Welcome to the beat.

I'm Ari Melburn.

We begin this week with news at home and abroad.

Jack Smith now barreling into the coupart of his Trump probe, New Testimony, courtesy

of NBC News, brand new report that they're getting this testimony from Donald Trump's

own Secret Service agents.

You may have seen that alert across your phone or in earlier coverage on MSNBC, we have

that story coming up while the top news echoing around the world are these new images of Vladimir

Putin making his first remarks from the Kremlin since a military standoff inside Russia

over the weekend.

Now this is widely viewed as the strongest challenge to Putin in his 23 years of rule.

Tonight what you see here is Putin speaking in Russia, addressing the rebellion.

It's a matter so public that even this master propaganda couldn't just deny that it's happening.

He is vowing in the translation that we have here to bring members of the rebellion to

justice, telling fighters in this mercenary force to sign up with the military or go home.

What Putin's doing here is trying to rebound after Russians basically waited around for

what, imagine if you lived there, would be quite a harrowing experience while your nations

also at war.

A once allied mercenary army group, so that used to be seen as really completely allied with

Putin, was literally marching towards Moscow over the weekend because its leader suddenly

made a public shift vowing at topple Putin.

So we're talking about a possible coup against the state with one of the largest nuclear

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