russia's vladimir putin saying alexei navalny's name out loud, while telling nbc news he agreed to

a prisoner swap involving the now deceased opposition leader. we have a live report with the details, fresh off putin's reelection. the supreme court set to rule today on whether texas can move forward with its border enforcement law. as border security remains a sticking point for d.c. lawmakers trying to prevent a government shutdown this week. and the race for the white house could come down to one new key demographic, the double haters. our team talks to these swing state voters who say they don't like either major party candidate for president. and get ready for the madness. brackets are set for this year's ncaa college basketball tournament that tips off later this week. and telling an untold story of this space race, highlighting the first black pilots, engineers, and scientists that became astronauts. it's monday, march 18th. "early today" starts right now.

good morning. i'm frances rivera. the supreme court could rule as soon as today on a sweeping texas border security law a mere hours before it's set to go into effect. sb-4 would allow texas state cops to arrest people for crossing the border illegally. traditionally, that kind of immigration enforcement has been the responsibility of the federal government. so the law has been widely criticized as unconstitutional. meanwhile, in d.c., the deadlock over how to handle the crisis at the border is likely increasing the danger of a government shutdown this weekend. congress has until one minute past midnight saturday before funding for two-thirds of the federal government will run out. republican nominee for president donald trump has discouraged party members from seeking compromise. russian president vladimir putin was reelected this weekend with a whopping 88% take of the vote. in the west, his victory is being regarded as a forgone conclusion. international observers and even the

u.s. state department say that russia largely conducts, quote, sham elections. let's go live now to claudio lavanga who is standing by with the latest. claudio, remind viewers why the elections are not seen as free and fair? >> good morning, frances. well, now 93% of the ballots counted, it looks like it is another landslide victory for vladimir putin, at least on paper, with 88% of the votes going to him. what this means that vladimir putin is poised to extend his almost 25 years in power with another six years as president. as you mentioned, this was not unexpected at all. on the contrary, the u.s. and other western countries said that these elections were anything but fair and free, for a number of reasons. well, first of all, the three contenders were practically unknown. they were seen as token rivals. there is literally no independent monitoring of elections in russia. and the real critics and political

contenders of vladimir putin are either in exile, in jail, or dead, just like, of course, as you may remember, alexei navalny, who died in an arctic prison just about a month ago. talking about navalny, our own embassy news foreign correspondent keir simmons did ask vladimir putin at a news conference in moscow about navalny, and putin replied, for the first time calling navalny by name, that he agreed that navalny would be part of a swap with western prison in western countries. but then he died. well, that's life, he concluded. well, now five sources confirmed that there was a negotiation of this kind going on, but it wasn't imminent when he died on february 16th. frances? >> okay, claudio, thank you. jose andres and world central kitchen say they're working to dispatch a second aid boat from cypress to the gaza strip with another 200 tons of food. but the first delivery

is still sitting in a warehouse amid desperate conditions in gaza. the ngo acknowledged they encountered logistical challenges in actually distributing the aid. the u.n. has warned of potential famine, especially in gaza's north where large areas have not received food support for weeks. the cross-country manhunt for a suspected killer has come to an en. 33-year-old jaremy smith is now in the hospital and in police custody after officers chased him on foot and shot him. smith is accused of killing new mexico officer justin hair on friday when herr had stopped to help him with a flat tire. >> the last words officer herr uttered on this earth was to offer help to a man who was about to kill him. >> smith had been driving a car that belonged to fannisha core, a paramedic from south carolina who was found dead on friday. smith is a person of interest in that case. . turning now to the race for the white house and the new block of voters that

could decide the election. they been dubbed the double haters because they don't like either candidates. our shaquille brewster talked to some in the swing state of wisconsin. >> reporter: excuse me there, how are you? i'm from nbc news. can i ask you a quick question? first thing that comes to mind. >> oh, boy. >> reporter: what do you think when you see these two options? >> not great. >> reporter: in battleground wisconsin, the choice these swing voters face in november is one they prefer not to make. >> reporter: are you excited about these being your options? >> quite honestly, no. >> i can't say i'm happy about either option. >> reporter: what's the word that you think when you see these two candidates running for president? >> oh, hell no. >> reporter: they're the so-called double haters. >> why is it them two again? it happened four years ago. >> reporter: and they could decide the election by holding their nose and voting for one of the major party candidates, choosing not to vote at all, or -- >> i'd like to have more choices. >> reporter: funny you say that. ask and you shall receive. >> well, look at that. >> reporter: does it change at all if i do that and give you a third option?

>> depending who it is. >> coca-cola or pepsi. maybe we do need a third option. >> reporter: support for third party candidates is one of the biggest wildcards this election. in a february poll, 21% of voters backed third party candidates with independent robert f. kennedy grabbing 15%. for context, in 1992, ross perot snagged 19% of the vote in what's considered one of the more successful third-party bids and the options may grow. the group no labels is vowing to field a unity ticket pairing a democrat with a republican. >> if somebody steps up to the plate other than these two i would consider it. >> reporter: but the challenges are massive, getting on the ballot in all 50 states, fund raising and navigating hot-button issues like abortion, but perhaps the biggest hurdle -- >> reporter: if a third party option makes it easier for trump to win would you even consider it? >> oh, no.

>> reporter: absolutely not? >> no. >> i believe it would be disruptive. >> reporter: perot was blamed for taking votes way from george h.w. bush and giving the presidency to bill clinton, just as ralph nader is still attacked for shifting liberal votes away from al gore in 2000. >> it just doesn't get any closer than this. >> reporter: for many of these double haters they want top have the choice to vote with their heart. >> reporter: could you see yourself voting for a third party in this election? >> absolutely, i could. >> reporter: shaquille brewster, nbc news, wauwatosa, wisconsin. over the weekend, cities across the nation became a sea of green as residents celebrated st. patrick's day. boston, which has one of the largest irish populations in the country, had a major turnout for its st. paddy's day parade. and in new york, an estimated two million to watch bagpipers, floats and more. farther west, the windy city kept up its

annual tradition of dyeing the chicago river green for its 69th year. here is the thing. winter isn't done quite yet. nbc's michelle grossman is tracking a cold front. isn't spring on a calendar going to pop up soon? >> this is the last full day of winter, but in the eastern half of the nation, especially in the southeast tonight, into tomorrow, we're going to be chilly today. but those freezing temperatures are coming tonight into tomorrow. so 22 million people impacted by freeze alerts this evening into tuesday morning. we're talking about memphis, little rock, tupelo, down to montgomery where you see this pink here that is a freeze warning. we're going see temperatures plummeting into the 20s, also the 30s. that's going to cool crops. so you need to kind of cover those plants and also the pipes. as we're looking at the spring this afternoon, temperatures well below normal for this time of year. huntsville 15 degrees below normal. 58 tuscaloosa. columbia, we're looking at 66. below normal as well. another chilly day on tuesday. and then we start to rebound by wednesday and thursday, into the 70s in atlanta.

also very winter-like along the great lakes, we're look at 5 to 9 inches of snow possible d 50s. just 48 degrees in nashville. but lots of sunshine there. 57 in atlanta. all right. that's your monday forecast. >> okay, michelle. thank you. coming up, time to fill out those brackets. march madness is here. who made into it the big dance on selection sunday? but first, the untold story of black astronautsha tt pushed nasa further into the final frontier. ) is he? confidently walking 8 long haired dogs and living as if he doesn't have allergies? yeah. fast relief of your worst allergy symptoms, like nasal congestion. [♪♪] looking for a moisturizer that does more than just moisturize?

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>> growing up, i loved the space program. but nobody doing that stuff looked like me. >> reporter: they're the astronauts and scientists who broke barriers in space and the civil rights movement. now their stories are told in the national geographic documentary "the space race," directed by lisa cortez and diego hurtado de mendoza. >> knowing your history is extremely important. for us, just having the opportunity to pair something that everyone thinks they know, and then you watch a film like ours, and you're going to discover that you didn't know all of the story. a few years ago there was the movie "hidden figures," which i think taught a lot of female about black female mathematicians who worked for nasa. many people didn't know that story. i guess that's really the tip of the iceberg, right? >> there are a lot of hidden figures. there is more to the

picture beyond the frame. and sometimes the frame cuts out important contributors to progress. to pull this thread, to pull an invisible thread is i think what is really exciting for us in telling these stories. >> reporter: like the story of ed dwight, who in the 1960s was training to become the first black astronaut, but never made it to space. a dream derailed by discrimination. it wasn't until 1983 that guy blueford paved the way to space, paving the road for many more. >> this has been an awakening for me, understanding these pioneers that were never talked about and never heard of. >> reporter: melvin went on two missions in 2008 and 2009, helping to build the international space station. >> you have spent more than 500 hours in space, right? >> uh-huh. >> how do you describe

that to people? >> joe, i think the biggest thing about traveling in space is that you're trained to do all of these technical things, right. but when you get the moment to look out the window, or when you're breaking bread with people you used to fight against, you have this other overview effect that you can almost not even describe it. you feel connected to the planet. you feel connected to the cosmos. >> reporter: but as the documentary shows, it also comes with challenges. >> find the defendant guilty. >> reporter: in 2021, when the police officer who killed george floyd was on trial, astronaut victor glover was in space. he says it was an overwhelming and emotional time for him. that also impacted melvin. >> when i think back on this really tough time in our country, i think about what i was feeling down here on earth and i felt numb. i can only imagine what my brother victor

glover was feeling up there. >> reporter: what do you hope people who see this documentary take away from it? >> the first thing i hope is that they learn their history. and that's all people. i've been talking to everyone that's seen it from white, black, asian, whatever color and culture you want to see have seen the movie, and they said the first thing they say is i never knew. and then the second thing they said is wow, what perseverance, what resilience, what ability to rise above your circumstances. >> reporter: when you hear those response, how does that make you feel? >> a big smile on my face. because i had a part of helping bring these stories to light. >> i'm going head that on our watch list. our thanks to joe fryer for that report. still to come, a method to the madness. we have all the info you need to llfi out your bracket as we break down the top teams in the ncaa basketball tournament. it's coming up right

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the stage is set for college sports' premier event. the brackets for the ncaa college basketball tournament were revealed on selection sunday. in the men's tournament, uconn is beginning with the first overall one seed in program history. they will face tournament new comers stetson on friday. north carolina laid claim to the top spot in the west, while purdue will look to avenge their first round knockout from last year. they're taking the top seed in the midwest. houston rounds out the top dogs in the men's tournament with the number one spot in the south. on the women's side, powerhouse, right? we talk about her so much. caitlin clark has a chance to top off her historic final season in iowa with a national championship. the hawkeyes claimed the top spot for albany regional 2. south carolina locked up the tournament's overall one seed in albany region one, while texas the number one seeds.

the madness begins wednesday night with the first four as eight teams on the fringe compete for a spot in a 64-team opening round. so a lot of action coming on. for caitlin clark, wouldn't that be so amazing to end this and go off to the wnba. >> with the title. it's so funny with all these championships; you never know. it's almost like a second season. you just hope for her she is going to go out on a high. she is on a high any way. >> anything could happen, though. >> exactly. anything could happen in golf too. scottie scheffler's hands, after finishing 23 under at the round of the players championship. the world number one watched from affair as xander schauffele, brian harman all one stroke behind. clark ended tauping a final shot with a putt he'll never forget. >> unbelievable! >> no, so close.

clark's heartbreak still ended up making history. scheffler won his second players championship title in a row, becoming the first golfer in 50 years of the tournament with back-to-back wins. and this reminds me, have you seen "full swing," the documentary? >> i have not. >> it's so good. it's about professional golfers. not just the physical demands, but the mental demands. it really is a mental game. you need to watch it. >> getting a boomerang ball that went right back around. all right. when we come back, on tuesday, one lucky person could be a multimillionaire. and keurig is brewing up a cleaner, greener way to enjoy your cup of joe. renews millions of surface skin cells while you sleep. wake up to smoother, younger-looking skin with olay retinol24. can the flavor of a slow cooked smoked sausage be so gloriously delicious that the sight of its sizzling makes your tastebuds weep? if it's hillshire farm, oh, hill yeah.™

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more. >> reporter: ever since he was born in 2021, cooper coda has been fighting to survive. he struggled to gain weight. and with his skin turning yellow, his parents feared the worst. >> when he was about three or four months old, he started to become super jau jaundiced. and that's shortly after when that itch really started. it's this itch that can't be satisfied. he would scratch himself until he bled. >> reporter: his doctors confirmed that he had alegiel syndrome, it runs in his family and had taken the life of his aunt. in the united states about one in 30,000 are born with the disease. it carries a mortality rate of up to 10%. >> we eventually came to this realization he is going to need a transplant in order to survive. >> reporter: with the clock ticking and his liver getting worse, cooper was placed on the transplant list at just 2 years old. then a few months

later, sherman and amanda cota got the call. >> all the emotions just flooding. happy, scared, slightly excited for the future that this is going to help him. this is going to massively change his life. >> reporter: cooper got a liver thanks to an innovative liver transplant surgery that allows two people to benefit from just one donor. it's called split transplant. and doctors say it can save hundred morse people. >> you can put it in a living person's liver and put it in someone and it will grow back. usually we give segments two and three to the child and give the rest and give them to adult. it's almost like it's 75-25 split. >> reporter: dr. adam greecemer transplant surgeries at langone health say cooper's transplant has transformed his life. >> he has gone through a tremendous growth spurt since his transplant. he is expecting up to his expected height and weight.

now it also allows him to develop mentally better. >> reporter: they say that splitting livers can save the lives of more kids, just like cooper. >> the highest risk for mortality on the waiting list are for children who are less than one year of age. i think if we split first and gave them the opportunity to receive more split livers, we could actually reduce that mortality rate to zero. >> reporter: now thriving since his transplant, cooper just celebrated his third birthday last month, one that he shares with his late aunt nicole. >> it just felt like she's here. she's watching over cooper. and at that point, i was i think everything is going to be okay. >> reporter: dr. akshay sile, nbc

presumptive gop nominee donald trump again facing blowback for using language at a rally that harkens