Savannah Guthrie Pleads for Help; Judge Blocks CA Law for ICE to Unmask | NTD Good Morning (Feb. 10)

Welcome, NTD. Good morning starts now. Here are today's top stories. As the search for Nancy Guthrie continues, her daughter Savannah Guthrie posts a fourth video asking for more than just prayers. Big wins in court for the Trump administration. A judge blocks California's mask ban for ICE agents. And an appeals court backs ending temporary protected status for three countries. Vice President J.D. Vance in Armenia this week pushing a US-brokered peace deal and securing a new civil nuclear agreement that could bring billions in American exports. A major social media trial now underway in Los Angeles with claims these platforms were designed to hook kids. A look at what the plaintiff alleges and which top executives are expected to testify. Under the Trump administration's new big, beautiful bill, you could be seeing a lower tax bill and higher refund this year when filing your taxes. What does it take to become an Olympic athlete? We delve deep into the inner life of high performers with psychologist Patrick Porter. This is NTD Good Morning. Live from our global headquarters in New York City, here are Stefania Cox and Kerry Dunst. Good morning, thank you for joining us. Today's Tuesday, February 10th. You're watching NTD Good Morning. And my co-host Kerry is on special assignment. In today's top news, a plea for help. Savannah Guthrie posting a fourth video asking for more than just prayers. The FBI also appealing to the public, writing in a message, someone has that one piece of information that can help bring Nancy home. Here are the details. We believe our mom is still out there. We need your help. US television host Savannah Guthrie pleaded for help in a video released Monday as a search for her missing mother who was presumed to have been kidnapped for ransom entered its second week. So I'm coming on just to ask you, not just for your prayers, but no matter where you are, even if you're far from Tucson, if you see anything, you hear anything, if there's anything at all that seems strange to you that you report to law enforcement, we are at an hour of desperation and we need your help. 84-year-old Nancy Guthrie was last seen on January 31st when relatives dropped her off at her home near Tucson after dinner. She was reported missing the next day. Authorities say Guthrie has severely limited mobility and could not have left on her own, leading investigators to conclude earlier on that she was kidnapped. Two apparent ransom notes were sent to media outlets. One letter listed a deadline that has already passed and a second note appeared Friday after the family appealed for direct communication with whoever may be holding her. Adding to worry over her fate was the frail state of Guthrie's health and that she's said to be dependent on daily medication. The Pima County Sheriff's Department says no suspects or vehicles have been identified but have confirmed the blood found on her porch matched her DNA. Separately, the FBI said it was not aware of any continued communication between the Guthrie family and suspected kidnappers. On Monday, Nancy Guthrie's neighbors voiced shock at a possible abduction so close to their homes. I think we just have to wait until we get some real evidence but my heart breaks for them. We're very upset about it and I hope they find who did it very quickly and we hope that Nancy is still alive. The FBI is offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to her recovery or to an arrest in the case. On Monday, the agency said additional personnel from its field offices across the country continue to deploy to Tucson to assist in the investigation. Two big wins in court for the Trump administration and its immigration enforcement agenda. We're starting off with a judge finding California's law forcing agents to remove their masks is unlawful. Here's more. A federal judge blocking part of a California law that would have stopped law enforcement officers from wearing masks on the job, saying the rule unfairly targets federal agents. The ruling sides with the Trump administration in a legal fight over two California laws aimed at federal immigration enforcement. The judge finding that the state's No Secret Police Act did not apply equally to all officers and ruling California cannot enforce a mask ban against federal agents. On X, Attorney General Pam Bondi praising the decision saying these federal agents are harassed, doxed, instructed and attacked on a regular basis just for doing their jobs. The state's second law requiring visible identification was allowed to stand. California passed both laws after federal immigration operations in the state last year. Meanwhile, a federal appeals court is clearing the way for the Trump administration to end temporary protective status for immigrants from three countries, Nepal, Honduras and Nicaragua. The Ninth Circuit says it is putting a lower court ruling on hold while the case is appealed. The panel explained TPS exists for foreign nationals who cannot return safely to their home country because of extraordinary circumstances like armed conflict or natural disaster. The judge is pointing out the Secretary of Homeland Security is required to regularly review whether those conditions still exist, saying if they don't, TPS must be terminated. In a post on X, Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem saying TPS was never designed to be permanent, yet previous administrations have used it as a de facto amnesty program for decades. Nepalese citizens were granted TPS following a devastating 2015 earthquake. Hondurans and Nicaraguans got their designation back in 1999. That year, Hurricane Mitch resulted in the deaths of around 10,000 people in Central America. Secretary Noem says the situation in each of these countries has since improved. The appeals court's decision now allows the administration to move forward with ending protections for nearly 89,000 people. It comes amid attempts to end TPS for around 300,000 Haitians in the U.S. A judge last week ruling that termination unlawful. The administration is appealing that decision. And President Trump says he's halting approval of a new international bridge linking Ontario and Michigan. He's calling for negotiations on the project to restart. Trump questioned Canadian ownership of the Gordie Howe International Bridge and argued the United States should receive greater economic benefits. He also criticized Ontario's ban on U.S. alcohol sales, Canada's dairy policies, and recent Canadian agreements involving China. The $6.4 billion bridge was funded by Canada and owned by the Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority. It has completed construction and is undergoing testing. It was approved under the Obama administration in 2013. Canadian officials have not yet responded publicly. President Trump previously expressed support for completing the cross-border project. That was during his first term. Vice President J.D. Vance is visiting Armenia and Azerbaijan this week. He's pushing a Washington-brokered peace agreement. Vance has already come away with an agreement on civil nuclear energy with Armenia. NTD's Daniel Monaghan reports on the agreement that could net billions of dollars in American exports. Vice President J.D. Vance and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan signed the accord on civilian nuclear energy yesterday. Vance is on a two-day visit to Armenia. This is one of the oldest Christian countries in the entire world, a true bedrock of Christian civilization and culture. As a devout Christian myself, I know the meaning of this country to the entire world and to the religion that the prime minister and I share. The two leaders completed negotiations on a so-called 1-2-3 agreement, permitting the United States to export nuclear technology and equipment. Vance called the agreement a classic win-win deal for Armenia and the U.S. It means stronger energy security for my own country, and it also, I think, means stronger energy security for Armenia, and it's also gonna create a lot of new jobs back home in the United States. It means small modular reactors. American technology is gonna be coming to this country again. Vance said the deal could bring as much as $5 billion in initial U.S. exports to Armenia, as well as $4 billion in long-term contracts for fuel and maintenance. The new agreement could advance the former Soviet Republic's move away from the orbit of Russia, especially if the United States wins the bid to build an energy plant. President Trump in January said Vance would travel to Armenia and Azerbaijan to bolster a peace accord signed in Washington in August. Peace is not made by cautious people. Peace is not made by people who are too focused on the past. Peace is made by people who are focused on the future. The peace deal stopped decades of hostilities over the Nagorno-Karabakh region. I think that we really do have an opportunity, not just to create a historic peace that can last, as you said, one that could reach the point of no return. I believe that we are at the point where we could actually have Armenia serve as an important anchor for economic development in this region of the world. On his trip, Vance is promoting the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity, or TRIP. The segment is a planned 27-mile corridor spanning southern Armenia. The route would also circumvent Russia and Iran, rerouting energy and trade from Moscow. It would provide Azerbaijan direct access to its Nakhchivan exclave and its ally, Turkey. An exclave is a portion of a country that is separate from the main territory. The TRIP also seeks to establish U.S. relations via agreements on nuclear cooperation, semiconductors, and defense equipment. This thing is scarier than I thought. It's pretty awesome. The second family can be seen here, arriving in Armenia. Today, Vance and Second Lady Usha Vance attended a wreath-laying ceremony at the Armenian Genocide Memorial to honor the victims of the 1915 Armenian Genocide. The genocide was carried out mainly through the mass murder of around one million Armenians during death marches to the Syrian desert and the forced Islamization of others, primarily women and children. Vance is scheduled to travel to Azerbaijan tomorrow and Thursday as the regional visit continues. Daniel Monahan, NTD News. And President Trump is set to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington tomorrow, where they're expected to discuss ongoing negotiations with Iran. NTD's Washington correspondent, Mari Otsu, brings us more from the White House. President Trump's set to hold that urgent meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a week earlier than was originally planned to talk Iran negotiations. That's as the president has repeatedly told the Iranian regime that it needs to do two things to avoid military action as the U.S. builds up its forces in the Gulf. I told him two things. Number one, no nuclear. And number two, stop killing protesters. They're killing them by the thousands. The announcement about Netanyahu's visit comes just a day after President Trump's top envoys, Steve Woodcoff and Jared Kushner, held negotiations in Oman with Iran's foreign minister over a potential nuclear deal. Iran looks like they want to make a deal very badly, as they should. Last time they decided maybe not to do it, but I think they probably feel differently. It'll be different than last time. And we have a big armada, we have a big fleet heading in that direction. We'll be there pretty soon. Following those talks, Woodcoff and Kushner visited the USS Lincoln, thanking the sailors and Marines aboard, as well as the pilot who downed an Iranian drone approaching the carrier last week. The warship and the ships in her strike group are deployed off Iran's shore in the Arabian Sea and would be the spearhead of any US military action against Tehran. Meanwhile, in a statement, Netanyahu's office insists that all negotiations must include limiting Iran's ballistic missiles and ending Tehran's support for terrorist groups like Hamas and Hezbollah. The attempt by the most extreme regime in the world to obtain the most dangerous weapon in the world, a nuclear weapon, is a clear danger to peace in the region and in the world. This comes as the Iranian regime leader urges Iranians to unify and participate in the coming anniversary of the Islamic Revolution. That's the 1979 uprising that ousted the pro-Western Shah installing a dictatorship that enforces Sharia law. We have a lot of enemies here. As long as the enemy is not made to despair, a nation remains exposed to harm and harassment. The enemy must be made to despair. The Trump administration's repeatedly warned about what it calls the growing global threat of Islamist ideology in the West. Now they want to go to Sharia law, but you're in a different country. You can't do that. When we talk about the threat of Islamism, this political ideology, there is no such thing as individual freedom or liberty. The White House says that while negotiations take place, it reminds the Iranian regime that President Trump has many options on the table aside from diplomacy. Reporting from the White House, Mari Otsu, NTD News. Thank you, Mari. And the U.S. military says it struck another narco-terrorist vessel in the Eastern Pacific. The strike killing two and leaving one survivor. The military says it struck another alleged terror vessel in the Eastern Pacific. U.S. Southern Command says the boat was run by a designated terror group and was moving along known trafficking routes. It altered the Coast Guard. It alerted the Coast Guard to search for the surviving person. It remains unclear whether the survivor was recovered. This marks the second strike in the Eastern Pacific in less than a week. Both operations are part of War Secretary Pete Hegseth's campaign against narco-terrorism named Operation Southern Spear. Next, the Pentagon saying the U.S. will enforce its Venezuela blockade halfway around the world. That's after the U.S. military boards a crude oil tanker in the Indian Ocean accused of breaching a U.S. enforced quarantine. Joining us for insight is Peter Brown, Senior Fellow at the America First Policy Institute. Good to have you with us, Peter. You have extensive experience in countering transnational organized crime in the Caribbean and Central America with the U.S. Coast Guard. What's your initial response to this latest move, which did start in the Caribbean, ended in the Indian Ocean? Good morning, Stephania, and thank you for having me here. This is another example of the combined tactical excellence of U.S. military forces with an assertive strategic outcome of commercial, military, and diplomatic primacy in the Western Hemisphere and beyond. And one of the elements of President Trump's national security strategy is ensuring that the rules-based international order is not exploited by our adversaries to their advantage and our detriment. This operation is one example of countering those abuses that have been taking place for decades. And in your opinion, how effective are these sanctions in terms of economic pressure? Well, we can see already that other countries for example, the UK and the European Union have sanctioned Russian oil. India is now reacting in response to the secondary sanctions that have been placed against them for importing Russian oil. And so these levers are now being used in a way that they really haven't been for centuries. This type of system is actually what ended global piracy centuries ago. And then the global slave trade, it was by Western nations asserting principles and then being willing to enforce them that resulted in eliminating those scourges from the high seas. And we're moving in a direction of doing the same now with regard to sanctioned oil. And what else is needed in terms of signaling U.S. military might in this way? Well, there are a lot of things that are going on including the strengthening of defense and Coast Guard budgets, which will allow for greater global reach of our military and constabulary forces. And the other that we're seeing now is a true coherence of national security strategy, national defense strategy, the Department of State's recently released strategic framework for the next five years, all of which add levels of detail to the President's America First policies. And again, for the first time in centuries, America's economic and commercial interests are elevated to the same level as our diplomatic and national security interests in a way that the dealmaker President Trump is uniquely qualified to do. So this particular boat is reported to have been carrying Russian and Venezuelan oil, both sanctioned. U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright is saying that he'll soon begin talks on the future leadership of Venezuela's state oil company, another layer of the diplomacy here. What role do you think the U.S. should play in that sense? Well, the U.S. has asserted that we will not allow adversarial extraterritorial or extra hemispheric nations to dominate our hemispheric resource markets. And that would include not only oil, but global critical minerals, mining, processing, recycling, et cetera. So this is an opportunity now for America to assert, rebuild a high trust commercial society in Venezuela, which has been a low trust commercial operation for the past decades under the Chavez and Maduro regimes, including expropriation of property. So we can understand that legitimate Western oil companies are somewhat reluctant to immediately go into Venezuela until a structure can be provided that protects their interests and investments. And on the Russian oil, you alluded to President Trump making a deal with India to reduce U.S. tariffs if New Delhi indeed does stop buying Russian oil. What else should the U.S. do here in regards to Russia? Well, what the U.S. is doing is basically constraining and driving down the price of worldwide oil. And that is gonna choke some of the profits that Russia has available to exert malign influence, particularly in Western Europe, including Ukraine, but also elsewhere as they continue to pressure the Baltics. So this is a multi-level move in sanctioning Russian oil. It reduces the ability of Putin to profit from the global market. And also at the same time, increasing American exports of oil and natural gas to unprecedented levels is helping Europe to establish some measure of independence from the Russian oil that they've been so dependent on for the past decades. Much to watch here. Thank you so much for joining us and offering your insights this morning. Peter Brown, thank you. Thank you for having me. Coming up, the House passing a sweeping housing affordability bill, how it aims to get more homes built faster and more Americans in them. At a major social media trial now underway in Los Angeles with claims these platforms were designed to hook kids. A look at what the plaintiff alleges and which tech executives are expected to testify. Welcome back. House lawmakers have passed a bipartisan bill aimed at tackling housing affordability nationwide. The measure yesterday drew overwhelming support from both parties. The bill focuses on cutting regulations and speeding up construction. House Financial Services Committee Chairman French Hill saying yesterday the country needs significantly more housing of all types. A poll conducted for the National Association of Realtors found housing affordability is an important issue to more than half of all voters. Industry groups are praising the legislation saying it will help alleviate the housing crisis. Nurses in New York City have reached a tentative agreement with two major hospital systems to end a nearly month-long strike. The healthcare workers have been demanding more staffing, protections against workplace violence, and a pay increase. The tentative deal involves the Montefiore and Mount Sinai hospital systems. The New York Presbyterian said it agreed over the weekend to a proposal presented by mediators. Around 4,000 nurses remain on strike at New York Presbyterian. The walkouts began January 12th, leaving the hospital scrambling to hire temporary nurses to fill in. The union said members at Montefiore and Mount Sinai will vote on contracts this week. The three-year deal affects roughly 10,000 of the 15,000 nurses on strike. The current strike represents the largest and longest nurses' strike in city history. And a jury is now seated in a landmark case accusing major social media platforms of intentionally targeting young users with addictive features. A 20-year-old plaintiff claims Instagram and YouTube fueled addiction and worsened her mental health. NTD's Christina Corona tells us more from Los Angeles. Opening statements began in a landmark lawsuit involving a woman who says men as Instagram and Google's YouTube are addictive and harmful to children and teens. The plaintiff, identified only as Kaylee GM, alleges the companies design addictive features contributing to her mental health struggles, including depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts. Her lawsuit claims the platforms were built to maximize addictiveness among children to drive profits. She compares those tactics to the tobacco and gambling industries. Meta and YouTube deny the allegations, arguing they are not legally responsible for third-party content posted on their platforms. Plaintiff's attorney Mark Lanier tells Fox that he plans to highlight internal documents he claims show Meta prioritizes profit over child safety. We've got documents where the companies themselves are claiming that they are addictive, that they are trying to drive addiction, because the more time they drive to their platforms, the more money they're able to garner. It's an attention economy that they're working. Lanier gives the first opening statement for the plaintiffs calling the case as easy as ABC, saying that stands for addicting the brains of children and accusing Meta and Google of engineering addiction. 12 jurors and six alternates are seated after nearly two weeks of jury selection. Jurors are not being told to stop using social media during the trial, but the judge instructs them to not change how they use the platforms, including settings or accounts. Observers say this trial could help guide how roughly 1,500 similar lawsuits against social media companies are handled. Five families who say they lost their child to social media are also attending the trial. The plaintiff previously reached settlements with Snapchat and TikTok earlier this month, though these companies remain defendants in other similar cases. The trial is set to last six to eight weeks. Executives, including Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Instagram CEO Adam Masseri, and YouTube CEO Neil Mahan are expected to testify in the coming weeks. Reporting from downtown Los Angeles, Christina Corona, NTD News. Thank you, Christina. And Trump administration can keep its funding freeze in place for the Hudson Tunnel Project, at least for now. The federal judge paused her earlier order that required the money to be restored. The project will build a new commuter rail tunnel between Manhattan and New Jersey. The pause gives the federal government time to file a motion with an appeals court. The judge put her original order on hold until Thursday at 5 p.m. The Trump administration withheld funding last year over concerns that money was being spent based on unconstitutional DEI principles. The existing Hudson Tunnel was heavily damaged by Hurricane Sandy in 2012. Since then, frequent emergency repairs have disrupted travel on the nation's most heavily used passenger rail line. The commission, which oversees the project, has halted construction, saying it will resume when funding is restored. And Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. marks one year of the Make America Healthy Again Project, speaking at the Heritage Foundation. Here's more from that event. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. celebrates the first year of the Make America Healthy Again project on Monday. He touts the reforms he initiated, including reducing synthetic food dyes, inverting the food pyramid, and releasing new dietary guidelines. You can summarize it in three words, eat real food. And we took the politics out of it, and we made science-based, gold-standard science-based recommendations, and these are recommendations that are gonna keep us healthy. Kennedy says his agency plans to remove all nine synthetic petroleum-based food dyes from the food supply by the end of this year. The secretary highlights the health impacts of ultra-processed food and the importance of diet in preventing chronic diseases. The cost to our society are existential. 70, 77% of our children can no longer qualify for military service, and most of that is diet-related, and we need to change what we're feeding these children, or we're gonna lose our country. Regarding the healthcare industry, Kennedy says HHS is focusing this year on affordability and transparency. Prior authorization is now gone. You will have an answer at point of care. In other words, before you leave that doctor's office, you will know whether your insurance company is gonna pay for it. The health secretary thanks President Trump for putting him in this role in initiating the Maha Project. He says he has been screaming about children's health with nobody paying attention for 20 years. I was censored and shut down, and I prayed every single day that God would put me in a place where I could fix this. And so for me, when President Trump asked me to join his campaign in August of 2024, it felt providential. It felt like the answer to prayers. Other Maha achievements that the HHS is celebrating include lowering prescription drug prices, updating the childhood vaccine schedule, researching autism treatments, bringing back physical fitness, and withdrawing from the World Health Organization. And you've likely received your tax documents by now. That means the clock is ticking to file your taxes. Trump administration made a lot of changes under the big, beautiful bill that could mean a lower tax bill and a higher refund for filers. Take a look. The deadline to file your 2025 taxes is quickly approaching. I would just get it done as soon as possible. Lisa Greene-Lewis is a CPA and tax expert with TurboTax. Here's what she says you need to know. First, a higher standard deduction. That means more of your money is shielded from federal taxes. For single filers, it increases to $15,750, up from 15,000. For married couples filing jointly, it increases to $31,500, up from 30,000. Second, a higher state and local tax deduction, commonly known as SALT. It allows you to deduct your state and local income taxes or your state and local general sales taxes. That cap jumps to $40,000 from $10,000 for married couples filing together. You may also be able to deduct your property taxes, as long as your income or sales taxes doesn't put you over that $40,000 cap. In those high property tax states and state tax states, they'll be able to claim some more of those deductions. Third, a larger tax credit for children. Parents can receive $2,200 per child. You must be under 17 at the end of the tax year, among other requirements. If you work in an industry where you get tips or overtime, there are some changes you need to know about. Eligible workers can deduct up to $25,000 in tipped income. If you're a service worker, like a firefighter, police officer, you can deduct up to $12,500 in overtime. Last year, the average refund was around $3,100, according to the IRS. With these new changes, some can expect an even higher refund. We are expecting filers to see up to $1,000 increase in their refund or lower balance due. Deadline to file your taxes is April 15th. A small, single-engine plane made an emergency landing on a roadway yesterday in Gainesville, Georgia. According to the Gainesville Police Department, it collided with multiple vehicles and shot down a major intersection. The city finished clearing the street last night, opening up the street for regular traffic. The police reported minor injuries, but did not specify who was injured or the nature of the injuries. Up ahead, the U.S. is funding free speech initiatives in Europe. Why the Trump administration says it's critical right now. And the impact of anti-Semitism, from hostility on college campuses to canceled bank accounts. Witnesses testify on threats to religious liberty. Welcome back. House lawmakers are meeting this morning to discuss whether foreign actors like China are using non-profits to fuel illegal activity in the U.S. The House Ways and Means Committee says the panel will focus on how money is funneled through these non-profits, including environmental groups, as a way to shape U.S. policy. Senator Ted Cruz last year accused the Chinese Communist Party of working through environmental groups to file lawsuits against fossil fuel companies, for example. And Canada's largest airline says it's suspending flights to Cuba because the island does not have enough jet fuel. Air Canada says it will carry out ferry flights to get 3,000 customers home. The fuel shortage comes after the U.S. disrupted oil shipments from Venezuela, after ousting former dictator, Nicolas Maduro. Air Canada says it will bring in extra fuel for the remaining flights. It will also make technical stops as necessary to refuel on the return journey. Two other Canadian airlines also canceled flights over anticipated fuel shortages. China's foreign ministry today said there are no reports of its citizens being stranded in Cuba due to the fuel shortage. And the Trump administration says it's plans to fund free speech initiatives in Europe. State Department Undersecretary Sarah B. Rogers discussing the initiative yesterday in Budapest alongside a top aide to Hungarian Prime Minister, Viktor Orban. You don't have self-governance without freedom of speech. You can't have democratic deliberation if viewpoints are proscribed from the public square. The bottom line in Europe is that the point of American foreign policy is to make America safe, strong, and prosperous. And that means we want safe, strong, prosperous allies. The initiative will include grants to support free expression after laws like the European Union's Digital Services Act and Britain's Online Safety Act. Trump administration criticizing these rules for restricting the free speech of American tech firms and stifling voices critical of immigration. In December, the administration warned censoring speech and suppressing victim criticism of immigration was leading to what it called civilizational erasure. Reactions are coming in after pro-democracy advocate Jimmy Lai was sentenced to 20 years behind bars under Beijing's national security law. NTD's Washington correspondent Jack Bradley brings us this report. Hong Kong media tycoon and pro-democracy advocate Jimmy Lai has been sentenced to 20 years in prison. It's the heaviest penalty so far under China's 2020 national security law, which virtually silences dissenting opinions in Hong Kong, just like it has been over the last century in China. Secretary of State Marco Rubio calls it an unjust and tragic conclusion to this case, saying we urge the authorities to grant Mr. Lai humanitarian parole. House Select Committee on the CCP Chairman John Molinar says this is the latest in the human rights abuses by the Chinese Communist Party of overstepping its promise of one country, two systems in Hong Kong. He said he'll work in Congress to sanction those responsible. Jimmy Lai's son Sebastian says the 20-year sentence of his 78-year-old father amounts to life in prison. Obviously, it was expected, but it was still pretty devastating. You kind of have doubt as to whether I'll see my father again. Lai was convicted back in December of conspiring with others to collude with foreign forces and sedition, and at that time, President Trump said. I feel so badly. I spoke to President Xi about it, and I asked to consider his release. He's not well. He's an older man, and he's not well, so I did put that request out. We'll see what happens. Sebastian Lai says he's grateful for Trump's support for his father. The President of the United States, President Trump, which has said that he will free my father, something I've been incredibly grateful for, has given my family a lot of hope, and at this point, it's about saving him. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer recently met with Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping over trade talks, and Jimmy Lai is a British citizen. But Sebastian Lai says the UK needs to do more for his father and not seek to normalize relations with China. There's no normalization until my father's out. There's no closer relationship until my father's out, because if they can't even do something so simple, then what can we possibly expect from that relationship? Jimmy Lai founded the now-shuttered Apple Daily newspaper, once a vocal critic of Beijing. His arrest was among the first under the national security law in 2020, and he had the opportunity to leave Hong Kong, avoid arrest, and save his fortune. But if I leave, I will totally disgrace myself, and also undermine the solidarity of the democratic movement. Looking ahead, President Trump is expected to visit Beijing in April, potentially an opportunity to push again for Lai's freedom. Reporting by Jack Bradley, NTD News. Thank you, Jack. And the impact of anti-Semitism, from hostility on college campuses to canceled bank accounts and more, witnesses testify on threats to religious liberty today. David Lam has more. At a hearing of the Justice Department's Religious Liberty Commission on Monday, witnesses testified on how anti-Semitism impacts religious freedom. One of the highlights, reports of hostility against Jewish students on college campuses, particularly after the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel on October 7th, 2023. Much of the hostility spreads in ways that are not easy to see, and in too many university classrooms, the notion that Israel is a settler colonial state is a taken, it's given, even though it's a lie that erases 3,000 years of Jewish history and connection to the Jewish homeland. Some students are so poisoned by such lies that they vandalize property or tear down posters with faces of Israeli children and mothers and hostages being held in Gaza. The Religious Liberty Commission was established by President Trump to increase awareness and celebrate religious freedom in the U.S. This comes as the War Department says it's cutting academic ties with Harvard University, saying military officers were coming back from the school with, quote, heads full of globalist and radical ideologies that do not improve our fighting ranks. The Chinese Communist Party literally refers to the Harvard Kennedy School, which is their school of public policy and government, as, quote, the party school. Chinese communists or individuals who work against American interests should not be allowed on American campuses for any reason. They should not be allowed to donate money to American campuses for any reason. So that would be one example of new policies that we should be looking into. Why is it that the Chinese communists or Islamic nations know that the secret to undermine the United States is to sort of politically indoctrinate young people? Other witnesses brought up additional issues, including the denial of banking services. Ambassador Sam Brownback said his bank closed the accounts for his nonprofit, which advocated for religious freedom. He said the bank representative claimed they were concerned about possible criminal activities. I go to the counter there in the suburban Kansas City, and the lady looks at the computer screen. She says, I'm sorry, that account has been closed. The note here on the screen says it's been done at the corporate office. It was explained the decision was final and non-revocable, and they weren't supposed to say anything more to me. The commission will hold another hearing in March focused on religious liberty in healthcare and social services. David Lam, NTD News. Ahead, what does it take to become an Olympic athlete? We'll delve deep into the inner life of high performers with psychologist Patrick Porter. And after leading the Seahawks to their second Super Bowl win head coach Mike McDonald talks about what's next for the team, what he says the Seahawks need to keep doing. Welcome back. Skier Lindsey Vonn's Olympic crash, which came while she was still recovering from an earlier accident, has ignited a debate over who decides when an injured competitor is fit to compete. Here's that story. Skier Lindsey Vonn's crash on Sunday's Olympic downhill is raising bigger questions about who decides when an injured competitor is fit to race. The 41-year-old American took the start line just a week after rupturing knee ligaments in a World Cup accident in the Swiss resort of Crane, Montana. She trained with a knee brace and posted the third fastest run on Saturday. But on race day, she suffered a devastating fall and was airlifted to a hospital with a broken leg. Vonn had said she felt strong enough to compete after days of therapy and medical consultations. But some experts say skiing needs clearer protocols governing when a competitor can return to racing, perhaps modeled on rugby's rules for players with concussion. International Ski and Snowboard Federation representative Peter Gerdahl says injuries are part of the sport. Well, I think it was a mistake of the racer as most of the times happened. The course was maybe bumpy or it's an Olympic medal race, so it has to be a challenging downhill. And most of the athletes managed really well. So if there are some mistakes from time to time, this happened in our sport and unfortunately happened to Lindsey Vonn and to Kande Moreno. We have two athletes that unfortunately injured. Gerdahl says return to play decisions currently fall on national federations, not the international ski body. Norway, for instance, barred its own injured skier, Marten Monsen, from starting on Sunday. Athletes themselves are split. Some defend personal choice, while others worry about the example it sets for younger competitors. Italian skiing legend Alberto Tomba says Vonn's drive to compete was understandable, but misguided. She shouldn't have raced in Gran Montaña, as I said. After Tarvisio, the last podium, her last victory, she should have come here at the end of January and trained. But for an athlete, it's not easy to decide something like that. When you feel in good shape, you want to keep winning. One race leads to another. Welcome back. What does it take to thrive as an Olympic athlete? Next, we welcome psychologist Patrick Porter to delve deep into the inner life of high performers. Patrick is also the founder and CEO of cutting edge brain fitness company, BrainTap. And welcome. Good morning, Patrick. What does set high performers apart? Well, I think they're able to take their mind and take fear and make it data instead of fear, which overrides the nervous system. I mean, they're doing crazy things going downhill, of course, you know, 90 miles an hour. You can't think the way we think when we're walking across the park, something like that. So walk us through this. What's the process of turning fear into data? Well, number one is something called brain priming, doing visualization to get your brain ready for the event. Don't let it just come at you like an accident. There's a saying that things happen through us or to us. These athletes feel reality is working through them instead of having the trees come at them, the hills, the bumps, all those things. They're actually in the flow state, what they call it. And this is a brain state, which usually is in a high state of alpha and theta, which is just below, you're really relaxed. Your brain is relaxed, but your body is responding at micros, super speeds at that point. But you first visualize it to get the brain primed. Okay, and how would somebody practice that if they wanted to work it into their life, someone who's not an extreme athlete? Well, number one, you probably have to put some relaxing music in the background, like classical music. They know it synchronizes the hemispheres, puts you into a relaxed state. In that relaxed state, your mind is able to liberate your intuition, your creativity. And then you start to visualize, like let's say you're going downhill. You're gonna start at the top. You're gonna do some breathing. You're gonna visualize yourself going through each of those turns. And then you're gonna visualize at the end of that race, what the time is that you want. And you keep doing that over and over again. And then the subconscious, which actually plays back to you what you visualize and realize, then your body responds to that. But you can't think while you're doing it. When those skiers are going downhill, they're not thinking. They're basically, they've done so much practice, thousands of hours on the hill, thousands of hours in their mind, and they just let it fly at that point. And unfortunately, we have seen some injuries already this Olympics. What do you suggest for when a person suffers trauma, whether it be out in the ski fields or just in daily life? Yeah, this is, what it is, is the brain will remember the high times of our life and the low times of our life. We need to take those low times and actually act like you're a Hollywood producer. And you take those memories and you make them black and white. You put them behind you. You say, hey, that happened to me in the past. My body is strong, my body is healthy. When I worked with the U.S. gymnast team a few Olympic games ago, we found that those athletes that could overcome injury were the ones that showed up in the Olympics and got the gold or got the bronze or the silver medals because they could put that injury outside of their mind and just focus on the task at hand, be in the moment. And you mentioned, okay, using music to calm down. A lot of the challenges that people face today are around the many distractions that just infiltrate so much of life. How do you recommend people work on getting that kind of extreme focus that I would say comes with the exercises that you're describing? Well, you also have to include breath work. So you could breathe in to the count of four, breathe out to the count of eight. This will exercise the nervous system. When you breathe in, you actually trigger something called the sympathetic system. This is our fight or flight response, the fear trigger. But then when we breathe out, we activate something called the parasympathetic, which is our relaxed digest recovery system. So as you breathe out, you should be visualizing what you want to excel in your life in a relaxed, calm manner. And then the brain will mirror that because we have something in our body called mirror neurons. And these mirror neurons actually will play out what we see in our mind will happen through our body. This, it's not a belief thing anymore. It's actually science. We showed that if we can do some brain priming, get the body ready, keep the body relaxed while you're doing it. A lot of people have high stress, and that high stress will interfere with the signals from the brain to the body because it moves down through the spine and out to the limbs. And if you're stressed, you can't get the right information. So you can't keep your balance. Basically things you could do well. You know, I always tell people if Bill Gates would get flustered plugging in a USB drive, you know, in front of an audience, you know, and he probably did it a million times, but if you remember when he introduced USB, he became all flustered. He couldn't even plug in a USB drive. That's because that nervousness overrides the nervous system. And things we think we can do really well get put on hold, and this happens in relationships too. You know, when you think about everyday life, you know, if you have a conversation with your significant other and you're both under stress, you're gonna say and do things you don't wanna do, and then later you're gonna go, wow, I wish I could take that back and say it this way or that way. So it's always good to do what we call pause, break, and breathe. You know, there's no requirement in reality that says that when somebody asks you a question, you have to answer right away. You can just say pause, break, breathe, because a lot of people hold their breath, especially under stress. And in instances like that, but also this kind of state of fear can be quite common or chronic for a lot of people. Say, you know, this term as a people pleaser or other forms of just going out and doing business in the world can create a lot of confrontation and require courage. What do you suggest for breaking down the kind of fear that may be lingering under the surface all of the time? Well, one thing is that in the past, you did the best you could with the information you had at hand. So don't judge yourself. You know, if you bring your past into your present, that's like having two TV stations at the same time on the screen. You can't make sense out of either. So you wanna basically focus on the moment, be present with the person you're with. And if the past comes in, then I use a little exercise, we call it the stop sign. You visualize a red stop sign. You say, stop, stop giving it energy, stop giving it life, stop giving it space in my mind. And then you put it behind you. You know, we all know somebody that was in a relationship and they say, what happened with you and Jeff? Oh, Jeff's behind me now, I'm over that one. So we need to do that as quickly as possible and train our brains. This is part of the Brain Fitness Blueprint, my new book, where I teach people these little techniques, because it's something you have to do on the fly, because we don't know what's gonna happen today. We know about 97% of it, but when that 3% happens in that stressful event, that car pulls out in front of us or that person presses our trigger, if we know they're pressing our trigger, we can disempower that trigger so it no longer triggers our emotional responses and things of that nature. But you have to train your brain to do that. You can't just expect to do it on its own. Certainly, and while we may not all be extreme sports achievers, many of these techniques are so applicable in daily life and helping us to become even better versions of ourselves in our very extraordinary lives, individual lives. Thank you so much, Patrick Porter. Thank you, thank you for having me. And now that they've won the Super Bowl, what's next for the Seattle Seahawks? Head coach, Mike McDonald, says the team needs to ride the momentum and not take the win for granted. Well, you know, we use the term chasing edges here in Seattle. You have to live like that, you know? You can't be copying everybody else. We want to be on the forefront of things. We know that we're target number one now. But again, it's really going to be our mentality for us to keep pushing the envelope with our personnel where we can take things at our speed, you know? McDonald, yesterday, alongside MVP Kenneth O'Brien, posing with trophies and answering reporters' questions. The MVP saying what he plans to do is stay positive and continue to work hard because you never know when it can all be over. The Seahawks relied on a relentless defense to beat New England 29 to 13 in Super Bowl 60 on Sunday. The win marked Seattle's second Super Bowl championship in franchise history and their first since 2014. Well, that's all we have time for this hour, but if you have any feedback on the show or have something you'd like to see us cover, send us an email at goodmorningatntd.com. We'd love to hear from you. For round-the-clock original news coverage, watch us live at ntd.com slash live or download our NTD app. I'm Stefania Cox. See you soon.