good morning, 11:00 a.m., eastern, 8:00 a.m. pacific, i'm josé diaz-balart, right now in new york, a grand jury is considering whether to indict,

donald trump. and jurors are expected to hear from a new witness today. we'll tell you who that is and why his testimony could be important to the case. plus, another emergency rescue effort in an attempt to curb panic in the markets. details on the deal involving sw switzerland's largest bank. xi jinping is in moscow right now and just met with vladimir putin. xi's new comments this morning about why he's there. 20 years ago today the u.s. invaded iraq. we are live in baghdad with the scars from that war still felt today. we'll also talk to congressman jason crow who served in iraq and now says there should be no more blank checks for the military. and back at home, deadly violence erupts during spring break in miami beach. we're live with how the city is cracking down. ♪♪ and we begin with the very latest on the investigations

surrounding former president donald trump. a new york city grand jury could hear from what could be the final witnesses in its investigation into a $130,000 hush money payment made before the 2016 election to adult film actress stormy daniels who claims she had an affair with trump. grand jurors are expected to hear today from attorney robert costello who was a legal adviser to former trump attorney michael cohen who was directed by trump to make that payment. cohen told msnbc he will return to the district attorney's auchs today to stand by as a rebuttal witness. this comes days after trump predicted he would be arrested tomorrow on tuesday and called on his supporters to protest. a trump spokesperson later clarifying the former president has not been notified he will be charged. trump has denied any wrongdoing and is accusing manhattan district attorney alvin bragg of a partisan witchhunt. bragg hasn't publicly responded

to the criticism, but he told staff in an email, quote, your safety is a top priority. nbc news correspondent vaughn hillyard in west palm beach, florida, nbc news correspondent garrett haake outside the courthouse in new york city, and paul butler former federal prosecutor, now a professor at the georgetown university law center. he is also an msnbc legal analyst. so garrett, what do we know about what we can expect to play out in the building behind you today? >> reporter: jose, new york law allows for a targeted grand jury investigation or a witness recommended by that target to get a chance to talk to a grand jury before any decisions on an indictment will be made. and that's who robert costello will be for the trump attorneys today. costello's sole mission appears to be to try to undermine the credibility of michael cohen. everything we know centers around michael cohen at the center of those hush money payments in 2016. costello as a former legal

advisory to cohen is expected to testify about michael cohen and about why he believes cohen's not credible. that's why the d.a. has cohen essentially in his back pocket able to respond to costello today and defend the testimony that he's already given this grand jury including over five hours just last week. so i think what this tells us is we're very near to the end of this process. trump's attorneys are going to take one last swing at undermining the prosecution's primary witness behind closed doors today, and frankly, it wouldn't surprise me if costello also can repeat some of what he says behind closed doors out in public. if anybody knows about kind of waging your legal battles in public, it's donald trump and his attorneys. that's what we're likely to see play out behind closed doors today and in the court of public opinion as this case continues to move forward. >> vaughn, give us a reminder of what this specific case is all about in the first place. >> right, this all comes down to

a payment made to stormy daniels for $130,000 in the weeks before the 2016 presidential election. of course the concern here and why election law and the potential violation of it is being addressed is because the argument is that if the story of stormy daniels alleged affair with donald trump, which he has denied, had come out, it could have influenced the outcome of the 2016 presidential election. that is why if the district attorney were to try to elevate this here to a felony from the misdemeanor, as an extension of those falsification of those business records and what that $130,000 was actually paid for, then it could translate to a potential election law violation, which would be a low level felony here in this particular case. stormy daniels was at the heart of this with michael cohen who received checks from donald trump throughout 2017, while donald trump was in the white house, paying michael cohen,

cohen alleges, for that payment in 2016 to stormy daniels. the question here is what sort of corroborating evidence backs up michael cohen's claims that donald trump knew that this payment was going before to stormy daniels for the payment of essentially silencing her story and a potentially damaging story against him. >> paul, just kind of breaking this down. how unusual is it for the defense to request a rebuttal witness at this stage? >> so in new york, defendants can present their own witnesses to the grand jury to try to head off charges. it's unlikely to work. it's really kind of a last ditch effort by the trump team. jose, costello isn't just a concerned citizen coming forward. he's represented people like steve bannon and rudy giuliani who are close to donald trump, and here his goal seems to be to get the grand jury not to indict trump.

michael cohen waived his attorney/client privilege to allow costello to talk to the grand jury, which suggests that cohen isn't too worried about what he's going to say. >> and paul, i'm just wondering, what would happen if the grand jury were to indict trump but on a misdemeanor instead of a felony, if they indicted him at all. let's say it was a misdemeanor, what would that mean? >> so he could still be arrested and then the circumstances of trump's arrest in new york law enforcement is something that would have to be negotiated by the manhattan d.a. and by trump's defense team. i think if it's a misdemeanor, there would be more political consequences than legal consequences. the legal procedure would be just the same. trump would have his mug shot taken. he would be fingerprinted, read his miranda warnings including that he has the right to remain silent, which might be kind of difficult for donald trump. in new york, one difference,

jose, would be people who get arrested for felonies are usually handcuffed, regardless of whether it's a felony or not, i doubt that that will happen to trump, and i'm also not expecting a perp walk where the former president will be paraded before the media. if charges are brought, as much as the d.a. would want to treat this like any other case, they're just unique security concerns including that the defendant would have a secret service detail. >> and vaughn, how much will michael cohen's credibility play a part in what's happening here? >> reporter: right, this is a major factor. michael cohen is the key witness in this investigation. he was donald trump's former lawyer and fixer, the one who paid that initial $130,000 to stormy daniels, and yet, as the u.s. attorney's office in the southern district of new york laid out in its own case against michael cohen in 2018, they repeatedly noted that he had a

pattern of deception. that over the course of years he had consistently lied at the benefit of not only donald trump but also himself. he also was found guilty as part of his plea agreement in 2018 to lying to congress in 2017. even a judge in march of 2020 rejected his plea to have his sentencing reduced saying that after his initial sentencing that he had continued to offer misleading and false statements. all of that said, michael cohen pushes back hard against this, essentially making the case that he since then, since his guilty plea has testified hundreds of hours under oath to the new york attorney general's office, to the manhattan district attorney's office, to the special counselor, robert mueller's probe. had is a man here who is at the heart of this relationship here with donald trump, and yet, we should note it was at the time of his sentencing that robert

mueller in a letter to the judge at the time said that he did believe that michael cohen had offered up credible testimony. at the same time, he stopped short of making him a cooperating witness because of some of these questions here at hand, and now as michael cohen goes before, you know, potentially the grand jury here yet again today, it's going to be jurors that ultimately decide whether there is enough corroborating evidence to indict the former president based off -- largely off of michael cohen's initial testimony, and to note exactly what do they have in their possession? we don't have all the answers to that. we do know that michael cohen has publicly released checks from donald trump to him in 2017 for the stormy daniels payments here, and when he entered that plea agreement back in 2018, we as the public never was able to see what federal prosecutors had in their possession, as potentially some of that

corroborating evidence because the trial for michael cohen never actually went to court. so that is where there's a lot of questions as to what these -- the district attorney may have presented as part of this case and what they may have against donald trump. >> how is new york city preparing for the possibility that trump could be indicted in the next couple of days? >> law enforcement officials in new york have been preparing for this possibility since at least late last week. we know according to two law enforcement sources that there's going to be an intra-agency meeting to try to discuss how they would handle moving a former president around in lower manhattan, if he were to come here to be arraigned, and how they might handle potential protests. new york city police department is one of the most prepared police departments in the country, if not the world, to handle the kind of large scale disruptions that frankly they see in this town maybe once a week. this is the kind of thing that they plan for with secret service, state and federal law enforcement agencies, and i suspect we'll see a pretty

robust law enforcement response not just downtown but perhaps across the whole city if and when we get to that point. >> vaughn hillyard, garrett haake, and paul bbutler, thank you. turning to the latest on wall street where fears are still lingering over the stability of the banking sector. this morning credit suisse's shares are still down after swiss banking giants ubs stepped in to purchase its long-time rival. when the markets opened after receiving a downgrade in its credit rating. let's take a look at where things stand at the dow jones. up 330 points, and that's right now at an increase of just over 1% the total trading. up 326 points. joining us now with more is cnbc global markets reporter seema mody. what do people need to know about this deal between ubs and credit suisse? >> thanks to ubs swooping in

with this $3.2 billion deal, a full-on collapse of credit suisse has been avoided. that is good news for europe. the overall banking, system, and it shows the ability to get teels deals done in a fast manner. it prompted respondent from the federal reserve and european central bank announcing last night really moving quickly to increase the total dollars available to major banks. it's widely seen as a move to instill confidence in a sector that certainly needs it. back here in the u.s., the situation is still fluid, with shares of first republic down again today. >> speaking of that, i mean, it is set tomorrow, amid these developments in the banking sector, what can we expect? >> there are a wide range of expectations.

consensus is for a quarter percent rate hike versus the half a percent on the table last week. goldman sachs is predicting a hold that is no interest rate hike whatsoever due in part to have the banking turmoil that has come to light in the past week. experts argue with inflation still high at 6%, the fed is really inclined to embark on another rate increase. this of course will be the first time we hear from chair jerome powell since he testified in front of congress just two weeks ago, and a lot has changed since then, jose. >> amazon set to lay off 9,000 more workers in the coing weeks? >> yeah, that's right. weakness across the tech industry with amazon announcing yet another plan to lay off, this time 9,000 workers. and it follows cuts previously announced. this is a trend we've been seeing across silicon valley and the tech industry as it braces for a slowdown.

last week, meta ceo mark zuckerberg announcing plans to lay off about 10,000 staffers. jose. >> seema mody, thank you very much. good seeing you. china's xi jinping and russia's vladimir putin together in moscow today. we'll break down why she is there and what putin is helping to get from this visit. and later, how iraq is faring today 20 years after the u.s. invaded. our very own richard engel is back in baghdad. >> reporter: it's hard to believe that this is what baghdad looks like today. people are back out onto the streets. think he's posting about all that ancient roman coinage? no. he's making real-time money moves with merrill. so no matter what the market's doing, he's ready. and that's... how you collect coins. your money never stops working for you with merrill, a bank of america company. ♪♪ inner voice (kombucha brewer): if i just stare at these payroll forms... my business' payroll taxes will calculate themselves.

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18 past the hour. right now china's xi jinping is in moscow since the russian invasion of ukraine last year. moments ago, vladimir putin welcomed xi at the kremlin. there you see him. in brief remarks, putin said that he had looked at xi's proposal to resolve the war in ukraine. two days ago vladimir putin made his first known visit to the russian of occupied city of mariupol, a day after the criminal court issued an arrest warrant for him. joining us now is nbc's matt bradley in kyiv. also with us, richard stengel, former under secretary of state for public diplomacy and affairs. and an msnbc political analyst. what has the reaction been like in ukraine after this xi, putin

meeting? >> that's a good question. we asked the foreign ministry what is your reaction, and they said they weren't going to comment until after the meeting was over. there is some talk there might be a phone call between xi jinping and volodymyr zelenskyy. it really does look as though the ukrainians don't want to say too much right now. and that's because they're copping what looks to be like a wait-and-see attitude. i think if the ukrainians had thought that xi jinping and vood vladimir putin were on the same page when it comes to this war, that the ukrainians might have blasted this meeting, might have criticized it more before it even happened. instead it looks like they're taking the posture that we're seeing from diplomats throughout the entire world. they are just on tenter hooks waiting to see, there might be

some daylight between these two men. remember, beijing, even though we're seeing that xi jinping is on side with vladimir putin, he has yet to really come out with a strong statement either way on this war. he came out with a proposed peace plan, a list of principles last month. kyiv rejected that as being too close or too favorable to moscow. it looks as though diplomats here might be hoping that they could clooef some sort of division between putin and xi. xi has already proposed a peace plan. the reason why it was rejected in kyiv is because it would essentially make for silencing the guns and possibly awarding all of the land that russia has already taken from ukraine. the thing that everybody's waiting for here is whether or not china will be giving weapons to russia. that could be a sea change, a paradigm shift in this war as it

enters a second year. >> indeed it would be. rick, what's your read on this xi, putin meeting? what are they trying to accomplish here? >> well, putin is trying to accomplish the idea that he isn't completely ostracized on the world stage. you have the leader of the world's second largest economy coming to visit him for three days, so he's saying, look, i'm not out of it like you folks in the west bank, and for xi jinping, you know, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. xi jinping sees the u.s. as its greatest obstacle to global dominance. that's the same way that putin sees the u.s. they want to be in league together. i think it's a very short high temperature -- short-sighted view by xi jinping. his economy dwarfs the size of the russian economy. he has relations with people

across the world stage. he is meeting with a man who was indicted by the international criminal court for war crimes. i mean, i don't think that's such a great strategy. >> yeah, and i mean, the fact is that xi went to moscow, not putin to, you know, beijing. what's been the response on the ground to putin's trip to mariupol over the weekend? >> yeah, i mean, that was considered extremely provocative because mariupol isn't just a city to ukrainians. it's a symbol of resistance. remember, the steel plant where for weeks thousands of defenders and their families were holed up there, resisting. they were the final last part of that city to be taken by the russians. and then there was also that incident only a year ago this month when the russians bombed a theater, what's thought to be thousands of civilians had been seeking reing refuge. that is the most deadly attack

against civilians in this year year-long wur. mariupol, putin touring it is a slap in the face to ukraine's since of resistance, to national identity. it was almost seen as a leader walking through his vang wished land. vladimir putin did this under the cover of night. we heard a woman shouting out this is all a fake while we saw this happening. these were optics that might have played well here. that were seen by a lot of folks here as, you know, kind of, yes, sort of a president who is trying show off what he's conquered, but at the same time the fact that he had to do it at night, the fact that he was driving himself around, it looked a bit affected. it looked like a man who had something to prove and not necessarily triumphant as vladimir putin was hoping the optics would show. >> last week on this program, the petro poroshenko said that

china needs to listen to ukraine. he was expecting some communication between china and president zelenskyy or others in the ukrainian government. china has been stepping into different diplomatic efforts. last week it was the key player in saudi arabia having relations with iran. i'm just wondering, how do you see china playing a bigger role in these conflicts and in these negotiated agreements? >> yes, jose, it's a good question. part of the reason for xi's visit is that he wants to be seen as a great diplomat on the world stage. as you mentioned, china was important to the kind of -- between saudi arabia and iran. part of the reason, as you mentioned, that the -- and as matt said, that the ukrainians are not telegraphing anything, they're waiting. they do think that there is some daylight between xi and

president putin. i mean, xi jinping isn't, you know, crazy. he doesn't necessarily want to throw his lot in with a war criminal, and the other thing he's realized and the chinese military has realized, is that russia is not the hyper power they have built themselves up at. russian weapons are not working very well. they didn't march into kyiv so he doesn't necessarily want to have an alliance with somebody who's a second rate power, a second rate military power, a second rate diplomatic power. he wants to be seen as someone who can actually solve this even though, as we've discussed, his proposal kind of would solidify the status quo, which is unacceptable to the u.s. and unacceptable to the ukrainians. >> matt bradley and richard stengel, thank you both so much. coming up, the u.s. invaded iraq 20 years ago. we're live in baghdad, and we'll hear what college students want the world to know about iraq

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despite deep scars from war and turmoil, iraq is showing signs of hope. nbc's richard engel sat down with college students in baghdad where they shared what they want people to know about their country. >> how is life in iraq these days? >> we need to change the world idea. you can see we are living in peace. >> freedom to speak, freedom to live, freedom to do anything. >> we have the future of iraq. iraqis need us. >> joining us now with more is nbc news chief foreign correspondent richard engel live in baghdad. pretty amazing how time passes. you were there 20 years ago today. you've been there so much. but take us back to how it was then and how you're seeing it today. >> reporter: so how it was then 20 years ago at this time, the u.s. invasion was just beginning. it started with the shock and awe campaign.

i was here. i was staying in the palestine hotel, which is just over there. actually, if we flip the camera around, you can see it. it's that tall hotel right over there, and that had an amazing view. still has an amazing view over saddam hussein's palace complex, an area that now became the green zone. so from that building, i was able to watch the invasion. actually, if you remember all those iconic images of the skyline in iraq lighting up as the -- as u.s. forces were targeting the command and control infrastructure, air defenses. those pictures were taken right from there, and then where we are right now is the culmination when baghdad fell several weeks after the bombing campaign, as u.s. troops were driving up from kuwait and finally arrived here in baghdad, u.s. troops were coming down this street. they pulled up on that corner.

they stopped, and they pulled down saddam hussein's statue which was right in the middle of this traffic circle, right in the middle of this square. there's really nothing left of it. just a tiny bit of the base, there's no sign, no marking of any kind. iraqis are not really celebrating saddam's past here. all of the former palaces have been converted into either museums or parks or entertainment centers or that clip you were just using before of those students, they were at one of saddam's palaces, the water palace for american soldiers who may know that place, it actually is where is a dam husain was in prison for a while and now it is the american university in baghdad. it has gone through a tremendous transformation. not all of it positive.

in the middle between where i am now 20 years later and the invasion, this country went through a horrible, bloody civil war that was unleashed by the american invasion. a civil war that american troops found themselves in the middle of trying to keep the two sides apart. but here we are 20 years later, and iraqis are trying to turn a page, and from what i've been able to see over the last several case days, talking to people, visiting more different locations, it seems like there's a lot more stability and a will to try and build a new future that is not just a future based on saddam hussein or a future based on the secretariat civilian. >> richard engel in baghdad, i thank you so much. it's great seeing you my friend. for more we're joined by democratic congressman jason

crow, served in iraq and afghanistan. as someone who served in iraq, what do you want people to know about the human toll of this war? >> reporter: good morning. first of all, i want to just express to my fellow combat veterans, thank you for doing everything you did to fulfill your duty. sometimes veterans look back over the 20 years, my fellow guys asked the question, what did we do? what was it all about? it's really important that veterans not confuse their individual service with the politics and the policy and the debates that happen in washington about these wars because our young men and imwith stood up. they raised their right hand, they did their job, they fulfilled their duty with honor and integrity and they should be proud of that. i am proud of that. the debate that has to happen in washington is we gave a blank

check to four different administrations. ten congresses did this, and we lost our way in iraq, we lost our way in afghanistan. we lost our sense for what the mission was and we relied too much on military power is and less on our other forms of influence, diplomatic, humanitarian aid, our moral authority, and it didn't turn out well in both cases. it's really important we now have that discussion again. >> just wondering what do you think were the biggest mistakes committed? granted, a military operation, 20 years ago there was richard engel reminding us of what he was witnessing at this exact hour 20 years ago today, but there was also billions and billions and billions of dollars sent to iraq, spent in that part of the world. what do you think were the biggest mistakes committed over these last 20 years? >> well, between iraq and afghanistan temperatures actually trillions of dollars, thousands of lives, that's just the american lives, not counting

the hundreds of thousands of afghans and iraqis who have died over the last 20 years. the biggest mistake is we focused too much on military power. we have generals that have a can-do attitude. you will never find a general who says i'm sorry, we can't win this. that's not military culture. i spent the formative years of my life as a young officer. from the first days of basic training and officer training, it's drilled into you mission first. you can always get it done. you will accept, you know, no failure as an answer. you will get the mission done regardless of the cost. that's what generals do. they come to you and they say, yeah, of course i can do this, you gif me more tanks, more af crafts, more troops, i'll be able to get it done. that's why we have civilian control of the military flt that's why we have elected officials accountable to the people who say you know what,

maybe we can't get this done, and maybe it's not in our best interests to continue to throw troops at the problem and hundreds of billions of dollars at the problem. so we need them actually to reinvigorate the conversation in congress. it's congress that has the responsibility in our constitution to decide matters of war and peace. we gave these authorization for use of military force to multiple administrations and then we stopped having the debate. it's time for us to pull those back, repeal them, replace them and start that national conversation. >> congressman, i thank you so much for being with us. really appreciate your time. >> thank you. coming up, we're just getting new developments in the investigations surrounding donald trump. what we just learned that trump's legal team is doing in georgia. and that investigation. plus, florida governor ron desantis just broke his silence about trump's investigation in manhattan, what he said next. you're watching "josé diaz-balart reports" on msnbc.

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40 past the hour, we have breaking news, former president trump's georgia attorneys have filed a motion to quash the special grand jury report and stop the district attorney's office from prosecuting him. this all surrounds the investigation into trump's efforts to overturn the election in georgia in 2020. joining us now nbc's blayne alexander. good morning, what do we know? >> reporter: jose, this is a filing that just came out today, just a couple of hours ago, and essentially attorneys for former president donald trump are seeking three things. one, they want this entire report from the special purpose grand jury to be quashed and they want any sort of evidence or any information that came from it to be deemed unconstitutional. the other thing that they're seeking is to stop the d.a. hearing in fulton county, d.a. fani willis from investigating, further investigating or prosecuting the former president. what they're trying to do is

discredit this entire process saying there were different things along the way that kind of made this improper, say that this was done improperly. among the things they're citing is the interview that i did, that nbc news did with the foreperson of the special purpose grand jury. they're also citing media statements and even social media activity they say from fulton county d.a. fani willis. what's interesting about this, jose, even though we've been covering this for the better part of a year, that this stemmed for more than eight months or so this is the first official time attorneys have become involved in this. they put out a statement saying they were never asked to testify, with this first official filing, this becomes the first time they've really stepped into this process here in georgia, jose. >> blayne alexander, thank you so very much. we also have new developments in another investigation into former president donald trump. moments ago nbc news obtained letters from three house

committee chairmen sent to manhattan district attorney alvin bragg asking him to testify before their panels on his investigation into trump's hush money payment to an adult film actress. it comes as florida governor ron desantis just broke his silence on a possible trump indictment. here's some of what he said. >> if you have a prosecutor who is ignoring crimes happening every single day in his jurisdiction, and he chooses to go back many, many years ago to try to use something about porn star hush money payments, you know, that's an example of pursuing a political agenda and weaponizing the office, and i think that that's fundamentally wrong. >> with us now to talk more about this is former florida congressman carlos, it's great seeing you. with these three chairmen

sending this letter to the d.a. in new york and the governor of florida saying that this was a political kind of activity going on versus a legal one, what's your reaction to that? >> well, look, obviously congress and people in public office have the right to question other people in public office. so that's understandable. now, it's clear here, though, that these individuals have been pressured into defending former president trump, and this is what happens in the republican party every day, jose. there is this intense pressure to show loyalty to donald trump. so yes, some of these elected officials might have legitimate questions about this prosecution, but at the same time, they're acting under duress. they need to show to their base voters that they're loyal to donald trump. >> how is this playing to those base voters? and i'm talking more about the possible indictment of the former president, maybe as early as tomorrow, could be a misdemeanor, could be a felony, could be nothing, but how does that play? >> well, jose, for donald

trump's supporters, he's always the victim. i mean, donald trump himself said i could walk out in the park avenue in manhattan and shoot someone and everything would be fine. that does describe the average trump supporter. now, there are a lot of swing voters in this country who actually decide elections. they don't make up the base of either party, and those voters have less of a tolerance for donald trump, his behavior, and his antics, and we saw those voters punish republican candidates in the 2022 midterms. >> we haven't heard from republican candidate nikki haley, desantis just spoke on it now. is there a danger politically for some of these folks just for not talking about it? >> you know, it's a trap that republicans face, jose. they have to be loyal to trump, but they can't operate in the shadow of trump. how do you beat donald trump if you're operating in his shadow. at the same time, you do have to distinguish yourself, but if you distinguish yourself too much,

then you lose credibility with that trump base, and you're going to need some of those votes. so this is a careful balancing act. some would call it an impossible high wire act that some of these candidates have to try to pull off. ron desantis hasn't said anything for days. the trump base pressured him. today he came out and attacked the new york d.a. he also in a very discreet way, i think, criticized donald trump saying that he can speak to the details of how someone pays hush money to a porn star. >> house speaker mccarthy did make some waves over the weekend. he tweeted that congress should investigate manhattan district attorney alvin bragg who was leading the investigation into this hush money payment. is this a defining moment statement for the speaker? >> well, speaker mccarthy relied on donald trump to get the votes to become speaker. so again, speaker mccarthy is showing his loyalty to donald trump because he's being

pressured to do so. i wouldn't be surprised if the trump team specifically asked him to put out this kind of statement. >> former congressman carlos curbelo, it's always a pleasure to see you. >> thank you, jose. two people are dead after a weekend of violence of spring break in miami beach. we're live with the measures officials are now taking to try to keep people safe. plus, how one school along the u.s./mexico border is helping families waiting for asylum. you're watching josé diaz-balart reports.

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one of the implications and long-term prospects for the curfews, first of all, the very likely scenario, and we'll see it later this week, from thursday to monday the miami beach commission is going to reinstitute, and they said it's likely it will happen given the fact they had to impound 70 firearms over the last few weeks. people will have to leave businesses, hotels can continue serving guests, but no one else. the longer-term implications are the fact that council members are going to be looking at whether or not they can continue to operate spring break in the traditional sense because of the sheer amount of violence. we spoke with a woman who witnessed one of the shootings over the weekend. here's how she described the scene. >> when a fight broke out, when everybody is gathered, it kind of takes a long time to travel.

so once everybody saw that it was a whole brawl, i guess someone decided to just start shooting and then everyone started running. >> reporter: and, jose, this is despite the fact that there was the presence of hundreds of police officers on the streets as this is happening, and to be very clear about one thing, it's not college students or residents of miem 'beach, it's young adults who have come and decided they're going to proceed with some level of criminality and the city is trying to stop that. >> sam brock on south beach, thank you very much. also here in miami over the weekend, the national cuban baseball team played against the u.s. during the world baseball classic semifinal. some protested across miami ahead of the game saying the regime is using the match at propaganda. protesters held signs reading fatherland and life, a few protesters even ran onto the field, including this one who had a sign calling for freedom

for all political prisoners on the cuban flag. there are more than 1,000 political prisoners in cuba. the u.s. team defeated cuba 14-2 and will advance to the championship game tomorrow. turning to the situation along the southern border and how a school has stepped up to help those families who await asylum in the united states, a sidewalk school offers classes in mexico five days a week to kids of asylum seekers, providing an education and healthy food as they await the asylum process to play out. joining us is the founder of the sidewalk school. thank you for being with us. talk to us about what a day is like for students at that school. >> it's very difficult. as you know, the app is how

asylum seekers are supposed to legally cross, so we see our students right after their parents try to make the appointments, so they come in, usually sad, but they eat breakfast, we do math, reading, art classes, dance classes, and then it's lunchtime, and then we start school back up again and school ends every day at 2:00 p.m. >> felicia, where are most of these kids from and is there a constant flow of kids who come in and then kids who leave? how is that? >> it is very fluid, definitely, yes. at its highest point at the encampment we had over 2,000 people living inside the

encampment, so the numbers do fluctuate. but we still have at least 50 or more students a day, because they do come here to eat. this is how they eat every day. >> felicia, how can we help you? >> please donate to the sidewalk school or any other ngo that works along the border. there are seven encampments where you have people from all over the world living outside in tents and dirt, with their children. i wish more americans were aware of what's happening here at the border. >> yeah, absolutely. it's fundamental that we continue shining a light. i thank you for what you do and i thank you for being with us this morning. that wraps up the hour for

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right now on "andrea mitchell reports" an unexpected new witness before the new york grand jury investigating donald trump's alleged hush money payments to