out on seeing their loved ones at all this holiday season. we had to wait in a line that was four hours and still in line. and nobody s giving us any direction what tline to get in. a total you know what show here. according to southwest, nowhere to be found. hung up on multiple times. and southwest, they don t give any answer. they don t answer the phone. there s no option to rebook anything online. oh, also been on hold for 5 hours and 43 minutes. 5 hours and 43 minutes on hold. that logjam starting with the powerful winter storm that battered western new york. look at that in particular. this morning people in buffalo struggling to get food, water, medicine. basic necessities, after days of driving bans and closed stores. live to buffalo in a moment but want to start with the thousands of southwest airline cancellations this morning. cnn s adrieene broaddus is live at chicago s midwear airport and nick valencia at atlanta s airport. we see bags behind you.
hello and thank you so much for joining us, i m ana cabrera in new york. surging inflation a major investigation, and a surveillance video that is shaking the nation. we are following a lot of headlines today. first, after meticulously outlining evidence, sharing new testimony to january 6th committee said it is starting producing material for the justice department. and the panel wrapping up his latest hearing with the bombshell, president trump tried to contact a witness. we dig in. plus, there s reaction to police in action. video from inside rob elementary leaked, and we can now see exactly what police were doing as they waited for more than an hour to confront the shooter. and, inflation hits a new 40 year high and we were talking gas, food, rent, the costs are surging but by how much, and why isn t it getting better? that is where we start, cnn business reporters matt egan are with us. okay 40 year inflation high but we are seeing gas prices starting to go down, so what
custody. there s a picture there. right now the motive is unknown. it is unclear if the attacks were racially motivated. but we should know police are ramping up security in asian-american communities as a precaution. president biden has been briefed on the shootings, and at this hour he returns to the white house. we ll bring you any live comments. also today, concerns of another covid surge. cases are climbing in more than one dozen states. the cdc is sounding the alarm on two variants in california. we ll get to that in a moment. let s begin on this tragic shooting spree. our ryan young joins us this morning in atlanta. what do you know about the victims, eight total, six of them asian. what can you tell us? reporter: so far, very little information is coming out about the victims except, besides their races. of course, what we ve been told so far is at least six of the people killed are asian. of course, we re trying to move forward with parts of this investigation. w
the senators released a joint statement saying it s clear that governor cuomo has lost the confidence of ice governing partners and the people of new york. what is the governor saying this morning about these calls to resign? reporter: in short, governor cuomo saying that those allegations of sexual assault and harassment, that they certainly should be heard, but at the same time he s also maintaining that he s innocent of any sort of misconduct and he also continues to double down on his position that he will not step down as the governor of the state of new york in spite of the ongoing state impeachment investigation and also, as you mentioned, the growing chorus of democrats that are calling for him to resign. here is the governor s latest position when it comes to the growing call for him to step down. i did not do what has been alleged, period. look, it s very simple, i never harassed anyone, i never abused anyone, i never assaulted anyone. and i never would, right?
That test may go a long way to help schools and workplaces reopen. Lets begin with florida. In an unexpected move as new cases and deaths surge and hospitals run out of icu beds, florida officials are now discussing, get this, reopening bars. Lets get to cnns rosa florez in miami. Explain, if you can, this new development. Reporter this is what you get when you have a governor who believes the number of cases in his state have stabilized. Take a look at this tweet because this is from his secretary of business and regulation, tweeting it just a few hours ago saying that he plans to meet with bars and breweries next week to set up meetings to figure out ways to reopen bars and breweries with a, quote, safe, smart and step by step plan. Its important to note that bars closed in this state about a month ago when the number of daily cases exceeded 9,000. That was the record then. Two weeks ago, that record was broken with 15,300 cases. And i just checked. In the month of july alone, there