breaking news tonight, the embattled chief of the epa is out, scott pruit facing scandals and spending taxpayer money stepping down today. supreme court suspense, president trump narrowing down finalis. de >>erate hours, rescuers facing a critical decision to save the soccer team trapped in a cave. >> it's zero visibility. it's a confined space. >> the clock ticking beforeonsoon rain. on the front lines, infernos raging and scorching heat is adding fuel to the flames. nearly 90 million under heat advisories and also heavy rain triggering flash floods in a major american c a mother to the

rescue shooting a carjacker trying to steal her suv with her two childrennside. and are you in the market for a high-tech home? nehe security warning you to hear. >> announcer: this is "nbc nightly news" lester holt. good evening. i'm kate snow in for lester tonight. t t was announced by presidump on twitter late this afternoon, he has accepted the resignation of his environmental protection agency administrator. scott pruit was under fire for months facing more than a dozen separate ethics investigations and not just activists calling for resignation but republican members of congress, as wl.si the administration, president trump was one of pruit's biggest supporters publicly defending m and tonight the presidentid ruit made the decision to step down because he didn't want ego be a distraction. rwe b with peter alexant the white

house. >> reporter: tonight for pruit, it's thepo tical climate that got too hot facing legal and ethical scandals, one of the original trump cabinet picks is out. president trump tweeting i accepd e resignation of scott pruit adding scott did an outstanding job. relaxed scott at the white house at the fourth of july picnic but under siege from at least 15 separate federal ethics inquiries many zeroi in on ex spending and a sound proof phone booth. installed in his officeinstalled in his office. >> much of what has been targeted towards me and my team has been half true or at best stories so twisted they do not resemble reality. >> reporter: just this week a schoolteacher ro coing pruit at a d.c. restaurant. >> i would urge you to resign before your scandals push you out. resignation letter

obtained by nbc news, pruit acknowledges the unrelenting attacks on me and my familyre unprecedented and took a sizable toll on all of us and pruit a hero ofor rolling backma era environmental protections under cl cutting the ean undercuttingn water act and stalling tougher fuel economy standards. president praising him just last month. >> scott pruit is doing a great job within the walls of the epa. we're setting records. >> reporter: tonight, president trump says there wainal straw that scott pruit first came to him a couple days ago and that pruit cse to resign still his departure will not change the agency's direction. pruit's replacement, his deputy andrew wheeler a former lobbyist for the coal industry. kate? >> peter alexander at the white house tonight, thank you. with the drama h ov latest cabinet resignation still playing out, president trump is moving closer now to decing who he'll nominate to the supreme court. late today he said he had narrowed the short list down to four candidates with two three finalists among them. nbc justice correspondent pete

mo williams wit on the contenders. >> reporter: with the decision just four days away, president trump has aprently narrowed the list to three fedal appeals court judges. a source familiar with the process tells nbc news it's brett kevin va ka va kavanah of washington and raymond kethledge and amy coney barrett. he's a strong advocate >> we can't under estimate how important ntthe second amend is. judge kethledge is an avid outdoorsman and hunter. >> reporter: kavanaugh ces some conservative opposition over his time serving in the bush white house but he says that's a plus. >> i believe my white house experience made me a more knowledgeable judge certainly and also more independent judge. >> reporter: and barrett a devote catholic is popular with evangelicals hoping to overturn roe v wade. not on the short list,

mike lee despite an endorsement rom ted cruz of texas. democrats are still smarting over the senate's refus two years ago to even consider president obama's final nominee, garland. center chuck schumer says it would unify the cotry. e choice will be revealed monday night at 9:00 p.m. at the white house. pete williams, nbc news, washington. now to the race against time at the flooded cave in thailand where a boy's soccer team has been trapped now for nearly two weeks. officials are about to l make a criti decision, do they attempt a dangerous rescue mission before ns n rains return. nbc's bill neely is at the cave with the latest. >> reporter: the world is watching them but a dozen boys with brave faces, their rescuers with one huge problem, flood water. divers struggling to t fi. the boys still too weak to cross it. they can't swim and it's six hours to the

cave entrance. they are getting a crash course on diving but e risks are deadly, the narrow passageways are trapped, even for the experts. >> it's quite allenging, obviously. t't's zero visibility. so is a challenge. >> reporter: rescuers are drling and digging and it's desperate because it's a race against time. getting rid of water before the monon ins fill the caves again. they are pumping millions of gallons of water out of the caves every day. meanwhile,p on the hills, up to 30 teams are looking for holes or shafts they could e usto winch the boys out. th no rain for three days, commanders are now tempted to try a fast rescue. yesterday, they said they needed 100% recertainty there no risks. today, if there is 90% e safety says governor, we're ready to bring the boys out.

two of them hart ebys this week, no ctions here, just preparations for a resc that can't come soon enough. but the rescuers know the clock is against them. rain forecast this weekend, so little time to strengthen those boys, train th in under water masks and take the risk and doctors are quite clear sothose boys just aren't up to it yet, kate. >> bill neely, thank so much. back home to the extreme weather from coast-to-coast. in the west a double threat nearly 60 major fires burning across 11 states as extreme heat now begins to gr the region. across the country, 90 million under head advisories and thousands without power in pittsburgh after heavy rain triggered flash floods. we're covering all of it beginning with nbc's miguel almaguer. >> reporter: with racing across the west, conditions are epic on the front lines.

in colorado, these are e fireworks crews faced overnight. the lake christine fire exploding so quickly in eagle county, firefigh are struggling to slow it down. but the largest in the state is sweeping across the mountainsth ree hours outside denver. >> the only thing left is the foundation. reporter: the spring fire destroying more than 130 homes, including russ and lisa white house's. >> there are no words to describe what that feels like. [crying] >> just to see rubble. >> reporter: from texas to california g.infernos are ragin in wine country, the county fire the size of the city of atlanta is threatening 1500 homes and structures. >> yeah. orretty scary. >> repter: and the blistering conditions that be the east. are now headed west bringi triple digit heat fueling fires

ady racing out of control. miguel almaguer, nbc newslos angeles. >> reporter: i'm kristen dahlgren. residents on alert around pittsburgh tonight with swift water teams on stand by as flash flooby as flash flood watches are in effect after parts of the city's roads thumped turned into rushing heivers. >> t current was fast. >> reporter: more than two inches of rain fell in some places and more on the way. >> it will be a massive one. when is it going to stop? >> reporter: 911 was da inted with calls from stranded drivers as dangerous floods hit during the morning rush hour. officialgoing door to door to evacuate homes. >> my adline was rushing. even my son said he was scared a little bit. >> reporter: residents pitching in to help >> i have water. i have food, you know, if they need something, i'm here. >> reporter: as

thousands rema without power tonight facing sweltering temperatures and the threat of more storms on the way. kristen dahlgren, nbc news, new york. some terrifying moments today at the hospital campus in baltimore. two research buildings evacuated after what a spokeswoman calls a small sample of frozen tuberculosis was accidently released inside.pl emees were isolated and evaluated but tonight, the evacuation is over and officials there say no one ist risk. the mystery is epening over a deepening over a couple in the u.k. poisoned with the same powerful nerve agent that almost killed a former russian spy and his daughter. investigators believe they know how the toxin was transmitted in this most recent case. nbc's kelly cobiella has the latest. >> reporter: tonight w security camera footage shdon sturgis in the hours before she and charlie

rawly ded up ill in the hospital. police say they were exposed to nova chalk. the same agent that poisoned russianpy sergei skripal and his daughter nearly four months ago. they were foun unconscious on a park bench seven miles from where the british couple lives. >> the ability these two investigations might be linked is clearly a line of >> reporter: six sites visited by the couple c visited by the coupli visited by the couplt plvisited by thei visited by the coupl e visited by the couple cities visited by the couple have been return kwir teened but not everyone believes it. >> these people but children touching it? it wouldn't be strong teight to fight it. >> rr: there was no guarantee they brould survive. two ish citizens are in the same fight for their lives. the british government accused russia of the

attempted assassination of the father and daughter and demanding answers in the latest poisoning. the kremlin continues to deny any involvement with people here fearing more of the deadly nerve agent may be out there. kelly cobiella, nbc news, engld. > back in this country, the federal government confirmed today it is using dna testing to help reunite migrant families who entered the u.s. illegally and were separated under president trump's zero tolerance policy.ab asgutierrez reports, the t overnment faces a courdeadline to bring those families back together. [ applause ] >> reporter: as a few emotional reunions play out in public, behind closed doors the department of health and human services is scrambling to reunite filies separated at the border sending 230 workers to speed things up. >> this is an unprecedented situation. >> reporter: today hhs said it will meet a deadline to reunite migrant children younger than 5 by tuesday. >> we'll compile even if those deadlines prevent us from arconducting stand

even a vetting process. agency is conducting dna tests by taking a cheek swab of every child. >> we're concerned this information could be used to potentially track these famili d these children for the rest of their lives. >> reporter: previously hhs said it had about 2,se0 rated children in custody but today it said there were just under 3,00use the quart order required reunited them. t 100 ose, ab are younger than 5. it was this mother jocelyn from brazil who sued the government prompting a federal judge to impose the deadline. she was separated from her 14-year-old son for nine months. how does a mother survive for so long without knowing where her child is? >> reporter: we have to suffer a lot of pain she says. it's very difficult not knowing how they are. gabe gutierrez, nbc news, el paso, texas. to a harrowing

story out of texas. police in dallas say one mom's trip to the gas station turnin a terrifying fight to save her children when a carjacker tried to steal the suv with the ki still inside. nbc's catie beck has more on the terrifying ordeal. >> it happened so fast. not even five minutes. >> reporter: still shaken, michelle asked us not to reveal her identity. >> if someone was trying to do ing, any harm to my kids, i'll do what i need to do to protect them by any means necessar >> reporter: around 10:00 wednesday night, michelle stepp inside a shell station leaving her two toddlers waiting in the car. she says she returned finding a e didn't know in the driver's seat of her car attempting to drive away with her children inside. >> i don't know whathe was coming after. i don't know what was his tentions. for it to happen to me, a woman, he probably thought he would get away with it. >> reporter: police identify that man as 36-year-old ricky wright. smith quicklmanaged to get inside the moving suv demanding that wright stop the caen e refused, she pulled a gun from her glove compartment shootingforcing the vehicle to crash

into a telephone pole. michelle and her children were t hurt, wright was taken to the hospital now facing charges. catie beck, nbc news. still ahead tonight, a smart home warning, they are wired for everythiyo u can think of but there is something you o know before buying one. also, the high-speed police chase that came to an end, right in someone's home. these feet... ... made waves in high school... ...and built a career in construction. but i couldn't bear my diabetic nerve pain any longer. so i talked to my doctor and he prescribed lyrica. lyrica may cause serious allergic reactions suicidal thoughts or actions. tell your doctor right away if you have these, new or worsening depression, unusual changes in mood or behavior, swelling, trouble breathing, rash, hives, blisters, muscle pain with fever, tired feeling or blurry vision. common side effects: dizziness, sleepiness, weight gain and swelling of hands, legs, and feet. don't drink alcohol while taking lyrica. don't drive or use machinery until you know how lyrica affects you. those who have had a drug or alcohol problem may be

more likely to misuse lyrica. now i have less diabetic nerve pain. ask your doctor about lyrica. i love you, basement but sometimes you stink. febreze air effects doesn't just mask, it cleans away odors. because the things you love can stink. (tei have a tip for you.ker, make a video of yourself, before all this happens. (announcer) you can quit. for free help, call 1-800-quit-now. at&t provides edge-to-edge intelligence, covering virtually every part of your manufacturing business. & so this won't happen. because you've made sure this sensor and this machine are integrated. & she can talk to him, & yes... atta, boy. some people assign genders to machines. and you can be sure you won't have any problems. except for the daily theft of your danish. not cool!

at&t provides edge to edge intelligence. it can do so much for your business, the list goes on and on. that's the power of &. & this shipment will be delivered... back now with a security warning if you're thinking about buying a new home, high-tech smart homes are all the rage but s. there is warni the previous owners could have access to the devices including cameras, microphones and door lkkscks. tom costello has the story. r orter: on this quiet street in austin, texas, is one of the most internet connected kl system, the porch

lights, the garage door, the door locks, the thermostat, the betereo, the alarm. ibm cyrsecurity expert charles henderson lives herenearby caf to control the connected devices from his phone. >> everything that you automated. , you've >> everything i can automate. >> reporter: and some t things you would think of. >> one of these bulbs is internet connected and the other isn't t but most people ca tell the difference. >> reporter: the risk, new homeowners may buy a home connected to the seller phone. >> a lot of these devices will phone home. the risk is the previous owner could still be managing your house. >> reporter: unlocking the doors, even spying. if you buy a house with cameras inside, keep in mind the previous owner could tap the system watching you or your kids in their bedrooms. tommy is so concerne he now lists every device in the houses he shows.

>> it's really important when we do sell and turnover that home that all that data is wiped and reset. >> i think it's like a scene out of the "exorcist" almost. >> reporter: remove evious owners profiles and contact info on every device daon the home and up the software and reset the passwords and if in doubt, buy new light bulbs, thermostats and rage or openers. tom costello, nbc news, austin. >> makes you think. the close call for a newlywed cple taking a break under a tree when disaster almost struck. what's already within me. because my body can still make its own insulin. and once-weekly trulicity activates my body to release it. trulicity is not insulin. it comes in a once-weekly, truly easy-to-use pen. it works 24/7. trulicity is an injection to improve blood sugar in adults with type 2 diabetes when used with diet and exercise. don't use it as the first medicine to treat diabetes or if you have type 1 diabetes or diabetic ketoacidosis.

don't take trulicity if you or your family have medullary thyroid cancer, you're allergic to trulicity, or have multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2. stop trulicity and call your doctor right away if you have symptoms of a serious allergic reaction, a lump or swelling in your neck, or severe stomach pain. serious side effects may include pancreatitis. taking trulicity with a sulfonylurea or insulin increases your low blood sugar risk. common side effects include nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, abdominal pain, and decreased appetite. these can lead to dehydration, which may worsen kidney problems. i choose once-weekly trulicity to activate my within. if you need help lowering your a1c, ask your doctor about once-weekly trulicity. (burke) so we ow to we've seen cover almost anything. even a "cactus calamity". (man 1) i read that the saguaro can live to be two hundred years old. (woman) how old do you think that one is? (man 1) my guess would be, about...

(man 2) i'd say about two hundred. (man 1) yeah... (burke) gives houseplant a whole new meaning. and we covered it. talk to farmers. we know a thing or two because we've seen a thing or two. ♪ we are farmers. bum-pa-dum, bum-bum-bum-bum ♪ but prevagen helps your brain with an ingredient originally discovered... in jellyfish. in clinical trials, prevagen has been shown to improve short-term memory. prevagen. the name to remember. dinner date...meeting his parents dinner date. why did i want a crest 3d white smile? so i used crest. crest 3d white removes... ...95% of surface stains in just 3 days... ...for a whiter smile... that will win them over. crest. healthy, beautiful smiles for life.

sad news tonight about one of our former colleagues here at nbc. ed schultz, the host of "the ed show" on msnbc has died. he began as a sports caster and worked in liadio before changing his cal views becoming a liberal. after leaving msnbc in

2015 he joined rt er a in washington. ed schultz was just 64 years old. caught on camera, a high-speed car chase ends with a car slamming into a pennsylvania home. police sstarted when troopers clocked the car speeding on the highway yesterday and exited doing 80 in a 35 mile an hour zone. the iver faces charges including fleeing police and a dui. nobody in the house was hurt. as many of u, weddings can be stressful but consider what happened in western new york, everything was going fine during filming of a video until they hear something cracking, looked u and incredibly just able to dive out of the way bere that large branch fell. they escaped with drinks in hand and fortunately, everybody was okay. when we come back, we'll take a ride with skate board legend tony hawk in ourgh y spotlight. ure itself. polident's 4 in 1 cleaning system consists

of 4 powerful ingredients that work together to deep clean your denture in hard to reach places. it kills 99.99% of odor causing bacteria polident should be the first choice of every person that wears a denture, to clean their denture. of every person that wears a denture, all around louisiana.s! you're a nincompoop! (phone ping) gentlemen, i have just received word! the louisiana purchase, is complete! instant purchase notifications from capital one. so you won't miss a purchase large, small, or very large. technology this helpful...could make history. what's in your wallet? your smile says (brett) my ta lot about you, what does this say?

(announcer) you can quit. for free help, call 1-800-quit-now. i'm a tin can tied to your bumper, cause.... i don't think enough people heard about your big day. but nothing says "we got married" like a 12 ounce piece of scrap metal. yo! we got married! honk if you like joint assets. now you're so busy soaking up all this attention, you don't see the car in front of you. and if i can crash your "perfect day", imagine what i can do to the rest of 'em. so get allstate, and be better protected from mayhem. like me. your mornings were made for better things than psoriatic arthritis. as you and your rheumatologist consider treatments, ask if xeljanz xr is right for you. xeljanz xr is a once-daily pill for psoriatic arthritis. taken with methotrexate or similar medicines, it can reduce joint pain, swelling, and significantly improve physical function. xeljanz xr can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal infections,

lymphoma, and other cancers have happened. don't start xeljanz xr if you have an infection. tears in the stomach or intestines, low blood cell counts, and higher liver tests and cholesterol levels have happened. your doctor should perform blood tests before you start and while taking xeljanz xr, and monitor certain liver tests. tell your doctor if you were in a region where fungal infections are common, and if you have had tb, hepatitis b or c, or are prone to infections. xeljanz xr can reduce the symptoms of psoriatic arthritis. don't let another morning go by without talking to your rheumatologist about xeljanz xr.

finally tonight, we turn the spotlight on skate boarding legend tony hawk, a man that made his living defying gravity now at age 50 he is revisiting some of his biggest tricks from career that launched generations with kids on skate boards. gadi schwaaught up with hawk on the half pipe. >> reporter: they say kids don't try this at home, if you're 50 definitely don't try this at home. >> happy bthday, man. >> reporter: for tony hawk, this ithe big 5-0 and his birthday present for himself capturing 50 of his most epic tricks. >> most people when they tur50 might go to a golf course. >> yeah. i had a lot of these tricks in my back pocket. there we a few that i tried and had to let gof. >> reporter: getting olr isn't easy for anyone and for tony hawk, that means occasionally you fly

off the ramp. since picking up his 9first skate board years old, the birdman had his share of highs but some tricks hata n a lot longer to master. >> i'd say i'm a much better parent than i was when i was younger in the throws of success. i'm a much more effective father. than i used to be. than i used to be. >> reporter: with son in raleigh followin his dad's kick flips, hawk is bringing the or spt to kids across america through his tony hk foundation funding 600 skate parks in low income communities but his 1999 video came, tony hawk proskater that p bridged the ga between those who could skate and those who wished they could. he's not done launchininto new heights. up next, the olympic debut at the 2020 games. as for his bag of 50 birthdayricks, he hit 51 proving tony hawk can still fly. schwartz, nbc news, california. >> still very young.

for this thursday ws" night. i'm kate snow. for all of us at nbc newsthanks for watching and have a great night. for this thursday night. i'm kate snow. for all

. lights, camera, access. >> chicken. >> thank you. >> don't forgetis th >> kid, might be the cutest kiap ever. he'se crusader and bringing a smile teo everyon down on their luck. tch whatpe hapn