74 million people are under heat alerts. we're talking temperatures up to 25 degrees above average in some places. and right now, texas is bracing for what was just named the first tropical storm of the season, tropical storm alberto, heading toward the gulf coast. and fast. meantime, out west, those deadly wildfires rage on with firefighters battling that relentless heat, and we have team coverage this morning with nbc's sam brock in galveston, texas, nbc's maya egoland in coney island and we have your meteorologist standing by with your forecast. storm prep is already under way there. this is now tropical storm alberto. what is the latest, sam? >> reporter: -- >> sam, we're having a hard time with your mic. let's work on getting that. let's turn to maya who is here in new york, one of the places experiencing these extreme temperatures. how are people coping, maya? >> reporter: hey, ana, as you can see behind me, some people are coping by taking a dip in the water, but it is extremely hot. as you mentioned, millions here are under a heat warning, and an air pollution advisory. we also know from the cdc that extreme heat is actually responsible for the highest number of heat-related weather hazards and deaths. so, millions under advisory. we have some advice from experts for those who are going outside. so, one thing you can do is stay cool and hhydrate. that may seem obvious, when you're in the beach or in the pool swimming, it can be easily something you can forget. use sunscreen, reapply it often and also wear loose clothing. if you can, you can use the buddy system to make sure you got your eyes on someone, someone has their eyes on you, and, of course, if it is a true emergency, definitely call 911. it is also a juneteenth holiday today. and we spoke with randy who is out here enjoying his day off. so here's what he had to say. >> summer started and it has been furiously hot. i work in construction. so i'm outside here all the time. and the last two summers have been, like, really brutal. so you can really tell the difference. >> reporter: want to make sure you're also keeping an eye on kids, elderly and pets during this time. and above all, remember the basics, stay hydrated, keep water nearby, and stay cool when you can. >> those are simple tips, but potentially life saving tips. we're working still to try to get sam in galveston, texas, where this now tropical storm alberto is headed. you're tracking both these weather threats, the heat and the storm. what do we need to know? >> there is a lot to get to. we're going to start with the same heat. this is something brewing for a couple of days. right now we have 74 million people impacted from parts of michigan on east, into parts of maine. you see the pink shading is where we're starting to see the heat warnings so that's where we're expecting that heat to be particularly intense at least for today. places like fort wayne, pittsburgh, the metro area and parts of interior new england as well. current temperatures in the low 80s along the i-95 corridor. notice interior sections of the northeast, we're already starting to see 90s here. syracuse, 92, burlington, 89. we're going to watch the temperatures build through the course of the day. so, heat indices likely to be into the triple digits here, new york state to new england. 105 up in bangor. it does not get quite that hot typically in that part of the country. in and around new york, little bit more borderline into the upper 80s for air temperatures. heat indices into the lower 90s. temperatures around new york, through points west, likely to be generally 5 to 10 degrees above normal. once you get up to new england, we're talking 15 to 20 degrees above normal. for tomorrow, this is going to continue, look at these numbers, pretty similar, philadelphia getting up to 94 in terms of how it is going to feel and even up to parts of new york state, likely to feel like the triple digits as well. this is going to go on, even for this weekend. i do think we're going to get some relief here across the northeast, parts of new england, into right around the new york city area. but places like philadelphia, 97 for the high on friday, 95 on saturday. and into the mid-90s still as we head into sunday. so, minimal relief across new england. it is still going to be baking here across the mid-atlantic through parts of the midwest and the ohio valley as well. let's get the tropical storm alberto. this is new information from the 11:00 advisory from the national hurricane center. right now, situated 185 miles east of mexico. winds east 40 miles per how, the storm, way down here, the rain shield into texas. it is raining heavily pretty far from the storm's center. you may look at this like it is just a tropical storm, these impacts are going to be pretty widespread all the way up to texas as impacts are going to extend pretty far from the storm's center. that track is expecting to take it due west here across parts of mexico. weakening across the higher elevations, but i think we can expect the impacts to continue for the next couple of days with flooding, heavy rain and, of course, gusty winds as well. >> violeta yas, thank you. sam, it sounds like the storm is picking up steam. what are you experiencing so far and what kind of preparations are under way? >> reporter: sure, ana, our apologies for the technical difficulty there. we're just outside of galveston. we passed the san louis pass. i'm standing near free port, texas. this next band of rain just popped up. as we're getting that, look over my shoulder. this is a home development called treasure island. the treasures that we're seeing right now are unfortunately people's lawn chairs and pillows and other items floating up. i just saw a couple coming in from houston, dustin and christine, renting a house out here, probably 40 or 50 homes raised because of flood-like situations. and they were just wading through the water, it came up to their thigh, they went to bed last night, ana, said the high tide had come in and picked up a little bit, but things were fine. they woke up this morning and they're just in a giant pool of water. you got to think there are a lot of folks now in homes and waiting for this to try to clear up. but the reality is that you have, you know, a couple of days, today and tomorrow, where we're going to be seeing pretty steady rainfall, so this may get worse before it gets better. trying to communicate with some folks to find out what type of situation they're in in addition to that couple. and also some cars are still out there too. we're kind of locked in, but all the way up and down this main road there is cars where people were able to get them out and to a thin strip of land before the water came all the way over here. this development is on one side. on the other side of the road is a second development, with another 40 or 50 homes. you're looking at probably hundreds of people, if they're out here right now, a lot of these are vacation homes, but dozens, if not hundreds that are facing these kind of conditions. as far as your question, ana, about preparations right now, you have the state that has deployed and readied about 20 different agencies from texas a&m forest services which have strike forces to also the national guard. we spoke with folks in galveston, said they were repositioning a lot of their high water vehicles to fire stations near flood prone areas so they can jump in if need be. right now this is sort of a surreal sight and what i was told from this couple, there is a seawall well in the distance and clusters of rocks breaking up the storm surge, but not doing the job fully. if this were to rise, the high tide a little bit more than what we're seeing right now, the water levels are also going to elevate. this is definitely something that is being felt in real time by lots of folks here out in galveston island and then the san louis pass where i am as well. i don't know how far it extends, but i know we have colleagues lining up and down the southeast coast. guad venegas, they're expected to see between 7 and 10 inches there if not more. you have the rainfall and the storm surge at the same time. a single ray of light coming through this rain. hopefully that sticks for a little bit. that's what we're seeing on the ground at this moment. we'll see how it develops over the course of the day. >> sam brock, thank you so much. stay safe, my friend. too much water there, but too hot and dry so many other places right now as cities boil. there is new pressure on the federal government to adapt its response. a coalition of environmental, labor and health groups is pushing fema to declare extreme heat a major disaster, that would unlock federal funding to help address safety issues during heat waves like the one we're experiencing right now. i want to bring in gene su, energy justice director and senior attorney at the center for biological diversity and lead author of a new petition about all of this. so thank you for joining us. walk us through why this matters, especially now. >> thanks, ana, for having me. why this matters, i think everything you just showed in the last five minutes is why this matters right now. we are at the -- only the beginning of what is predicted to be another record-breaking year in terms of extreme heat and basically climate-fueled disasters generally. what we saw last year was a horrific record-breaking year where around 1200 people died, though that's a severe underestimate, and thousands more experienced extreme heat conditions that carry on to today. what we did this year is try to preempt and basically get the federal government and in particular the federal emergency management agency to recognize extreme heat and wildfire smoke as major disasters, to help states and local governments with funding, with funding for common sense measures, to help people from dying and passing out from extreme heat and wildfire smoke. >> now, looking at today alone, there are, you know, tens of millions of people facing temperatures above 90 degrees across multiple states here in the u.s. so, when we talk about this disaster declaration, if the goal is to boost the resources to the areas facing this major disaster, how would this actually work, practically speaking, when you're not just talking about something fairly isolated to one state or one region. >> absolutely. so because this is an ongoing issue, we -- we're advocating three sets of measures. but the first is the most common sense. so, it is erecting community resilience centers that have water stations in them, and then wildfire smoke areas, air filtration systems that you actually can breathe clean air. and the really important parts of these stations, whether they are temporary or permanent because you build them in a building that exists is that they are walkable for worker communities and especially communities of color and low income communities who may not have cooling or air filtration systems at the ready. so, the idea is to create these resilience centers and then actually place them strategically in the areas and neighborhoods that need them the most. but in addition to that, we are actually looking at more long-term solutions as well. one of the consequences of extreme heat is that grids are actually buckling right now in terms of electricity, so extreme heat is frying up power lines and actual electricity grids, and that's leading to rolling blackouts which means that people won't have electricity to run that life-saving air conditioning or air filtration system. so, we're advocating for community solar and storage, which we know from puerto rico to the southeast, those have been, if you have a solar on your rooftop, you're able to keep your electricity going and basically withstand these disasters. >> interesting ideas, possible solutions, that's what we like to hear. thank you for taking the time. still ahead, where things stand in virginia after a wild primary night with big implications for house republicans and the former president. plus, how trump is responding to president biden's election year executive action impacting some 500,000 undocumented spouses of american citizens. and we'll take a closer look at the history and activism behind the juneteenth holiday, with the 97-year-old who helped lead the charge. we're back in 90 seconds. helpe lead the charge. we're back in 90 seconds here's to getting better with age. here's to beating these two every thursday. help fuel today with boost high protein, complete nutrition you need... ...without the stuff you don't. so, here's to now. boost. okay, so here's my most requested hack for stubborn odors. you'll need vinegar, a large salad bowl and... oh, hi! have you tried tide fabric rinse? it works after your detergent to fight deep odors 3 times better than detergent alone. i love that. try tide fabric rinse. the future is 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(vo) new and existing customers get iphone 15 on us when they trade in any iphone. verizon at this hour, still too close to call. no winner yet in the republican primary in virginia. house freedom caucus chair bob good facing a challenger and attacks from donald trump and kevin mccarthy. the congressman is locked in a tight race right now with state senator john mcguire. meanwhile, in oklahoma, veteran republican congressman tom cole, the appropriations committee chair, beat his primary opponent last night. let's go to nbc news capitol hill correspondent ali vitali. so, ali, this virginia race, did we expect it to be this tight and what is the significance? >> reporter: we brought you this story yesterday, and we focused so heavily on virginia's 5th district because we knew it was going to be interesting, the dynamics were all there to make this a race that was worth us tracking. but i don't think that we anticipated that the day after we would still be waiting for results and you just look at how close this is, 345 votes separate the challenger in this case, john mcguire, from the incumbent, congressman bob good, who, remember, is the head of the powerful house freedom caucus here. he's someone who has been part and parcel to a lot of the upheaval that we have seen, a consistent thorn in the side of republican leadership throughout this congress and several others prior. now we're watching in the state of virginia this race continue on, but there is a few fascinating pieces to it. first, the fact that mcguire, even if he wins and he did declare victory last night despite the fact the race has not been called, if he wins, it will call into question the power of a trump endorsement. on one hand, trump's endorsed candidate could win this race. on the other, to win it by such a tight margin really does speak to what does it mean to have a trump endorsement, especially if you're in a state where you're going up against an incumbent and it is really hard to take out candidates who already are serving in congress. for bob good, he does have the right, because we're within 1 percentage point, again, we'll see where it lands when this race is called, he has the opportunity, if he loses, to demand a recount. it is not automatic like it is in some states, but because it is within a 1% margin, that is something we could see. whoever wants to call a recount, has ten days in the rules to actually do so. we're trying to keep in touch with the campaigns to see if that's something they plan to do, but, look, we're going to see, this is basically the general election here because it is a ruby red district. so, whatever republican comes out of the primary is going to be the next likely congress person for this area. it is, though, i think much closer than any of us thought that it was going to be and a reminder of how hard virginia actually is to poll because polling in this race, and the things that experts were looking at, our sources, were way off. >> all right, ali vitali, you never know. why you got to count the votes. this morning, reactions are pouring in after president biden unveiled a series of sweeping executive actions that could shield half a million undocumented spouses of u.s. citizens from deportation. >> i doubt why the action we're taking today matters, if you wonder about that, ask business leaders, labor leaders, economists, elected officials. they know it is good for american business. they know it is good for the american economy. they know it is good for america, period. >> let's get more now from nbc news senior white house correspondent gabe gutierrez. gabe, what more is the biden administration saying about this and are they seeing any legal blowbacks so far? >> they expect that, ana. yesterday, white house press secretary said that the white house believes that it does have the legal authority for this executive action, and it comes just weeks after that previous executive action targeting -- tightening the asylum rules. the biden administration expects these. they say they're getting legal challenges from both sides of the political spectrum and last night homeland security secretary alejandro mayorkas spoke out about this on msnbc. let's listen. >> what we do before we take action is we study the law, and ensure that the actions that we take are indeed lawful. that we have done with respect to this action, like we have done with all our prior actions. it is no surprise that steven miller intends to attack this in the courts, we stand by it. >> you just heard right there, secretary mayorkas bringing up steven miller, who was the architect of trump's immigration policies, and it is something we're seeing not just from the white house itself and the biden administration, but also from the biden campaign. they're really trying to tie and bring up in voters' minds trump policies when it comes to immigration and trying to have that contrast, that former president trump was responsible in their view for separating families at the border and instead president biden is trying to make it clear he's for families sticking together, that's why he had that executive action allowing undocumented spouses to stay in this country. >> so now we are seeing republicans slam this executive action. let's hear what donald trump had to say about it. >> joe biden's granting mass -- he's going to formerly grant a mass amnesty to millions of illegal aliens that came into our country. crooked joe is sending a message to the world that he rewards illegal entry and that's what's happening. >> jeff, just how important is the immigration issue for voters right now, and is there any sense at this point how this executive action is resonating? >> well, it is hugely important, ana, and for the biden white house, this does a couple of things, one, the biden team believes that polls show that the electorate wants a balanced approach to immigration. that's tough border security measures, combined with real solutions for long-term undocumented immigrants. and to the great point that gabe made, we hear president biden say all the time that elections are about choices, elections are about contrasts. and that by keeping families together in this way, as the white house sees it, that, yes, they are convinced that when americans are reminded of the trump immigration polic