♪ william: good evening. i'm william brangham. geoff bennett and amna nawaz are away. on the “newshour” tonight, a baltimore bridge collapses after being struck by a container ship. the search for survivors and for answers. reproductive rights are back before the supreme court. at stake -- access to a commonly-used abortion pill. and israel's defense minister

meets his american counterpart in washington as the two nations are increasingly at odds over the war in gaza. ♪ >> major funding for the "pbs newshour" has been provided by. the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions, and friends of the "newshour," including kathy and paul anderson, and camilla and george smith. >> these are people who are trying to change the world. startups have this energy that energizes me. i am thriving by helping others, every day. people who know, know bdo.

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this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. william: welcome to the “newshour.” search and rescue efforts are underway in baltimore after a major commuter bridge collapsed there overnight. officials say six people remain unaccounted for. in the middle of the night, a container ship, slowly trying to exit baltimore's outer harbor, rams into a support beam of the francis scott key bridge. and all at once, the towering, 1.6-mile-long structure plummets into the river below. >> never would you think that you would see, physically see, the key bridge tumble down like that. it looked like something out of an action movie. william: by sunrise, the scope of the disaster came into full-view.

the on-ramp, severed. the cargo ship, buried beneath the bridge's mangled truss. investigators are still seeking answers to what happened. marilyn governor wes moore. >> i know this has been a long night. we started coordinating immediately after the key bridge collapsed. the preliminary investigation points to an accident. we haven't seen any credible evidence of a terrorist attack. william: a few minutes before impact, the ship's lights went out. operators put out a mayday that the vessel had lost power, giving police time to divert traffic from the bridge before the collision. >> many of the vehicles were stopped before they got onto the bridge, which saved lives in a very, very heroic way. william: still, sonars detected several cars in the water. and authorities say a crew had been repairing potholes on the bridge when it collapsed. maryland's secretary of transportation said a massive

search and rescue is underway. >> we're basically searching for everyone that was potentially on the bridge. as you can imagine it's the middle of the night, you know, what type of traffic was there, how many workers were there. william: president biden said today that he intends to have the federal government pay to rebuild the bridge. pres. biden: this is going to take some time, but the people of baltimore can count on us, though, to stick with them, every step of the way. william: the key bridge was one of three interstate crossings of the patapsco river, which is an tributary of the chesapeake. the remaining two are both lower-clearance tunnels. the wreck has already snarled commuter traffic, as well as shipping traffic in and out of baltimore. but experts say other harbors along the east coast can handle the pressure. >> baltimore is not one of the bigger container ports in the region. william: emily stausboll is an analyst at xeneta, an international shipping analytics platform. >> the ports of new york, new

jersey and virginia are much bigger. and also have, at the moment, capacity to be able to manage diverted volume from baltimore. if you combine those three ports in 2023, about 10% of containers were handled in baltimore. william: for now, the harbor is dotted with remnants of a bridge, used by 30,000 drivers daily, with no timeline on when it will be operational again. ♪ in the day's other headlines, russian officials insisted again that ukraine played a role in friday's concert hall attack outside moscow. a branch of the islamic state group has claimed responsibility for killing 139 people there. but as workers spent another day clearing debris, the head of russia's top security agency accused kyiv and its allies. >> we believe that the action was prepared by the islamist radicals and facilitated by

western special services. as for the ukrainian intelligence services, i think they are directly involved too. william: the russians have not presented evidence to support their claim, and ukraine has denied any role. a moscow court has extended the detention of american evan gershkovich again -- this time, through june. the wall street journal reporter already spent a year behind bars, accused of espionage. after he appeared in court today, the u.s. ambassador to russia again rejected the charges and said the case is purely political. >> as we crossed the one-year mark, the russian government has yet to present any evidence to substantiate its accusations. evan's case is not about evidence, due process, or rule of law. it is about using american citizens as pawns to achieve political ends. william: gershkovich and the journal have denied the espionage allegations. a british court today blocked

wikileaks founder julian assange from being extradited to the u.s., for now. the u.s. wants to prosecute assange for publication of classified american documents in 2010. the court said the u.s. must guarantee assange is afforded the same first amendment protections as a united states citizen, and that the death penalty is not imposed. washington has three weeks to give that guarantee, or a new appeals process will begin. in venezuela, the main opposition coalition says it is undeterred after its presidential candidate was barred overnight from the upcoming election. corina yoris, an 80-year-old newcomer, had been chosen to face authoritarian president nicolas maduro in july. the group's original candidate was also barred from the election. back in this country, a state judge in new york imposed a gag order on former president trump for his hush money trial next month.

the judge's ruling said it is without question that the imminency of the risk of harm is now paramount. the gag order bars public statements about witnesses, prosecutors, court staff, and jurors. independent presidential candidate robert f. kennedy jr. announced nicole shanahan as his running mate today. shanahan is 38, a lawyer and philanthropist from california, and has never held elected office. but in oakland, california, kennedy told supporters that shanahan met all his requirements for vice president. >> i wanted a partner who is a gifted administrator, but also possesses the gift of curiosity. an open, inquiring mind, and the confidence to change even her strongest opinions in the face of contrary evidence. william: kennedy chose a running mate early because some states require it before he applies for ballot access. texas attorney general ken paxton will pay nearly $300,000

to settle a criminal securities fraud case. the high-profile republican faced trial next month on charges of duping investors in a tech startup. under today's agreement, paxton makes restitution and does community service, but keeps his elected position. visa and mastercard have reached a roughly $30 billion settlement with merchants over so-called swipe fees. the companies charge per transaction, and that cost is usually passed on to the consumer. the settlement will cap those fees through 2030, so shoppers could save billions of dollars. and on wall street, stocks edged lower in lackluster trading. the dow jones industrial average lost 31 points to close at 39,282. the nasdaq fell 68 points. the s&p 500 slipped 14. still to come on the “newshour”" a troubled rollout causes more delays for students seeking financial aid.

an acclaimed foreign correspondent discusses his memoir, and battle with terminal cancer. the changing landscape of podcasts. plus much more. >> this is the "pbs newshour" from weta studios in washington and in the west from the walter cronkite school of journalism at arizona state university. william: for the first time since roe v. wade was overturned two years ago, abortion is once again before the u.s. supreme court. the justices today heard a case that centers on access to the most widely used abortion pill, mifepristone. outside, on the steps of the court, protesters marched, chanted, and waved signs. inside, arguments focused on the fda's approval of the drug, patient safety, and protections for doctors with moral objections to abortion care. "newshour" supreme court analyst

marcia coyle was there and joins us now to break down the case. so good to have you back, as always. one thing we should note, this was not about the fda's initial approval of mifepristone. this was about subsequent changes that the fda made during the pandemic and otherwise to expand who could get it, when they can get it, and who could prescribe it. what was being argued, in essence, by the challenges to this? marcia: well, if you focus only on the merits, which had to do with the changes that were made in 2016 and 2021, the challengers believed that those changes have created significant risk of harm to the women who take the pills, as well as are injuring doctors who have conscience objections, especially emergency room doctors, who may be forced to deal with the complications of the drug if it goes wrong for women.

but really, william, the focus of the argument, that they were dominated actually, by this question of standing, whether the challengers themselves, which is an umbrella organization for anti-abortion, doctors and dentists, whether those challengers really had the legal right to bring this challenge to the fda in the first instance. william: the issue of standing is simply the legal principle that in order to bring a claim i have to prove that i was somehow injured or -- that's the issue here. on that point, i mean, two of the justices who seemed sympathetic to the challengers, alito and thomas, alito brought up this issue of standing. let's take a listen to what he had to say. >> how about a woman who suffers adverse consequences from having taken mifepristone? would she be able to sue for damages, or you would say that's barred by sovereign immunity? >> i expect that we would have sovereign immunity arguments in that kind of case. >> who, in your view, who would have standing to bring that

suit? >> i think that with respect to these regulatory changes, it's hard to identify anyone who would have standing to sue. >> the american people have no remedy for that. william: so, explain a little bit, what is alito arguing here? marcia: basically he's saying that someone has to be able to challenge the fda's action, and who can that be? the court has never said that someone has to be able to challenge a federal law. the standing requirements are what they are. and the u.s. solicitor general representing the fda today really kept focused on the challenges themselves and what she said and believed is a very hypothetical injury that is rarely going to occur, based on voluminous studies done here at home and abroad, about the safety and efficacy of the drug itself. william: because none of these

doctors, if i remember correctly, said that they had to care for someone in these circumstances. marcia: that's right. the challenges have some declarations from a couple of doctors that they believe show that they had to participate, despite their conscience objections. but again, the government believes these are hypothetical problems and very attenuated from being traced back to the changes that the fda made in 2016 and 2021. william: i see, because that is what is essential here. as i mentioned, the justices who seemed to line up against this argument a were making, argue that there is no evidence of this. justice jackson took issue with this and felt the challengers were proposing a very unequal remedy. let's listen to what she said. >> so what they're asking for here is that in order to prevent them from possibly ever having to do these kinds of procedures,

everyone else should be prevented from getting access to this medication. >> so, with respect to the premise of that question, justice jackson, i don't think our doctors necessarily are able to object. >> assuming we have a world in which they can actually lodge the objections that you say that they have, my question is, isn't that enough to remedy their issue? do we have to also entertain your argument that no one else in the world can have this drug? marcia: justice jackson was reiterating something that justice kagan also said. that in in the normal course when you have an objection based on conscience, the court or the law will provide an exemption for you. and law, as the solicitor general pointed out and emphasized several times, does protect objections based on conscience. the challengers, however, don't feel it's sufficient. they feel that in an emergency situation, doctors don't have

time to raise an objection. however, justice jackson pointed out as well that most hospitals today have procedures and objections based on conscience are known. william: you have always cautioned me to never try to interpret from oral arguments what's going to actually happen. i'm going to disregard your good advice and ask you, what is your sense of, from today's arguments, how this might go? marcia: i think i would say i see a majority of justices who will rule in favor of the fda, primarily on the standing question. i think that justices thomas and alito may not go along with the majority in that, but i'm not even sure that justice thomas would be a dissenter. because he had some very good questions about standing as well. so, that's my gut feeling at this point. william: we always like to trust your gut.

marcia coyle, thank you as always. marcia: my pleasure. ♪ william: today at the pentagon, secretary of defense lloyd austin presented an alternative vision to israel's stated assault plan on the southern gazan city of rafah. more than one million gazans have fled their homes and are now sheltering there. austin and israeli defense minister yoav gallant met today, as negotiations over a ceasefire and hostage release seemed to hit an impasse. nick schifrin is following it all. how did this meeting today go? nick: as you said, austen laid out an alternative vision that the u.s. sees that israel should use in order to go into rafah. separate to the delegation that regimen netanyahu canceled. the u.s. agrees with israel,

that israel needs to go after hamas's final four battalions hiding among the population in rafah. it just disagrees how to go about doing that. according to a senior defense official, austin laid out a vision that includes precision targeting of senior hamas leaders, securing the border with egypt and ensuring humanitarian assistance goes into rafah and civilians leave rafah in the right sequence pretty the senior defense official we spoke with said rafah is home to not only 1.5 million displaced gazans, many of whom have been displaced twice, it is also strategically important for aid. rafah city is right next to the rafah crossing through which aid needs to arrive into gaza and u.s. officials are imploring israel to allow more aid into gaza as lloyd austin said today. >> protecting palestinian civilians from harm is both a moral necessity and a strategic imperative.

in gaza today, the number of civilian casualties is far too high. and the amount of humanitarian aid is far too low. gaza is suffering a humanitarian catastrophe. and the situation is getting even worse. william: so those are some of austin's strongest words about the humanitarian situation in gaza. israeli officials continue to blame the u.n. for a lack of distribution capacity. and israeli officials are telling the u.s. tonight that they will have a humanitarian plan before the assault rafah. nick: part of these negotiations over the cease-fire and release of hostages is also this conversation about how to move those gazans trapped in rafah to the north in advance of the assault. what is the state of those negotiations? nick: talks appear to be at an impasse after benjamin

netanyahu withdrew his negotiators from delhi where the negotiations take place and there appears to be two major disagreements. one is exactly what you were just talking about. the movement of gazans from the south to the north. israeli officials want to continue to go after hamas in the north and don't want to deal with thousands of civilians. number two is whether israeli forces have to withdraw either from the cities or from gaza itself after the cease-fire. but the framework of a cease-fire remains. about 40 hostages would be released in exchange for about 700 palestinian detainees that israel has agreed to. the framework still remains but netanyahu is calling hamas's demands delusional. but the bottom line u.s. officials tell me these negotiations continue. william: nick schifrin, thank you so much. nick: thank you. ♪

william: students waiting on financial aid will now have to wait even longer, after the department of education just found a calculation error on hundreds of thousands of student aid applications. that means right as students are trying to decide what school to attend, some have to make that choice not knowing key information about how much aid they're getting. laura barron lopez is here to help unravel the details. laura: that's right, william. the calculation error in the free application for federal student aid, commonly known as fafsa, impacts as many as 200,000 applicants. the latest misstep comes after the education department already delayed the launch of its new fafsa form by three months, requiring some colleges to adjust enrollment deadlines. now, many students are questioning if they will get any aid at all. here's what some high school seniors told us earlier this month.

>> it's just been delay after delay. the only thing fast has said is that it's coming in mid-march. it's coming. it's mid-march right now and we've heard absolutely nothing. >> i don't know where i'm going to go because i don't have the money to just decide to go to whatever school. i'm in a spot where i don't know how much it is going to cost for me to go to college. so because of the delays and the delays in them sending their financial aid offers, i'm put in a spot where i have no idea what i'm going to be able to do. >> i worry because most of my grants and most of my scholarships have a time frame from now until march 31, which is in 10 days. if the fafsa form does not come to me in between those 10 days, most of my scholarships will be invalid and my scholarships will not apply to my courses. >> as a senior who's trying to get college stuff squared away, it's really frustrating and honestly very anxiety-inducing because i don't know how much money i'm going to get. and, you know, i can run numbers through calculators all i want, but it really depends on when i get that letter from the

colleges. >> it's beginning to get to that time where people are choosing their colleges, they're finalizing plans, and they're beginning their next steps of buying things for their college dorms, getting summer jobs because they know where they're going to be. and i feel behind because i don't know where i'm going to go yet because i can't commit. so, it's causing anxiety and that kind of bleeds into my life in every aspect >> i think not knowing is just pushing back plans. i don't know how much i should be saving, how much my parents should be saving. they don't really know what to do either, because not a lot of information has been relayed. >> and seeing that a lot of my money for college would be coming from federal grants and stuff, i won't get that number until the fafsa is received, until colleges start sending out their decision. so we're basically sitting ducks right now. laura: for more on how this will impact students and their families, i'm joined by ted

mitchell, president of the american council on education and a former u.s. under secretary of education. ted, thank you so much for joining us. federal financial aid is critical to helping students pay for college tuition. so how is this latest mishap going to impact students, and it is -- and is it going to mean they cannot go to the top school of choice? ted: thank you for having me. this is a rolling catastrophe. as we have just heard it is rolling over students who are waiting to hear about their aid so that they can make the right decision for them and their families. this is unprecedented. has your reporting said at the beginning, the delay has been a long time coming. three or four months. federal student aid forms have begun getting out. that is the good news. the bad news is some of them still need to be corrected.

it will now be several weeks before colleges get their full contingent of aid forms. in a week after that were so before colleges can package aid. this is crunch time for students and i have a great sympathy for them. i have a great sympathy for financial officers at colleges and universities as well who want to provide that notion of how much money students are going to get. but their hands are tied behind their backs because they are not getting the information they need from the federal government. laura: since students may not even know how much financial aid to even have, our colleges and universities reacting in any way to that? are they extending the decision deadline or deadlines for deposits? ted: that is a really good question. we have been working at the american council on education to encourage all colleges and universities to extend that may 1 deadline. it is not a formal deadline but it is certainly one that most institutions abide by.

figure it out. if a student gets the package on april 15 and have two weeks to go -- decide where to go, that is not fair. it is particularly not fair to low income first-generation students for whom this is a decision of monumental proportions for them, their families and their communities. we have 175 institutions that have moved their deadline either to the middle of may or to june. and they are giant institutions. about 5 million students represented in the university of california. california state university system, the sunni system, university of north carolina system. we need more institutions to move those deadlines. laura: according to federal data analyzed by the national college attainment network, a nonprofit that helps students prepare for college, the number of high school seniors filling out the fafsa application forum was down by more than 30% compared to

last academic year. these changes that have been made to fafsa most recently were designed to make it so more students had access, increase applications. how can these impact the low income students are talking about were students of color? ted: this is the satire in a. the changes to -- this is the sad irony. the changes made to fafsa will impact low income students positively. 6000 more students will be eligible for the pell grant. but that does not help the students looking for college today. the darkest nightmare is that this will event students from going to college in the first place. 30% of american high school students are likely to not matriculate this fall and that is a danger not only to them but to the country. laura: it is stunning that it

may mean some students may not be able to go to college at all. but the sweeping changes to federal financial aid are a result of a 2020 passed by congress. it was meant to make the application easier, to extend eligibility. but republicans are blaming president biden's administration , the administration is blaming congress for what has gone wrong so far this year. how did this happen and what can be done to prevent it in the future? ted: i think there will be time to do an analysis once we have gotten this figured out and that is the most important thing, to make it possible for students to access financial aid now so they can begin their studies in the summer or in the fall. but there is plenty of brain to -- blame to go around. this is a problem of long standing. the computer systems that run financial aid have been out of date for some time now. the simplification process is temple -- is simple.

there are a lot of things backed up around this from congress and from vendors supplying the software to the government and institutions. we will unravel this but i think the bottom line is this is a very important task for the federal government and we need to get it right for our students and our collective future. laura: we certainly hope it is fixed soon. that is ted mitchell. thank you for your time. ted: thanks. ♪ william: after decades of covering war, journalist and author rod norland was in new delhi when he was struck by a grand mal seizure, and then given a diagnosis of incurable cancer.

nick: from cambodia to kabul, ron is no stranger to death. he has been a foreign correspondent for more than 40 years. first for the philadelphia inquirer and then the new york times including his bureau chief in kabul where we met for the first time. but if he shadow death for all those years, today death shadows him. he has been diagnosed with glioblastoma, a malignant incurable grade 4 brain cancer known as gbl. and so nordlund has written his final assignment, waiting for the monsoon, a memoir about his career, that disease, and what's known as the second life, life after being diagnosed with a fatal disease. rod nordland, welcome back to the "newshour." thank you so much. it's so good to see you again. how has this fatal disease, as you write, become the best thing that ever happened to me? rod: i mean, just changed

everything in my life. it led to my reconciliation with my children and also to a lot of old friends. it just made me think about what was important in life. i'm having brain surgery again tomorrow for the third time since the beginning of my illness. nick: does that kind of thing scare you anymore? rod: i think one of the things i've learned in the course of my illness is how to be vulnerable and how to accept my vulnerability and admit it and and cope with it and not just deny it. nick: the book is not just a memoir of your illness, but of your career, your life, and your childhood, which you survived, if i can use that word. you describe how your father beat you and your siblings with a belt, he used to beat your

mother. and he became a convicted child pedophile who died in prison. you describe this, that your childhood fueled your craft and your storytelling. how so? rod: my childhood gave me a lot of rage. and i went through a period where i was always in fights. kind of a violent street fighter. then i managed to grow out of that and realize i needed to take the energy of that rage and redirect it into my work. i felt like it was kind of a duty, that i owed it to my mother, who had given me such strength and love despite the brutality that she struggled to live through. i was a war correspondent in many wars, but i never liked war.

and the thing i like least was the bang-bang. i never wanted to be on the front line in a bang-bang. what i wanted more was to talk to the victims of war. the women and children, especially. nick: the story that you turned into a book called "the lovers," about two star crossed afghans named 18-year-old zakia and 21-year-old ali. and my colleague jeffrey brown talked to you a few years ago, and this is what you said about it. rod: i stepped over the line between being a journalist and being a participant, and i admit i did that, and probably by the precepts of my profession, that was the wrong thing to do. rules sometimes need to be broken in the interest of doing what's right. nick: how do you look back on that story today? rod: with a lot of pride, actually. that story and that book, the end result were that that couple were rescued from afghanistan

and our government brought them in under humanitarian parole. that was a real happy ending. we so seldom, as journalists, get to do stories with happy endings. nick: when you started researching your disease, you realized that john mccain, ted kennedy, beau biden, had all died from this. and i went back to my old emails that i had sent to you back in 2019. and i sent you note and you replied this -- i feel great physically. went for a five mile hike in some woods yesterday, pushed the pace till we were huffing and puffing. so i feel like my chances are good. describe the hope that you had and still have about your illness. rod: the median life expectancy on diagnosis with glioblastoma is5 months, and i'm now 40 months out.

and i actually, literally -- i mean, i joke that i have terminal cancer, but i feel healthier than i ever have. the tumor made me look at my the mistakes i have made in life and do things to correct them. and it really did bring me a second life, which was a tremendous gift, an opportunity to fix whatever i had done wrong in the first life. nick: you've got this scene, the beginning of the book. it's your 70th birthday. you're about to have brain surgery. your ex-wife is there, from whom you'd been estranged. your children are there, from whom you've been estranged, with your new partner. but you describe yourself as, quote, feeling so happy. try and explain that. rod: i had never felt so happy in my life, especially the closeness of my children and,

you know, the new love in my life. my my partner, leila siegel, who's been with me since my first seizure in india. stayed by my side when another person, a more sensible person, would have moved on. it's made both of us, learn about the power of love and how to keep it alive in the worst of circumstances, and we really have been through some of the worst possible circumstances. nick: the book's epigraph is a poem from raymond carver, written as he was dying of lung cancer. and it begins, "and did you get what you wanted from this life, even so?" rod, do you feel like you've gotten what you wanted from this life even so? rod: i did, and the rest of that

fragment goes, and what was it that you wanted? i wanted to know that i was beloved upon this earth. >> he said to me many times that before this, he's never been unconditionally loved before. and you know, the feeling of unconditional love brought him the kind of peace that he had never had. you said that to me, didn't you? rod: i'm really serious when i say i don't think i've ever felt happier in my life, and i have the tumor to thank for that, even though it'll kill me. you know, i will die a happy man. nick: rod nordland. the book is "waiting for the monsoon." great to see you. thank you so much. rod: great to see you. thank you very much.

♪ william: stay with us for a look at the gambling allegations against the translator for baseball's biggest star. but first, to the world of audio. an estimated half a billion people will listen to podcasts this year, the most in the medium's short history. since the very term "podcast" was coined 20 years ago, the format has grown into a $25 billion industry. spotify just revealed that its top-performing podcast, from joe rogan, has over 14 million subscribers, nearly three times the next most-popular show. but the industry's growth has also come with major growing pains. jeffrey brown reports for our arts and culture series, canvas. >> let's give it up for serial. jeffrey: it was a celebration of an industry, the annual on air fest, a showcase for and

gathering of the world of podcasting. held, of course, in a hip brooklyn hotel. the first session marked the 10-year anniversary of the podcast that changed everything, sarah koenig and julie snyder's serial. >> how many people have downloaded the first season? do you know? >> oh, probably more than 200 million. jeffrey: in fact, serial has over 300 million downloads to date. and it thrust this medium into the cultural mainstream. today, on-air fest is a launch pad for new shows. >> you are about to get a first listen of her new limited series. jeffrey: a gathering place for industry heavyweights like malcolm gladwell. and even a platform for celebrities from other fields, like grammy award-winning singer-songwriter norah jones. >> why are you here? >> i guess because i have a podcast now. doesn't everybody? jeffrey: it can certainly sound that way. with mega-popular talk shows like joe rogan's provocative interview podcast.

>> it's legal, right? nick: true crime. >> she walked into something she never expected. a trail of blood. jeffrey: music, art, even cooking shows. >> cooking is a philosophy, unless it's pastry. then it's chemistry. jeffrey: everything for everyone. but if you lean in and listen closely, there's another story still unfolding, a tale of two worlds. scott newman, founder of on-air fest, brought them together here in brooklyn. you have an industry that is an opportunist commercial industry around an art form. so everyone with commercial interests is looking to take advantage and play the game. >> i started my first podcast in 2008 when i was still in college. jeffrey: today, laura mayer is executive producer of audio at abc news, and host of her own podcast, shameless acquisition target, a show about her own experiences within the industry as media giants took notice and became major players.

>> in 2019, there was a shot across the bow. jeffrey: that's when streaming giant spotify bought production company gimlet media, an industry leader, for an enormous sum. >> the amount was for north of $200 million. and i can remember being like, oh, no. jeffrey: i mean, the world has changed. >> the world has changed. jeffrey: and enormous money has come in. >> but then these larger companies that had been intending to scale, saw that they weren't getting their return on investment. and then you saw in the past, i'd say a year and a little bit, huge, huge, huge rounds of layoffs. jeffrey: the headlines have been grim. >> i think there was a little bit of over excitement. and, you know, a lot of people wanted to get into the medium quickly. jeffrey: because they felt they just had to be there. >> absolutely. and i think that it was a little bit of an arms race. jeffrey: kelli hurley, vp and head of revenue partnerships at sirius xm, one of the majors who jumped in, says sirius remains

serious about podcasting, but -- >> i think we're being a lot more rigorous in terms of the deals that we're bringing in. jeffrey: rigorous means, you're looking to see what will make money? >> absolutely. jeffrey: part of that rigor, laying off hundreds of employees in the last two years, including in the podcasting department. among them, longtime audio producer john delore. like many who came out of the tradition of public radio, delore had high hopes that the investment by sirius and others would bring creative freedom, time, and resources. >> ultimately there was just a misalignment of their strategy -- if they had one -- between really what kind of audio they wanted to make in that space. you know, this is a company that their bread and butter is howard stern. and then the kind of stuff that we make, it requires a lot of time. jeffrey: after the layoffs, delore co-founded a small,

independent company called audio flux with producer julie shapiro. >> audio flux is a new home for independent audio and new voices, and an engine for community in audio and big ideas in podcasting. jeffrey: what does that mean? >> it means that the podcasting world has become very corporate and moneyed, and imagination has left the building. and we're just trying to say, there is a space to think through these things, feel the pieces, play with the medium and try something new. >> i think there's an audience for the kind of experimental, craft-driven stuff that we believe in, that we care about. it is just that we need to bring them new things that they want to hear. jeffrey: those niche audiences, laura mayer says, do exist and can be valuable. >> the audience is more fragmented, perhaps, on a per podcast basis. however, those audiences are loyal. jeffrey: can both things be true, that the audience continues to grow, but it's

still a very difficult business model? >> the audience will continue to grow, but i think the business model is being right-sized right now. you know, the obsession with scale in terms of making the one show that everyone listens to, that may not be the case. jeffrey: tonya mosley, co-host of npr's fresh air, is speaking to one audience in particular with her new podcast, she has a name, which she launched here. >> this is more than trying to solve a cold case. it's about a family in search of healing, and a city fighting for its own survival. >> i'm talking specifically to people, black and brown people from urban centers who understand this story. and everyone else can follow along if they want to, and they can be a part of this, too. well, where are they? where can i capture their attention? jeffrey: you are reaching out to a new audience in that sense? >> i hope so. i mean, at this point, we don't have a template, we don't have a blueprint. so we have to try new things, and also try things that we know have worked in mainstream media.

jeffrey: on the business side, kelli hurley of sirius also sees new opportunities. >> we're going to see content creators expand beyond audio and become true influencers. that can mean all forms of social media. that can mean youtube content, video content. that can even mean a live event, a tour. jeffrey: on-air fest founder scott newman believes the future is still being written. >> it's going to be the people that are here that are going to decide what the future is, through their action, through their investment, through their creative work. jeffrey: as for musician norah jones. >> i mean, i'm not going to quit my day job. it's more of a labor of love, and it's fun, and it's just, like, joyful. jeffrey: for the "pbs newshour," i'm jeffrey brown at on-air fest in brooklyn, new york. ♪ william: one of the world's

premier athletes, shoehi ohtani, has been caught up in allegations of illegal gambling. the los angeles dodger just signed a record 10-year $700 million contract, but is now engulfed in controversy. here's what we know. ohtani's former interpreter, ippei mizuhara, said he asked ohtani to pay off millions of dollars of his gambling debts. mizuhara, who's been fired by the dodgers and is under criminal investigation, said ohtani had no role in any betting. and while $4.5 million was sent from ohtani's bank account to an alleged illegal bookmaker, ohtani hasn't been accused of any wrongdoing, and denies any involvement. >> i am very saddened and shocked that someone whom i trusted has done this. i do want to make it clear that i never bet on sports or have willfully sent money to the bookmaker. william: for a closer look, we turn to andy mccullough, a senior writer for the athletic,

and author of "the last of his kind, clayton kershaw & the burden of greatness." andy, thank you so much for being here. just for our viewers who are not familiar with who shohei otani is, this is one of the stellar athletes in baseball, an incredible hitter, keeps getting better, was an amazing pitcher when he is on the mound. many believe this guy is the greatest in the game today. also apparently one of the nicest guys, too. so, this news gets out about these gambling allegations. how did that news come out? and how did that land in the baseball community? andy: yeah. i mean, i can answer the second person -- the second part first. it landed like a bomb. it's been that is still basically been going off you know, nearly a week later. the way the story initially came out with the los angeles times

reported that thani's name had surfaced in and in a the sort of books or the records of an alleged legal bookmaker named matthew bauer, who lives in southern california, is under federal investigation, when the los angeles times and subsequently espn approached his camp. he was in there because he was paying off the debts of mizuhara, his long time interpreter. subsequently he recanted his story. he said he was unaware this is what he was telling the dodgers. when he became aware of what he said he said it is not true. i was never knowingly paying his debts or anything. and subsequently he accused him of massive theft.

mizuhara said i cannot say how i got the money but he knew nothing about it. there are so many unanswered questions. shoehi ohtani said he clearly did not bet on baseball and he was swindled by his friend. but a lot of stuff still needs to be cleared up. william: as you well know after major league baseball and all professional sports have spent generations trying to keep gambling at bay. but now professional sports gambling, legalized apps and all of that are widespread. what is it that professional ball players and people in professional organizations are not allowed to do? andy: sure, and it's important to say upfront that ohtani has said he d not bet on baseball. he did not bet on anything to be clear.

it is going to be important for this investigation to figure out what mizuhara was betting on. as a former employee of baseball mizuhara will be subject to the same punishment a player would if you are found to be betting within a legal bookmaker on college basketball, the nfl, tennis, whatever. you are punished by a fine mos likely. if you are betting on a baseball game that you were not involved in the punishment is a year-long ban. if you're betting on a baseball game that you are involved in its a permanent ban. william: so this could turn out to be that otani had done nothing wrong, and he has been stolen from by his former colleague, i mean, in the end, that's what this all could turn out to be, but we still just don't know that yet. andy: well, that's certainly possible. that is what ohtani presented to the public on monday. that ippei is his friend and

stole from him and he is shocked by that. figuring out next is how much did mizuhara steal, and how did this person get access to his accounts and how was he able to complete that theft. one thing that in talking to attorneys who are following this case has mentioned is that for the ohtani camp to come out this strongly alleging things this way they must feel confident in their evidence. because with the legal exposure he would face is for gambling, even though legal gambling is probably less than xavier -- less significant than what he might face for perjury. there is no evidence he committed that in any sort of way but it is by committing strongly to a sorority -- to a story that suggests his legal camp feels confident in what they have. william: andy mccullough of the

athletic. thank you very much. finally tonight, brandon stosuy is the co-founder and editor-in-chief of the creative independent, an online resource that provides emotional and practical guidance for writers and musicians and artists. here, he shares his brief but spectacular take on the power of crying in public. brandon: i think people can be disarmed by crying if you're not expecting it. it's a powerful thing and if someone's willing to go to that place in front of you, you react to it. i think very rarely does someone cry and you just have zero emotion. i feel like i cry pretty frequently. i cry during sports. i'm a huge buffalo bills fan and sometimes i'll cry tears of joy. my mother died 13 years ago. so i find sometimes around then i'll cry more and then my wife points out, oh yeah, you're nearing the anniversary of your mother's death. so i think sometimes there's those points in the year where you just cry more. the first time i noticed people crying in public was when i was

jogging, and i just saw someone running towards me and they were crying, and once i noticed that, i just started noticing more and more people crying. and just started documenting it and writing it down. so, guy eating fruit salad and crying. guy in the airport, crying at the urinal. when i saw a guy crying in a jfk bathroom air drumming to a chicago song, hard to say i'm sorry. so i would just write it like that. and then really when i posted stuff on twitter and saw so many people reacted, i realized, oh, there's other people thinking about this too. so i wrote a book called "sad happens," and the book has 115 essays by a variety of different people speaking about crying. and so it started out my friend matt beringer who's in the band the national, he was the first person to give me something and he writes a lot of lyrics about sadness. so we just kept adding people. i think my favorite story from the anthology is this one by a woman named olivia. she wrote me in my dm's and said, hey, i'm a zookeeper and i want to write about the animals i take care of who eventually die. and so she wrote a piece about loving these animals and then her favorite owl dies. i hope after people read the book, they feel more willing to share. i'm not necessarily saying everyone has to walk down the

street sobbing all the time, but i do think it's ok to have these moments where you pull the veil back and say, oh yeah, i'm struggling, or, hey, i'm really excited, or, i'm having this moment that i want to share with you. it is this actual biochemical release that is going to ultimately make things better for you, make things healthier. that's really the ultimate goal of the book is just to have more people realize, oh yeah, this is a universal thing. i'm not alone with this kind of, these feelings i'm wrestling with. my name is brandon stosuy and this is my brief but spectacular take on crying in public. william: you can watch more brief but spectacular videos on our website. and that's the "newshour" for tonight. i'm william brangham. thank you so much for joining us. >> major funding for the "pbs newshour" has been provided by. >> consumer cellular, this is sam. how may i help you? this is a pocket dial. well, somebody's pocket, thought i'd let you know that with consumer cellular, you get nationwide coverage with no contract. that's kind of our thing. have a nice day.

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♪ hello, everyone. and welcome to "amanpour & co." here's what's coming up. >> believe me, they've been taking stock. >> europ faces a world of challenges as terrorism strikes russia with at least 137 people killed. and israel pounds gaza, allowing little food aid through. the u.n.