u.s. and china deteriorated to their lowest point in decades. real tension, particularly over taiwan. secretary of state antony blinken speaking today with his russian counterpart sergey lavrov. as cnn learned exclusively of plans under way for a prisoner swap, trading convicted russian arms dealer viktor bout for detained wnba star brittney griner and marine veteran paul whelan. we re watching that closely. let s begin with the new gdp numbers, cnn chief business correspondent christine romans is here with more. christine, break down, a lot of numbers not just you but economists follow, this headline number is not good. this is gdp gross domestic product. it is the largest gauge of the size of the economy and it this rank 0.9% in the second quarter. this is a rear view mirror looking picture, and that s after the economy this rank 1.6% in the first quarter, that first quarter was blamed on the omicron variant and how much was going through the economy with supply chain pro
schumer on a major reconciliation bill that would lower prescription drug costs and invest hundreds of billions of dollars to combat climate change and clean energy programs. sinema s support is crucial to get the bill through a 50/50 senate and to the democratic house for a vote. vladimir putin s top spokesman was annoyed the u.s. had gone public about ongoing talks for a prisoner swap to free brittney griner and paul whelan. tony blinken is expected to call sergei lavrov for the first time since the ukraine invasion after shunning him since the invasion in february to talk about a possible swap. president biden spoke with china s president xi this morning as tensions have risen over potential congressional trip to taiwan led by nancy pelosi and the passage of a senate bill increasing competition with china in the semiconductor market. we begin with the president and the economy. joining me now, nbc white house correspondent carol lee, nbc capitol hill correspondent ali vi
network this weekend to pass the inflation reduction act of 2022. this legislation would be historic investing in things like combatting climate change, extending access to obamacare and finally, finally letting medicare negotiate with drug companies. but this is only after wheeling and dealing with you know who of course arizona senator kirsten sinema who demanded the preservation of a major tax loophole and forget this. the extremely rich hedge fund managers. the side eye is for you, we will talk more about that in a minute but first, republicans are starting to see that face bumping over the nine military and military aid are trying to obliterate abortion rights in kansas tonight go quite as well as they think. the defeat was kind of like when craig took down deebo and friday, you guys remember that? psychotic. regardless, they did not stop trump and back candidates from a sweeping victory in arizona s primaries. former tv anchor and corn election denier, kari lake said he
charges of smuggling cannabis. it was nearly the maximum sentence for bringing less than one gram of cannabis oil into the country. britney griner pleaded guilty last month to cartridges in her possession, which arrived i airport in february. but she told the court that bringing them into russia was an honest mistake after she packed in a hurry. before the sentencing today, unemotional britney griner apologized, saying she never intended to break any laws in a final plea for leniency. i never meant to hurt anybody. i never meant to put in jeopardy the russian population. i never meant to break any laws here. i made an honest mistake. and i hope that, in your ruling, that it doesn t lose [inaudible] my life here. i know everybody keeps talking about political pawn and politics. but i hope that that is far from this courtroom. but the judge didn t grant her any leniency. the lawyers called the verdict absolutely unreasonable and plan to appeal, saying the court ignore
ready to discuss a prisoner swap. former u.s. ambassador to russia michael mcfaul and the executive director of the wnba players association will join us to break down the latest. also ahead, democrats reach an agreement on their economic package helping president biden make good on a major campaign promise. we ll have the latest from the white house. that is because, and willie, my gosh, our economy later job numbers have just come out. you talk about a resilient economy, man. it keeps rolling. this is an incredible jobs number. the july jobs report is in and much stronger than expected. the u.s. economydded 528,000 jobs last month. with the unemployment rate ticking down to 3.5%. that jobs number notably higher than what we ve seen in recent months. economists are expecting gains to slow this month and in months to come. let s go right to nbc news senior business analyst stephanie ruhle. by my count, this is about twice as many jobs as most analysts expected to be added