The former Nissan chief executive officer filed the case against Nissan in May in Beirut, alleging he was detained in Japan in 2018 on false charges because of what he calls the automaker s disinformation against him. The 69-year-old Ghosn is seeking half of the $1 billion in damages and half for compensation including salary, retirement funds and stock options.HITTING BACK Former Nissan executive Carlos Ghosn speaks during an interview with The Associated Press in Beirut, Lebanon on June 23, 2023. The former Nissan executive filed a $1-billion lawsuit against the Japanese automaker and others for spreading disinformation against him. AP PHOTO
The winds are still blowing the water into shore, there are still areas that are seeing the storm surge get worse. let s go to tampa now. we re in different locations in tampa. carlos, first to you, what are you seeing? john, so we are just to the west of where derek van dam has been live the entire morning. we re in a neighborhood where we ve seen some the worst flooding associated with this storm as well as the storm surge. we were trying to get out to pinellas county which is home to clear water and the st. pete area but we weren t able to do that because several of the bridges that connect the tampa bay area to pinellas county are closed because of this storm. you can see here behind me, what a lot of these homeowners are facing at this hour? this house has a dozen sandbags out in the front part of this house. because this is florida and we re close to the bay here, all of this water no doubt pushed its way in.
derek van dam, thank you, thank you to your crew adrian and carlos who are taking those incredible pictures, giving people a sense of what they would be experiencing if they did not evacuate, if they did not get out of the storm s path. and you are not even in the major part of this storm, there s a tiny bit of good news, it s no longer a category 4 storm, sustained winds of 130, now gone down to a category 3. you will see this happen. as it gets closer and closer to shore, once it hits the shore it starts to knock the wind, so to speak, out of the hurricane. that does not mean that people are in a safer spot because of the storm surge, because it is still a major hurricane, a category 3, we re talking 120-mile-per-hour winds or more, so when you look at that it still is a very, very dangerous
The west of where derek is right now. and they have teams in place in the event that someone does call 911. but right now, as we get this high tide and king tide moving in, you can see the water continues to push out and it s causing it s causing and leading to some serious flooding which, of course, is the concern that emergency officials have had the entire time since the storm made its way north. their concern was, the weather really isn t too bad because obviously the storm has passed further north of here. but because we re still seeing all of that strong current, we re still seeing some of that rain and we re seeing all of that water just being pushed into the tampa bay, we re going to still see some more flooding throughout the day. john? that s a great point you make there, carlos. even though the weather seems to be improving, the situation not yet at least. you need to stay vigilant. thank you very much. let s go to derek also in tampa. derek?
In the polls, you had ron desantis and that is right. lindsey, the point is that it is going to be very difficult for any republican to defeat donald trump in this primary. the question, i think we are trying to contemplate here is, is there a path? it appears that there is a path if, if these candidates all have the discipline to perhaps coordinate and figure out when is the right time to get out of this race. we know that there are republican leaders like governor sununu of new hampshire, mitt romney of utah, who have advised republicans to get out before it is too late if you want to have the chance of defeating donald trump. when do you think we will know, carlos, whether donald trump s gamble to skip the first debate was worthwhile? i think after the second debate, lindsey. i do think that the president did pay a price for missing the debate.
Economy, lowering employment rates, and any other term in american history, it is a strong case to make, and by the time you settle into the general election which is going to be just a few short months once the republicans, i think, formally nominate donald trump, that choice will be clear. the american people will speak in unison. they want joe biden over trump maga extremism. that is why i don t take too seriously any threats from a primary challenge to the president. carlos, we will turn to the republican field, new numbers from the latest nbc news des moines registered poll taken before the debate among iowa republicans to participate in next year s caucuses, according to some of the state, up 46% of those voters described themselves as margaret publicans. it is actually more than the 42% who say donald trump is their first choice for president. how should we read those results? because it doesn t give any