good morning to you. thank you for joining us. >> we're following breaking news. >> president biden expected to address the nation in a matter of moments. this is over the escalating crisis at the russian-ukraine border. the white house now calling what's happening an invasion. >> it comes as russian lawmakers gave vladimir putin permission to use military force outside of the country today. it is a move that could trigger a broader attack on ukraine. this following putin's announcement yesterday dechairing two separatist regions of ukrainian -- of

ukraine independence. >> the statements follow new video coming to light, showing columns of military vehicles including tanks on the outside skirts of one of those breakaway regions of eastern ukraine. no insignias were visible. we await president biden's comments. the white house continues to toughen its stance as they monitor the russian aggression. nbc's bre jackson is taking us, taking it all as russia also received a blow to its economy overnight. >> this morning germany announced it is halting approval have russia's massive gas pipeline, nord stream 2. raising the stakes on an already tense situation -- today germany announced it is hitting the brakes on russia's massive gas pipeline, nord stream 2. this after russian president

vladimir putin recognized two key regions of eastern ukraine as independent states and ordered troops into those areas. during a rare emergency meeting of the united nations security council, the u.s. ambassador warns russia's deployment is a pretext to war. >> he calls them peacekeepers. this is nonsense. we know what they really are. >> in response, president biden signed an executive order imposing sanctions on the two russian separatist regions of ukraine. the order prohibits new investment, trade and financing in those areas. other key allies will begin imposing sanctions immediately. >> we are cracking down on russian banks, russian individuals. >> russia continues to deny plans to attack, criticizing the west instead. >> whipping up unfounded panic. >> reporter: on the ground in ukraine, commanders say they've been under fire from russia's newly recognized separatists and have fired back saying -- this

is an historic moment and maybe a breaking point. ukraine's president says his one goal is peace in ukraine. but russia's actions violate ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity. secretary of state blinken will meet with ukraine's foreign minister later today here in washington, d.c. in washington, i'm bre jackson for nbc news. >> the flakt a russia-ukraine conflict would likely impact everyone. uncertainty already driving up prices at the gas pump. russia is the world's third largest oil supplier. the images are already leaving people outraged. >> i am appalled by this. disgusted by this. i am really frustrated and worried for the family i have in ukraine and what that means to the world order. >> in a worst-case scenario,

experts warn a full-on conflict would likely push u.s. gas prices to new all time highs. we're talking about above $6 per gallon in the bay area. >> of course, we'll bring you those comments from the president as soon as they happen live on air and on our website. also on our website, continuing coverage of the growing tensions overseas. head to nbcbayarea.com. click on the link. it is in our trending bar. switching gears, take a look at this. some much needed spotty showers moving over the bay area early this morning. time lapsed video of the pg&e camera in the santa cruz mountains at about 7:00 a.m. >> we're still seeing some rain. >> yeah. as we look at storm ranger right now, we are seeing some of those showers moving through the south bay. we can see the snow over the sierra that continues, and our storm ranger really picking up on some snow right now.

we take a look at mt. hamilton. all the bright colors we're seeing as well as, as you head to the santa cruz mountains as well. and some of those pockets of rain may be quite heavy at times as we go into later today. we'll see this firing up again with another round of moisture coming into the bay area that could trigger some showers. we can see those building clouds over the south bay, heading toward the hills. as we go into our time line for this afternoon, we can see more of these pop-up showers and possibly even hail today due to the cold temperatures that we're seeing. we'll talk more about that cold. it's in the forecast and freezing temperatures coming up in a few minutes. >> thanks. new at 11:00, san jose police announcing the arrest of dozens of people. this is in a sexual assault investigation sweep. i want to you take a look at the screen here. these the 35 suspects arrested in part of that operation. they all face sex crime charges

ranging from misdemeanors to felonies. police say the incidents took place as far back as 2016 and as recent as this month. now, investigators say it is possible that there could be additional victims. just into a newsroom, a federal jury in georgia found three men guilty of all charges including hate crime charges. no cameras were allowed in the courtroom when the verdict was read this morning. father and son, greg and travis mcmichael, and their neighbor were convicted of violating arbery's civil rights. it centers on mcmichaels and brian who chased arbery. they cornered him. travis mcmichael fatally shot him with a shotgun. happening now, school employees are making their voice heard as hundreds of san francisco teachers' jobs are on the chopping block. the school board members may be ready to sign off on layoff notices to solve a massive

budget shortfall. nbc bay area ciera johnson is at the protest at the san francisco school district headquarters. according to the union, those notices have already gone out. >> reporter: good morning. yeah, they went out. nearly 400 union members received those potential layoff notices. we heard them speak just a moment ago. it just wrapped up. i stepped to the side. 400 union members received those potential layoff notices. we had a chance this morning to hear from social workers, middle school teachers, as well as some parents who are concerned about what this could do. those potential layoffs, long term as well as in the intermediate. so we'll break down just who the employees are who received these notices. according to a presentation given by sfusd, they're working to slash a $125 million annual spending and they say to do that, they'll work by reducing

the work force. that same presentation broke down who these individuals are. they include 151 credentialed united educators of san francisco. that is the union here in the district. as well as 37 classified union members. 20 administrators, part of the united administrators san francisco union. 51 unrepresented management, as well as 30 that are part of the service employees international union. they're also looking to lay off 12 unrepresented individuals. the district did note in that presentation that those numbers could potentially decrease but they said they would not increase. of course, that was written in that presentation. we have reached out to the district for comment but so far we have not heard back. i want to you take a listen to a social worker. she shared her message at the present participation just wrapped up. she did receive a potential layoff notice and she has this

message for district leaders. >> just figure out your problems and navigate this on your own. that's irresponsible and not how a big city school district should operate. it's just stunning. >> reporter: now, this morning we've also learned that those same union members have started a petition. they're urging teachers, as well as parent to sign that petition. they said they will then present it to district leaders. all of this happening ahead of tonight's meeting. the vote from the board of education with the san francisco unified school district regarding the potential of 400 petitions. we're live in san francisco -- excuse me, 400 layoffs, potential layoffs. >> any time you hear layoffs with educators, that's certainly a big concern to a lot of those parents out there. thank you. developing now, today, one of the country's largest wireless carriers will shut down it's 3g service.

bob redell live in livermore this morning. some industries are asking for a delay on this one, bob. why? >> reporter: well, good morning. the end of 3g service means if you have a flip phone, whoever you are still using this, that this is all it impacts. it's not true. a burglar alarm system, detection systems, "medical alert" devices. they still rely on the old 3g technology. when at&t starts shutting dow 3g service on cell towers, people are concerned that lives will be put in danger. that's why they're asking the fcc to give them more time. at&t says they have been transitioning customers off 3g and now less than 1% of the mobile traffic runs on that old technology. but critics point out that 2 million home and personal emergency systems still operate on 3g.

and 80% of those customers are seniors. hence the concern about lives being put at risk. company have known since 2019 that this day would come but a worldwide chip shortage and the supply in chain disruptions because of covid have delayed it. we spoke with david burgess. >> what is having a big symptomatic so auld iot systems, machine to machine systems. things like burglar alarms, point of sale terminals, atms, connected cars, things like that, that have cellular communication capability built into them. it was probably built into them several years ago and maybe difficult to update. >> reporter: roger from san francisco still uses a 3g flip

phone. for a number of reasons, he doesn't want to be surveiled. also, it's not as big a deal if he loses it when it is out and about compared to the loss of an expensive smartphone stored with so much personal information. >> if i'm going to be strong-armed into using a smartphone, i'll go kicking and screaming but i'll go. i'll do it. i'll be very unhappy. it is interesting. there are parts of san francisco where if i left my apartment stark naked in the morning, i would get less attention standing on some corners stark naked than i would using a flip phone. people point at you and they laugh. >> he visited his t-mobile phone after he we spoke. it turns out his old phone will work on the 4g network. if you're on a flip phone, check with your service.

t-mobile by july, verizon by the end of the year. reporting live in livermore. nbc bay area news. >> you'd better check your phone. maybe old photos on it. back in the day. >> congratulations on still having a flip phone. okay. tracking unpredictable weather. still ahead in the newscast, the reason our climate in crisis is making it harder to manage the wildlands. plus, do you leave it on or take it off? a decision on the holdouts coming tonight.

i'm mark and i live in vero beach, florida. my wife and i have three children. ruthann and i like to hike. we eat healthy. we exercise. i noticed i wasn't as sharp as i used to be. my wife introduced me to prevagen and so i said "yeah, i'll try it out." i noticed that i felt sharper, i felt like i was able to respond to things quicker.

and i thought, yeah, it works for me. prevagen. healthier brain. better life. . moving you forward as we await mask guidance from the cdc, some bay area communities still in limbo. >> one may lift the mandate today. another waiting to decide. more on where we stand right

now. >> depending on where your day takes you, around the bay you may have to mask up and the rules continue to evolve. in vallejo, the city council will decide whether to get rid of the mask mandate for everyone vaccinated and boosted or not. vallejo held on a bit longer than solano did. and right now, santa clara county is the only county with an order to keep masks on indoors. we could see more uniformity tomorrow, wednesday, when the cdc updates its indoor masking guidelines. right now the agency is considering where to set the bench marks in terms of hospitalizations and severity of disease in a community when requiring masks. in some states, leaders are deciding for themselves, dropping mask mandates over the last few weeks. look at this map here. all of those states now have no mask requirements. nevada, for example, lifted mandates even in schools and medical settings.

new york doing things a little differently, requiring masks on public zprpgs health care settings. california and the other states in yellow have unvaccinated people masking up in some situations, and in green states, they require masks in some situations, whether or not people are vaccinated and boosted on. average, covid cases are declining across the nation. also here in california. and in california, 82.8% of people 5 and up have at least one covid vaccine. let's talk about it. everyone else is. with today's rain comes that fresh snow in the sierra. this is video at pollock pines near highway 50. the good news for ski fans, they got the snow. but that comes with the treacherous rain -- i mean, treacherous for drivers out there. you know that area well. >> it's not too bad. the snow plows are clearing it up so we can go skiing maybe by the weekend, marcus.

>> i'm ready. will it be nice and smooth sailing? >> yeah. you maybe able to go right out here in the parking lot and play in the hail. we just recently had a hail stone in san jose. and scott was like, hey, it's hailing here in widow glen. and then we're getting these videos and reports coming in. these little cells that we're seeing, and really, storm ranger is helping us out to see exactly where that is happening around the los gatos area and also heading toward south san jose. we also are seeing some really intense rainfall around gilroy and just to the south. look at all this rain. there may be some thunderstorms, some hail, and that could make the roads really slick. especially if you're driving down 101. here's a look at the wider view and what's happening. we're seeing some moisture coming in. right now in the south bay, the rest of the bay area, not seeing much activity as of now.

here's what to expect. this blast of cold air is really shaking things up. and we can see more rain, even some thunderstorms along with more small hail as we go into the rest of today. we're also looking at snow coming down to about 1,000 feet. that's the santa cruz summit, mount hamilton, and even coming down to some of the spots in the north bay as well. going hour by hour, we should see things calming down for the next couple hours after it moves out of the south bay and then start to fire up about 2:00 for parts of the north by a. around napa and solano counties. that then starts to move into aircraft and alameda counties as we go into the evening. the evening commute may be really treacherous, especially if we get one of those really heavy down pours. and then we see the snow on the hills. we're not looking at a lot of rain here. it just depends where we see the heavier down pours setting up. we could see another quarter to

a tenth of an inch of rain. as far as at that, it is about to get cold. freezing at that for all these areas shaded in purple. that's a lot of our inland valleys and away from the bay. as we take a look at the next several days, our temperatures are cold now but we will be warming up as we go into the rest of the week. this is our main chance of getting in some rain. another slight chance on sunday. that's when temperatures will be much milder and we're looking at temperatures in the low 50s in san francisco. as we turn to our climate in crisis, we have researchers at uc berkeley using an experimental force in the sierra trying to come up with ways -- it looks like we're going to our special report. let's head over to nbc. this is an nbc news special report. here's lester holt. >> good day from new york.

president biden is about to deliver an update in the rapidly escalating crisis in ukraine. it come after president vladimir putin of russia ordered troops into separatist held regions of ukraine. the white house is calling that plan an invasion. there are the two regions where putin says he will send so-called peace keeping forces. they are russian-speaking areas which have been ruled by pro russian forces for years. the administration has long made clear there will be severe consequences. mainly economic sanctions on russia if it invades and the white house this morning stated that any movement in this region would constitute an invasion and trigger an american response. we want to go to nbc news chief white house correspondent kristin welker. do we know la the president will talk about in this briefing? >> reporter: we are expecting president biden to talk about new sanctions. they will be targeted toward russia and they've been

partnered with allies. president biden imposed limited sanctions. democrats and republicans have urged him to go even further in the wake of those sanctions. the white house pushing back though saying essentially, they are holding the toughest sanctions to try to pressure putin not to invade even further. so that is why they're not going full board with these sanctions. as you mentioned, the administration is using the term invasion. that's a shift in its rhetoric. it is using that strengthened term after monday night, administration officials stopped short of calling it an invasion. what changed? effectively, what changed, the word invasion was appropriate after assessing russia's actions on the ground and of course, those peacekeeping missions that are moving in. and lester, here's the president. >> thank you. >> make up your mind, huh?

well, good afternoon. yesterday vladimir putin recognized two regions of ukraine as independent states. and he bizarrely asserted that these regions are no longer part of ukraine and they're sovereign territory. to put it simply, russia just announced that it is carving out a big chunk of ukraine. last night, putin authorized russian forces to deploy into the region. these regions. today he asserted these regions are actually, extend deeper into the areas he recognized, claiming large areas under the jurisdiction of the ukraine government. he is setting up a rationale to take more territory by force, in my view. if we, we listened to his speech last night, and i know many of you did. he's setting up a rationale to go much further. this is the beginning of a russian invasion of ukraine as he indicated, and asked permission to do it.

so let's begin to, so i'm going to begin to impose sanctions in response far beyond the response we implemented in 2014. if russia goes further with his invasion, we plan to go further with sanctions. who in the lord's name is putin think gives him the right to declare new so-called countries on territory that belonged to his neighbors? this is a flagrant violation of international law and demands a firm response of the international community. over the last few months, we've coordinated closely with our nato allies in europe and around the world to prepare that response. we said all along, and i've told putin to his face more than a month ago, that we would act together and the moment russia moved against ukraine, russia is now undeniably moved against ukraine by declaring these independent states.

so today, i'm announcing the first sanctions to impose cost on russia in response to their actions yesterday. these have been closely coordinated with our allies and partners who will continue to escalate sanctions if russia escalates. we're implementing full blockage sanctions on two russian financial institutions. veb and their military bank. complementary sanctions on the sovereign debt. that means we've cut off russia's money, it can not raise money from the west and cannot trade in its new debt on our markets or european markets either. starting tomorrow, and continuing in the days ahead, we will also impose sanctions on russia's elites and their family members. they share in the corrupt gains of the policies and should share in the pain as well. because of russians' actions, we've worked with germany to

ensure nord stream 2 will not, as i promised, will not move forward. as russia contemplates its next move, we have our next move prepared as well. russia will pay an even steamer price if it continues its aggression, including additional sanctions. the united states will continue to provide defensive assistance to ukraine in the meantime and will continue to reinforce and reassure our nato allies. today in response to russia's admission that it will not withdraw forces from belarus, i have authorized additional u.s. forces and equipment already stationed in europe to strengthen our baltic allies, estonia, latvia and lithuania. let me be clear. these are totally defensive moves on our part. we have no intention of fighting russia. we want to send an unmistakable message though, that the united states together with our allies will defend every inch of nato territory and abide by the

commitments we made to nato. we still believe that russia is poised to go much further and launching a massive military attack against ukraine. i hope i'm wrong about that. i hope i'm wrong. but russia only escalated its threat against the rest of ukrainian territory, including the capital city of kyiv. there are still well over 150,000 russian troops surrounding ukraine. and as i said, russian forces remain positioned in belarus to attack ukraine from the north including war planes and offensive missile systems. russia has moved troops closer to ukraine's border with russia. russia's naval vessels are moving in the black sea including amphibious assault ships, missile cruisers and submarines. russia has moved supplies and blood and medical equipment on the border. you don't need blood unless you plan on starting a war. over the last few days we've seen much of the play book that

secretary blinken laid out last week in the united nations security council come to pass. false flag events along the line of contact in the donbas. dramatically staged, conveniently on camera meeting of security council to grandstand for the russian public. and now political provocation of recognizing sovereign ukrainian territory and so-called independent republiviation, aga international law. putin has sought authorization from the russian parliament to use military force outside of russian territory. and this set the stage for further pretext, further provocation by russia to try to justify further military action. none of us should be fooled. none of us will be fooled. there is no justification. further russian assault on ukraine remains a severe threat in the days ahead.

and if russia proceeds, it is russia and russia alone that bears the responsibility. as we respond, my administration is using every tool at our disposal to protect american businesses and consumers from rising prices at the pump. as i said last week, defending freedom will have cost. for us as well and here at home. we need to be honest about that. as we do this, i'm going to take robust action to make sure the pain of our sanctions is targeted on the russian economy, not ours. we are closely monitoring energy supplies for any disruption. to have a plan, coordination with major oil producing consumers and producers toward a collective investment to secure global energy spots. this will be, this will blunt o the american people at the gas pump which is

critical to me. over the last few days, i've had constant contact with european leaders including ukrainian president zelenskyy. vice president harris met in person with the leaders of germany over the weekend at the munich conference including president zelenskyy. at every step we've shown the united states and our allies and partners are working in unison, which he hasn't been counting on, mr. putin. we're united in our support of ukraine. we're united in our opposition of russian aggression. we are united in our resolve to defend our nato alliance. and we're united in our understanding of the seriousness of the threat russia is making to the global peace and stability. yesterday the world heard clearly the full extent of vladimir putin's twist rewriting of history. going back more than a century, as he waxed eloquently. noting, well, i won't