinks it is likely to be given the skepticism you've laid out here that's the fed
eral level there's still a lot of challenges at the state level right talk us through that there's certainly a lot of challenges at the state level and I we should put up a map for folks to really understand what's going on here around this country you have a number of States including States like Texas like Arkansas like Louisiana Southern States conservative States who have already banned medication abortion then you have a number of states that are saying that it can only be prescribed by cli
nicians others saying it only can be prescribed by physicians but let's remember this is going to continue to be a moving Target because medication abortion is becoming the most common way that women who are seeking abortions are getting those abortions and research is showing that in the last few years since roie over roie Wade was overturned you've seen that use of medication abortion go up something like six in 10 women if they have an abortion through medication abortion and you've also hear
d from conservative activists who are just going to continue to hammer home and try to get more wins after getting that really generational win of overturning roie weight so a lot here of course it's also an election year so Democrats are going to be pointing this out over and over again hoping to sort of capitalize on the momentum and the anger frankly between some women who are angry at the fact that this medication abortion might not be accessible hiy yamish elendor live for us there outside
the Supreme Court yamish thank you for being there right now President Biden and vice president Harris are on the trail together for the first time in this 2024 campaign in North Carolina no coincidence it's a big Target for the Biden Camp which sees it as their best chance to pick up one of the states former president Trump won in 2020 take a look at this President Biden won four of the five closest races in 2020 but the fifth one you see it there North Carolina the closest where fifth closest
where Mr Trump won by just over a percentage point NBC's Mike memoy is traveling with the president in Raleigh North Carolina it is an interesting piece of timing here right we just talked with yamish about the issue of Reproductive Rights and abortion access that is expected to be front and center for democrats for the president for the vice president over the course of the next seven months as they campaign here putting some eggs in the North Carolina basket if you will yeah that's right hie I
mean it's not an accident that this event took place on the day of those Supreme Court arguments it's not an accident that this event came just a couple days after the anniversary of the Affordable Care Act and it's not an accident that this is the first of this post State of the Union Road show that the president's been on where vice president Harris who has really taken the lead on abortion rights issues for the administration joined him for this event but there's a lot that the Biden team do
es like about North Carolina you got to play a lot of Defense when you're an incumbent running free election this is a state they think they can go on offense you look at the demographics of North Carolina one of the bigger back black populations among the Battleground States obviously a key uh constituency for President Biden you're also seeing changing demographics you see a real population boom here in the as it's called the triangle uh the economy improving bringing more college educated wor
kers those tend to be at least for the Biden team voters that they think they can win and then you have the sance of the health care issue this is why the event here was focused on that take a listen to how the president presented that argument here's what it would mean if they get rid of the ACA because of Donald Trump and his Mig Republican in Congress 45 million people Nationwide would lose their health Insurance including 1.4 million right here in North Carolina now hie another reason that t
he Biden team feels there's a strong argument to be made for spending a lot of time and resources in North Carolina it's not just the presidential race that's going to matter here you have the lieutenant governor Republican Robinson running against the Democratic attorney general Mark Stein Stein was at this event talking about how he has fought to defend the Affordable Care Act we know that there are certainly crossover in terms of the framing of the presidential race to how the down ballot gub
ernatorial race is also going to be waged here in North Carolina yeah the former Governor tells NBC news that North Carolina could be this elections Arizona in other words a state that could decide the whole shebang right I wonder um how that plays into things where you are yeah absolutely I mean you look at the eight states that Biden campaign has really put its cards on the table since the State of the Union he's visited every one of the states that the Biden team sees as a Battleground State
and yes a lot of that includes places like Arizona but let let's just talk about Michigan and North Carolina as it relates to the electoral map right we know the president's vulnerabilities in Michigan state that he only narrowly won four years ago especially as it relates to the war in Gaza the Arab American population there Michigan has 15 electoral votes you if you lose Michigan but you win North Carolina which has 16 electoral votes well you're actually up an electoral vote as long as you ho
ld the rest big if but that's kind of how the Biden team is looking at this and so this is not the end of the the president's travel here we're going to see him here a lot it's just notable that the type of event he was holding here was uh with a with an audience with a rally style atmosphere was very different than what he did in Michigan where it was a lot of off- the record type visits without the ability to build a crowd because of course the protests that you often see in Michigan he did ha
ve a protest and Interruption here uh made a little bit of news by the way they were asking what about healthcare for for Gaza and the president actually answered back you have a point it's interesting ' just before I let you go there's also some other political news today on the third party front with RFK Jor announcing his running matate so he's rolling out his VP pick a woman named Nicole Shanahan little known lawyer entrepreneur How concerned is the Biden Camp about the potential that the RF
K ticket now the I guess the Kennedy Shanahan ticket could have an impact in some of these states where the margins as in North Carolina are just so extremely close that a few thousand votes really could make a difference yeah I mean the first concern depends on where actually RFK is able to get on the ballot so we're looking at that ballot access but when you talk about the close margins in these States absolutely a third party candidate could make the difference now the Biden team the DNC had
a call today to talk about this pick they are very squarely focused on RFK and are going to have a rapid response operation for moments just like this but in North Carolina is interesting if you look at that new poll you see that RFK actually takes away from both candidates equally Trump does lead in both scenarios here uh but that lead about stays the same because he's pulling just about equal numbers from both candidates at least in this state hie Mike memal thank you very much lots to cover t
onight appreciate it tonight some new details from the the parents of Evan gershkovich That Wall Street Journal reporter who according to the paper faces at least another 3 months in a Russian jail in custody before his trial on spy charges even gets going the US of course considering gershkovich wrongfully detained you are looking now at his mother and father opening up to our Andrea Mitchell on evans's year behind bars in Russia we knew that it it's going to be Marathon but still had hopes tha
t it will be soon there he spent all four seasons there he spent his birthday and all the holidays and we wanted him home as soon as possible remember it's a year this week since Gish kovic's arrest while on a reporting trip you see him there NBC's Matt Bradley is following this one for us and it is uh I think it it hurts right to see evans's parents to see gic's parents talking about the pain that they have with their son still detained in Russia yeah they seem to be doing remarkably well you k
now they're kind of holding it together here um I was impressed with you know just you can see how weighty this is especially coming on that Oney year anniversary as we're seeing today here's a little more of what they said uh to our own Andrea Mitchell it's hard to feel anything it's hard to uh to think about anything it just you stop function in a normal sense it's difficult to understand the time you only think about one thing we are keeping ourselves um optimistic that's the best way we can
cope with it that it will be next day and maybe next day something will change and you know we keep hearing them talking about timing the marathon you know the timing here is so open-ended there's no prison term applied to this he hasn't been convicted and that's why decisions like the one that we saw today must be so agonizing for the parents of Evan gershkovich because you know it's just adding another three months onto and this is important that pre-trial detention now this is not surprising
this is the fifth time that the Russian court has done this extended his pre-trial detention the fact is hie the best thing that Evan gershkovich can hope for right now and his parents definitely know this is to be convicted and to get a prison sentence and to go to prison I know that sounds Twisted to think you know the best thing that could happen for this guy is to be convicted of Espionage in a Russian court and sent to a Russian Penitentiary but that's the start of a new process here that w
e saw with Britney Griner a couple of years ago and others where once you get that prison sentence and the Russians have been clear on this that's when you can start negotiating diplomatically so any extension to this he's been in prison in jail now for a year that extends the progress the prospect that he could be freed through some kind of negotiation H that of course the hope for his family and for so many others Matt Bradley live for us overseas thank you more of Andrea's interview with Evan
gic's parents will Air Tonight on NBC Nightly News Lester Holt will be there in Baltimore uh more on that to come coming up here on this show new data shows how the economy might be booming for Boomers but for their Millennial kids not so much plus how a disease that hits Birds is now attacking cows what it means for our supply [Music] an NBC News exclusive tonight as we're learning the music producer accusing sha Diddy combes of sexual assault and harassment is also accusing actor Cuba Gooding
Jr of something similar remember this producer filed his original lawsuit against Diddy and others last month he said coms forced him to find sex workers and pressured him into doing sexual things with them now he's saying that Gooding groped him while they were on Sha comes' yacht we know that comes of course is at the center of a federal investigation with multiple people being interviewed by federal officials in New York related to allegations of sex trafficking assault and more against the
rapper according to sources familiar with the matter as you saw here unfolding on this show 24 hours ago the feds raided Combs Florida and California homes Reps for Gooding and comes did not immediately respond to a request for comment from NBC in the past of course didd he has denied all the allegations against him Dana Griffin is joining us now important to note here that Gooding has not been charged with any crime talk us through some of the other details that we're learning yeah H according
to this amended lawsuit producer Rodney Jones alleges actor Kuba Gooding Jr groped him on Diddy's yacht in January 2023 while this yacht was in the US Virgin Islands the suit goes on to claim that Jones was extremely uncomfortable he rejected the advances and that Mr Gooding Jr did not stop until Mr Jones forcibly pushed him away and as you mentioned the attorney and representatives for goody did not immediately hie respond to NBC news's request for comment the lawsuit was amended hours after th
e raid happened last night but there's no information that connects Gooding to those searches right so what is the latest on what we all saw as breaking news last night unfold right where those raid stand where that investigation stands yeah hie so this is a a federal investigation out of New York we know so far three women and one man has been interviewed by officials in Manhattan an additional three people are also scheduled to be interviewed now during those simultaneous raids in LA and Miami
we know that feder Homeland Security officials also seized cell phones from Diddy moments before he was about to board a plane to the Bahamas he was scheduled to take a trip it's unclear if he actually got on that flight now our colleague Steve Patterson interviewed former Federal prosecutor Francy hes who says this investigation could lead to an entire spiderweb of further investigations listen I think it's important to know that the sdny and the Department of Justice generally does not go aft
er high-profile celebrities unless they've got uh a ton of evidence and I'll be very interested to see these search warrant affidavits when they're eventually released to see what that probable cause actually is and hie representatives for Diddy have yet to respond to our request for comment now the big question is what charges if any come from these searches and what didd he has to say about he has not said a word and we will be following the story as it develops hie I know you will be Dana Gri
ffin live for us there in LA thank you let's get you over to the five things our team thinks you should know about tonight number one two Russian officials saying today they believe Ukraine was involved in the deadly attack on a Moscow Concert Hall remember President Vladimir Putin has been trying to point the finger at Ukraine to a degree for the attack that killed at least 130 people with no evidence Ukraine has repeatedly denied any involvement and remember Isis has claimed responsibility num
ber two cows in Texas in Kansas testing positive for bird flu according to the feds the first time that virus has been found in cows now officials say the milk supply in this country is safe that the risk to people is low milk from any sick cattle any sick cows being destroyed number three former New England Patriot star Malcolm Butler facing a DUI charge in Rhode Island according to police he was arrested earlier this month but we're just finding out about it now you'll remember Butler made tha
t Super Bowl clinching interception against the Seahawks in 2015 his lawyers trying to get the charge dismissed arguing Butler's constitutional rights were violated he set to be arraigned later this week number four King Charles and queen Camila will attend an Easter service at Windsor Castle this Sunday according to Buckingham Palace the King's first big event since he was diagnosed with cancer last month officials say other members of the royal family will be there as well but Prince William a
nd Princess Kate who announced she's going through cancer treatment last week probably will not appear number five The Bachelorette naming its first Asian-American lead in the show's history Jen Tran as Vietnamese American made it to the final six of the most recent season of The Bachelor she says she feels so grateful and so honored at tonight's original now with in-depth reporting on a topic we've been watching and tonight we're talking about a reading Law in Tennessee that could potentially h
old back thousands of fourth graders the law was intended to try to make students better readers before they moved on to the next grade but some kids say the policy puts too much pressure on testing Kathy park has more 10-year-old Ava Weiss is a fourth grader in Tennessee who says there's one test next month that's giving her a lot of anxiety talk to me about why it stresses you out so much I'm just not a good test taker and I'm like overachieving and I like just wish I could do better she's hau
nted by the outcome of last year's State assessment known as teap the score on the English language art section determines whether a third grader is held back a policy under the reading retention law that went into effect last year you took the exam last year and how did you do well I'm pretty sure like almost all of us in my class failed and I failed too Ava was among the 60% of third graders who fell short on the state's reading benchmark but after backlash over the law families were given opt
ion to get their child into the fourth grade including summer school tutoring or an appeal which Ava was granted it still affects her emotionally after failing the test last year and just feeling like she's not as joyful with school not as excited about doing her work as she was before ultimately fewer than 900 students had to repeat the third grade last year roughly 12,000 students moved on to the fourth grade opting for tutoring after falling short on the reading benchmark now those students m
ust show adequate growth on the English language section of the teap next month before they can advance to fifth grade at the State Board of Education meeting last year one member projected up to 6,000 students could be retained unless the law were changed then would likely be roughly five or 6 thousand fifth graders retained is that correct this year I think that's accurate state representative Mark White who chairs the education Administration committee says Tennessee lawmakers are currently r
eviewing next steps for fourth graders being held back we are amending that particular bill right now everyone believes it's not healthy to hold back a third or fourth grader but at the same time it's not healthy to let them go on through high school where let many drop out because school is too hard Tennessee isn't alone in enforcing a third grade reading retention law similar policies are in place in at least 26 States and the District of Columbia Deborah Reed is a director of the Tennessee re
ading Research Center students that are not successful readers at the end of third grade about 75% of them will struggle with reading for the rest of their lives illiteracy rates are associated with poor mental health poor physical health of course limited education and limited access to employment Katherine bike is a Knox County School Board member and the mother of a fourth grader who filed an appeal after her son didn't pass the English section of the teap last year so you noticed a drastic c
hange after he took that exam absolutely yes he's secretly a perfectionist and um he really holds himself to a high standard and he just started calling himself dumb and stupid and hitting himself in the head and that was really hard to watch happen as a parent and to not know what to do for that with the next exam just weeks away she says the pressure is building what are the lawmakers missing you think I think that they're missing that these kids are have feelings and emotions and the Damage t
hat's being done I think they're really missing that Kathy Park and BC News our thanks to Kathy for that reporting coming up here on the show The Deadly attack during rush in the New York City subway by police say it came out of nowhere plus the Jagger Heist solved where the Penguins say they found all those missing bobbleheads okay that's [Music] next so some new numbers out today shows your age probably has a lot to do with how you feel about the economy with the consumer confidence index sayi
ng basically the same this month compared to February but if you go deep it's really two stories 55 and up if you're above the age of 55 you probably feel better about the economy if you're below 55 you feel worse Christine Romans is joining us to break it all down as if we needed one more reason to divide Boomers from Millennials right talk us through it I know well Boomers by the way they probably have a house that has a record high home value and they probably have a 401k that has record high
stock market value Millennials can't buy a house yeah and they can't get in so you can see they're too very different stages of life in this economy for those two groups let's look at the overall numbers you can see that basically this index is muddling along look at the top that's the present situation how I feel right now and then below that the blue line is expectations how I think things are going to be and the expectations index kind of dragging things down here you know the people who wer
e answering this survey were writing in about food prices and gas prices in the Rin part of this survey so they're still concerned about that embedded inflation yet when asked about the risk for a recession the recession risks going down so it's super interesting here that that twos speed economy they're worried about the next shoe that's going to drop but things are actually pretty good right now look at that's the recession likelihood declining there pretty dramatically so that's where we sit
with this kind of um two-speed economy I would say you know people with a job with savings and with Investments are doing just fine people who can't get into that game are feeling a little left behind two-p speed economy Christina I like how you put it thank you very much for that we'll see how those numbers change if they do next month appreciate it nice to see you MBC news covers hundreds of stories every day and because it can be tough to read or watch or listen to them all our Bureau teams h
ave done it for you this is what the tell us is going down in their regions in a segment we call the local out of our Western Bureau Utah's women's basketball coach says the team had to switch hotels during the NCAA tournament because of what they called racial hate crimes she didn't say exactly what happened but said there were several incidents after the team got into the Spokane Washington area to play Gonzaga she says Gonzaga and the NCAA helped them switch hotels the NCAA says it condemns r
acism and is devastated by what happened out of our Southern Bureau Texas AG Ken Paxton come to a deal where hope pay like $300,000 so he will not have to go to trial next month on criminal Securities fraud charges remember he was indicted a while back for allegedly misleading investors in a tech startup and the deal today does not mean he's admitting guilt it will let him keep his job out of our Northeast be you know those stolen bobbleheads we've told you about hockey player yir yogger they're
now found the Pittsburgh Penguins were supposed to hand him out weeks ago but the shipment was stolen a bobblehead theft the Penguins say a special cargo recovery team got the bobbleheads back they're planning to give them out just about a week to New York now an A man and I charged there with murder for what police say was an unprovoked attack on the subway a horrific attack the suspect in custody there after that arrest but the scary scene inside a subway station in Harlem police all around h
appened during rush hour right as we were coming off the air last night the victim was pushed onto the tracks was pronounced dead on the scene the suspect reportedly has a history of arrests and mental illness according to the New York Times stepen Romo is joining us now and it plays into what is perhaps a perception problem about safety on the New York City subway system the governor has tried to address it the data shows crime overall is going down but talk us through the reality here yeah H t
here have been several major Transit crimes that have gotten a lot of headlines but you're right the data actually shows that crime has dipped a bit looking at the data from transit crimes from 2022 to 2023 down about 3% and take a look at this month compared with March of 2023 down 15.5% but if you were just going from social media and what we're talking about it might be hard to believe those numbers just two weeks ago we had an incident with a man who got on the subway without paying he argue
d with some passengers before fighting one of them ultimately dropping a gun that he was shot with that caused a lot of alarm leave left him badly injured that passenger who pulled the trigger not expected to face any charges but it's incidents like that that have led Governor Kathy hokel to deploy New York City Police and National Guard troops as well in the subway to try to help a divisive move bringing privacy concerns because of bag searches that are happening but ultimately it may be too so
on to tell if that's actually helping I ride the subway I talk to people on the subway and they are concerned a lot of times about crime as it plays out as we talk about crime more broadly in the city there's this thing that's been happening that's caught the attention of our team here because these women I think mostly younger women are are putting these videos up saying that something pretty disturbing has happened to them and it it feels like a pattern let me play a little bit of it I was lit
erally just walking and a man came up and punched me in the face I literally got punched by some man on the sidewalk so somebody punching women in the face what do we know about this can these be these this be verified is this an issue what's the deal yeah those two incidents we have verified with the New York City Police Department but there are even more incidents more videos Frank Frankly that we're looking into right now some people are injured in them this is causing a lot of alarm as you c
an imagine those two incidents we can tell you more about police confirming yesterday a 23-year-old woman was walking around 10: a.m. near Chelsea when she was hit in the head we we could see it there in the video she had injuries to the right side of her face and then last Sunday the 17th near Soho blocks away from that scene pleas say a 25-year-old woman was walking her dog when an unknown person punched her in the head now she thankfully did not appear to be injured from that the New York Cit
y Police Department not yet able to tell us whether these incidents are related there are I can tell you other incidents we're looking into as well that are similar some of them have some uh differences in there but it is chilling to think about just walking around and being sucker punched in the face more New York City crime that is making headlines right now hie St Romo thank you so much when we come back a new lawsuit against hospitals who employed a Serial sexual predator the emotional react
ion from one of the victims only right here on NBC [Music] News [Music] tonight a law firm says it's filed its first lawsuit against some Chicago hospitals on behalf of an alleged sexual assault Survivor saying the hospitals chose profits over patient safety allowing a sexual predator to prey on patients ignoring warning sign after warning sign the firm says it represents hundreds more alleged victims women reported that Ortega's examinations felt more sexual than medical these Healthcare instit
utions did not just turn a blind eye to the abuse that was happening in front of them they enabled a sexual predator they gave him a platform and they gaset the women who continued to come forward and Report what was going on there Dr Fabio Oro was a Chicago OBGYN who pleaded guilty to sexually abusing two of his patients during exams sentenced to three years in prison in 2021 this lawsuit now alleges it goes further than that trying to hold the hospitals where he worked accountable saying they
negligently hired supervised and ained a known Predator NBC's Maggie vesa who's been following this story these are obviously extremely concerning allegations I know you spoke with one of the victims right tell us more yeah so she is a 49-year-old mother of two from Mexico who said she wanted to remain anonymous because she told us that her children her two adult daughters don't know at this point what happened to their mother but again as you said she says hie she's one of the 300 plus who atto
rneys mentioned in this lawsuit that lawsuit's filed on behalf of one woman Jane Doe 300 the woman that we talked to is not Jane do 300 attorneys tell us simply they're going suits uh one by one sort of Survivor by Survivor and they say more suits are coming but she is quoted in the lawsuit as are several women her story in particular saying that she was abused by Dr Ortega and that years later after she stopped seeing him because of the abuse she says that an employee at NorthShore Hospital one
of the two named in this suit called her this was like in 2018 and told her that Dr Ortega had retired and she said she didn't know that that's interesting to know thank you for the information the suit goes on to say what they didn't tell her was that he had had his license revoked after he had been charged with criminal sexual abuse the charges that we later saw he was convicted on so now knowing kind of how widespread this is and now knowing she believes based on what these attorneys say the
y found that this was kept from patience she says she is angry and that's why she's speaking out take a listen the allegation is they definitely should have been doing far more to protect patients what's that emotion like how does that make you feel to read where this case is going down Angry Angry Angry Angry because they knew what was going on I didn't say anything there are few people in my you know Circle that they know about this if there were a complaining before I went to see him you know
before for me you know what happened to me maybe you know maybe couldn't I mean I couldn't be like not couldn't be not happening to me you know and hi our viewers might have guessed from that sound bite our interviewee is a Spanish speaker and a lot of these women attorneys say are Latina they're predominantly Spanish speaking and they were sent they say to Dr Ortega because he spoke Spanish so a lot of them that kind of adds another layer you can imagine as to why attorneys say they didn't spe
ak out and they allege why the hospitals didn't take their complaints seriously so now this is now a massive windfall that attorneys believe the doctor never thought would come to fruition hie so then what are we hearing from the hospital so the hospitals have gotten back to us with the state but it's interesting we're talking about two separate hospitals previously they're now owned by the same Healthcare Group so that group Endeavor Health which represents now NorthShore University Health Syst
em and Swedish Covenant Health got back to us with a statement saying they have no tolerance for abuse of any kind they recognize the tremendous strength and the courage this takes to come forward they believe trust is earned and they'll always look for opportunities to demonstrate the commitment to those highest standard standards of care they went on to say they have actually improved their policies for investigating and kind of lending Credence to these types of complaints we also should note
that we reached out to the doctor including his former attorneys both in his criminal case and other civil cases that have been brought against him we haven't gotten a response yet that doctor is out of prison so we will let you know if that changes Maggie vesa thank you very much if you or somebody you know has experienced a sexual assault help is available look at what's on your screen here 1800 656 hope that's 1800 656 4673 you can catch more of Maggie's interview coming up on top story at 7
:00 eastern right here on NBC News Now does it for for us for this hour we've got a lot more coverage picking up right [Music] now we are coming on the air with the race to find survivors in Baltimore that horrifying video I know you've seen by now a cargo ship sending this bridge right into the water in Baltimore the big questions about who was on it when it happened where the search stands now and when this key port o after that terrible moment can reopen we're live from every angle from the g
round and from the air in just a minute we're also live outside the Supreme Court just blocks for randing with more on why the justices sound kind of ready to allow people to keep access to an abortion pill then we're seeing President Biden vice president Harris side by side for the first time in this 2024 campaign season targeting a state they lost last time around North Carolina will explain why plus the new interview with the parents of a Wall Street Journal reporter held behind bar in Russia
accused of spying what Evan gic's mother and father are telling us out of his trial plus a new Vibe check on the economy tonight why boomers are booming their kids not so much the generational money divide coming up a little bit later on in the show hey there I'm hiy and tonight we're starting with that catastrophic bridge collapse in Baltimore and the desperate race happening as we speak defined at least six people still missing in that frigid River some 16 hours after this bridge you're looki
ng at came down it's this moment here just horrifying unimaginable one of the more iconic bridges in the Mid-Atlantic it is just snapping you can see on the left side of your screen that cargo ship slamming into one of the pillars of that bridge it comes crashing down that bridge carried I 695 across the Patapsco eight workers had been fixing potholes on the road when this happened and you can see it here it's one of the busiest ports in America that the ship was coming out of it was on its way
to Sri Lanka apparently lost power but put out a Mayday call before the bridge a made a call that officials credit with potentially saving lives the whole thing to so many just heartbreaking and shocking this is literally the road I travel almost on a daily basis to go over my brother's house um and so when I found out today uh this morning I was like this has to be an April Fool stroke I'm so in shock of this bridge coming down I mean this is unreal President Biden promising late today the fede
ral government is going to help Baltimore rebuild as fast as possible we're going to send all the federal resources they need as we respond to this emergency and I mean all the federal resources and we're going to rebuild that Port together everything so far indicates that this was a terrible accident so an accident right not some sort of malicious act we're know we're learning a little bit about this situation but there's still so many questions we don't have answers to at this moment like why
this Mayday call stopped lots of cars from getting on the bridge potentially but didn't get construction workers off of it in time like whether or not this bridge should have been able to withstand an impact like this although the transportation secretary late today points out the unique circumstances to have a ship this big this huge basically lose control then the other question of course down the road when ships might be able to get through this critical passageway again to the Port of Baltim
ore it's a Lifeline to thousands of jobs in that City and to trade in the region and around the world what is the economic Fallout we've got team coverage with George siss S Antonio Hilton on the ground and Marilyn Tom yamus getting a look at the aftermath from the air I want to get to George first we just heard the governor say this is still a very active search and rescue mission that is the priority and yet here we are pushing 16 plus hours since that bridge collapsed what's the sense of wher
e things stand on that effort yeah absolutely hie and I just checked in with Baltimore City Fire officials tell me this is still search and rescue Baltimore city office of emergency management officials telling me again search and rescue so that is the priority even though this much time has passed in these frigid Waters here on the ground hi what we can really tell you is just the sheer impact is really visible from this angle and I want to show it to you right now if I can this is the cargo ve
ssel right there right up against the Francis Scott Key bridge still partially submerged and around this time of evening you could imagine this would be the evening Rush many people using this bridge to get to and from their job to get to and from work to get home and that's not happening here today and that's s sort of the main headline for so many people people who have been reacting to this today the fact that that bridge is no longer here you you pointed out at the top of the show this is so
important for Commerce for people getting to and from work and just the overall economic impact around the country as this port obviously is so important for Commerce here and again the timeline right now for this investigation we heard from the NTSB chair today who are saying right now they're not even going to board the vessel until they continue those search rescue efforts and so that is a again the priority we know that around 1 before 1:30 this morning that's when the ship reported losing
its power and right around 1:30 or so is when those workers went into that water those uh eight workers we know one of them was rescued one of them still in critical condition at Shock Trauma in Baltimore City and those six Souls still unaccounted for and so that what we've been seeing here on the ground are those vessels in the water those Choppers in the air searching and desperately trying to find any sign of life we know that some of the technology that they're using is sonar and it has dete
cted some vehicles in the water at least that was reported earlier today and again still no sign of those six individuals hie George tell us a little bit more about the scene on the ground there because this all went down in the you know pre- Dawn hours 1:30 in the morning we know that the governor the transportation secretary were awoken in the minutes after that there and you have been there as well for hours tell us more about that piece of it yeah they weren't the only ones that woke up I me
an in this community you have a lot of homes and so many people telling me they heard that their homes were shaking and so a lot of these people heard it before they actually saw it and they come came out here and they really couldn't believe their eyes and then of course that video came out showing that moment of impact that has gone viral and it's been seen around the world at this point people really at a loss for words I Was Here In This Very spot speaking with a man who described it in such
detail and what this loss means for this community take a listen I felt a significant vibration by my house and uh I could have never never imagined that it was the Key Bridge that had just collapsed what' you think it was I thought it was perhaps like a really low flying maybe a military jet perhaps a small earthquake however unlikely that is in in Baltimore Al more than 30,000 people use this uh Bridge daily that's 11 million a year but again right now people not so worried about those number
s officials again saying the priority right now is finding those six individuals that is absolutely clearly the focus George to thank you our Tom yamus has a look from up above of the Fallout on the Patapsco in Baltimore filing this report just not long ago hi we're about 2,000 ft over the Patapsco River right now and just to my left here I can see the dolly that massive cargo vessel that crashed into the Key Bridge from this high the first thing that sticks out is just how massive of this vesse
l was we're talking about 950 ft that's almost the same size as the Empire State Building but one thing you do notice is that on on the surface right on the deck there is not an inch of space it is container after container after container it's stack 10 high I point that out because a long shoreman who I spoke with earlier today who actually helped load the dolly before it took off from the Port of Baltimore said to me you know those container ships are filled with all types of cargo including c
ars so you know when we talk about 8 knots that's how fast the dolly was traveling that's only about 10 mph that may not seem very fast that it would be able to crash into a bridge and this whole thing would collapse but the thing is you have to remember is that that cargo ship was filled with cargo so it weighed so much so when it hit that bridge you're talking about just tons and tons of weight impacting the bridge essentially knocking that those pillars and that's why it collapsed from up her
e the other thing you notice is the amount of sort of uh boats that are still in the water a lot of Coast Guard boats uh a lot of boats from uh Maryland County officials that we can see here Maryland state officials I should say um it's hard to tell whether a rescue operation is still underway um we know that they're still hoping to to find those six people that are missing at this point from up here it doesn't look like it's too active but there are things also that we can't see there there are
are maybe teams still in the water trying to search for those people and or those Vehicles trying to find whatever they can um what you do notice right away though is is that this bridge is completely gone uh I I I heard from someone that it took I think 3 years to build this bridge if not longer it's going to take a long time to repair this and this is a major artery uh here in Baltimore in the greater Baltimore area and it's completely gone right now and and moving that ship and getting that
cargo off that ship and also any of the bins that actually fell into the river as well it's going to be a massive undertaking that's the very latest from where we are right now flying over Baltimore hie I'm going to send it back to you in the studio uh in Washington our thanks to Tom who is now back on the ground you'll be seen him in just a little bit on top story Antonio let me go to you because you're speaking with the mayor of Baltimore tell us more about that conversation because we know an
d as we've talked about the focus is on the search and rescue at some point the question is does that shift a question that the families absolutely don't even want to be asking at this point well H there's absolutely no question for the mayor of Baltimore Brandon Scott the focus is still on the families and search and rescue is still the priority and there he still using that term they haven't turned to search and Recovery which is often the the sort of second stage of the language you would hea
r in this case and that's even as we are starting to hear NBC News has spoken to uh the corporate team behind the company of that the construction workers there late in the early hours of the morning uh that they were associated with that they believe that there's no chance that that these six unaccounted for individuals are still alive they're still holding out hope they have people out on boats even FBI agents have been out on the water today d iers once the sun came up have been giving this e
ffort their all we're also learning because our team at NBC News and also at Telemundo have been speaking to people who are related to or friends with the victims and it appears that most if not all of them may come from immigrant communities here and and really the mayor wants people to focus on that take a listen to some of my conversation with him yes we're talking about an iconic bridge but we're talking about lives of workers who were simply out there uh trying to provide for their families
and make others uh uh Transit better by filling potholes and that's where our thoughts should be right now the mayor is making Mental Health Resources available to anyone in the area who's struggling to process this imagery who may be connected to some of the people who worked with this crew and they want the people here to feel very supported you know the long-term project here is one thing but there are very raw emotions here on the ground and so the mayor is really trying to be someone who's
stepping up to fill that Gap and to support his community in that way Antonia Hilton live for us there just outside of where that bridge collapse happened uh in Maryland thank you very much back here to Washington now with the Supreme Court just a few blocks away from me seeming to Signal today it'll let people keep access to abortion pills with some heavy skepticism from the justices about a push to restrict that access listen to some of it just to confirm uh on the standing issue on under fed
eral law no doctors can be um forced against their consciences to perform or assist in an abortion correct this case seems like a prime example of turning what could be a small lawsuit into a nationwide legislative assembly you need a person you need a person to be able to come in and meet the Court's regular standing requirements who's your person who's your person we're going to get to that more in a second because they're talking about M prone you can see it here one of two pills used in near
ly two-thirds of abortions in this country now there's no decision today right today was just the oral arguments but those arguments Drew crowds of people rallying outside Court chanting with signs with megaphones many of them in favor of abortion rights yamish Alcindor is joining us now okay so yamish why so skeptical why are these justices seeming and sounding so skeptical of this argument trying to restrict access to these pills hie this skepticism really comes down to one word science these
justices over and over again really were questioning whether or not the FDA as an agency that is not just a leading agency in the United States but really around the world why the Supreme Court would really second guess that and there was a really telling exchange between Justice Alo was of course seen as a conservative justice as well as the lawyer for the manufacturer of Miss priton was of course is this medication abortion take a listen to that Exchange the statement was made that no court ha
s ever previously uh second guessed uh the fda's judgment about access to a to a drug right and it's never second guess that that that's correct you think the FDA is infallible no your honor now over and over again we heard the lawyer for the anti-abortion groups who sued the FDA to really stop the the access to this medication abortion to be more widely available they said over and over again that this was really putting women at risk and that this was really also um forcing doctors into a posi
tion that would go against their conscience but the FDA as well as the lawyer for Mr pstone they really did Hammer home at the idea that the FDA had a long rigorous science-based process that the every single step that they took including including approving the the the pill decades ago but also opening up that approval and letting people have it by tellah health as well as by mail over and over again they were really looking at the science here so that's why justices sounded skeptical and you h
eard that over and over again from conservative justices asking questions about the medical procedures here saying overall that this would not really change even if the FDA lost the medical issues here would not change it would just be the accessibility issues hiy so we know that June tends to be kind of the big moments for the Supreme Court towards the end of the term when some of these really high-profile decisions tend to drop obviously we don't know for sure that's just you know how past pre
cedent has worked that said even even if this ruling comes down in June or whenever and even if it is what everybody thinks it is likely to be given the skepticism you've laid out here that's the federal level there's still a lot of challenges at the state level right talk us through that there's certainly a lot of challenges at the state level and I we should put up a map for folks to really understand what's going on here around this country you have a number of States including States like Te
xas like Arkansas like Louisiana Southern States conservative States who have already banned medication abortion then you have a number of states that are saying that it could only be prescribed by clinicians others saying it only could be prescribed by physicians but let's remember this is going to continue to be a moving Target because medication abortion is becoming the most common way that women who are seeking abortions are getting those abortions and research is showing that in the last fe
w years since roie over roie Wade was overturned you've seen that use of medication abortion go up something like six in 10 women if they have an abortion through medication abortion and you've also heard from conservative activists who are just going to continue to hammer home and try to get more wins after getting that really generational win of overturning roie weight so a lot here of course it's also an election year so Democrats are going to be pointing this out over and over again hoping t
o sort of capitalize on the momentum and the anger frankly between some women who are angry at the fact that this medication abortion might not be accessible hiy yamish elendor live for us there outside the Supreme Court yamish thank you for being there right now you've got President Biden and vice president kamla Harris on the trail together for the first time in this 2024 campaign in North Carolina no coincidence it's a big Target for the Biden Camp which sees it as their best chance to pick u
p up one of the states former president Trump Juan back in 2020 take a look at this he had President Biden winning four of the five closest races last election but the fifth closest yes North Carolina where you can see Mr Trump won by just over a percentage Point NBC's Mike memy is with President Biden in Raleigh North Carolina it is an interesting piece of timing here right we just talked with yamish about the issue of Reproductive Rights and abortion access that is expected to be front and cen
ter for democrats for the president for the vice president over the course of the next seven months as they campaign here putting some eggs in the North Carolina basket if you will yeah that's right hie I mean it's not an accident that this event took place on the day of those Supreme Court arguments it's not an accident that this event came just a couple days after the anniversary of the Affordable Care Act and it's not an accident that this is the first of this post State of the Union Road sho
w that the president's been on where vice president Harris who's really taken the lead on abortion rights issues for the administration joined him for this event but there's lot that the Biden team does like about North Carolina you got to play a lot of Defense when you're an incumbent running free election this is a state they think they can go on offense you look at the demographics of North Carolina one of the bigger black populations among the Battleground States obviously a key uh constitue
ncy for President Biden you're also seeing changing demographics you see a real population boom here in the as it's called the triangle uh the economy improving bringing more college educated workers those tend to be at least for the Biden team voters that they think they can win and then you have the salience of the healthare care issue this is why the event here was focused on that take a listen to how the president presented that argument here's what it would mean if they get rid of the ACA b
ecause of Donald Trump and his Mig Republican in Congress 45 million people Nationwide would lose their health insurance including 1.4 million right here in North Carolina now hie another reason that the Biden team feels there's a strong argument to be made for spending a lot of time and resources in North Carolina it's not just the presidential race that's going to matter here you have the lieutenant governor Republican Robinson running against the Democratic attorney general Mark Stein Stein w
as at this event talking about how he has fought to defend the Affordable Care Act we know that there are certainly crossover in terms of the a framing of the presidential race to how the down ballot gubinatorial race is also going to be waged here in North Carolina yeah the former Governor tells NBC news that North Carolina could be this elections Arizona in other words a state that could decide the whole shebang right I wonder um how that plays into things where you are yeah absolutely I mean
You' look at the eight states that Biden campaign has really put its cards on the table since the State of the Union he's visited every one of the states that the Biden team sees as a Battleground State and yes a lot of that includes places like Arizona but let let's just talk about Michigan and North Carolina as it relates to the electoral map right we know the president's vulnerabilities in Michigan state that he only narrowly won four years ago especially as it relates to the war in Gaza the
Arab American population there Michigan has 15 electoral votes you if you lose Michigan but you win North Carolina which has 16 electoral votes well you're actually up an electoral vote as long as you hold the rest big if but that's kind of how the Biden team is looking at this and so this is not the end of the the president's travel here we're going to see him here a lot it's just notable that the type of event he was holding here was uh with a with an audience with a rally style atmosphere was
very different than what he did in Michigan where it was a lot of off the Record type visits without the ability to build a crowd because of course the protests that you often see in Michigan he did have a protest and Interruption here uh made a little bit of news by the way they were asking what about healthcare for for Gaza and the president actually answered back you have a point that's interesting ' just before I let you go there's also some other political news today on the third party fro
nt with RFK Jr announcing his running mate so he's rolling out his VP pick a woman named Nicole Shanahan little known lawyer entrepreneur How concerned is the Biden Camp about the potential that the RFK ticket now the I guess the Kennedy Shanahan ticket could have impact in some of these states where the margins as in North Carolina are just so extremely close that a few thousand votes really could make a difference yeah I mean the first concern depends on where actually RFK is able to get on th
e ballot so we're looking at that ballot access but when you talk about the close margins in these states absolutely a third party candidate could make the difference now the Biden team the DNC had a call today uh to talk about this pick they are very squarely focused on RFK and are going to have a rapid response operation for moments just like this but North Carolina is interesting if you look at that new poll you see that RFK actually takes away from both candidates equally Trump does lead in
both scenarios here but that lead about stays the same because he's pulling just about equal numbers from both candidates at least in this state hi Mike memoy thank you very much lots to cover tonight appreciate it tonight some new details from the parents of Evan gershkovich That Wall Street Journal reporter who according to the paper faces at least another three months in a Russian jail in custody before his trial on Espionage charges of course the US considers kovich wrongfully detained and t
here you see his mother and father sitting down with our own Andrea Mitchell talking about evans's year his year now Behind Bars we knew that it was going to be a marathon but still had hopes that it will be sooner he SP all four seasons there he spent his birthday and all the holidays and we them home as soon as possible remember it's been a year this week since gershkovich is arrest while on a reporting trip NBC's Matt Bradley is following this for us it hurts right to see evans's parents to s
ee gic's parents talking about the pain that they have with their sons still detained in Russia yeah they seem to be doing remarkably well you know they're kind of holding it together here um I was impressed with you know just you can see how weighty this is especially coming on that oneye anniversary as we're seeing today here's a little more of what they said to our own Andrea Mitchell it's hard to feel anything it's hard to uh to think about anything just you stop function in a normal sense i
t's difficult to understand the time you only think about one thing we are keeping ourselves um optimistic that's the best way we can cope with it that it will be next day and maybe next day Som will change and you know we keep hearing them talking about timing the marathon and you know the timing here is so open-ended there's no prison term uh applied to this he hasn't been convicted and that's why decisions like the one that we saw today must be so agonizing for the parents of Evan gershkovich
because you know it's just adding another 3 months onto this is important that pre-trial detention now this is not surprising this is the fifth time that the Russian court has done this extended his pre-trial detention the fact is hie the best thing that Evan gershkovich can hope for right now and his parents definitely know this is to be convicted and to get a prison sentence and to go to prison I know that sounds Twisted to think you know the best thing that could happen for this guy is to be
convicted of Espionage in a Russian court and sent to a Russian Penitentiary but that's the start of a new process here that we saw with Britney Griner a couple of years ago and others where once you get that prison sentence and the Russians have been clear on this that's when you can start negotiating diplomatically so any extension to this he's been in prison jail now for a year that extends the progress the prospect that he could be freed through some kind of negotiation that of course the h
ope for his family and for so many others Matt Bradley live for us overseas thank you more of Andrea's interview with Evan gic's parents will Air Tonight on NBC Nightly News Lester hold will be there in Baltimore uh more on that to come coming up tonight breaking tonight Diddy's team addressing that raid raids plural on his home's plural for the very first time tonight what we're hearing in just the last half an hour or so plus the new court order on former president Trump today what he can and
importantly cannot say about his upcoming [Music] trial we want to get back to that breaking news out of Baltimore with that bridge collapse you're taking a live look now on the left side of your screen at the aftermath there the Executive Vice President of Broner Builders the construction company that had its workers on the bridge that collapsed now tells NBC news that six members of that crew are presumed dead Jeffrey pritzer saying that one survived with the names not released it is a devasta
ting update to a story that we have been covering since it happened about 16 hours ago about 1:30 in the morning when that cargo ship hit one of the pillar at the base of that bridge you see it there and this is the video that we've been showing you of the moment of impact and the collapse after now it is important to note here that this update is coming just hours after Maryland officials said that there was still a very active search and rescue operation happening devastating images of course
happening overnight President Biden promising the feds will help rebuild this bridge we're going to continue to follow these developments we're going to look for more updates now not just from that construction company but from Maryland officials from federal off offal as well we'll bring them to you as we get them we've also got some other breaking news now from out west as we've been on the air we're hearing for the first time from a rep for Diddy Sean comes remember after the feds raided his
houses in California and in Florida we brought it to you as breaking news on this show 24 hours ago with those live Aerials at the time well now those Reps for Combs say that this was and I'm quoting here a gross use of military level force and the Diddy is innocent remember we're just the last couple of minutes were learning that the feds apparently found guns at the homes of combs according to three sources familiar with the matter Diddy is now at the center of this federal investigation with
multiple people being interviewed by federal officials in New York related to allegations of sex trafficking assault and more against the rapper according to it sources tell NBC and that say NBC is learning exclusively that the music producer accusing Diddy of sexual assault and harassment is also accusing actor Cuba Gooding Jr this producer filed the original lawsuit last month accusing k of forcing him to find sex workers and pressuring him into doing sexual things with them now he's saying Go
oding groped and fondled him while they were on comes' yacht no comment from gooding's reps yet Dana Griffin is joining us now but tell us more about what Diddy's reps are saying about all of this here yeah Al they just released a statement within the last hour I'm going to read parts of it they call this a gross overuse of military level Force they go on to say that there is no excuse for the excessive show of force in H ility exhibited by authorities or the way his children and employees were
treated that it also mentions they call this an unprecedented Ambush and also note that this is a premature rush to Judgment of Mr Colmes and it wraps up saying that Mr Colmes is innocent and will continue to fight every single day to clear his name hie what about this lawsuit from the music producer now accusing not just Colmes but Cuba Gooding Jr as well important to note that Gooding has not been charged with any crime talk us through some of that yeah so this producer Rodney Jones amended hi
s lawsuit to now say that Kuba Gooding Jr according to the suit groped him while he was on a yacht in 2023 with Diddy in the Virgin Islands and I want to read part of that as well in the suit he claims that Mr Jones believes Mr Colmes was grooming him to pass him off to his friends he also alleges that he rejected Mr gooding's advances and that Mr Gooding Jor did not stop until Mr Jones forcibly pushed him away now this suit is is has not said a specific amount of Damages but this this this um e
xcuse me this producer says he worked on Diddy's latest album which was released in 2023 it also was nominated for a Grammy so we have reached out to both representatives for Diddy and Kuba Gooding Jr on these latest allegations and we have yet to hear back hie Dana Griffin thank you very much for that let's get you over to the five things our team thinks you should know about tonight number one the judge in the hush money case against former president Trump putting in place a partial gag order
today basically saying that Mr Trump can't talk about Witnesses prosecutors Court staff or jurors in this case now the order does not apply to him commenting on Manhattan da Alvin brag or the judge himself remember that case is set to go to trial next month number two cows in Texas in Kansas testing positive for bird flu according to the feds the first time that this virus has been founding cows officials say the nation's milk supply is safe that the risk to people is low that's because milk fro
m the sick cows is being destroyed number three the British museum taking a former curator to court today for allegedly stealing nearly 2,000 artifacts from its collections remember the museum is one of the most visited in the world it fired the man last year after a whole bunch of things went missing things like ancient gems gold jewelry the museum says it's found hundreds of the missing items so far the former curator denies the allegations number four King Charles and queen Camila will attend
an Easter service at Windsor Castle this Sunday according to Buckingham Palace that'll be the King's first big event since he was diagnosed with cancer just recently officials say other members of the royal family will be there but probably not Prince William and Princess Kate of course after she announced Kate did that she's going through cancer treatment last week number five it's possible that Crispy Cream Donuts may be coming to a McDonald's near you they've been partners for a couple years
now just not in all stores but by the end of 26 McDonald's says it plans to sell crispy creams in all of its restaurants in the country so tonight's original now with in-depth reporting on a topic we've been watching and tonight we're talking about a reading Law in Tennessee that could potentially hold back thousands of fourth graders the law was supposed to make students better readers before they moved on to the next grade but some kids say the policy is putting too much pressure on testing h
ere's Kathy Park 10-year-old Ava Weiss is a fourth grader in Tennessee who says there's one test next month that's giving her a lot of anxiety talk to me about why it stresses you out so much I'm just not a good test taker and I'm like overachieving and I like just wish I could do better she's haunted by the outcome of last year's State assessment known as teap the score on the English language arts section determines whether a third grader is held back a policy under the reading retention law t
hat went into effect last year you took the exam last year and how did you do well I'm pretty sure like almost all of us in my class failed and I failed too Ava was among the 60% of third graders who fell short on the state's reading benchmark but after backlash over the law families were given options to get their child into the fourth grade including summer school tutoring or an appeal which Ava was granted it still affects her emotionally after failing the test last year and just feeling like
she's not as joyful with school not as excited about doing her work as she was before ultimately fewer than 900 students had to repeat the third grade last year roughly 12,000 students moved on to the fourth grade opting for tutoring after falling short on the reading benchmark now those students must show adequate growth on the English language section of the TCAP next month before they can advance to fifth grade at the State Board of Education meeting last year one member projected up to 6,00
0 students could be retained unless the law changed then there would likely be roughly five or 6 thousand fifth graders retained is that Cor right this year I think that's accurate state representative Mark White who chairs the education Administration committee says Tennessee lawmakers are currently reviewing next steps for fourth graders being held back we are amending that particular bill right now everyone believes it's not healthy to hold back a third or fourth grader but at the same time i
t's not healthy to let them go on through high school where let many drop out because school is too hard Tennessee isn't alone in enforcing a third grade reading retention law similar policies are in place in at least 26 States and the District of columia Deborah Reed is a director of the Tennessee reading Research Center students that are not successful readers at the end of third grade about 75% of them will struggle with reading for the rest of their lives ill literacy rates are associated wi
th poor mental health poor physical health of course limited education and limited access to employment Katherine bike is a Knox County School Board member and the mother of a fourth grader who filed an appeal after her son didn't pass the English section of the teap last year so you notice a drastic change after he took that exam absolutely yes he's secretly a perfectionist and um he really holds himself to a high standard and he just started calling himself dumb and stupid and hitting himself
in the head and that was really hard to watch happen as a parent and to not know what to do for that with the next exam just weeks away she says the pressure is building what are the lawmakers missing you think I think that they're missing that these kids are have feelings and emotions and the Damage that's being done I think they're really missing that Kathy Park NBC news our thanks to Kathy for that reporting a lot more when we come back including women sharing their horrifying stories tonight
about men just punching them in the face randomly on the streets of New York what else we're learning about what's happening there plus a wild goose chase through the streets of South Korea I'm sorry a wild ostrich Chase oh yeah that s new data out today shows your age might have a lot to do with how you feel about the economy the consumer confidence index stayed basically the same this month compared to February or in March compared to February but if you deep dive it's really two different st
ories and it depends on how old you are 55 and older you're probably feeling better about the economy under 55 probably worse Christine Roman is joining us to break it down as if we needed one more reason to divide Boomers from Millennials right talk us through it I know well Boomers by the way they probably have a house that has record high home value and they probably have a 401k that has record high stock market value millennial's campire house yeah and they can't get in so you can see they'r
e two very different stages of life in this economy for those two groups let's look at the overall numbers you can see that basically this index is muddling along look at the top that's the present situation how I feel right now and then below that the blue line is expectations how I think things are going to be and the expectations index kind of dragging things down here you know the people who were answering this survey were writing in about food prices and gas prices in the right in part of t
his survey so there's still concerned about that embedded inflation yet when asked about the risks for a recession the recession risks going down so it's super interesting here that that Tweed economy they're worried about the next SHO that's going to drop but things are actually pretty good right now look at that's the recession likelihood declining there pretty dramatically so that's where we sit with this kind of um two-speed economy I would say you know people with a job with savings and wit
h Investments are doing just fine people who can't get into that game are feeling a little left behind twoos speeed economy Christina I like how you put it thank you very much for that we'll see how those numbers change if they do next month appreciate it nice to see you NBC News covers hundreds of international stories every day and because it can be tough to read or watch or listen to them all our teams around the world have done it for you here's a look at what they're watching in a segment w
e call the global out of the UK Julian assange's extradition to the US put on hold today after a high court said America had to provide assurances that the WikiLeaks founder would not face the death penalty remember Assange is facing multiple spy charges in the US official say he put lives at risk after publishing classified military documents the court says if the US does not respond with 3 weeks Assange can appeal his extradition at a May hearing out of South Korea look at this a wild ostrich
Chase officials got it after it escape from a local Zoo but not before an hour weaving through traffic dodging cars look at it it looks elegant actually weaving its way through the streets they netted him that's how they caught the ostrich safely returning him to his habitat and in France the official stamps of this Summer's Olympics getting unveiled little Art Deco vibe there the Eiffel towel Tower rather the main river that goes through Paris French Postal Service says it's making 800,000 of t
hem for you stamp collectors who are absolutely dying to get your hands on those to New York now a man tonight charged there with murder for what police say was an unprovoked attack on the subway you see the suspect you're about to there he is in custody after that arrest today the scary scene inside a subway station in Harlem look at that police everywhere here's what we know that it happened during rush hour right as we were coming off the air last night T night the victim was pushed onto the
tracks was pronounced dead at the scene the suspect reportedly has a history of arrests and mental illness according to the New York Times Stephen Romo is joining us now and it plays into what is perhaps a perception problem about safety on the New York City subway system the governor has tried to address it the data shows crime overall is going down but talk us through the reality here yeah hi there have been several major Transit crimes that have gotten a lot of headlines but you're right the
data actually shows that crime has dipped a bit looking at the data from transit crimes from 2022 to 2023 down about 3% and take a look at this month compared with March of 2023 down 15.5% but if you were just going from social media and what we're talking about it might be hard to believe those numbers just two weeks ago we had an incident with a man who got on the subway without paying he argued with some passengers before fighting one of them ultimately dropping a gun that he was shot with th
at caused a lot of alarm it Le left him badly injured that passenger who pulled the trigger not expected to face any charges but it's incidents like that that have led Governor Kathy hok to deploy New York City Police and National Guard troops as well in the subway to try to help a divisive move bringing privacy concerns because of bag searches that are happening but ultimately it may be too soon to tell if that's actually helping I ride the subway I talk to people on the subway and they are con
cerned lot of times about crime as it plays out as we talk about crime more broadly in the city there's this thing that's been happening that's caught the attention of our team here because these women I think mostly younger women are are putting these videos up saying that something pretty disturbing has happened to them and it it feels like a pattern let me play a little bit of it I was literally just walking and a man came up and punched me in the face I literally just got punched by some man
on the sidewalk so somebody punching women in the face what do we know about about this can these be this be verified is this an issue what's the deal yeah those two incidents we have verified with the New York City Police Department but there are even more incidents more videos frankly frankly that we're looking into right now some people are injured in them this is causing a lot of alarm as you can imagine those two incidents we can tell you more about police confirming yesterday a 23-year-ol
d woman was walking around 10: a.m. near Chelsea when she was hit in the head we could see it there in the video she had injuries to the right side of her face and then last Sunday the 17th near so blocks away from that scene police say a 25-year-old woman was walking her dog when an unknown person punched her in the head now she thankfully did not appear to be injured from that the New York City Police Department not yet able to tell us whether these incidents are related there are I can tell y
ou other incidents we're looking into as well that are similar some of them have some uh differences in there but it is chilling to think about just walking around and being sucker punched in the face more uh New York City crime that is making headlines right now Hy Steven Romo thank you so much when we come back a new lawsuit against hospitals who employed a Serial sexual predator the emotional reaction from one of the victims only right here on NBC [Music] News Tonight a law firm says it's fil
ed its first lawsuit against some Chicago hospitals on behalf of an alleged sexual assault Survivor saying the hospitals chose profits over patient safety allowing a sexual predator to prey on patients ignoring warning sign after warning sign the firm says it represents hundreds more alleged victims women reported that Ortega's examinations felt more sexual than medical these Healthcare institutions did not just turn a blind eye to the abuse that was happening in front of them they enabled a sex
ual predator they gave him a platform and they gaslit the women who continued to come forward and Report what was going on there Dr Fabio Ortega was a Chicago OBGYN who pleaded guilty to sexually abusing two of his patients during exams sentenced to three years in prison in 20121 this lawsuit now alleges it goes further than that trying to hold the hospitals where he worked accountable saying they negligently hired supervised and retained a known Predator NBC's Maggie vesa who's been following t
his story these are obviously extremely concerning allegations I know you spoke with one of the victims right tell us more yeah so she is a 49-year-old mother of two from Mexico who said she wanted to remain anonymous because she told us that her children her two adult daughters don't know at this point what happened to their mother but again as you said she says hie she's one of the 300 plus who attorneys mention in this lawsuit that lawsuit is filed on behalf of one woman Jane Doe 300 the woma
n that we talked to is not Jane do 300 attorneys tell us simply they're going suits uh one by one sort of Survivor by Survivor and they say more suits are coming but she is quoted in the lawsuit as are several women her story in particular saying that she was abused by Dr Ortega and that years later after she stopped seeing him because of the abuse she says that an employee at NorthShore Hospital one of the two named in this suit called her this was like in 2018 and told her that Dr Ortega had r
etired and she said she didn't know that that's interesting to know thank you for the information the suit goes on to say what they didn't tell her was that he had had his license revoked after he had been charged with criminal sexual abuse the charges that we later saw he was convicted on so now knowing kind of how widespread this is and now knowing she believes based on what these attorneys say they found that this was kept from patience she say she is angry and that's why she's speaking out t
ake a lesson the allegation is they definitely should have been doing far more to protect patients what's that emotion like how does that make you feel to read angry where this case is going now Angry Angry Angry Angry because they knew what was going on I didn't say anything there are few people in my you know Circle that they know about this if there were a complaining before I went to see him you know before me you know what happened to Me Maybe you know maybe couldn't I mean I couldn't be ni
ght not couldn't be not happening to me you know and hi our viewers might have guessed from that sound bite our interviewee is a Spanish speaker and a lot of these women attorneys say are Latina they're predominantly Spanish speaking and they were sent they say to Dr Ortega because he spoke Spanish so a lot of them that kind of adds another layer you can imagine as to why attorneys say they didn't speak out and they allege why the hospitals didn't take their complaints seriously so now this is n
ow a massive windfall that attorneys believe the doctor never thought would come to fruition hie so then what are we hearing from the hospital so the hospitals have gotten back to us with the state but it's interesting we're talking about two separate hospitals previously they're now owned by the same healthc care group so that group in De Health which represents now NorthShore University Health System and Swedish Covenant Health got back to us with the statement say they have no tolerance for a
buse of any kind they recognize the tremendous strength and the courage this takes to come forward they believe trust is earned and they'll always look for opportunities to demonstrate the commitment to those highest standard standards of care they went on to say they have actually improved their policies for investigating and kind of lending Credence to these types of complaints we also should note that we reached out to the doctor including his former attorneys both in his criminal case and ot
her civil cases that have been brought against him haven't gotten a response yet that doctor is out of prison so we will let you know if that changes Maggie vesa thank you very much if you or somebody you know has experienced a sexual assault help is available look at what's on your screen here 1800 656 hope that's 1800 656 4673 you can catch more of Maggie's interview coming up on top story at 7 o'clock Eastern right here on NBC News Now for us for this hour we've got a lot more coverage pickin
g up right now thanks for watching stay updated about breaking news and top stories on the NBC News app or follow us on social media
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