the next with two titles and two rings. they don't understand how far he has to go to be close to brady. >> you picking one? >> yeah. i got usher for the win. the 49ers, they have been favored. showed heart coming back against the lions. maholmes and andy reid are today's brady and belichick. there's no way i'm betting against those two. >> coy, have fun. coming up sunday, marco rubio talking about the immigration deal collapsing. i will see you sunday morning at 9:00 eastern and noon here on cnn.

coverage continues now with t"te swituation room." a scathing report describing the president as an elderly man with a poor memory. voters' concerns about the president's age weigh on his re-election bid. donald trump is courting people in pennsylvania. we will get a read on his message a day after his ballot battle at the u.s. supreme court that seemed to go his way. fresh tense between the united states and israel after president biden calls the israeli military's operation in gaza over the top. this as israel is facing backlash over a planned evacuation and ground offensive in the refugee-packed city of rafah. welcome to our viewers here in the united states and all around the world. wolf blitzer is off today.

i'm alex marquardt and you are in "the situation room." president biden lashed out at the special counsel for portraying him as a forgetful old man who can't remember when his own son died. arlette saens has more. we saw a full court press by team biden. >> reporter: the president departed for a weekend at his home in delaware. one day after a scathing report and assessment of the president's mental acuity. the white house is in full damage control mode with aides defending the president, the president lashing out at what he believed was inappropriate parts of the report. kamala harris even suggesting that the report was politically motivated.

president biden today hosting the german chancellor to discuss ukraine. biden ignoring questions about the explosive report one day after teeing off. >> i have seen the headlines since the report was released about my willful retention of documents. this is not only misleading, it's plain wrong. >> reporter: today, it was vice president kamala harris who came out slamming the special counsel, suggesting politics was involved. >> the way that the president's demeanor in that report was characterized could not be more wrong on the facts and clearly politically motivated. gratuitous. we should expect there would be a higher level of integrity than we saw. >> reporter: the president fully cooperated with the investigation, including two days of interviews in the

opening days of the israel-hamas war. >> he didn't want to throw up roadblocks. >> reporter: the investigation ending without criminal charges. the assessment of biden as a, quote, well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory, putting the 81-year-old president's age in the spotlight. >> i know what the hell i'm doing. >> mr. president, for months when you were asked about your age, you would respond with the words, watch me. then the american people have been watching and they have expressed concerns about your age. >> that's your judgment. i'm the most qualified person to be president of the united states. >> reporter: a chief issue voters raise about the president, a recent nbc news poll found three in four voters have major or moderate concerns about whether he is fit to serve a second term. >> yes, okay, we know. the president is old.

it doesn't sound like breaking news to me. >> reporter: it comes amid slipups, including thursday when he mixed up the leaders of egypt and mexico. >> initially, the president of mexico did not want to open up the gate to allow humanitarian material to get in. >> reporter: the report striking a personal nerve with biden after saying the president couldn't remember when his son died. >> how dare he raise that? >> reporter: in private, his fury more direct. telling democratic lawmakers, how would i fin' forget that? one big question going forward is whether there could be a potential release of transcripts or audio of president biden's sit-down over two days. the white house spokesperson told reporters they are not ruling thae a possibility. they would maybe be open to that once a review is done and any

de due to classified information. what is clear here is that the white house hoped this report -- the headline of biden facing no criminal charges is what would emerge from the investigation. now it's clear that one of the key issues about biden's age, concerns about his age is coming front and center once again in the 2024 campaign. >> it is. thank you very much. let's get more with our experts. do you think this has done anything to dampen questions about biden's fitness after the scathing report? >> i'm going to deploy one of the most cliche of cliches about if you are explaining, you are losing. you can tell by just how many people are coming out, what they're saying, that they are saying it that there's a panic going on.

to add one more, the special counsel report, they are the gift that keeps on giving. this is why there's a battle when there is going to be a special counsel appointed. at the end of the day, you don't know what you are going to get. so far, the last 15, 20 years or so, americans have gotten reports of one kind or another that underscore and create almost new political firestorms on their own. >> of course, the point is their independence. kate, you have a unique perspective. wasn't your reaction to something that a strategist said earlier today. take a listen. >> i'm a biden supporter. i slept like a baby last night. i woke up every two hours crying and wet the bed. this is terrible for democrats. anybody with a functioning brain knows that. >> kate, we know that trump has made his fair share of mistakes as well. those are well documented.

do you think there's a recognition inside the white house about how widespread and serious these concerns are about biden's fitness? >> look, i heard the word panic. i can tell you from working for joe biden with this team for a long time, this is not a team that panics. that's not the way they do business. what they're doing is trying to forcefully push back. they recognize this is a moment where they need to forcefully push back on some of what was in this report. i think they did that by sending the president out last night to show fire in the belly, to show some anger, which i actually think can be a good thing. that's something that combats this notion of age or is he too old when he shows that he is sparring with reporters, he shows he is fired up. i didn't think that was a bad thing. i think this question of age is certainly going to be one that is going to play out across the campaign. i don't agree with paul that this is a bed wetting moment. i think it's a reminder age is

one factor in the campaign. it's something that the biden campaign is going to have to deal with and the white house and president biden will have to take on. there are going to be other factors, too, like people wanting to protect their right to have an abortion. people not wanting a president in donald trump who is going to try to take away their right to vote or overturn the results of a fair election. i think you have seen the white house push back forcefully today. now the campaign needs to get on offense and get back to talking about donald trump. >> scott , to that point, this s damaging. how much do you think the concerns over biden's age are baked in for voters heading into the general election? >> well, look at the polling. obviously, people had these concerns. the concerns that they had came from what they saw themselves in television appearances and

speeches and so on and so forth. what makes this more damaging and i think longer lasting and really pivotal for the campaign is that a third party credible, independent voice comes along, spends a few hours with joe biden and says, yes, everything you think you have been perceiving about his public performance is absolutely true. in politics, some of the most damaging things are the ones that are confirmed by independent third pavalidaters. he he comescomes to a conclusio lot of people had been perceiving. it's what they could see on tv. i think it's going to last. i think it's going to hurt. you can see from the people coming out today and how vicious they have been -- called him a liar and a partisan today. they know it's damaging as well. >> a lot of democrats are saying he is not independent or a third party. he is a longtime republican and

trying to score political points. we have seen both biden and trump have verbal missteps, mistaking leaders of different countries. why do you think that these concerns about mental acuity in particular seem to be sticking to biden more, in a way they aren't with trump? >> biden is older than trump. this is very much hammered home in certain media circles. it's just always been a problem. i think your question earlier about whether it's baked in is the real issue and whether or not there are voters who say, look, if my choices are between someone who is being described as elderly with a bad memory or someone described as possibly vindictive and violating democratic norms, who are the choices that we are going to make? nikki haley, you can hear in the distance trying to get attention. this is her argument. neither of these choices is

ideal. she uses age specifically to make that point. >> she certainly does. thanks to you all. just ahead, a new warning that the gaza city of rafah could become a zone of bloodshed as israel plans mass evacuations ahead of an expected israeli ground offensive against hamas there.

there is a fresh source of tension tonight between the united states and israel. president joe biden escalating his criticism of the way israel is carrying out its military operation in gaza, calling their approach over the top. >> the conduct of the response in gaza -- in the gaza strip has been over the top. there are a lot of innocent people who are starving. a lot of innocent people who are in trouble and dying. it's got to stop. >> i want to get to nic robertson who is in tel aviv. this sharpening criticism, is it having any affect?

>> reporter: i think it is. we heard from prime minister men gent -- benjamin netanyahu's office today. he said the military should go ahead and go into rafah and take down the last four battalions of hamas that he says are there. he said do that, there's civilians and the civilians need to be moved out of the way. he is calling on the army to give the cabinet -- his cabinet a plan of how the army is going to make sure the civilians are not in harm's way. it gives the impression of the prime minister feeling the political heat and pushing off the resolution or tamping down the heat to the military. the military has had a plan for trying to protect civilians. it used in khan yunis. it calls for certain neighborhoods to be told by

text, leaflets to take a certain route, leave at a certain time and go to a certain safe area. what we have witnessed is that those routes are sometimes not safe. people get killed along the way. they are not safe in the safe areas. sometimes they get killed there. some people are too afraid to leave and don't leave, and they also have been killed. it's very hard to, it appears, by that mechanism to protect all the civilians. >> you can't go any farther south than rafah. the u.n. is saying that an israeli operation in the occupied west bank -- not gaza but the west bank, may amount to a war crime. what more do you know? >> reporter: yeah. this is for two reasons, two different war crimes. when that 12-man undercover commando unit went into the hospital, some of them were dressed as nurses, doctors, as people who were works in the hospital. that is a war crime. it's not wrong for the military

to diseguise itself to perpetrae a military operation, but not to use medical clothing and pass yourself off as protected personnel. that was one count. the other war crime that the u.n. officials are saying is that you cannot kill somebody who is in hospital getting treatment. the maximum they could have done to the people in the hospital would have been arrest and detain. you can only use, they say, physical force, you know, shooting them if there was -- if they put up resistance. as we saw at the time, at least one person appears to have been shot in the head. there was a bullet hole in the pillow and a lot of blood on the pillow. >> nic robertson in tel aviv, thank you very much. joining me now is senator michael bennet of colorado and a member of the senate intelligence committee. thank you so much for joining us this evening. i want to start on israel and gaza. you heard the president saying the way israel has been waging

its war over the past four months is over the top. do you agree with that? >> i do agree with that. i think that a lot of us believe that more civilians have been killed than should have been killed. we are supporters of israel. we are believers that they have to defend themselves against what hamas has perpetrated here. but they are also going to be held to a very high standard. i think it's important that they kill as few civilians as possible. obviously, it's very important that they comply with international law. i think it was important for the president to send that signal, not just last night but with the guidelines that he established as part of the aid that we're going to be voting on this weekend for israel. >> those guidelines are that anybody receiving aid should abide by u.s. law and international law as well. senator, i want to ask you about

rafah and the plans that israel may have to expand their military operation to the southern most tip of the gaza strip. as you know well there are around 1.3, 1.4 million palestinians who have sought refuge in rafah. many of them have nowhere else to go. what pressure do you think the administration should now be putting on israel to make sure that those civilians who are so desperate are not in harm's way as israel presses forward? >> i think that we have a moral obligation to those civilians. i think israel has a moral obligation to the civilians. it's not clear to me that prime minister netanyahu shares that view about that moral obligation. it's very important that israel proceed in a way that does as little damage as possible to civilians. israel is in an impossible situation. it's true. they are dealing with a death

cult in hamas. the damage that hamas has done has been extraordinary to israel. the fact is, they have burrowed into civilian infrastructure all over gaza. that does not mean that we are relieved of -- that israel is relieved of a set of high expectations for those of us that have high aspirations for democracy, whether it's here or whether it's anywhere else. it's going to be a very difficult situation. i think we would all feel a lot better here if we thought that prime minister netanyahu shared that moral view about the palestinians that are there. of course, he doesn't. he is more interested in his political position in israel. that's a great worry to me. >> senator, before i let you go, i want to ask about president

biden lashing out at critics who are saying that he doesn't have the mental acuity, mental fitness. they point to memory lapses after the skcathing report. listen to what adam smith had to say. >> i think we can all agree he was angry, frustrated by what came out. there was not a prepared agenda of here is my explanation, here is what i'm doing. it didn't go well. there was no doubt about that. that needs to get better. >> senator, do you agree? do you think the president is handling the concerns the wrong way? >> before you let me go, i want to say this. two things. president biden has accomplished an extraordinary amount domestically. the bipartisan infrastructure bilk a good example of that. he has led this coalition against putin brilliantly. more important than that, the

ukrainian people have fought brilliantly. the president is going to have to campaign this summer and this fall and litigate the obvious issue of his age. i believe he will be able to do that. in the meantime this weekend, we have a really important piece of business to do. we have got to get ukraine aid extended. we have to do that in the senate with a big bipartisan vote. then the house of representatives is going to have to figure out how do it. measured against the standard of his global leadership, he has done exceedingly well, particularly compared to the person that he is running against. the american people are going to be able to make their choice in november. >> senator bennet, thank you for joining us. >> thanks for having me. donald trump on the campaign trail. is he seizing on the special counsel report on president joe biden? we will get an update on his event in pennsylvania and his next battle at the u.s. supreme court.

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just in to cnn, the house is scheduling a new vote on impeaching homeland security secretary mayorkas. >> reporter: we are learning the house is going to bring up mayorkas impeachment articles again on tuesday night. as you mentioned, the house failed to pass those articles this week with three house republicans voting against it. what was a very embarrassing floor defeat for the leadership. house republicans are confident they have the votes next week when steve scalise, who has been

out battling cancer and receiving treatment, returns as he is expected to do on tuesday. the timing of this is actually very notable. tuesday night, there's a special election to replace the seat vacated by former congressman george santos. if republicans fail to win that, they are going to see their margins dip lower. as we have seen around here, nothing is certain given the thin majority. we will see. >> thanks very much. this hour, donald trump is on the campaign trail appearing at a national rifle association event in pennsylvania which is a key battleground state. what is trump's message as president biden is now once again on the defensive about a sensitive issue really for both of them, their ages. >> reporter: it is a sensitive issue for both of them. trump is 77. biden is 81.

a majority or many of donald trump's supporters are older. i was told by senior advisers there's concern that he could alienate those voters if he is consistently attacking biden for his age. trump has called him mentally unfit and saying it's not about age, he has older friends, this is about cognitive ability. when it comes to the report, even though democrats, republicans, president biden himself have been focusing on that sentence that said he was a sympathetic, well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory, donald trump has not seized on that at all. instead, he is focused on blurring line between his special counsel case, jack smith brought on mishandling classified documents, as well as biden's case saying it's a to-tiered justice system. on the second day of the biden fallout, donald trump has been quiet all day. of course, he is on the stage now. we will listen and bring you updates.

>> on the stage now. can't hear what he said but the crowd is booing. thanks very much. tonight, trump and his lawyers are on the brink of yet another supreme court fight. they are facing a monday deadline to ask the justices to block an appeals court ruling against trump's claim of presidential immunity from prosecution. let's bring in our legal and political experts. what options does trump really have right now? >> this is a procedural moment. it could be the whole ball game. option a, if donald trump does nothing, then the case on monday will go back down to the district court, the trial court, which can resume proceedings and would set a trial date. i think that's very unlikely. option b is donald trump can go up and ask the supreme court either to take the case or to keep everything paused. if the supreme court does that, then the case will be on pause pending the big decision, which is will the supreme court take

the case? if the supreme court does not take the case, then i think we're going to very likely have a trial sometime around the summer. that's a huge deal. if the supreme court does take this case, that's going to push this whole schedule back to the point where i think it becomes probably unlikely that we see a trial before the election at all. that key sequence is about to kick off on monday. >> it had been scheduled for next month. then taken off the docket. the judges attempts to hamstring trump's ability to ask a full court to review this. how do you expect trump will deal with that? >> this was an interesting wrinkle. ordinarily, trump would have the option to ask the court to rehear it. that would extend the process. they essentially said, you can ask. it will not stop the clock unless we agree to rehear it. there's a disincentive to go that without. my expectation would be that on monday we will see him go to the supreme court through his

lawyers, because the d.c. circuit is not going to be so appealing. >> very interesting. do you think that yesterday's oral arguments in the 14th amendment case, the colorado ballot case, impacts the supreme court's appetite for another highly politically charged trump case? >> to be honest, we noticed in the oral arguments, they didn't spend a lot of time talking about the issue of immunity or somehow trying to retry or try the president's actions leading up until january 6. they were looking narrowly at the provisions of the constitution that were at play. what they made very clear across the spectrum was, what are the ramifications if we do something sweeping and it keeps coming to our doorstep to figure this out? fundamentally, all of the cases are about figuring out the guardrails. what's legal? what's not? how do we prevent the country from falling into the same kind of political and cultural battle that it has been locked in for

the last two years? is there a way to build stronger protections into case law so that we're not in this conversation four years from now? >> simply, what is your prediction? do you think that the supreme court will be willing to take up this case? >> well, as of this moment, on friday, february 9, i am at exactly 50/50. sorry to cop out. this could go either way really. on the one hand, this is why we have a supreme court. this is a massive issue. we know little about it. the consequences are enormous. this is consider we have a supreme court, to give us rulings on cases like this. on the other hand, the supreme court doesn't like to get involved in political cases. you can feel they weren't thrilled to be involved in the colorado case the other day. i don't think they will be thrilled to get involved in this one. we have seen pretty -- very consistent ruling from the district court and circuit court. they have been strong rulings. i think they have been well reasoned. i could see them saying no. important to keep in mind, of

course you need five of nine to win a supreme court case. you only need four to take the case. you can count heads. you can say maybe alito and thomas will take it. probably gorsuch. if that's the case, they only need one out of roberts, barrett and kavanaugh to join them. it could derail the case until after the election. >> let's turn to the mar-a-lago classified documents case where jack smith this week detailed threats against prosecutors, judges and other witnesses writing that witnesses, agents and judicial officers have been harassed and intimidated and the further outing of additional witnesses will pose a similarly intolerable risk of turning their lives upside down. prosecutors want to keep the names of many of the individuals secret. how do you think the court should be handling this? >> look, when there's a public trial, information becomes public in the course of the trial. in the run-up to the trial, the judge does have some discretion

to impose some confidentiality around the process, particularly in a situation like this where you have the prosecutor saying people are exposed to serious threats. i would expect or at least hope that the judge would take this very seriously. i don't know what the judge will do, obviously. the judge has options here. once it goes to trial, people don't testify in secret. they will have to take the stand. >> to add to that, we had the colorado -- i think one of the state election officials here. she's had security with her everywhere she's gone. there have been attacks on the judiciary in one way or another over the last few years. there's actually a sustained concern about the safety of this process and the people involved. >> these threats could be very, very real. thanks to you all for your expertise. appreciate it. check out the podcast, "assignment." more on the dire situation in the gaza city of rafah and how it could get far worse as an

israeli ground invasion looms.

the last ten seasons, the afc has been dominant. >> good stuff. it doesn't get better than this. first ever super bowl in las vegas. let's go.

we are getting a disturbing new look at the crisis in the southern gaza city of rafah ahead of an expected israeli ground offensive. residents bracing for more suffering. some viewers may find some scenes disturbing. >> reporter: there are simply no words. this grandfather cradling the body of his 7-year-old granddaughter. beside the shallow grave where she will soon be buried. i told her mother that she's a bird in heaven, he says. with her aunt, her cousin and her grandmother who are all waiting for her. you see, we have many martyrs in our family.

he says histake i -- taking shelter in a school. it took hours to reach a hospital. it was too late. more than 10,000 children have been killed since the war began, according to the hamas-run health ministry. many more left orphaned or facing life-changing injuries. the air strikes are near daily. those who survive left to dig through the rubble with their bare hands in search of their loved ones. in rafah, once deemed a safe zone, unicef estimates there are now more than 600,000 children among the over a million people

in the area, many taking shelter in these sprawling tent cities. the southern city has for weeks come under relentless air strikes by the israeli military, who say they are targeting hamas. now a looming ground operation is stoking fears that rafah could become, as one aid described it, a zone of bloodshed. if by some misfortune there's an invasion of rafah, two-thirds of the population will die, he says. we can't get out. we have no other alternative. israel says it's calling for a mass evacuation of civilians in the southern city ahead of a planned ground offensive. but it's almost impossible to fathom where else they can turn to. rafah has not only become a vital life line for the displaced, it is also a crucial

gateway for humanitarian aid crossing over from egypt. many in the international community are now sounding alarm bells over israel's warning. >> i am alarmed that they intend to focus on rafah when hundreds of thousands of palestinians have been squeezed in a desperate search for safety. >> reporter: the u.s. state department has warned that it cannot support an israeli military operation in rafah without serious planning for civilians there. with u.s. president joe biden on thursday describing israel's actions in gaza as, quote, over the top. israel's prime minister benjamin netanyahu has already dismissed a proposal from hamas for a prolonged truce, which would see a phased withdrawal of israeli troops from gaza and a gradual release of hostages in exchange for palestinian prisoners. netanyahu, who described the

proposal as delusional, vowed to push ahead until a, quote, complete victory over hamas is achieved. leaving little hope for diplomacy as negotiations continue and little hope for what lies ahead in gaza. coming up, president zelenskyy of ukraine removes two of ukraine's top generals from their post. more on what this means for their war against russia.

ukraine is abuzz over the dismissal of the country's top military commander as well as a key general. president zelenskyy follows through on his pledge to make changes to the top of the military leadership. brian todd has been monitoring the story. what does this mean for ukraine's war effort? >> reporter: it could mean changes in tactics on the

battlefield. president zelenskyy announced a new chief of the general staff. it comes just after a very significant and controversial move to replace the overall head of the army. ukraine's president makes his biggest military shakeup since russia's invasion almost two years ago. zelenskyy announced his popular army chief has been dismissed. >> translator: we had a frank discussion about what needs to be changed in the army. urgent changes. >> reporter: zelenskyy softened the blow by giving him the highest honor, the hero of ukraine award and posing for a picture. >> they want to put the best face on it for the world. at the end of the day, he wants ukraine to win. >> reporter: why is he being pushed out? it could be a political move. opinion polls show that he has higher approval ratings than the president. there is speculation he could be a presidential candidate, which

one expert says makes this a risky play by zelenskyy. >> my fear would be that by firing him, you create a potential political martyr who also has the glow of a hero in the war. >> reporter: experts say zelenskyy could simply be holding him to account for the fact that ukraine's co counteroffensive has failed to make significant gains. he described the war as a stalemate in a november essay. >> i think satzelenskyy said, y are the guy responsibility for bringing us to stalemate. maybe it accelerated thinking he had been having. >> reporter: his replacement, ukraine's land forces commander who led the defense of the ckyi. he is not well liked among many ukrainian troops. >> he is viewed by many of ukraine's rank and file military

as a commander who does not value the lives of his soldiers. there was a battle russia waged for ten months, during which time ukraine did not withdraw troops. he demanded his soldiers remain inside the city and hold it to the bitter end. >> reporter: this move comes after zelenskyy told an italian media outlet he is considering replacing several ukrainian leaders beyond just the military. >> it might be to reenergize, reinvigorate, keep people on their toes. some of that could be political to consolidate, to remind people he is the boss. i also think that they just have a very real human fatigue. probably a need for new ideas and new blood and new energy. >> reporter: today, the new commander in chief laid out his new priorities. one is to implement new technology in the fighting space like more drones. they are looking to upgrade

technology because, of course, the new weapons and ammunition they need from the united states have not arrived. that aid package held up in congress. >> those drones critical. thanks very much for that report. the nfl's biggest game of the year is almost upon us. the biggest tv audience might be bigger this year because of none other than taylor swift.

millions of football fans will be watching sunday's super bowl between the 49ers and the chiefs. some of that huge viewership might be attributed to taylor swift, who is getting as much attention as the game itself. coy wire has this report. >> taylor swift has reached the super bowl in her rookie year.

>> shoutout to taylor. >> thanks for joining the team. >> the nfl and fans are embracing this romance. one thing you can bet on is that taylor swift is good for business. nfl viewership hitting all-time highs this postseason. >> rewriting history books herself. i told her i will have to hold up my end and come home with hardware. >> if you are screaming at taylor swift, you are a loser. >> what is everybody so mad? >> this anger, this says nothing about taylor swift. it says everything about the men bothered by it. >> it's clear that this has all been divisive. some supporting her. others -- >> boycott. i have her on my running play list. >> nope. she's dead to us this week. >> listen to this. her favorite number is 13.

>> this is my 13th grammy. my lucky number. i don't know if i told you that. >> this is suthe super bowl plad on 2/11. it is her 13th game this season. leaving some conspiracy theer r -- theorists to say it's scripted. >> i don't think i'm that good of a script er. >> has this been taylor made? >> people are running wild with this. t there are bets whether he will propose after the game. he says that's crazy talk. you can bet on the game is going to be epic. >> whether she will perform with usher as well. have to wait and see. >> hey