Tonight the race to escape as monster Hurricane Milton threatens to make a direct hit here in Florida.

The hurricane regaining category 5 strength and expected to double in size before slamming Florida's West Coast. A state of emergency

mandatory evacuations, highways jammed with vehicles trying to get out,

theme parks shutting down, Tampa, and the potential bullseye were with first responders

bracing for impact. Tropicana Field with the Tampa Bay Rays play transformed

into a base camp President Biden warning this could be the worst storm

to hit Florida in over a century as the southeast is still reeling from

Helene. Al Roker with a shifting new track tonight. Also this evening, four weeks until the election,

Kamala Harris on a media blitz and asked,

what would she have done differently than President Biden?

How she answered?

And the new book claiming Donald Trump secretly sent COVID

testing machines to Vladimir Putin during the shortage in 2020.

How his campaign is responding and just in the Afghan national under arrest in Oklahoma the terror

attack he's accused of plotting for election day the new legal battle over children

using Tik-Tok why more than a dozen states are now suing the popular app.

This is NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt.

Reporting tonight from Florida's Gulf Coast, here is Lester Holt.

Good evening and welcome from... Coast. Here is Lester Holt.

Good evening and welcome from St. Pete Beach, where neighborhoods like this still bear the scars of the last hurricane to come through here.

Helene, now the area tonight bracing for what's about to come. Helene. Now the area tonight bracing for what's about to come. Hurricane

Milton, now barely 30 hours away from making a historic landfall here along Florida's

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