HARI SREENIVASAN: Good evening. I'm Hari Sreenivasan. Judy Woodruff is away.
On the "NewsHour" tonight:
DONALD TRUMP, President of the United States: We will turn our grief into action. We have
to have action.
HARI SREENIVASAN: President Trump puts pressure on Congress for gun reform in the wake of
the Florida school shooting.
Then: Power Grab. China's Communist Party moves to abolish term limits, allowing President
Xi Jinping to stay in office for life.
And Somalia struggles to its feet. A surge in U.S. military presence pushes the militant
group Al-Shabaab out of the East African nation, but not without complications.
JANE FERGUSON: The U.S. military's involvement in the war here in Somalia happens in the
shadows. That has some people worried here about accountability.
HARI SREENIVASAN: All that and more on tonight's "PBS NewsHour."
(BREAK)
HARI SREENIVASAN: From President Trump today, more talk of gun control in America and of
crossing the NRA. He spoke amid calls for action at the federal and state levels, in
the wake of the school shooting in Florida.
DONALD TRUMP, President of the United States: And we're going to do very strong background
checks. If we see a sicko, I don't want him having a gun.
HARI SREENIVASAN: It was another listening session of sorts, this time President Trump
with the nation's governors. He called again for banning bump stocks, even if it means
breaking with the National Rifle Association.
DONALD TRUMP: Don't worry about the NRA. They're on our side. You guys, half of you are so
afraid of the NRA. There's nothing to be afraid of. And you know what? If they're not with
you, we have to fight them every once in a while. That's OK.
HARI SREENIVASAN: The president also returned to the idea of arming trained teachers in
schools. But Washington State's Democratic Governor Jay Inslee challenged him.
GOV. JAY INSLEE (D), Washington: I have listened to the people who would be affected by that.
I have listened to the biology teachers, and they don't want to do that at any percentage.
I have listened to the first grade teachers that don't want to be pistol-packing teachers.
So I just suggest we need a little less tweeting here and a little more listening, and let's
just take that off the table and move forward.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Several other governors, including Texas Republican Greg Abbott, spoke
in favor of having armed people on school campuses.
This as the gavel echoed in Congress for the first time in 10 days. West Virginia Democratic
Senator Joe Manchin appealed to Republicans to help pass something.
SEN. JOE MANCHIN (D), West Virginia: But it would be the president weighing in that would
give them the comfort zone, I would think, the Republicans, in order for them to support
something that's reasonable.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Lawmakers face a host of proposals. They include fixes to the instant
criminal background system and raising the purchase age for long guns. But it's not clear
if anything can pass.
On Sunday, Republican Congressman Brian Mast of Florida, a longtime NRA member, called
for a temporary ban on assault rifles. He spoke alongside Democratic Counterpart Ted
Deutch.
REP. BRIAN MAST (R), Florida: We can get the president on board and members of Congress
on board to say, let's put that same kind of pause on board right now, where we look
at who is having access, what do they have access to.
HARI SREENIVASAN: The NRA's Dana Loesch said her organization doesn't back any ban.
DANA LOESCH, Spokeswoman, National Rifle Association: We're talking about banning firearms. And
the discussion is about banning all semiautomatic firearms. And that's really the discussion.
Can we actually look at what could have prevented this? That firearm didn't walk itself into
the school.
HARI SREENIVASAN: The NRA also faces an economic backlash.
Starkey Hearing Technologies is the latest organization to drop its discount program
for NRA members. That makes nearly 20 companies who've cut ties with the group since the Florida
shootings. The Broward County Sheriff's Department Faces its own backlash, amid reports that
several deputies waited outside Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland as 17 people
were killed.
President Trump raised it again today.
DONALD TRUMP: You don't know until you're tested, but I think I -- I really believe
I would run in there even if I didn't have a weapon, and I think most of the people in
this room would have done that, too, because I know most of you. But they way they performed
was really a disgrace.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Deputy Scot Peterson, who was assigned to the school, seen here on archival
footage, said through his attorney today that the allegations of cowardice are patently
untrue.
SCOTT ISRAEL, Broward County, Florida, Sheriff: Of course I won't resign.
HARI SREENIVASAN: And Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel said Sunday he will not step
down, despite criticism of his deputies and reports that his department ignored warnings
about accused gunman Nikolas Cruz.
But Florida Governor Rick Scott has asked for a state investigation.
Meanwhile, a Parkland survivor, Maddy Wilford, spoke out. She lived, despite being shot three
times, and had a presidential visit at the hospital. Today, she thanked those who saved
her life.
MADELEINE WILFORD, Parkland Shooting Survivor: And I would just like to say that I'm so grateful
to be here, and it wouldn't be possible without those officers and first-responders and these
amazing doctors.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Doctors say she still has bullet fragments in her body and is lucky
to be alive.
Yesterday, thousands of students and parents returned to Douglas High to gather their belongings.
STUDENT: It's not like you're going back just to see your friends. You're going back to
see people that are traumatized for the rest of their lives.
HARI SREENIVASAN: The school is set to officially reopen on Wednesday.
We will take a closer look at the leader of the NRA in Florida after the news summary.
In the day's other news: The U.S. Supreme Court heard a pivotal case for more than five
million Americans 24 states who are members of public sector unions. At issue, whether
workers who are not union members should be required to pay dues to cover the cost of
collective bargaining.
Outside the court, the two sides argued about whether the ultimate decision will jeopardize
unions or free speech.
MARK JANUS, Attorney: Collective bargaining has its place, but let the individual worker
choose what they want to do. Don't force them to do something that they may disagree with
or they may not want to be involved in.
DAVID FREDERICK, Attorney: Their purpose is clearly to hurt unions and it is to give government
free rein to act in an authoritarian way with respect to the workplace, to set wages, terms
and conditions without input from workers.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Separately, the court declined to hear the Trump administration's appeal
to end the DACA program as of March 5. The policy protects immigrants brought to the
U.S. illegally as children. Lower courts have blocked the president's attempt to abolish
the program. He had wanted the Supreme Court to intervene, without waiting for a federal
appeals court to rule.
In Syria, a government air assault intensified outside Damascus, despite the U.N. Security
Council's call for a 30-day cease-fire. U.N. officials reported at least 30 people killed
in the last 48 hours and more than 500 in the last week.
Today, rescue workers in Eastern Ghouta pulled injured from the rubble. Local health officials
say some were victims of a chemical attack.
And in Geneva, the U.N. secretary-general demanded action.
ANTONIO GUTERRES, United Nations Secretary-General: Eastern Ghouta cannot wait. It is high time
to stop this hell on earth. And I remind all parties of their absolute obligation under
international humanitarian and human rights law to protect civilians and civilian infrastructure
at all times.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Later, Moscow announced that Russian President Vladimir Putin has
ordered a daily five-hour humanitarian pause in the attacks. Russia has been a key military
ally of Syria.
Meanwhile, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan urged all sides in Syria to honor
a cease-fire in Eastern Ghouta, but he insisted it doesn't apply to Turkey's assault on Syria's
Afrin region, where it's targeting U.S.-backed Kurdish fighters.
President Trump suggested today he would be open to talks with North Korea. It came a
day after Pyongyang said it is ready for such talks. The Trump administration has said the
North must first be ready to give up its nuclear and missile programs.
Today, at a meeting with governors, the president said talks are possible under the right conditions.
DONALD TRUMP: Talking about tremendous potential loss of lives, numbers that nobody's ever
contemplated, never thought of. So they want to talk, first time. They want to talk. And
we will see what happens. That's my attitude. We will see what happens. But something has
to be done.
HARI SREENIVASAN: The president also lauded China for doing more to rein in North Korea,
but he called out Russia for -- quote -- "behaving badly."
An arctic storm paralyzed parts of Europe today with record cold. The frigid front blew
out of Siberia with driving snow and the lowest temperatures of the season. Several inches
of snow even reached Rome, a rarity, that closed schools, disrupted flights and covered
roads. Elsewhere, blizzard conditions dumped five feet of snow in the Balkans.
Back in this country, the company co-founded by Harvey Weinstein said it will file for
federal bankruptcy protection, after talks to sell the studio fell apart. Weinstein was
fired as chairman after he was accused of sexual harassment and abuse by dozens of women.
He denies the allegations.
The Trump Organization says it has donated its hotel profits from business with foreign
governments to the U.S. Treasury. The company said today it includes profits from all of
last year. It wouldn't say exactly how much that was. Watchdog groups said the lack of
any details leaves key ethics questions unanswered.
And on Wall Street, stocks surged as interest rates backed down a bit from the four-year
highs they set last week. The Dow Jones industrial average gained nearly 400 points to close
at 25709. The Nasdaq rose 84 points, and the S&P 500 picked up 32.
Still to come on the "NewsHour": how the NRA shaped Florida's gun laws; president for life?
-- China moves to eliminate it's president's term limits; American troops fighting alongside
Somali forces in a battle against terror; and much more.
In the final weeks of Florida's legislative session, several proposals regarding guns
are on the table.
Republican Governor Rick Scott has said he now backs raising the age to purchase a firearm
from 18 to 21. State legislators are considering a law that would require a new three-day waiting
period for the purchase of firearms. But will these changes pass?
The NRA has been a powerful voice in that state. The latest issue of "The New Yorker"
focuses on the NRA's past successes in Florida and the lobbyist behind it, ®MD-BO¯Marion
Hammer. She represents the NRA there and is a past national president of the gun rights
group. And she was in Tallahassee today arguing against a bump stock ban during a legislative
committee meeting.
Mike Spies is a staff writer for The Trace. The piece appears in "The New Yorker."
He joins me now.
Mike Spies, why ascribe so much power to this one woman? Tell us a little about her accomplishments.
MIKE SPIES, The Trace: Well, she's been around for nearly four decades in the Florida legislator
-- or in Tallahassee, rather.
And she has accomplished some truly amazing things, things that have actually transformed
not just Florida, but also the country. Beginning in the 1980s, she helped pass -- she was responsible
for pushing through, rather, the country's first concealed carry law, which effectively
allows people to carry concealed handguns in public if they can satisfy a very basic
criteria to get a permit.
And that law has been replicated virtually in every state in some form. So, before that,
it was more or less -- it was very rare for someone to be able to carry a concealed weapon
in public. And now it's essentially been normalized.
There are 1.8 million of those concealed carry permit holders in Florida alone, by far the
most in the country. And going forward, her other major accomplishments include the creation
and then of course enactment of stand your ground, which was in 2005.
People are familiar with that law because there was a lot of controversy surrounding
it in 2012 after Trayvon Martin was killed by George Zimmerman, and Zimmerman's arrest
was delayed as a result of the law.
The law itself also figured in the jury instructions in Zimmerman's trial. Stand your ground is
sort of like the defining self-defense law in the country. The most important thing is
that is sort of established this idea that you could engage in almost preemptive self-defense.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Through public records requests, you looked at thousands of e-mails. What was
the kind of influence that she and by extension the NRA had in the legislative process in
Florida?
MIKE SPIES: She sort of -- in every part of the process, she has a hand.
She ultimately oversees the development of legislation. She often creates it with her
NRA lawyers and then shepherds it through the legislature. And that means there are
government staffers who help make sure that language in bills accords with the Constitution
and stuff like that.
And she's working directly with the staffers as if she were a lawmaker, which, of course,
she's not. She's a lobbyist. But what winds up happening is that legislators ultimately
abdicate their responsibilities to her, so she effectively acts as if she were a legislator,
though she's more powerful than they are, and then does things like, you know, as the
piece detail, sets up her own bill signing ceremonies once a bill gets to desk of the
governor.
HARI SREENIVASAN: There's a quote in your article that you have.
It says, "If you're a governor and you have won by a handful of votes and you have got
great political ambitions, you are going to take Marion's call in the middle of the night.
And if she needs something, you do it. And if you don't think you can do it, you try
anyway."
Given that the Florida leadership has been in the hands of one party at least for the
last 20 years and the influence of the NRA, as you report, has been fairly strong, what's
the likelihood that something changes, if it didn't change after Trayvon Martin, if
it didn't change after the Orlando Pulse shooting?
MIKE SPIES: It seems like this is a very -- I mean, this is a very rare moment and I sort
of think we're in uncharted territory right now.
To be clear, what's being proposed right now, raising the age limit on buying assault -- or
rifles from 18 to 21, expanding the three-day waiting period for all gun purchases made
at private dealers, these are still really modest proposals, despite the fact that the
NRA opposes them.
What happened recently, when there was a proposal to ban assault weapons in Florida, for instance,
that doesn't go anywhere. That's not even a -- that's just a nonstarter.
In this case, it seems like there's wide Republican support, not just with Rick Scott, but just
sort of across the chamber -- across the legislature in both chambers. And I think, in this case,
there is some cover in numbers.
®MD-BO¯Marion is very good at punishing people and getting retribution against those
who violate her position. But, in this case, you can't really punish everyone, if everyone's
going to go along with the proposals.
So, it's not really -- there is just not really any precedent for this. That said, it still
doesn't mean that she's not going to be able to strip those provisions out of the bill
or get at least one of them stripped out of the bill before it arrives on Governor Scott's
desk.
HARI SREENIVASAN: All right, for the record, we also reached out to ®MD-BO¯Marion Hammer
as a program, and we have not heard back yet. And she didn't cooperate in this profile that
you wrote about her.
Mike Spies of Trace, in collaboration with "The New Yorker," thanks so much for joining
us.
MIKE SPIES: Thanks so much for having me.
HARI SREENIVASAN: China's ruling Communist Party proposed Sunday to remove term limits
on the office of president. That means Xi Jinping, who heads the party and the military,
may never have to leave office.
As William Brangham tells us now, it sets Xi up to be the most powerful leader of China
since Mao Zedong.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: The surprise proposal to amend China's constitution would eliminate
the current limit of two terms for China's presidents. That limit was designed to avoid
a cult of personality developing, similar what grew around Mao Zedong, the founder of
the modern Chinese state.
With us now to unpack what this means for China, the U.S., and the wider world is Christopher
Johnson. He served as a top China analyst at the CIA, and he's now the Freeman chair
in China studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington think
tank.
Welcome.
CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON, Center for Strategic and International Studies: Thanks. Glad to
be here.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: How significant a move is this in China?
CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON: I think it's very significant.
Basically, what we see here is an upending of 30 years of practice in the Chinese system
and overturning really the legacy of Deng Xiaoping, the last great paramount leader,
who really was in charge, as you pointed out, of deconstructing the dangerous setup that
happened under Mao Zedong.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: You were saying earlier that this move confirms some of the worst
fears we have about Xi. What are those worst fears? What could we see with this?
CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON: I think it confirms a lot of worst fears of a lot of people in the
system, which were that he is a power-mad megalomaniac like Mao and in fact is not the
pragmatist that he has often sort of been portrayed as.
I actually think the jury is still out on that and we will have to see. The key question
really, of course, is, he has got all the power now, so what is he going to do with
it? And there's really two choices. On the economy, for example, he can take on the tough
reforms and make the economy more open, or he can move toward the status model that we
have seen increasingly under his leadership, which has been a real problem, especially
in trade relations with the United States.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: You said the jury is still out. What do you think? Which direction do
you think? Will we see more liberal, so-called liberal reformists, or the opposite?
CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON: My own sense is, in this case, probably the past will be prologue,
and the last five years that we have seen, which has been towards a more repressive state-oriented
system, will be the direction of travel.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Do you think the U.S. is ready and able to handle a surging China economically,
politically?
CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON: I think we certainly have the tools.
One of the things that's interesting, for example, right now, we're about to enter some
dicey territory with the Chinese on trade. I think there is a general view in the administration,
which I would agree with, that we have a lot of leverage in this.
But we also have to understand, what is it that we want from China out of this in terms
of making a more free trade and fair environment for us? I'm not sure we have a plan and a
strategy for that. So, the real story here is, it's very clear with Xi Jinping's latest
move here that he's going to be around for a while. He has a plan. We need to get a plan.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: We tend to think of China as a one-party state, but there are some people
who are not Xi acolytes in China.
CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON: That's true.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Do those people have the interest and/or the authority to challenge
any of this?
CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON: What has been striking about it actually is really since he came
into power and started attacking a lot of the people who actually put him in power,
I think there was a general sense, for those us who have watched the system for a long
time, this is going to create an immune response of some sort.
I think really what we have seen instead is through what I call political shock and awe,
he has so outmaneuvered these people in the system that there is really nothing they can
do about it. And we don't really see any visible signs of opposition. And probably the key
area where we see this is his taming of the military, which, of course, in the past has
been sort of a tool within the system for changing leaderships.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Taming of the military, meaning they are now completely responsive
just to him and not independent on their own?
CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON: They largely seem to be.
Historically, the role in the military in the system has been both to defend China,
but also to defend the party and keep it in power, as we saw during the Tiananmen crackdown
in 1989. And, therefore, they have always been a political actor within the system.
Through a vigorous anti-corruption campaign and changes to their force structure, he's
really brought them under his control.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: A lot of the talk about Xi is his desire to return China to its greatness
of the past.
CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON: Correct.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: In the 21st century, what does that mean today? What does China's return
to greatness mean today?
CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON: I think, first and foremost, it's returning China to a power, a position
of hegemony in Asia. And whatever broader global power aspirations, we will have to
see.
But it's really also increasingly under Xi Jinping's leadership a desire to show China
has indeed discovered what we might call a third way between communism and capitalism,
a state-led capitalist system that actually works for them and delivers results.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: All right, Chris Johnson, thank you very much.
CHRISTOPHER JOHNSON: Thank you. Nice to be here.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Stay with us.
Coming up on the "NewsHour": what's in the Democratic memo and what it means for the
Russia investigation; and the female director behind the hit TV drama "Homeland."
But first: The last time most Americans thought of the East African nation of Somalia was
a quarter-century ago, when U.S. troops died fighting in the capital, Mogadishu.
Now, after years of civil war and upheaval, the country is struggling to its feet. And
the U.S. is back in Somalia, with boots on the ground and drones in the skies. Just last
week, the U.S. launched more airstrikes against the Islamist militant group Al-Shabaab. The
group struck Mogadishu Friday night with suicide bombers and gunmen. More than 40 people died
in that attack.
As special correspondent Jane Ferguson and videographer Alessandro Pavone found, the
U.S. and African partner nations are helping Somali forces fight that insurgency on a very
complex battlefield.
JANE FERGUSON: The soldiers patrolling this dangerous road are a long way from home. They
are Ugandans, stationed here in Malia as part of an African Union peacekeeping force.
They search for bombs planted by fighters from Al-Shabaab, Somalia's powerful Islamist
militant group. Allied with al-Qaida, Al-Shabaab gunmen have enjoyed a freedom here few armed
groups have had anywhere in the world, ruling over swathes of this country for years, attacking
the central government's security forces, and even making videos to celebrate their
attacks.
The African Union troops have been here for 12 years, and aren't alone in this fight.
They work alongside the Somali national army, local militias, and, increasingly, Americans.
The U.S. military began conducting drone strikes and Special Forces raids here under the Obama
administration.
Since President Trump entered the White House, the drone strikes have more than doubled from
14 in 2016 to at least 34 in 2017. Last November, U.S. boots on the ground officially increased
from 50 to 500. American commanders say they want to prevent Somalia from becoming a hub
for other groups like ISIS.
In May 2017, U.S. Navy SEAL Kyle Milliken was killed during an operation against Al-Shabaab.
His was the first U.S. military death in Somalia since the Black Hawk Down incident in 1993,
where 18 U.S. soldiers were killed in clashes with local fighters.
It is believed that at least hundreds of Somalis died also that day.
MAN: We have seen them personally in area around June. And there were some Special Forces
moving their vehicle. And these strikes, we could hear, even beyond across the river where
we are not present. We could hear bombs during the day, during at night.
JANE FERGUSON: Do you feel in the field here that American drone strikes targeting their
leadership, Special Forces operations, does that help weaken them? Have you seen a difference?
MAN: Absolutely. And that is what has caused a lot of fear in them these days, because
at times we could hear the drones moving around, and we hear bombs.
JANE FERGUSON: That fear has forced Al-Shabaab from an active army into shadow, from controlling
towns and cities into an insurgency, hiding in rural areas.
ABDIRAHMAN OMAR OSMAN, Somali Minister of Information: And now every time they move
one place to another, they believe that we are doing an airstrike, so they are more cautious.
JANE FERGUSON: Somalia's information minister says his government has watched its enemy
weaken under U.S. military pressure.
ABDIRAHMAN OMAR OSMAN: We fully appreciate the support that we get from the Americans
in that. Otherwise, we wouldn't have enjoyed the peace that we are enjoying in Mogadishu.
JANE FERGUSON: Because you think that the drone strikes have them on the run?
ABDIRAHMAN OMAR OSMAN: Absolutely, not only on the run, but also to believe that they
cannot hide anymore.
JANE FERGUSON: The capital city, Mogadishu, for decades synonymous with war, is starting
to know peace again. On patrol with African Union soldiers, the danger of an ambush or
a hidden roadside bomb is always there, but so too are surreal moments of calm.
Stopping to get out of our armored vehicles, we found a park. No guns allowed here, just
bird song and families enjoying the cooler winter weather, and these teenagers hanging
out. Everyone we spoke with said they feel safe.
"There are no problems here, the situation is very good," 19-year-old Najma told me.
Down the road at Lido Beach, we found joyful scenes, and Somalis eager to chat with us.
Life seems to have improved here?
MAN: Yes, a lot. It's like the risk is minimized and the Somali security apparatus can do their
part.
JANE FERGUSON: You are confident in that?
MAN: Yes, yes. We are confident in that.
JANE FERGUSON: Although security has improved for Somalis in the capital, Al-Shabaab are
still able to strike weaker, softer targets through suicide bombings.
In October last year, a truck bomb killed over 500 civilians in Mogadishu. It was one
of the deadliest terrorist bombings anywhere ever. Despite this, everyone we spoke with
in the city said life is much less dangerous than it has been in years.
The newfound security is welcome here, even though some question the methods used to provide
it. The U.S. military's involvement in the war here in Somalia happens in the shadows.
Drone strikes and Special Forces operations take place inside Al-Shabaab territory. That
has some people worried here about accountability.
ABDIRIZAQ OMAR MOHAMED, Former Somali Internal Security Minister: The government officials
do not have access to assess the damage and so on and so forth. So, it's -- the public
is not aware of the collateral damage.
JANE FERGUSON: Until last year, Abdirizaq Omar Mohamed was Somalia's internal security
minister. He suspects that civilian deaths in drone strikes are being kept a secret.
ABDIRIZAQ OMAR MOHAMED: Basically, we have to believe what the Americans tell us, that
they have shot and killed Al-Shabaab leaders. So that's where we are.
JANE FERGUSON: Concern is also growing over how the U.S. decides who to hit with each
attack. In taking on Al-Shabaab, the U.S. military is targeting a dangerous militant
organization. The social landscape within which that fight takes place, however, is
extremely complicated, and avoiding getting involved in local armed disputes and rivalries
very important.
Somalia's conflict is not simply a matter of Al-Shabaab vs. the government. At the same
time, there are many clans, Somalia's version of tribes, fighting each other all across
the country.
In Somalia, even farmers carry guns to protect their property, so American forces need local
informants to identify who is Al-Shabaab and who is not. In August of last year, a joint
U.S. Special Forces and Somali forces raid on the town of Bariire killed 10 people.
Outraged family members took these pictures, insisting the victims were just farmers, including
young boys. Clan leader from the area Abdal Ilmi Hassan spoke with the "NewsHour" about
the incident. He says a rival clan trying to push them off their land lied to the American
Special Forces, telling them his people were Al-Shabaab.
ABDAL ILMI HASSAN, Clan Leader (through translator): Some clan men called U.S. and said, "We used
the Americans against you and will use them again, so leave the area."
JANE FERGUSON: The U.S. military in Africa wouldn't speak to the "NewsHour" on camera,
but have insisted the men and boys killed that day were enemy combatants.
The bitterness left behind is clear.
ABDAL ILMI HASSAN (through translator): The Americans came here to support the people,
but the people ended up hating them because of that misinformation. I wish they would
be more careful about any information they are given. They shouldn't be drawn into a
conflict among clans.
I honestly don't think the Americans have any interest in killing any clan or civilians,
but the wrong information being given to them causes this.
JANE FERGUSON: Somalia's future depends on reconciling the warring clans. Since the government
collapsed in 1991, fighting between them has made building a functioning state near impossible.
The current government is often ineffective as a result of infighting amongst the clans.
It's those divisions that Al-Shabaab feeds off. We met with this defector from the group,
who said the weaker clans are more likely to join with Al-Shabaab while there is no
peace.
MAN (through translator): The minority clans are oppressed by the main clans. Their properties
are taken and there is no justice for them. These people join voluntarily to get justice.
Al-Shabaab are the only people who can give them that.
JANE FERGUSON: It's a cycle that has been going on here for decades. The lack of a state
means people often turn to armed groups for protection, strengthening the militants, which
makes building any state with the power to enforce law and order all the more difficult.
Every night in Mogadishu now, African Union troops supervise the Somali police at checkpoints,
looking out for Al-Shabaab bombs and fighters slipping into the city under darkness. These
soldiers won't be here forever. They are planning to leave in 2020 and have already started
a slow drawdown.
When they are gone, the weak Somali forces will be left to face Al-Shabaab by themselves,
with only their American partners fighting with them.
For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm Jane Ferguson in Mogadishu, Somalia.
HARI SREENIVASAN: We turn now to part two of the fight over a controversial and once
classified memo.
Earlier this month, House Intelligence chairman Devin Nunes released a Republican memo about
the handling of one piece of the Russia investigation.
Over the weekend, Democrats served up their own version of the document.
Lisa Desjardins takes a closer look.
LISA DESJARDINS: This memo, 10 pages long and partially redacted, rebuts a key claim
made by the previous one, that federal law enforcement abused its powers when it sought
so-called FISA wiretaps on former Trump campaign aide Carter Page in late 2016.
In a weekend tweet, the president called this latest memo, prepared by the top Democrat
on House intelligence, Representative Adam Schiff, a total political and legal bust.
What is exactly?
Let's talk to Jamil Jaffer. He was senior counsel for the House Intelligence Committee
from 2011 to 2013, also served at the Justice Department's National Security Division during
the George W. Bush administration.
Thank you.
There's much to say and a lot of frenzy here, but let's cut to sort of the main point. The
original memo charged that the FBI and DOJ put a hand on the scale early on in this Russia
investigation by not disclosing that one of their key sources had political motivation.
What did this new Democratic memo add to that?
JAMIL JAFFER, Former Senior Counsel, House Intelligence Committee: Well, I think it's
pretty clear now that the Justice Department did in fact disclose to the court that there
were political motivations behind the Steele dossier. Right?
And the only question now is, did they use the words Hillary Clinton and Democratic campaign?
The answer to that is no, but they didn't do that in part because they were redacting
out the names of U.S. persons and U.S. entities.
And so should they have said more? Hard to know. But I think that is what the debate
is about now. We now know that in fact they did tell the court that there were political
motivations behind it.
LISA DESJARDINS: So, let's unpack that a little bit.
The Steele dossier, many of our views may know, because it has sort of some scintillating
information alleged against the president. Some of that has been debunked. And that information
originally was gathered by a conservative funding source.
Later, Democrats paid for that. It ended up in the FBI's hands. And you're saying is,
this memo today tells us that while the FBI did disclose there was a political motivation,
but not exactly who it came from?
JAMIL JAFFER: Exactly.
And it says -- what it says is that people who want to discredit campaign one, the Trump
campaign, were gathering this information, right, and that they had paid the source for
this information. So, you know, from the context, it's fairly clear. I mean, the court could
easily assume who was paying for this.
But they weren't exactly transparent about that exact point as to which campaign it was
and who was involved. The Republican memo suggests they should have been. The Democratic
memo says, well, they told the court enough.
Now the American people now have an honest sort of debate between the two about who's
got it right here.
LISA DESJARDINS: Can you help us understand then what's normal procedure?
You have been on both sides, the oversight side and the filing application side. Is it
normal to just say there was someone who was politically motivated, we're not saying from
which party, involved here, or is it more the common procedure to say Democrats were
doing this or Republicans were doing this?
JAMIL JAFFER: Well, it varies, when it comes to FISAs. Right?
What you want to do is, you want to give the court enough information about the context
and about the information so the court can judge, is this reliable information on which
to depend when it's making its decision about whether to grant the court order and whether
there's probable cause to believe that Carter Page was an agent of a foreign power.
Now, at the same time, depending on which side of that debate you fall on, you might
want to give the court more or less information. The goal is to give the court as much information
as it needs to make its judgment.
Here, they were clear about the political motivations behind the memo. They were not
clear specifically about which side. And that's partly because they take efforts to protect
the privacy of U.S. persons involved and they typically redact out U.S. persons' names and
put in U.S. person one or U.S. entity one. That's not unusual.
LISA DESJARDINS: Let's take a bigger step back also at this overall investigation.
Does today's memo shed any light on what we know about Russian meddling and whether there
were any contacts or any collusion between Russians and U.S. officials, including the
Trump campaign or the Trump White House? Do we learn anything more? Is this just a tempest
in a teapot?
JAMIL JAFFER: So, I think, in a lot of ways, what we know now about Carter Page is that
Carter Page, there were a lot of reasons to surveil him, right, beyond the dossier.
LISA DESJARDINS: Just a reminder, he was at one point, for a few months, a foreign policy
adviser to the Trump campaign.
JAMIL JAFFER: That's right.
Of course, this FISA took place after he had left the campaign already and was disassociated
with the campaign. But there were good reasons to surveil Carter Page.
Now, ultimately, it looks like that investigation hasn't come to anything. But there were good
reasons at the time to do that. That all being said, what we did know about the larger context
is in fact there was a Russian effort to influence our elections.
It's actually an effort that continues today to influence our trust in our system. Right?
And this partisan infighting about Carter Page in the memos is actually really playing
into the Russians' hands in a lot of ways. And it's something that we as a country need
to think about and come together and say, look, this is a very real threat by a foreign
nation state. We need to respond to that, and respond aggressively.
LISA DESJARDINS: People trying to pay attention to this investigation, what would you recommend?
What matters and what is distraction?
JAMIL JAFFER: Yes.
I think what matters here is, if you believe there was a problem at the FBI or there were
issues going on, what's the evidence of that? And if it's there, let's figure out how to
fix that.
But let's not get caught up in this back and forth about Republicans, Democrats, right,
this whole thing, this fight between Schiff and Nunes on one hand. And really what you
need to focus on is, was there a problem and was there political influence here? If there
was, let's fix it.
If there wasn't -- but this doesn't bespeak a larger problem with the FISA process, because,
ultimately, that process has worked pretty well and is very effective at combating threats
to our national security. We need to focus on that. And there is today a very real threat
to our national security . And that is a Russian effort to influence our body politic, which
is a real problem.
LISA DESJARDINS: Jamil Jaffer, you have seen that process from the halls of Congress and
from the Department of Justice.
Thank you for joining us.
JAMIL JAFFER: Thanks for having me.
LISA DESJARDINS: And imagine this, national, important issues rife with political divide.
Oh, it must be time for Politics Monday.
Hello, Tamara Keith, of course, from NPR and Amy Walter of The Cook Political Reporter.
Thank you very much.
We just heard a lot, of course, about Russia, but let's go back to the top topic of the
show tonight, and that's guns.
Tamara Keith, things seem to be moving fast in terms of coverage and rhetoric. Democrats
on Capitol Hill are now saying this kind of bill that they were perhaps going to support,
that now they say it's too watered-down, that it just supports the current background checks.
They want more.
What can happen, do you think, on guns in Congress?
TAMARA KEITH, National Public Radio: It's a very good question and it's one that we
don't fully have the answer to yet.
There does seem to be some coalescing on the Republican side around something related to
school safety, but it's not clear what that would be exactly, and this smaller, more narrow
Fix NICS bill is what it's called, which basically just requires state, local, federal agencies
to put people into the background check system, as they are currently required to do, gives
some incentives for that.
That had been a problem in the Texas shooting, that church shooting several months ago.
LISA DESJARDINS: Amy, in the midst of all this, as Congress -- and we see Republicans
and Democrats returning to town -- I think I can hear their planes landing behind me
at Washington National Airport.
President Trump has actually done something different this time. He's gotten out in front.
He's said more than Republican leaders in Congress on this issue so far, initially indicating
in a tweet last week he wanted an age limit. Now it's not as clear, today back and forth
on the NRA.
What does President Trump want and how does that matter?
AMY WALTER, The Cook Political Report: Exactly. What the president wants is really unclear,
because, as we have seen on almost any major issue that has gone in front of Congress,
whether it's health care or the DACA issue, or now on guns, the president takes multiple
positions in Twitter, in front of the press, privately to members of Congress, privately
to governors, and then it leaves folks on Capitol Hill, especially Republican allies
on Capitol Hill, really wondering what the marching orders are.
What are we supposed to advocate for? Because we don't quite know where the president is.
And I think that Tam is exactly right. What's clear that's happening on Capitol Hill right
now is Democrats feel really emboldened by the energy and enthusiasm from more gun control
folks, you know, people who are really energized and engaged in a way they haven't seen before.
There is a new polling out showing a new energy on this issue. People like Chuck Schumer,
the minority leader, think, we need to go father. We don't have to just get half-a-loaf,
we can get the full loaf.
Meanwhile, there are a whole bunch of Republicans who say, oh, no, no, no, no, this goes much,
much too far. That's never going to fly in our red states. It's not just as much just
that the NRA is popular, but the issue of guns in red states even among Democrats is
still one that's very important.
So I think you're going to see that getting something that's a compromise once again become
very difficult.
TAMARA KEITH: Here's a thought experiment. This is an election year. November 2018, all
of these Republican congresspeople are going to be up for reelection. They're going to
run on the tax bill that they passed last year.
Are they also going to say, and we went up against the NRA, we went further than the
NRA had wanted us to go and further than, you know, our voters wanted us to go, and
we did all of this stuff on gun control?
It's hard to imagine Republican elected officials running on gun control.
LISA DESJARDINS: But it is easy to imagine, I think, some Democrats running on that.
TAMARA KEITH: Yes.
LISA DESJARDINS: And I kind of want to get beyond the politics here. It feels like a
very us vs. them momentum is building. Almost reminds me in some ways of the abortion debate,
the passion, the energy, but also the really sharp divide.
You wrote a great piece last week, Amy, saying it's not just about the NRA. Can you take
us a little deeper on what's going on here, what the motivations are?
AMY WALTER: Yes.
I think there's a cultural issue here. As you pointed out, about, I think, is a good
opposite of that, as you could think about it. We talk so much about the NRA when we
talk about guns. We spend not as much time the;looking about people who either are gun
owners, may not be part of the NRA, or people who live in areas or who are a part of a cohort
who believe that guns are fundamental to their safety and their sense of freedom.
It's a core value set to them. And I think when it gets into this debate about the Florida
is manipulating people, the NRA is all-powerful and is controlling the legislative agenda,
it misses the fact that there are real people out there who hold these views, that are very
passionate about these views.
And, in fact, the challenge for gun rights folks for a long time has been that the intensity
on gun issues has been decidedly toward the -- I'm sorry -- has been on the gun rights
side, not on the gun control side, almost by a 2-1 margin.
Pew found a few years ago when asking people who own guns, people who don't own guns, have
you ever contacted an official and talked about this issue specifically, 21 percent
of gun owners said yes. Only 12 percent of non-gun owners said yes.
What the real question is, when it comes to the political piece, is that number going
to change because of what we saw in Florida?
LISA DESJARDINS: All this is happening in, oh, an election year. Right?
And, Tamara Keith, you just came back from a bright blue state, California, Fresno, where
something very interesting happened to the state's longest serving Democratic official,
Dianne Feinstein.
Her Democratic Party over the weekend voted not to endorse her. Why is that? Do we read
anything more into this?
TAMARA KEITH: And it wasn't that they voted not to endorse her. It's that they couldn't
coalesce behind a candidate.
She has a challenger in the primary, Kevin de Leon, who is also a Democrat. And he got
more support than she did from the state party at their state party convention. He didn't
get the 60 percent that he needed to get the endorsement.
But Dianne Feinstein has long had this issue in California where she has been seen more
moderate than her very bright blue liberal state. And that energy is reflected in the
activists that are part of the state Democratic Party.
AMY WALTER: Yes.
LISA DESJARDINS: Got it.
And, Amy, I want ask you quickly. Democrats say they're targeting 100 seats. Is that realistic?
Is it risky? Or is maybe a sign of a pulse? What is that?
AMY WALTER: I think what they're showing you is that they have intensity and they want
to take advantage of that.
Intensity is a very terrible thing to waste. And Democrats have it in fund-raising, they
have it in candidate recruitment, and they're seeing it in the polls. So why not spread
it as far and wide? They're not going to win all those districts. They're probably not
going to be able to invest in a lot of those districts.
But you might get a surprise or two. Only need 24 seats.
(CROSSTALK)
AMY WALTER: Right. It's easier to get 24 seats out of 100 than trying to win 24 out of 40
seats.
LISA DESJARDINS: You can miss when you shoot 100 and you need only 24.
AMY WALTER: Correct. All right.
LISA DESJARDINS: All right, very good.
Amy Walter of The Cook Political Reporter, Tamara Keith of NPR, thank you both very much.
AMY WALTER: You're very welcome.
TAMARA KEITH: You're welcome.
HARI SREENIVASAN: Finally tonight, we continue our occasional series about women helping
to bring equity and change to the workplace in this time of MeToo and TimesUp.
Jeffrey Brown paid a visit to the set of a veteran director who's been hard at work at
this for years.
JEFFREY BROWN: At a cemetery in Richmond, Virginia, actors Claire Danes and Mandy Patinkin
shoot a scene at a funeral.
We can't tell you who's died this time. You will have to wait until later in this seventh
season of the acclaimed Showtime series "Homeland."
Behind the scenes, Lesli Linka Glatter, one of television's most respected and prolific
directors, who knows what it takes to do the job well.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER, Producer/Director: Certainly, tenacity.
JEFFREY BROWN: Tenacity.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: Yes. It only takes one person to say...
JEFFREY BROWN: Which means don't give up.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: Don't give up, no matter how difficult it is. And wear comfortable
shoes. That's very important.
JEFFREY BROWN: Tenacity, one, comfortable shoes, two.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: Yes.
And don't pretend to know something you don't, because you will get caught, someone will
know, and then you won't learn. And learn everyone's name on the first day of shooting.
JEFFREY BROWN: It's a philosophy that's taken Linka Glatter, now 64, to the top of her profession,
directing more than 100 hours of TV, including such shows as "E.R.," "The West Wing," "Mad
Men," as well as "Homeland," where she also serves as an executive producer.
The show, created and led by Alex Gansa, has been shot on locations around the world, as
CIA agent Carrie Mathison, played by Danes, battles terrorists in the Middle East and
Europe and, these days, dark forces within the American government.
This season, much of the action is set in Washington, D.C.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: Welcome to our Situation Room.
JEFFREY BROWN: But the shooting is being done in nearby Richmond, indoors in a large warehouse
transformed into the White House and other government settings.
Once again, "Homeland"'s plot has a ripped-from-the-headlines feel.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: We're in a very divided, unstable world.
JEFFREY BROWN: Imagine that.
(LAUGHTER)
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: I know.
JEFFREY BROWN: And we have a president of the United States.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: Yes, a president at odds with her intelligence community, in a world
that's kind of a post-truth world.
JEFFREY BROWN: But for Linka Glatter, there's another pressing issue of the moment in her
own field, for, while she's made it as a director, too many other women have not had the opportunity.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: I started directing a while ago. And if you would have asked me,
would we be discussing, I would have said, absolutely not, Jeff. No way. This will be
a nonissue, nothing to discuss.
And the fact that we are still having to talk about that is very surprising to me.
JEFFREY BROWN: She points to a survey by the Directors Guild of America showing just 21
percent of TV episodes in 2016-'17 season were directed by women.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: I don't think anyone is sitting in an office and twirling a moustache
and going, oh.
JEFFREY BROWN: No women.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: No women. Let's not hire the women.
I think it's deeper than that. I think it's, you know, in that land of unconscious bias,
where women are still all lumped together. And I have had it said to me, you know, we
hired a woman once, and it didn't work.
JEFFREY BROWN: You have literally had that said to you?
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: Oh, yes, multiple times.
JEFFREY BROWN: You think about arguments you might hear, like a lack of qualified women.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: Yes. That's so not true.
JEFFREY BROWN: That's not true.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: Absolutely not.
JEFFREY BROWN: But you still hear that?
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: You still hear that, because it's easy. The handful of women that
are working all the time, OK, yes, they're qualified because they work all the time.
But there are so many women who are definitely qualified that are not. So, it's just not
an equal playing field yet. It comes up often that a young director, a male director, will
do a small indie film, and the next movie they're doing is a huge studio...
(CROSSTALK)
JEFFREY BROWN: Right, million, multimillion.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: Yes, a $100 million movie.
That has not happened for women. It would be said, oh, she doesn't have enough experience.
But, somehow, a man has enough experience.
JEFFREY BROWN: Who is in charge, she says, also directly connects to the sexual misconduct
issues that have come to the fore.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: Honestly, I don't know any woman that hasn't been put, and myself
included, in some sort of position where you can't quite believe this is happening.
Now, there are levels to that. Whether you're talking about sexual harassment or, you know,
hostile work environment, you know, there are degrees of all of that. But I think it's
coming out because it's been unspoken. And the need to speak and feel that it's OK to
finally speak is hug.
And no one should ever be in a position where they're, you know, harassed or abused. It
should never happen. And you shouldn't create an environment where that can happen.
JEFFREY BROWN: Back at the cemetery, Mandy Patinkin, who plays veteran CIA operative
Saul Berenson, spoke of working with Linka Glatter.
MANDY PATINKIN, Actor: Lesli wants as much input from the people that are there. And,
in my opinion, that's a smart director, because that's a collaborative effort, it's a collaborative
game. And you're being foolish not to ask the other people what they feel, what they
would do, and to listen, and to be ruthless in terms of making sure that they are telling
the story.
JEFFREY BROWN: Why do you think there are so few women directors, still?
MANDY PATINKIN: I think there are so few women directors because the world has been run by
men, and the world isn't doing so well. The world is certainly not doing very well now.
JEFFREY BROWN: During a break at another site, Claire Danes shared her experience.
CLAIRE DANES, Actress: Our show is surprisingly diverse, and in no small part because of Lesli's
involvement. She really makes it a priority to hire people who are not sufficiently represented.
So we have more female directors than most productions. But, still, it's not enough.
JEFFREY BROWN: Has that been true for you in your career or is something you notice?
CLAIRE DANES: Yes. I mean, it's impossible not to. But I think that is starting to change.
It's a powerful phenomenon that's occurring right now, and it seems to be having a real
impact.
JEFFREY BROWN: Linka Glatter credits her rise in large part to the support she got from
powerful male mentors, including Steven Spielberg, for whom she worked during his 1980s TV series
"Amazing Stories."
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: My first day of shooting on that, "Amazing Stories," I ended up doing
three of them, so it was my film school on every level.
There were 200 guys storming a beach in World War II with 12 cameras. So, is that a gender
thing? I don't know. It was a filmmaking thing. It was a story thing.
JEFFREY BROWN: She's made it her business to mentor women ever since, having them shadow
her while she works.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: That's thrilling to me.
JEFFREY BROWN: Many, she says, now with strong careers themselves.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: I should also say, Jeff, I was told when I first started doing this
by other women, you know, why are you doing this? You're going to make it harder for yourself.
JEFFREY BROWN: Really?
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: Yes. Yes. And, again, remember, I started...
(CROSSTALK)
JEFFREY BROWN: You mean as in, like, rocking the boat, or just...
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: No, not rocking the boat, just like there's only room for one of us,
and it better be me.
JEFFREY BROWN: Oh.
LESLI LINKA GLATTER: And if you are bringing all these women in, it's going to affect your
career.
And I can tell you categorically that has never happened. It certainly didn't, by helping
other women direct, never hurt me as a director. I'm still here, you know, tough old broad.
(LAUGHTER)
JEFFREY BROWN: Now, she's involved in a new push aimed at gender parity, working with
NBC Entertainment on the Female Forward initiative.
Beginning in the fall, 10 women will shadow directors on an NBC series, and then direct
at least one episode themselves.
"Homeland," of course, also features strong women in front of the camera, including Elizabeth
Marvel playing the president, as well as Danes.
While the show continues to explore the shadowy world of secret intelligence, while Glatter
and others aim for more women in positions of power in their world.
For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm Jeffrey Brown on the set of "Homeland" in Richmond, Virginia.
HARI SREENIVASAN: And that's the "NewsHour" for tonight. I'm Hari Sreenivasan.
Join us online and again here tomorrow evening. For all of us at the "PBS NewsHour," thank
you. See you soon.
For more infomation >> কখনো হার না মেনে চলতে থাকুন || Student motivational video || success motivational video in bangla - Duration: 3:52. 
For more infomation >> Chicken theft suspects say they were rescuing them from 'horrific conditions' - Duration: 1:44. 
For more infomation >> Students return to Edgewood Highland Elementary - Duration: 2:31. 
For more infomation >> Car crashes in neighborhood - Duration: 0:53. 
For more infomation >> Rob's 6pm Full Weather Forecast - Duration: 4:38. 
For more infomation >> Motociclista manejaba desnudo y en contravía | Al Rojo Vivo | Telemundo - Duration: 0:37. 
For more infomation >> Case Closed: Sexual Battery Investigation Against Miami Beach Comm'r - Duration: 0:51. 
For more infomation >> 'Racist' anthrax threat made against royal family - Duration: 2:50. 
For more infomation >> International Music Festivals Pledge to Achieve Gender Equality - Duration: 1:02. 
For more infomation >> Bus maker for ART may owe city $800K for delivery delay - Duration: 2:04. 
For more infomation >> Fazilet & Her Daughters Episode 36 Hazan's kidnapping (Eng Subs) | Hazan & Yağız Scenes 6/6 - Duration: 8:05. 
For more infomation >> Question 7 - Hon Paul Goldsmith to the Minister of Employment - Duration: 3:32. 
For more infomation >> New details released after driver crashes into Walmart barriers - Duration: 1:35. 
For more infomation >> [Trọn bộ] Anh được gặp em - Truyện ngôn tình hay về cuộc sống hằng ngày | Huệ Trần 3S - Duration: 3:15:07. 
For more infomation >> Lunes de la 2ª semana de Cuaresma – 26 de febrero de 2018 – Ciclo B - Duration: 2:23:48. 
For more infomation >> Voici comment vous débarrasser d'un double menton en quelques semaines - Duration: 9:45. 
For more infomation >> 感謝當年林心如不嫁之恩，他現和心愛的女神相戀，網友紛紛送祝福 - Duration: 2:34. 
For more infomation >> Learn How to Reduce People...
For more infomation >> CAPTAIN AMERICA's Moves Set Marvel: Avengers Alliance - Conjunto de Movimientos del Capitán América - Duration: 0:56. 
For more infomation >> 걸그룹 원했던 대학생이 축제 게스트 명단보고 분노한 사연 | korea 247 DHL - Duration: 3:04. 
Không có nhận xét nào:
Đăng nhận xét