an end here in new york city. defense team expected to call an accounting professor as an expert witness. so the president may take questions from reporters before going inside and if that happens, we shall bring it to you. first the fireworks from last night. >> nikki haley, she caves any time the left comes after her. any time the media comes after her. >> he continues to lie about my record. >> the only person for fascist than the biden regime is nikki haley. >> he has insulted nicki highlyy's basic intelligence. not her positions, her basic intelligence. >> bill: wow, tough night in alabama. republicans honing in on nikki haley while largely ignoring the elephant in the room that wasn't in the room. good morning, everybody. thursday. hope you are having a good day. i'm bill hemmer. >> dana: i'm dana perino and this is "america's newsroom." we're ever closer to the first votes in iowa. >> bill: yes, we are. >> dana: that was the final debate before the iowa caucuses. the brunt of the attacks were aimed at nikki haley. she expected that despite polls showing that president trump is far and away the frontrunner. haley and desantis a distant second and the former president skipping the debate. >> bill: christie sounded like this. >> we've had these three acting as if the race is between the four of us. the fifth guy who doesn't have the guts to show up and stand here, the fact is that when you go and you say the truth about somebody who is a dictator, a bully, who has taken shots at everybody, whether they've given him great service or not over time, who dares to disagree with him, then i understand why these three are timid to say anything about him. >> dana: first alexis mcadams is live in alabama with the morning after. good morning. >> good morning, dana and bill. as you said it was a tough night on the debate stage. nikki haley was hammered hard by those candidates. she expected that and she didn't even respond to some of it saying it isn't worth my time to respond to some of these attacks. they went after her hard saying you aren't even a real conservative and saying that she needs to do more to step up to the plate and stop taking money from democratic donors. watch this. >> these wall street liberal donors make money in china. they are not going to let her be tough on china and she will cave to the donors. nikki is corrupt. a woman who will send your kids to die so she can buy a bigger house. this is the problem using identity politics more effectively than kamala harris is a form of intellectual fraud. >> trump skipped the debate and hit a town hall with sean hannity in iowa. he wasn't on the stage trump was a hot topic. the moderators asking if trump is mentally fit to be president, desantis saying it's not a question of his mental fitness but his age. chris christie didn't mince words, though. check this out. >> father time is undefeated. the idea we put someone up there almost 08 and no effects, we all know that's not true. >> i'm in the race because the truth needs to be spoken. he is unfit. >> so trump's team firing back this morning saying the battle for second place has become the biggest waste of time money and energy that politics has ever seen. according to the latest monmouth university poll trump has a 40-point lead against the competition. the poll also finds, dana and bill, most supporters of the former president say they would have preferred a primary where no one opposed him for the gop nomination. back leave in alabama we heard from nikki haley who shrugged off the attacks saying they are jealous she is getting a surge in the polls and doing better than they are right now. trump said the other day trump will hold onto the lead. all the others will be back in the hawkeye state. we'll keep an eye on it. >> dana: thank you. >> bill: josh holmes former mitch mcconnell chief of staff. nice to have you on here. the buffet is yours, josh. you can take 15 seconds, a minute. what was your takeaway? >> i appreciate that, bill. the florida is open. look, my first takeaway is we could do a lot worse, america could do a lot worse than the people on that stage. my second take away is we probably will. what these candidates all needed was separation. they needed consolidation and separation. i don't think anybody got it last night. they take turns one after another sort of turn at the barrel. ron desantis and ramaswamy and everybody pointed their guns toward nikki haley. she moved up in the polls. a validation of that. who is doing their best stuff? desantis translated conservative anxieties into accomplishments he had already done in florida. i also thought that chris christie. his pitch isn't every republican's cup of tea it's his best stuff on message as he sees as the insufficient -- i don't see anything changing here. >> dana: you mentioned ron desantis. i want to play this for you. this is what he said could happen even though the polls say what they say. watch. >> so we have a great idea in america but the voters make the decisions not pundits or pollsters . i'm sick of hearing about these polls. i remember the polls in november of 2022 said there would be a big red wave, monumental. it crashed and burned. the one place it didn't crash and burn was in the state of florida. >> dana: what do you think about that? a lot of the polls are very consistent but does he have a point? >> well, they are pretty consistent. you always have a problem with a poll where the polls don't go your way. clearly that's not going to be the case for anybody on this field other than donald trump. all that being said he is right. at the end of the day it is about the voters in iowa, a caucus system. turnout is pretty important. you have four candidates working their tails off in iowa and donald trump with the lead and sat on top of it. whether or not those sort of deficiencies within that campaign ultimately translate to a sea change in terms of what we expect for turnout remains to be seen. i am not sure we moved the ball a lot last night. >> bill: dictator comment. chris christie took it on. call for number four from last night we'll play that next. >> do i think he was kidding when he said he was a dictator? all you have to do is look at the history and that's why failing to speak out against him, making excuses for him, pretending that somehow he is a victim empowers him. >> bill: well oh he see him in court this hour. here was the comment when asked by sean the night before at the town hall. >> do you in any way have any plans whatsoever if reelected president to abuse power, to break the law, to use the government to go after people? >> you mean like they are using right now? >> if you are a trump supporter, that's like rolling a strike right down the center aisle of the bolling alley. he talked about drilling and border policy. the left is going to run with this comment for some time. does it have legs for them or even independents? yes or no. >> yeah, for sure. in the center of the electorate this has been the misgivings people had about a donald trump presidency back to 2020. the problem is the right certainly doesn't have a problem with it. conservatives want to hear more of it. chris christie is in this race and on the stage in the final four in large part because of this argument because he is the only one taking it on, the only one that's pushing it forward. there is a constituency within the republican party. it is not a huge one unfortunately for him but it is that enabled him to get on the stage. it carries huge general election liability. what he is talking about in terms of trump and second term and what it would look like is a problem in the center of electorate and see it show up in almost every poll. >> dana: trump has just left his condo and will head down to court. quickly the breakdown in the house call for number eight without kevin mccarthy and santos we have 220 republicans. 213 democrats. two vacancies. you need 218 to get anything to pass. how is this next couple of months going to look on the hill? >> yeah, truth is, dana, house republicans haven't had a functional majority in quite some time certainly from before speaker mccarthy was ousted. they did a nice job in the debt ceiling getting a conservative accomplishment but after that it broke down quickly and will require democratic votes for everything. unless republicans have unanimous support for everything they are doing, they are inviting democrats to come and use leverage and shape any sort of policy that can ultimately pass. that means more left of center than ideally most republicans would want. that's the situation they're in at least until next november when we have another election. >> bill: it's your town. deal with it, all right? josh, nice to have you on, brother. thank you. >> dana: that's so mean. >> bill: thanks, guys. as of right now, we love josh. you are roughly 40 days from iowa. at the moment i don't believe there are any more debates scheduled so we could go into that caucus. >> dana: there could be but nothing scheduled. >> bill: with last night being the final word. we'll be out in des moines and see what we get that evening. >> dana: president trump's strategy of not going to any of the debates worked for him. he maintained his lead and increased his lead in some places and the rest of these candidates they have narrowed down from 2016 they still have a distant second from him. so we'll see what happens. keeping track of it. >> bill: donald trump has just left trump tower moments ago so now we're back on this caravan, dana, that has become all too familiar to us at 9:00 a.m. during this hour he will run down the east river to lower manhattan, walk inside the courtroom. usually he takes that opportunity to speak to the cameras. he may do that. if so, you will probably see that within the next 30 minutes or so. >> dana: i bet he does. i take the over on that, or under. i don't know how it works. i think he is going to speak. president biden dismissing a reporter's questions about his involvement in his families dealings a bunch of lies. records show otherwise. peter doocy at the white house with the latest. >> bill: president biden is dismissing the premise there was any wrongdoing here and declining to explain or give any kind of context to these accusations that house republicans think warrants an impeachment inquiry. >> can you explain to americans that this impeachment inquiry why you interacted with so many of your son and brother's association >> president biden: i won't comment. i did not. it is a bunch of lies, they're lies. they are lies. >> james comer writes on x, joe biden kind with oligarchs from around the world and joined on speaker form and used aliases. potus continues to lie. white house officials pointed us to part of sworn testimony from devin archer said the speakerphone calls did happen and they were about things like the weather. >> there is this testimony now where one of your sons former business associates is claiming that you were on speakerphone a lot with them talking business. is that what -- >> harris: we never talked business. i knew he would have a lousy question. >> why is that a lousy question? >> president biden: it's not true. >> thank you, mr. president. >> president biden has been clear throughout he never talked to his son's business associates about business. before yesterday he never claimed that they never talked at all. dana. >> dana: all right. just like little incremental changes that keep everybody wondering what the heck is going on. thank you, peter doocy. >> everyone is running frantic and hysterical. 30 more gunshots and powe pow. >> we're confirming more of the identity of the shooter there at that school out west. at least three dead. what we know about the gunman and what we're learning. >> dana: illegal border crossings breaking an all-time record. what is behind is surge and how to stop it? >> bill: some of the best schools in this country, you could say, some of the best schools in the world, doing serious damage control on how they have handled the issue of anti-semitism on campus. >> in that moment, i was focused on our university's longstanding policies aligned with the u.s. constitution. which say that speech alone is not punishable. balanced nutrition for strength and energy. yay - woo hoo! ensure, with 27 vitamins and minerals, nutrients for immune health. and ensure complete with 30 grams of protein. 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(dog bark) it's just smarter, healthier pet food. it's amazing what real food can do. i'm sarah escherich, i'm the life enrichment director at independence village, the senior living community in waukee, iowa. everybody here really, really make you feel like family and that they love you. our goal with tiktok was to enrich the lives of our residents and just to be able to show people what senior living can be like. i think i am a tiktok grandma. my kids think i am. i mean, we're the ones that are being entertained. time goes faster when you're having fun. >> dana: a gunman opens fire at the university of nevada las vegas and killed three people, wounded a fourth before being shot dead by police. authorities say the suspect was a professor who represently applied for the job at the school and turned down for that opportunity. unlv canceled all classes and other activities through sunday of this weekend. >> bill: meanwhile the story goes on. the presidents of two ivy league universities trying to clarify positions about callings for genocide of jews on their campuses. now the do overs follow backlash after a heated congressional hearing we watched two days ago dealing with anti-semitism at the elite schools in america. harvard's president now saying quote, let me be clear, calls for violence or genocide against the jewish community or any religious or ethnic group are vile and have no place at harvard and those who threat en our jewish students will be held to account. the universities of pennsylvania president doing this last night on x. >> i was not focused on what i should have been. the fact that a call for genocide of jewish people is a call for some of the most terrible violence human beings can perpetrate. >> dana: it's so pitiful. imagine when they were prepping for their testimony that they had maybe lawyers or communications people saying this is what you should say about asking about genocide. two, you are crazy we'll get crushed. their apology was pitiful and they got crushed. >> bill: they could have done that on tuesday and chose not to. for whatever reason. from the u.n. we have followed this news all week and now this. >> silence is despicable. the women who were raped and murdered on october 7th may be silent forever but justice will be done. >> truth shall prevail. we'll never forget them. >> dana: a stirring speech by israel's former miss world at the united nations. the jewish state pressing the u.n. to investigate the sexual violence committed by hamas terrorists on october 7th including rape and mutilation. lenore is also a victim of sexual assault and she joins us now. that story of what you went through came out just before or right around when you won miss world your story was out there are foreverybody to know and you have been an amazing advocate. what was it like at the united nations giving that speech? >> wow, to be so emotional, and hope people will respond to what happened to my story and to what happened to the israeli women. i think something changed since my speech a little bit. we still have a long way. the thing is, you know, for me 25 years ago when i promote my film, [inaudible] it has people watching it from all over the world and i felt the u.n. was supporting me and believed me. didn't ask for any investigation then. but today i feel so ashamed that i was a part of this organization and any other women's organization that are so silent and didn't condemn hamas even once except one time on friday evening when they said in the same sentence they are alarmed by what happened to the israeli women by the sexual assault and then in the same sentence they say that they are very worried about palestinian women and that we have to have a cease-fire. >> bill: the ambassador from the czech republic a month ago said why is my country even an organization here? why are we even involved in the u.n.? when you go to the u.n. you know what you are up against. you are pushing a big rock up a hill and whether or not you are even making progress. a couple of things now. we have had significant women's groups in america that have said nothing about rape. we can put it on screen and show everybody world health organization, emily's list, women's march, i stand with her and on and on the list goes. i want you to listen to the israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu on this very topic from yesterday. >> i say to the women's rights organizations and human rights organizations, you have heard of the rape of israeli women, horrible atrocities, sexual mutilation, where the hell are you? >> bill: can you answer that? >> yeah -- no, it's me too unless you are a jew. it is hard for me to say that but this is the truth. what women organizations did they took it to the political side. it is not about political. it is not about free palestinian. it is not about what side you are on the map. to use rape as an act of war is unbearable. what happened to humanity? you know, there is -- one of my friends, it is hard for me to speak about it -- >> bill: take your time. >> before i arrived here he told me a story about this young woman that he saw a video of her that she was raped by ten hamas people one after another, a young woman. screaming, they are beating her, they are beating her. they butchered her and then one of them took her cell phone and just sent everything to her mother. her screaming just haunts my friend every night he is trying to sleep. and hear screaming should be out there for all the world to shout out for these girls. if they are not here to shout for themselves. instead all the women organizations are just silent. i'm telling you, i am speechless and i have nothing -- >> bill: there is no humanity in what you are describing to us. it's absent. you are exactly right. >> dana: for the hostages that have been released and know there were sexual assaults perpetrated against them during their captivity. what kind of help and support will they need and can we help provide to them as they recover? >> i think the first help you can do is first to believe because when somebody goes through something so bad, you have to first believe and support them. and that's the basic. it cannot go, you know, do anything if you don't have that. what just kills my heart now is just the fact there are so many hostages that are still there going through i don't know what and the world is silent. now it's just like -- >> bill: you are very brave. >> dana: you are not silent. >> i'm not. >> dana: glad to have you. have a safe trip. >> bill: stay strong. >> thank you so much for everything you do. >> bill: thank you for being here. let's get to this now. >> it's not the republicans that opened the border. every one of that 1,000 plus persons was 18 to 35-year-old men military age. they have made this country very dangerous. >> bill: we watch it again this week the floodgates are open america. migrant encounters at the border hit the highest total for a single day that we've ever seen. also this in new york right now. check it out. donald trump is heading back to court. his motorcade has arrived, we hear. and we'll probably hear from him in a matter of minutes, so we'll wait on that and our program will continue. in a moment after this short break. out of control. get a newd