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GEOFF BENNETT: Good evening. I'm Geoff Bennett.
AMNA NAWAZ: And I'm Amna Nawaz.
On the "NewsHour" tonight: death and desperation in Gaza. More than 100 people trying to pull
food from an aid convoy are killed in chaos and Israeli troop fire.
GEOFF BENNETT: President Biden and former President Trump hold dueling events at the
Texas border, showcasing their conflicting immigration policies.
AMNA NAWAZ: And women who struggle to get pregnant share their personal experiences
and their views on the Alabama Supreme Court ruling that jeopardizes in vitro fertilization.
BARBARA COLLURA, President and CEO, RESOLVE: The National Infertility Association: What
is an embryo? Is it a person? Is it a clump of cells? Is -- it have the potential for
life? All of those things are still undecided.
(BREAK)
AMNA NAWAZ: Welcome to the "NewsHour."
Thirty thousand, that's the number of Gazans the Hamas-led Health Ministry there says have
died in just 146 days of war. That grim threshold was crossed after one of the deadliest single
incidents of the war, more than 100 people reportedly killed trying desperately to pull
aid from trucks.
GEOFF BENNETT: The need is dire and hunger acute. The U.N. says more than half-a-million
people in Gaza -- that's one out of every four -- are -- quote -- "one step away from
famine."
The White House today called the deaths in Northern Gaza tragic and alarming. And President
Biden says it could complicate negotiations to pause the war and release Israeli hostages.
Nick Schifrin starts our coverage.
And a warning: The following report includes images that are disturbing.
NICK SCHIFRIN: They went to retrieve aid. They returned instead with the dead and the
food they desperately wanted for their families now covered in their blood.
It happened at 4:00 a.m., as Egyptian aid trucks arrived in Gaza City.
(GUNSHOTS)
NICK SCHIFRIN: The sound of gunfire on this footage aired by Al-Jazeera as Gazans who'd
come to gather aid began to flee.
And, afterward, residents walk away with bags of food surrounded by the injured. Israel
released this footage of crowds that surrounded the aid and what it called tanks securing
the convoy. That's when Gazans began fighting for food, said Israeli military spokesman
Admiral Daniel Hagari.
REAR ADM. DANIEL HAGARI, Spokesperson, Israeli Defense Forces: The tanks that were there
to secure the convoy seized the Gazans being trampled and cautiously tries to disperse
the mob with a few warning shots. When the hundreds became thousands and things got out
of hand, the tank commander decided to retreat. No IDF strike was conducted towards the aid
convoy.
NICK SCHIFRIN: But at the Kamal Adwan Hospital, where the injured were rushed in, eyewitnesses
blamed Israel.
MAN (through translator): We were surprised by Israeli tanks that came out and opened
fire on people randomly and directly. This is my brother, who went to bring food for
his children. If aid is to come to us in this way, we do not want it. We do not want to
live on the blood of our children.
NICK SCHIFRIN: But the aid is desperately needed. The U.N. says, in Northern Gaza, one
in six children under the age of 2 are acutely malnourished. Some don't make it.
Doctors in Beit Lahia said this baby died of hunger and dehydration, a helpless mother
left to grieve. To a man with an empty stomach, food is God. And for the Al-Awadeya family
in Central Gaza, salvation comes from a plant that, like them, can survive the harshest
conditions, a thorny, prickly cactus.
MARWAN AL-AWADEYA, Displaced Palestinian (through translator): Today, we are living in famine.
We have exhausted everything. There is nothing left to eat. We eat cactus, even with its
thorns.
NICK SCHIFRIN: In Southern Gaza, volunteers from the international humanitarian organization
MedGlobal document children's nutrition rates. A UNICEF ruler shows an alarming truth. The
U.N. says famine in Gaza is looming.
DR. ZAHER SAHLOUL, President, MedGlobal: Hunger is a major issue right now. And the severe
malnutrition among children is alarming.
NICK SCHIFRIN: Dr. Zaher Sahloul is MedGlobal's president and co-founder. He volunteered in
several clinics and hospitals in Southern Gaza last month.
DR. ZAHER SAHLOUL: When we were there, there were no food, no chicken, no eggs, no milk,
no fruits and vegetables. Food were very expensive. So average adult eats less than one meal a
day.
NICK SCHIFRIN: Israel says there are no restrictions on aid and blames the limited flow of aid
on the U.N.
U.S. officials believe part of the problem is that Israel targets Hamas fighters who
would be guarding the aid, leaving convoys vulnerable to the kind of incident that occurred
today. On Monday, Gazans flocked to the beach after Jordan airdropped aid into the sea,
a drop into an ocean of need.
U.S. officials confirm they are actively planning for the possibility of U.S. airdrops.
DR. ZAHER SAHLOUL: This is something that has to be done because people are dying because
of lack of food and lack of medicine. And this should not happen in 21st century.
NICK SCHIFRIN: For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm Nick Schifrin.
GEOFF BENNETT: For more on the humanitarian situation in Gaza, we turn to Jeremy Konyndyk.
He's the president of Refugees International. That's a global humanitarian organization.
He previously served in the Biden administration as executive director of USAID's COVID-19
Task Force.
Thanks for coming in.
JEREMY KONYNDYK, President, Refugees International: My pleasure.
GEOFF BENNETT: This incident in Gaza City, as we saw in Nick's report, Israeli forces
firing on a crowd of Palestinians waiting for aid, at least 100 people were killed.
It's not clear how many people were killed from gunfire or in the ensuing panic.
What more can you tell us about what transpired and really what contributed to it?
JEREMY KONYNDYK: Well, one thing that I think is really notable here is that the traditional
humanitarian organization seemed not to have been involved at all.
So this was -- did not involve the U.N. Relief and Works Agency or other U.N. bodies that
are normally involved in coordinating major distributions. This seems to have been organized
more by the Israeli government. It was secured, as Nick reported, by Israeli tanks. That's
not typical of a humanitarian distribution.
And it suggests this is Israel trying to find some other ways to show that they're doing
something without actually working with the humanitarian capacity that exists in the territory.
GEOFF BENNETT: The U.N. says a quarter of Gaza's population is one step away from famine,
infants dying from starvation.
JEREMY KONYNDYK: Yes.
GEOFF BENNETT: Your team was just on the ground there. What did they encounter and what did
they witness about really the unspeakable devastation there?
JEREMY KONYNDYK: They heard just shocking stories of the damage from the war. They talked
to one man who is a pediatric surgeon in the European Hospital in Khan Yunis who told the
story of his brother and his nephew.
So, his brother had a child, a 5-year-old child, with cerebral palsy who he didn't want
to evacuate their home because the child didn't do well outside the house. Their house was
raided by the IDF. Both of the parents were killed, and the child's older brother then
had to drag him overnight to the hospital. The 5-year-old had caught shrapnel in the
face.
He ended up losing his eye. It is just all of these stories of incredible deprivation,
incredible harm to civilians and really, as we saw with the report today, to all appearances,
really indiscriminate military action by the IDF.
GEOFF BENNETT: The Biden White House is considering airdropping aid into Gaza, given the dire
need and the slower pace of land deliveries.
You could argue that that's one solution, but not the best solution, given that, how
do you get aid to 2.4 million people? Are there other viable routes to not just get
aid in, but to make sure it is delivered in a fair and logical manner?
JEREMY KONYNDYK: Yes.
So, when I served, I served previously in the Obama administration in like disaster
response there. So, I used to coordinate airdrops like this. And we only used them when we had
absolutely no other option, because they're the worst way to get aid in. They cost a lot
of money. They are difficult to mount logistically, and they get very little volume in.
What we need to see is opening of border crossings. We need to see Israel doing much more to facilitate
humanitarian action. They have been actively blocking humanitarian groups from getting
into Northern Gaza and restricting access even to Southern Gaza.
We're only resorting to airdrops because of the blockages by the Israeli government.
GEOFF BENNETT: The other side of that, though, is, how do you do that when the IDF is fighting
the better part of, what, some 20,000 Hamas fighters who are underground with hostages
who are engaged in this high-intensity combat operation against the IDF?
JEREMY KONYNDYK: They are engaged in a pretty difficult combat operation. They have also
conducted that in an extraordinarily indiscriminate way now for five months.
And the way that they have conducted the war, even U.S. government officials, even the president
himself has said it's indiscriminate, and the words he used, over the top. If they had
conducted this war differently, it would be a lot easier. It would not be easy, but it
would be a lot easier for humanitarians to operate there.
But the way Israel has conducted the war has made it nearly impossible, because they have
not done it in line with international law and the expectations outlined there.
GEOFF BENNETT: As Amna reported earlier in this broadcast, the Gaza Health Ministry is
reporting now that 30,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli attacks since the start
of this offensive.
That figure, even though it comes from the Gaza Health Ministry, is widely viewed as
the most reliable figure available. What does that say about the way that Israel is conducting
this war?
JEREMY KONYNDYK: I think it just underscores the indiscriminate nature of what they have
done.
To go five months, to have made as little progress as they have against their own objectives,
their own military objectives, while incurring this amount of civilian damage, it is the
definition of disproportionate and indiscriminate military action under international law.
And the U.S. government has yet to take a firm stance on that. They're going to need
to, because the Rafah offensive, which could be looming in the next few weeks, would put
to -- would overshadow anything that's happened in this war to date. Every offensive so far,
people have been able to move out of the way, not everyone, but a lot of people have been
able to move out of the way.
With Rafah, there's nowhere left to go. So, this would be happening amidst a civilian
population in a literal tent camp. It would be devastating.
GEOFF BENNETT: Jeremy Konyndyk, thanks so much for your time and for your insights this
evening. We appreciate it.
JEREMY KONYNDYK: My pleasure.
AMNA NAWAZ: In the day's other news: Fire crews in Texas fought to gain ground on what's
now the largest wildfire in the state's history.
It's already burned across more than a million acres, an area larger than the state of Rhode
Island. In the Texas Panhandle, heaps of ash are all that's left of these families' former
lives.
JASON WILHELM, Wildfire Victim: You know, it was heartbreaking. It's our home.
AMNA NAWAZ: The Smokehouse Creek Fire claimed Jason Wilhelm's house in the town of Canadian.
He was away. His wife fled with what she could.
JASON WILHELM: A lot of sentimental things, blankets, pictures. The kids got some of their
toys, a few things. But other than, that's really it. That's all she could fit in her
car.
AMNA NAWAZ: The fire is the largest in a cluster still blazing in the Panhandle. By this morning,
the Smokehouse Creek Fire alone had burned more than 1,700 square miles and was just
3 percent contained.
Earlier this week, unseasonably warm temperatures and high winds sent flames barreling across
farmland and through towns, fueled by dry grass and vegetation.
WOMAN: You got to go. You have got to go now.
AMNA NAWAZ: Hundreds were ordered to evacuate, but unpredictable conditions pushed walls
of fire across highways, blocking an escape. An 83-year-old woman was found dead in her
burned home in Stinnett, Texas.
Officials say scores of houses have been destroyed and tens of thousands of cattle could be lying
dead in scorched fields. Satellite images showed the town of Fritch in Hutchinson County
before and after the Deuce Fire reduced it to ash.
DEIDRA THOMAS, Hutchinson County, Texas, Emergency Management Department: I know that there are
a lot of people still waiting to get into Fritch.
AMNA NAWAZ: Deidra Thomas with the county's Emergency Management Department warned residents
to brace themselves for the damage.
DEIDRA THOMAS: The easiest way to put this is, I don't think a lot of the folks that
live in the Fritch area are probably going to be prepared for what they're going to see
as they pull into town.
AMNA NAWAZ: Officials also predict the flames could pick up again this weekend.
NIM KIDD, Texas Division of Emergency Management Chief: I don't want the community to feel
a false sense of security that all of these fires will not grow anymore.
AMNA NAWAZ: For now, cooler temperatures and lighter winds have opened a crucial window
for firefighters to tame the blazes.
On Tuesday, another fire burned close to the nation's main nuclear weapons assembly plant
near Amarillo. The site reopened after the fire shifted north.
Former President Donald Trump today appealed a ruling that bars him from Illinois' presidential
primary ballot. The judge found he incited insurrection, the January 6 assault on the
U.S. Capitol. Mr. Trump's lawyer argued that -- quote -- "Staying the judgment until the
Illinois appellate courts finally decide this case would reduce the great risk of voter
confusion."
The U.S. Supreme Court is already considering a similar case from Colorado.
Congress is moving to head off a partial government shutdown this weekend. The House passed a
short-term spending bill today and sent it on to the Senate. The measure funds one set
of federal agencies through March 8 and another group through March 22.
In Russia, President Vladimir Putin has renewed his warning to the West that it could risk
nuclear war over Ukraine. That comes after French President Emmanuel Macron said this
week that sending NATO troops to Ukraine should not be ruled out. Putin responded today in
Moscow in his annual address to Parliament, painting Western leaders as reckless in their
support for Kyiv.
VLADIMIR PUTIN, Russian President (through translator): We also have weapons that can
hit targets on their territory. What they are doing now, trying to scare the whole world,
it does risk a conflict with nuclear weapons, which means the destruction of civilization.
Don't they understand this, or what?
AMNA NAWAZ: The United States and other NATO members have already said they would not send
forces to Ukraine.
Back in this country, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin got grilled at a House hearing for
letting the president and others go days without knowing he was hospitalized last month. He
said there was no lapse in command structure while he was treated for complications from
prostate cancer surgery.
At the same time, Austin acknowledged to Republican Congresswoman Elise Stefanik that transparency
is essential at all levels.
LLOYD AUSTIN, U.S. Secretary of Defense: If a service member was in a hospital, I think
the chain of command would be concerned about why they are in a hospital and make sure they
are doing the right things to take care of them and their families.
REP. ELISE STEFANIK (R-NY): But don't you think it is their responsibility to notify
their commanding officer?
LLOYD AUSTIN: I think...
REP. ELISE STEFANIK: The answer is yes.
LLOYD AUSTIN: ... it's possible, yes. In my case, I would expect that my organization
would do the right things to notify senior leaders if I am the patient in the hospital.
AMNA NAWAZ: A Pentagon review of the incident has concluded there was no indication of ill
intent or any attempt to cover up.
The Biden administration will investigate smart cars made in China that could gather
data on drivers and track their locations. U.S. officials warned today they pose a risk
to national security. In a statement, the president said -- quote -- "China's policies
could flood our market with its vehicles. I'm not going to let that happen on my watch."
And, on Wall Street, stocks finished their fourth straight winning month. The Dow Jones
industrial average gained 47 points to close at 38996. The Nasdaq rose 144 points to an
all-time high. The S&P 500 added 26 and also reached a record high. For the month, the
Dow gained 2 percent, the Nasdaq surged 6 percent, the S&P was up 5 percent.
Still to come on the "NewsHour": a Palestinian-American artist's exhibit in Indiana is canceled in
response to the Israel-Hamas war; a community parks advocate gives her Brief But Spectacular
take on the power of nature; plus much more.
GEOFF BENNETT: Today, President Biden and former President Trump made separate visits
to two towns along the southern border, as immigration becomes the key issue ahead of
the November election.
Laura Barron-Lopez has been reporting from Brownsville, Texas, on the president's trip.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: In his second visit to the Texas-Mexico border, President Biden met
with Border Patrol and immigration officials in Brownsville, attempting to turn the tables
on his likely 2024 rival, former President Donald Trump.
JOE BIDEN, President of the United States: Here's what I would say to Mr. Trump. Instead
of telling members of Congress to block this legislation, join me, or I will join you in
telling the Congress to pass this bipartisan border security bill.
We can do it together. You know and I know it's the toughest, most efficient, most effective
border security bill this country has ever seen.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Meanwhile, some 300 miles West along the Rio Grande in the town of Eagle
Pass, Trump attacked Biden and again demonized migrants.
DONALD TRUMP, Former President of the United States (R) and Current U.S. Presidential Candidate:
Now the United States is being overrun by the Biden migrant crime. It's a new form of
vicious violation to our country. It's migrant crime. We call it Biden migrant crime.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: The showdown here at the U.S.-Mexico border is set to be a defining
battle of 2024, a fight guaranteed when Republicans killed a bipartisan deal designed to stem
the flow of migrants and funnel billions to border security.
What do you hope President Biden's trip accomplishes?
CHRIS CABRERA, Vice President, National Border Patrol Council: You know, hopefully, he takes
some good out of this trip, and, hopefully, when he meets with the Border Patrol agents,
they give him an idea of what you could work from. Any time you want something done on
the front line, you need to talk to the front-line workers.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Chris Cabrera is the vice president of the National Border Patrol Council,
a union representing 18,000 agents nationwide. The union supported the bipartisan deal.
Do you want it to still pass?
CHRIS CABRERA: You know, that's the hope. But on top the -- at the end of the day, anything
will help. I know there's the power of the pen. There's executive action that he's done
in the past with other issues. He has the power to put a stop to this today if he wanted
to.
Granted, Congress does have some fault in this. They have been kicking the can down
the road for quite a few years, not one side or the other, but both sides. And if they're
not going to do it, then either we get somebody in there that will or the president needs
to take action like the last president did.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: With the Senate deal all but dead, sources have told "NewsHour" that
President Biden is considering using his executive authority through a decades-old law to block
some asylum seekers from entering the U.S.
While state and federal authorities clash in Eagle Pass, becoming a national flash point,
here in Brownsville, advocates say things are different.
ASTRID DOMINGUEZ, Executive Director, Good Neighbor Settlement House: We often hear that
the border is chaotic, but it's orderly. It's not chaos.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Astrid Dominguez is the executive director of Good Neighbor Settlement
House, which is one of the groups that helps welcome asylum seekers in Brownsville.
What would the impact be for migrants if the U.S. were to put in place more severe asylum
restrictions?
ASTRID DOMINGUEZ: Seeking asylum, it's a right. And we want to make sure that, as a country,
we're looking at solutions that allow them to seek asylum in a safe way and not putting
them in danger.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Despite the danger, some are still making the long journey with their
children.
Roxanna just arrived from Cuba.
ROXANNA, Asylum Seeker From Cuba (through translator): It was difficult because we had
to travel with coyotes and we had a small child.
LURIA, Asylum Seeker From Venezuela (through translator): I cried a lot. It was terrifying.
I'm 22 years old. I don't know how I did it, how I was able to flee with my son. It's something
that I just don't know how I did it. But I accomplished it, and we're here, and that's
the most important thing.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Fleeing Venezuela through the Darien Gap, 22-year-old Luria was robbed
twice before arriving for her appointment with Customs and Border Protection.
LURIA (through translator): I want a better life. I want a better future for my son, and
I just want to start a new life.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Geoff -- Geoff, those migrants are arriving through the CBP One
appointment system app that President Biden has urged asylum seekers to use, rather than
cross regularly into the United States.
But, overall, Geoff, crossings are low here right now in Texas.
GEOFF BENNETT: And, Laura, let's return to what we heard today from the current and former
presidents. We heard Donald Trump with his criticisms of Joe Biden.
How do Mr. Trump's stated concerns and contentions square up with the facts and with your reporting
and what you're seeing there along the border today?
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Geoff, Chris Cabrera of the Border Patrol union told me that there
were only six apprehensions in Brownsville yesterday and that overall, across Texas,
other entry points, other border towns may have slightly higher apprehensions, but that
it's overall low.
But I want to point out, Geoff, and fact-check one of the things that the former president
said today. He was talking about claiming that there was a migrant crime wave occurring.
And the data just doesn't match up with that, Geoff. A Stanford study shows that immigrants
are 60 percent less likely than native-born Americans to be incarcerated and that also,
in sanctuary cities, each unit increase in the unauthorized immigration population actually
represents a 5 percent decrease in violent crime.
GEOFF BENNETT: And President Biden today, he also called on Senate Republicans to pass
that bipartisan border deal, but he said he might act alone. There's word of an executive
order? Is that right?
Tell us more about that.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: That's right, Geoff.
An executive order could come in a matter of weeks. And that order, what's being considered
right now would severely restrict asylum seekers. It would narrow who can claim asylum. And
I was talking to immigration advocates today who have been in talks with the White House.
And they're trying to convince President Biden to essentially go a different route with an
executive order, declare an emergency declaration, and just send more resources border, rather
than restrict asylum. It's important to note, Geoff, that asylum under current U.S. law
is a right for migrants to claim whether they're presenting at a port of entry or between ports
of entry.
GEOFF BENNETT: In the meantime, Laura, there is this continuing dispute between Texas and
the federal government over border security. Where does that stand right now?
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: A federal judge today, Geoff, blocked a Texas law that would give
police more authority to arrest migrants that they suspect may have entered into the U.S.
illegally.
And I was speaking with an immigration lawyer today who said that they expect Texas will
ask for a stay, which would allow them to try to implement that law as legal proceedings
move forward. But, of course, they're going to be battling with immigration lawyers and
advocates who are trying to block this to take effect.
And one thing that's important to note, Geoff, is that a lot of people can't always present
at a port of entry when they're trying to come into the U.S. There's a lot of reasons
why they actually present between ports of entry, as they're trying to flee violence.
And I also spoke with a lifelong Texan today in Eagle Pass, Geoff. He's a business owner
who's been really frustrated by Governor Greg Abbott's Operation Lone Star, saying that,
initially, he supported it, but that now he isn't really happy with what's been going
on, because Governor -- the governor has seized so much of the land and so much of the public
property in Eagle Pass.
GEOFF BENNETT: Laura Barron-Lopez on the U.S. southern border for us tonight.
Laura, thank you.
IVF
AMNA NAWAZ: Lawmakers in Alabama have quickly passed bills to protect IVF clinics and providers
so treatments can resume in the state.
A state Supreme Court decision last week ruled that an embryo created through in vitro fertilization
should be considered a person. Since then, three IVF providers in Alabama have paused
some services, including the University of Alabama at Birmingham Hospital, the biggest
hospital system in the state.
The decision is rippling across the state and sparking fears in other states of similar
rulings. We spoke with a few women who were affected.
DONELLA GELPIN, Alabama: I am Donella Gelpin. I'm located in Birmingham, Alabama, and I'm
38 years old.
When I heard the news about my particular clinic, I cried at my desk at work all day.
I could not hold back the tears. My pressure has been up just about every day since the
news hit. And I'm just pleading and hoping that the lawmakers would just listen.
EMILY CAPILOUTO, Alabama: My name is Emily Capilouto. I'm 36 years old, and I live in
Birmingham, Alabama.
I am in between treatments, but I'm currently going through IVF. I just finished my second
egg retrieval on January 31, and we are awaiting some test results. We were hoping that, after
the second retrieval, we would be able to move forward and, beginning in March, schedule
our first transfer.
And this ruling has now put our whole timeline and all of our hopes in jeopardy.
PEYTON WADE, Tennessee: My name is Peyton Wade. I live in Nashville, Tennessee, and
I am 32 years old.
I think it is absolutely horrific and shocking that this is the reality in the world that
we currently live in. As someone who is currently 15 weeks pregnant with my miracle IVF baby,
I cannot imagine that IVF would be looked at as anything but a gift for people trying
to achieve their family goals and just navigate the world of infertility, which is traumatic
enough.
DONELLA GELPIN: Unfortunately, I had multiple ectopic pregnancies that weren't really and
truly diagnosed. IVF was the ideal choice for us. And, to be honest with you, it may
be the only option for us.
EMILY CAPILOUTO: I disagree with the court's ruling that an embryo should be protected
legally as a child, because this embryo cannot thrive or grow without being in a cryogenic
freezer. It can only thrive or grow if it's implanted in a uterus and is given the chance
to be born.
PEYTON WADE: Sometimes, some of these rulings can have a domino effect. So, while there
are several Tennessee decision-makers who have vocally said that they support IVF, that
they do not see this coming to Tennessee, I think, at the end of the day, you just don't
know who is really going to stand up and do the right thing when push comes to shove.
EMILY CAPILOUTO: I am very, very worried that women that are facing the fight of their life
from a cancer diagnosis now will have to further make tough decisions in terms of if they're
going to wait and see what our courts do in order to potentially preserve their fertility
and delay treatment or if they will have to decide to immediately start treatments and
lose the opportunity to have families in the future.
DONELLA GELPIN: We have three embryos that are still frozen right now. We have three
embryos. And I am just hoping, even if it's just one, just that one, my husband and I
will be happy if it's just that one.
But I at least want to have the opportunity to try.
AMNA NAWAZ: Supporters of the legislation to protect IVF treatments gathered at the
Alabama Statehouse yesterday to speak with lawmakers.
Barbara Collura helped to organize that effort. She's the president and CEO of RESOLVE: The
National Infertility Association. She joins me now.
Barbara, welcome, and thanks for joining us.
So, we have seen lawmakers in Alabama move very quickly to pass bills allowing treatments
to resume. The governor is expected to sign that into law. And the state's attorney general
has said he will not prosecute clinics or doctors providing IVF treatment. So do all
of those things combine ease your concerns about access to IVF in Alabama?
BARBARA COLLURA, President and CEO, RESOLVE: The National Infertility Association: Well,
first of all, thank you so much for having me.
I'm listening to the providers on the ground in Alabama, those three clinics you mentioned
that are paused. They believe that this bill, if passed and signed into law, will give them
an opportunity to start seeing patients again.
But I do want to say that there's still a lot to be determined in Alabama that is not
totally resolved with this legislation. But, for now, the clinics are confident that they
will be able to reopen and begin seeing patients again once this is signed into law.
AMNA NAWAZ: What is not resolved with the legislation as it is right now?
BARBARA COLLURA: The law doesn't really talk about the status of an embryo.
And so that was the real crux of that Supreme Court case was, what is an embryo? Is it a
person? Is it a clump of cells? Is -- it have the potential for life? All of those things
are still undecided.
This bill protects those providers and patients from any kind of criminal or civil prosecution.
So it gives them some immunity. And, quite honestly, that was a big reason why they paused.
And so we have got a lot of work ahead of us. The good news is, these clinics feel confident
that they can soon reopen.
AMNA NAWAZ: So that's the case in Alabama.
But we also just heard from Peyton Wade in Tennessee, worried about what she called a
domino effect, that other states could also move forward with similar rulings or legislation.
Do you see that concern as valid?
BARBARA COLLURA: I absolutely do.
And the reason why I say that is because, for many years, we have actually been fighting
embryo personhood, fetal personhood bills in many states for many years, far before
Roe v. Wade was overturned. When Roe v. Wade was overturned, we were very, very concerned,
because we thought we would see a larger number of these kind of bills, which we did in 2023.
And we have seen a lot already in 2024. And we don't have the protection and that backstop
of Roe v. Wade if one of these passes. And we know that legislators want to regulate
IVF. We know that they want to define when life begins. And, look, I was in the Capitol,
Montgomery, yesterday. I was approached by folks who do not approve of IVF, who want
it shut down.
And they have a voice, and their voices are being heard, not only in Montgomery, but in
other statehouses.
AMNA NAWAZ: So, we're talking about the state level right now. But, at the federal level,
we did see an effort by Democratic Senator Tammy Duckworth, who herself relied on IVF
to conceive her two daughters, proposing a bill to enshrine IVF protection nationally.
That bill's path was blocked by Republican Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith from Mississippi.
Do you see the only way to guarantee IVF access through some kind of federal legislation or
move?
BARBARA COLLURA: I think it's a number of things. I think the federal bill is an incredible
step. And it's an important piece in that puzzle.
There are some state constitutions that we're going to have to still get fixed, similar
to what we have in Alabama. But that federal legislation is gaining a lot of ground over
the last week or two. And we are strongly supporting it. And we need to get that passed.
AMNA NAWAZ: You mentioned a lot of what we have been seeing since the fall of Roe v.
Wade.
Where do you see this ruling in terms of the trend we have seen since then when it comes
to reproductive rights?
BARBARA COLLURA: Yes, I mean, this is -- this has been on the radar all along. It's just,
I think, on the back burner.
And I think this Alabama court ruling has really brought it to the forefront. We have
already seen a few governors. While some have said,I totally support IVF, others have said,
I think we need to look at this and I think we need to study it.
And that concerns me greatly. So I think we're going to have our work cut out for ourselves
in many states.
AMNA NAWAZ: That is Barbara Collura, CEO of RESOLVE: The National Infertility Association.
Barbara, thank you so much for joining us.
BARBARA COLLURA: Thank you.
GEOFF BENNETT: Now a story about an exhibition you cannot see.
Some arts institutions have been roiled by tensions in the ongoing war in the Middle
East. And one controversy has unfolded at the Art Museum of Indiana University, where
a prominent Palestinian-American artist was scheduled to have her first American retrospective
this month.
Jeffrey Brown reports for our arts and culture series, Canvas.
JEFFREY BROWN: A work of art returning from an exhibition carried up the stairs to the
New York studio of its creator, Samia Halaby.
SAMIA HALABY, Artist: Here it is, the Queen Bee being treated like a princess.
JEFFREY BROWN: But this is no routine return. The Queen Bee was never put on display. The
exhibition, titled Centers of Energy, and scheduled to be shown at the Eskenazi Museum
of Art at Indiana University, was canceled in late December.
SAMIA HALABY: The only thing they told me was two-sentence letter. The show is canceled
and the artwork will be returned safely. That's all.
JEFFREY BROWN: Eighty-seven-year-old Samia Halaby is known for her large and vibrant
abstract paintings, which she's been making for more than 60 years. In addition, she creates
sculptures and works with fiber and textiles, and was an early practitioner of computer
and digital art, teaching herself how to write computer programs starting in the 1980s.
She's also a passionate supporter of Palestinian culture and advocate for Palestinian rights.
She was born in Jerusalem in 1936, when Palestine was under British control, fleeing with her
family amid the fighting that eventually led to the creation of the state of Israel in
1948, the period known to Palestinians as the Nakba, or catastrophe.
Her family eventually came to the U.S. and settled in Cincinnati, Ohio.
SAMIA HALABY: As an intellectual, I chose to be an abstractionist. I am a Palestinian,
and I believe in the Palestinian will to have freedom. I believe in the right of self-determination
and self-defense.
I love Palestinian culture. All of these things are me.
JEFFREY BROWN: Her tie to Indiana University is strong. She received her master of fine
arts degree there in 1963 and later taught, before moving to Yale in 1972, where she was
the first woman to have the title of associate professor at the School of Art.
Her work is in the collections of major U.S. museums, including the National Gallery of
Art in Washington and the Guggenheim in New York. And she recently had a large retrospective
in the United Arab Emirates. The cancellation came as she was using Instagram to express
outrage at Israel's bombing of Gaza in response to the October 7 Hamas terror attacks on Israel.
She called Israel's retaliation a genocide and compared Gaza to Auschwitz. Though she
was well aware of the tensions at universities around the country, including Indiana, she
says the cancellation was a surprise.
SAMIA HALABY: I thought stupidly that I was immune because I was an alumni and belonged
there. And so it came as a surprise. My first reaction was to be upset, because, hey, this
is my second home. You know, someone is now stealing my second home from me.
But then I got over that quickly and I thought, ah, the community there is really very upset
about it.
ETHAN SANDWEISS, Indiana Public Media: It's been quite a big deal, and the fallout is
still coming.
JEFFREY BROWN: Ethan Sandweiss has been covering campus reaction at Indiana as a multimedia
journalist with Indiana Public Media.
ETHAN SANDWEISS: We're seeing a lot of students and faculty organizing protests, sit-ins,
teach-ins. A venue in town is putting on a retrospective in the place of the museum.
So, the response here has been quite significant.
JEFFREY BROWN: The university itself, however, has said little publicly.
In response to the "NewsHour"'s request for an interview with university president Pamela
Whitten, we were referred to this previously released short statement: "Academic leaders
and campus officials canceled the exhibit due to concerns about guaranteeing the integrity
of the exhibit for its duration."
Last month, university provost Rahul Shrivastav also cited security concerns at a faculty
forum, saying, in part:
RAHUL SHRIVASTAV, Provost and Executive Vice President, Indiana University: In this case,
we had clearly competing values. We had an exciting debut exhibit of a major international
abstract artist and alumna three years in the making.
We also had a potential lightning rod at a charged political moment that might draw ongoing
or major protests and require significant and long-term security we would need for hundreds
of other events.
JEFFREY BROWN: Reporter Ethan Sandweiss sampled responses across the campus.
ETHAN SANDWEISS: I haven't spoken with anyone who feels like this is a compelling enough
reason to cancel the exhibition. I have talked to faculty members who say, if there is a
security risk, then that's why we have an I.U. Police Department that can provide that
extra security.
So I don't think a whole lot of people are buying it within the I.U. community.
JEFFREY BROWN: Halaby had worked on the exhibition for several years with a curatorial team headed
by Elliot Josephine Leila Reichert, who told us she was instructed to refer press inquiries
to university communications officials.
In lieu of an interview, she sent an e-mail statement to the "NewsHour" saying: "I am
immensely proud of the work that Samia Halaby, Rachel Winter, and I accomplished together.
Anyone who has the privilege to witness Halaby's artwork in person will understand some small
piece of the beauty and joy we have experienced working together over the past several years."
The controversy at Indiana is just one example of the conflict in the arts and culture world
since the October 7 Hamas attack, including 92NY. The cultural center in New York, canceled
an October event with a novelist who signed a public letter critical of Israel. Several
staff members resigned in protest and other authors pulled out of their events.
The editor in chief at "Artforum," a prominent arts magazine, was fired after the magazine
published an open letter from artists calling for a cease-fire in Gaza. At another Midwestern
university, the Wexner Center for the Arts the arts at Ohio State decided to keep an
exhibition by a Palestinian artist that had opened prior to October 7. But it had canceled
a public panel she was scheduled to take part in.
In a follow-up e-mail to the university administration, we asked if it was aware of specific security
risks, whether it had canceled the exhibition due to Samia Halaby's public statements, and
if it had received pressure to cancel the exhibition from politicians or donors. We
were once again referred to the one-sentence statement.
Samia Halaby, however, believes she knows why her exhibit was canceled.
SAMIA HALABY: Oh, it's obviously an extension of what's happening in Gaza, where Palestinians
are not allowed to speak or express our opinion, or, in my case, because it wasn't a political
show, provide a role model to students as to what intellectual activity could be like.
JEFFREY BROWN: But a museum or a university in this case does have a right to decide who
they're going to exhibit?
SAMIA HALABY: Yes, and they decided to take me two-and-a-half-years ago, so they changed
when the genocide began. So, what gives here?
JEFFREY BROWN: So, you have no regrets about using that language?
SAMIA HALABY: Do I not have a right to express my feelings? My feelings is that I'm horrified.
I'm equally horrified when I see other things happening. I'm equally horrified at the Holocaust
of the Jews. I'm equally horrified at -- about Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I'm horrified by what
happened to the African Americans.
When I read about all of these things, they bring me to great sadness.
JEFFREY BROWN: Meanwhile, on campus, a petition to reinstate the exhibition is circulating,
and reporter Ethan Sandweiss is hearing fears of another kind of fallout.
ETHAN SANDWEISS: A lot of faculty that I have spoken with are worried that these signals
that the university could be sending, perhaps inadvertently, that they are not standing
strongly enough by their researchers, it could send a signal to people who might apply to
I.U. as students, as graduate students, as faculty that Indiana is not a place where
they would be welcome and it's not a place where they would be able to perform their
research undisturbed.
JEFFREY BROWN: As for Samia Halaby, her work will next be shown at the upcoming Venice
Biennale, one of the world's leading international art exhibitions.
And her canceled retrospective exhibition is so far scheduled to run at its next venue,
Michigan State University's Broad Art Museum, beginning June 29.
For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm Jeffrey Brown.
AMNA NAWAZ: We will be back shortly.
GEOFF BENNETT: But, first, take a moment to hear from your local PBS station. It's a chance
to offer your support, which helps keep programs like this one on the air.
AMNA NAWAZ: For those staying with us, a new book is examining how innovation can lead
to gains for all stratas of society, not just the elite.
Economics correspondent Paul Solman meets the author in this encore report.
PAUL SOLMAN: Spot, the wonder dog, using A.I. to navigate tricky terrain. Already in service
today at construction and manufacturing sites. And tomorrow?
SIMON JOHNSON, Co-Author, "Power and Progress: Our Thousand-Year Struggle Over Technology
and Prosperity": It could be something that helps workers be safer, helps them be more
productive, and thought will get a high wage, or the same Spot could take people's jobs.
So, I think it's in the balance.
PAUL SOLMAN: In "Power and Progress," economists Simon Johnson and Daron Acemoglu surveyed
the history of technological progress and came to a sobering, if familiar, conclusion.
SIMON JOHNSON: Technology changes all the time, but it doesn't necessarily turn into
shared prosperity. There's a few additional important steps that have actually been missing
for a lot of human history.
PAUL SOLMAN: As in the Middle Ages.
SIMON JOHNSON: Take the medieval plow, for example, all the other improvements in agriculture
in Europe more than 1,000 years ago. What we know is that productivity increased, but
there was very little change in terms of the living conditions of ordinary folk.
PAUL SOLMAN: In the Industrial Revolution, textile tech. A power loom revolutionizing
at a cost.
When the Luddites are called machine breakers, these are the machines they're breaking.
SIMON JOHNSON: Yes, exactly.
PAUL SOLMAN: Loom like this at the Boston Manufacturing Company in Waltham, Massachusetts
were already displacing workers in England 200 years ago.
SIMON JOHNSON: When weaving became automated, all those people who had previously been hand-loom
weavers, they got thrown out of work or they couldn't make much money. And the Luddites
were really angry, because it was the weavers who were making good money. Those opportunities
eroded and nothing else sprang to take its place.
So, like, this is not good for us, and they were right about that.
PAUL SOLMAN: Workers ditched, business owners enriched.
SIMON JOHNSON: We have a steam engine back here.
PAUL SOLMAN: On the other hand, sometimes technological progress did lead to shared
prosperity.
SIMON JOHNSON: This would turn these wheels, drive the belts and transfer the power throughout
the whole system. And then if you want to use a particular machine...
PAUL SOLMAN: And so, in fits and starts, the new factories of the 19th century prompted
the long process of harnessing technology.
SIMON JOHNSON: They offered jobs to people who also didn't have a lot of education. They
were more productive. Demand for labor goes up, wages go up, and trade unions show up
and say, hey, how about we pay an extra wage or people have the weekend off? Put that together,
yes, you have got shared prosperity in the 20th century.
PAUL SOLMAN: Labor organizations, Johnson argues, were key to ensuring everybody shared
in productivity gains. And so it remained for almost a century.
But since about 1980, automation has outpaced the creation of shared prosperity jobs, says
Johnson.
SIMON JOHNSON: People with a lot of education have done well. People with not that much
education still have jobs, but the wages at the low end have not gone up, and we're missing
now that middle. And we have been missing it for 40 years. So it's not an overnight
phenomenon.
PAUL SOLMAN: Are we in a situation in which the trend you're so worried about will reverse?
SIMON JOHNSON: We have a lot of income inequality, wage inequality, and unions in the private
sector are weak. They have had a little resurgence since COVID, but not really very much. So,
into this environment we now have A.I. arriving.
A.I. could be a tool to rebuild the middle class or it could be a way in which the middle
class, the remains of it get hollowed out further.
PAUL SOLMAN: These are not real people.
Artificial intelligence, today's technology frontier. A 2022 research study found that
A.I.-generated faces are difficult to distinguish from human faces and are even considered more
trustworthy.
At the Exploring A.I. exhibit at Boston's Museum of Science, a car programmed by Toyota
Research Institute scientists to assist drivers.
SIMON JOHNSON: The vision is not to replace human drivers. The vision is to make humans
safer, better drivers. We do know there's 42,000 fatalities on the roads every year
in the United States and almost all of those are due to some form of human error.
PAUL SOLMAN: So the hope is that A.I. can reduce human error. The concern, that A.I.
will instead replace jobs, like taxi and truck drivers. Or take this retail robot, for example.
SIMON JOHNSON: So, this is an A.I.-enabled robot from Badger Technologies, goes through
the store aisles looking to verify the prices and ensure that everything is properly stocked.
PAUL SOLMAN: So this is good for jobs or bad for jobs?
SIMON JOHNSON: Well, I think this one's bad for jobs, honestly, because you would previously
have a whole set of people working the night shift restocking the shelves.
PAUL SOLMAN: Suddenly laid off, they'd be competing for other lower-skill jobs, lowering
wages. Same thing for drive-through robots.
SIMON JOHNSON: There are fast-food chains that have announced that they plan to replace
all the human interaction. So that entire order placing and order communication in the
kitchen becomes automated by a form of A.I. That's a lot of jobs.
PAUL SOLMAN: And plenty of much-better-paying jobs are also under threat from A.I., even
those of us who may have figured we were safe.
Johnson first used the Chrome browser.
SIMON JOHNSON: We can search for you, Paul Solman, and we can get an A.I.-powered overview
for the search. Are you sure you want to go there?
PAUL SOLMAN: Yes, I'm fine.
SIMON JOHNSON: All right. You're American, you have brown hair. OK, we will pass on that.
(LAUGHTER)
PAUL SOLMAN: Once upon a time.
SIMON JOHNSON: Build, fit. I mean, we could just stop right there. And you have blue eyes.
Well...
PAUL SOLMAN: I don't have blue eyes.
SIMON JOHNSON: Well, you probably lied to the DMV once.
(LAUGHTER)
PAUL SOLMAN: OK, not exactly reliable, but here's ChatGPT.
SIMON JOHNSON: Write a script for Paul Solman of the "PBS NewsHour."
PAUL SOLMAN: A script for this very story.
SIMON JOHNSON: Here's a suggested script.
"Good evening. I am Paul Solman reporting on a compelling new analysis that's stirring
debate in economic circles."
(LAUGHTER)
SIMON JOHNSON: It's good so far.
"Cut to a visual of the book cover or relevant imagery. The work 'Power and Progress' by
economists Daron Acemoglu and Simon Johnson challenges conventional wisdom on the relationship
between political power and economic development.'"
PAUL SOLMAN: And so it does.
SIMON JOHNSON: It's not bad for a first pass.
(LAUGHTER)
SIMON JOHNSON: I would have put in a bit more about technology, personally, and some steam
engines and a little bit of an industrial museum ambiance.
PAUL SOLMAN: Well, that's where we have added.
SIMON JOHNSON: Right, that's the human touch.
PAUL SOLMAN: And that's what Johnson is pushing, our power to harness the progress of technology
in the service of shared prosperity.
What policies do you put in place to get Spot to augment people's labor, as opposed to replace
it?
SIMON JOHNSON: Just like this kind of device was really Spot by DARPA, the research -- advanced
research arm of the Department of Defense, when they were pushing for autonomous vehicles
by having some grand challenges, you could have grand challenges where you challenge
people to find ways to use these kinds of robots or A.I. in general to develop technologies
that are useful for teachers, nurses, plumbers, electricians.
PAUL SOLMAN: As Toyota is doing, for example, but economy-wide.
SIMON JOHNSON: We have done it many times, World War II, after Sputnik, the Internet,
Human Genome Project, COVID vaccines. The list goes on in terms of technologies deliberately
developed with government money and with social impetus, let's say.
So this is another task like that one.
PAUL SOLMAN: And with that thought, this story comes to a close, for which I might as well
use ChatGPT's conclusion.
SIMON JOHNSON: "This has been Paul Solman reporting for the 'PBS NewsHour.' Back to
you in the studio."
(LAUGHTER)
GEOFF BENNETT: Washington, D.C., native Akiima Price is executive director of the friends
of Friends of Anacostia Park. That's a program aimed at improving the park in Southeast Washington
and the lives of community members.
Tonight, Price shares her Brief But Spectacular take on the power of nature.
AKIIMA PRICE, Executive Director, Friends of Anacostia Park: Nature is going to far
outlive us.
(LAUGHTER)
AKIIMA PRICE: I mean, that's -- sorry to say, but that's the truth.
When I'm in Anacostia Park, I feel peace. I hear children laughing. I hear people on
the basketball court. I smell cookouts. Anacostia Park is located along the Anacostia River
in Washington, D.C. Anacostia is a different kind of park. It's mainly like a recreational
park. It's flat. There are no monuments, but there is a skating pavilion.
There is a pool. There's also a bike trail. Easily, a million people use Anacostia Park
over the course of a year. The majority of those people that use that park are African
Americans. And so the park gets a lot of use in a cultural context.
The Friends of Anacostia Park helps to support the National Park Service's goals around keeping
the park nice, keeping the park accessible. When I was tasked with building the friends
group, I knew I didn't want it to just be another organization raising funds, because
we had a lot of social capital and a lot of human capital that we needed just as much
as those dollars.
The premise, again, is on membership where you can have no money and just donate your
time. So their human capital could look like the form of helping us clean up the park.
But we also need grandmas to sit at the playground and watch over and make sure people are safe.
I would ultimately like to establish this park as a trauma-informed park that has models
and systems that can be replicated and shared in other places, to where it's really seen
as a clinic, in terms of whether you're using the space where we're sort of just a circle
or you're having court-mandated mental health happen in the form of a hike, instead of being
in a room, and call it therapy.
I know there are people who share with me that use that bike path that have gotten off
their blood pressure medicine and their diabetes medicine. I have met people who are going
through drug addiction that -- trying to get clean, and just how just being in that park,
the stillness and the silence of that park is helpful, and the fact that there are people
that they can talk to.
Like, that's what we're about, is not just the park, but the people. That park feels
like that's my family. Like, the elders feel like my grandmas. And having our staff there
and seeing all these people working and then bringing their kids, it feels like a village.
If you feel like you need the healing power of nature, just step outside your door. There's
birds in the sky. We just don't look up.
My name is Akiima Price, and this is my Brief But Spectacular take on the power of nature.
GEOFF BENNETT: And that is the "NewsHour" for tonight. I'm Geoff Bennett.
AMNA NAWAZ: And I'm Amna Nawaz.
On behalf of the entire "NewsHour" team, thank you for joining us.