practitioners set targets and meaningful goals, and they have to step up the efforts to stop the damaging impacts of humans around the world. we were surprised to find thought the course of human civilisation the number of trees that have fallen were 50%. it's a huge reduction. we didn't expect to find anything, anywhere near that. ♪ a kentucky clerk heads to court this morning facing charges of contempt and her beliefs trump anyone's right to get married and votes for the iran nuclear deal as republicans move up to timetable to try and reject it and president obama wraps up his trip to alaska with another call for action on climate change but it could be over shadowed by the state's dependence on oil drilling. ♪

this is al jazeera america, good morning and live from new york city, i'm randall pinkston, a kentucky clerk who refuses to issue marriage licenses because of her religious beliefs faces a judge today, kim davis and her staff will appear in federal court to face contempt charges for davis' continued defiance of the law, she refuses to issue licenses to anyone to avoid giving them to gay couples and we have more at the woman at the center of the controversy. >> kim davis is hoping this federal judge will delay that court order so she can appeal a decision relating to an injunction that the governor filed. kim davis has been the center of controversy for many weeks here and to some she has become sort of a hero in rowan county. [chanting]

before kim davis was at the epicenter of the battle over same sex marriage -- [chanting] she led a life of little notoriety, elected official who followed in her mother's footsteps ran rowan, kentucky clerk's office and people go to her for records and licenses. but her refusal to issue licenses to same sex couples put her in the national spotlight and opponents say she was an unlikely candidate to take a stand on the sanitity of marriage and davis has been married four times and gave birth to two children out of wedlock, in the small community of moore head the neighbors support her and note divorces and having children out of wedlock happened before her religious conversion four years ago and say she has turned her life around, denver and carolyn

collins live down the road and she issued their marriage license in december. what do you think about all the controversy regarding her in her office? >> i can't judge, but i hope she wins. we are not to judge. that is the good lord who does that. >> reporter: it was here in the solid rock church that davis said her life changed and said she went to a service to honor a dying wish from her mother-in-law more than four years ago. in a statement she wrote, i am not perfect, no one is. but i am forgiven and i love my lord and must be obidient. she has a daughter the same as davis and davis used to baby sit for her. >> taught her kids to do the right thing. i mean from day one that i knew her it was always you should do the right thing. i mean, she always has been like that and i do believe she is

being true and honest in what she is saying and what she does. >> reporter: the attorney tells al jazeera she is a woman with a strict set of principles she adheres to. >> she is resolute and willing to accept what consequences come her way but violating her conscious is something she cannot do. >> reporter: davis will be in federal court at 11:00 a.m. and many here in rowan county hope this situation will finally be resolved once and for all. >> diane in moore head, kentucky, there are others preventing them from giving licenses to same sex couples. reports that one marine was killed, nine others hurt when their helicopter made a hard landing and military has not put out any more details and will put out developments as we receive them. donald trump will meet with the head of the committee today as they push him to rule out an independent run for president,

the rn c is asking all presidential candidates to sign a pledge of loyalty to the gop, trump was the only one to refuse the possibility of a third-party campaign during a debate last month and the campaign will not say if he plans to sign the pledge. president obama is on his way back from alaska this morning. he ended the trip by announcing a new initiative to tackle the effects of climate change. >> i'm here to tell you we got to do more and we got to move faster and we are not moving fast enough and for the sake of our kids we got to keep going, when it comes to climate change there is such a thing as being too late. the effects can be irreversible if we don't act. and that moment is almost here. >> the plan provides nearly $20 million in funding to help remote alaska communities and includes grants to enhance water systems and relocate families who are threatened by environmental changes.

the last stop on the president's arctic journey was a northwest alaska village where leaders are divided over the issue of off shore oil drilling and libby casey explains. >> a why of life for thousands of years. >> we survive off our land and we have values that we use as foundation as a foundation for who we are. >> reporter: the people of alaska. and continuing their heritage even as their village modernizes. 69-year-old pete schaffer shaves bark to preserve his fish and his life is built on what nature provides and is afraid an oil spill will ruin that. >> it would be a major shift in our traditional activities. >> reporter: schaffer's village opposes this but they want it safe and many see it as

impossible. why do you think it would be harder to cleanup an oil spill up here? >> i don't think there is any precedent that would show the difficulty of what we are talking about. >> reporter: locals remember the exxon valdez spill in 89 and he is on the other side of alaska and 600 miles away but take that disaster and put it in the arctic's icy waters. >> if a large spill were to occur before freeze up, once the ocean starts freezing up it's pretty much game over until the next summer. >> reporter: that could mean a spill gushing four months under layers of thick ice with no easy way to stop it and a place reached bi-plane or boat where the unemployment rate is nearly three times the national average, opportunities are scarce and if oil drilling is successful it could mean work and visitors. >> so economic and other oil companies pump some money in the community to various jobs or the

science department. >> i'm sure it would be good and help familys because a lot of families out here can use it but the thing you got to think about is just my kids. >> reporter: shell's exploratory drilling is stalled because of equipment problems and the company only has a month left before the season ends and another winter begins. another year for the people here to hunt and fish and weigh the future, al jazeera, alaska. just as the president toured alaska five chinese navy ships sailed off the coast in the baron sea and the ships and other vessels are carrying out routine exercises and it's sailing in international waters near the islands and not behaving in a threatening way. the nuclear deal with iran is set for a vote in the house next week when leader nancy pelosi are urging democrats to state opposition as soon as possible

and congress will debate wednesday, september 9 and vote on it by september 11, senator barbara is the 34th senator to back the deal giving democrats enough votes to sustain the deal and senior advise of the senate committee on foreign relations if this is a win for president obama. >> i don't think it's a win for the president. in fact, what is also clear is that both the house and the senate will disapprove this deal by by partisan majorities and maybe not over ride a veto but will over ride it with by partisan support. >> it will go through and if he vetoes it it's over. >> that is right but what is interesting about that john is there an are by partisan on both houses opposed and a presidential election in november of next year and it's very possible the next president will walk away from this deal and i think the europeans are going to see that and may not implement the deal until they see what happens in the november

election. >> the iran deal also on the agenda tomorrow when president obama hosts the king at the while house and expressed reservations about the agreement. the u.s. government is on the defensive this morning in connection with the 2012 attack on a diplomatic compound in benghazi libya. officials say they acted legally when they detained and interrogated the man charged with leading those attacks. but his defense team says he was interrogated for several days before an f.b.i. team read him his miranda rights and alleged the team told him there was no lawyer available to represent him. the u.s. ambassador to libya and three other americans were killed in the benghazi attack. authorities in northern illinois are asking for the public's help as they expand the search for whoever shot and killed the police officer. joe's body was found tuesday morning in a swampy wooded area north of chicago, police this morning say they believe whoever

shot him was familiar with the area and may have planned an escape route. they are asking anyone with information to call them. >> all it takes is one tip, a good lead to break a case wide open so we are vetting through those right now and we have hundreds of those coming in. >> hundreds of people gathered late wednesday in an fox lake park to remember the veteran officer and his widow thanked the community for the support it has given her and their four children. tensions between police and black lives matter movement has grown dramatically since it began but where is it going? and a new warning over e-cigarettes, the cancer-causing chemicals some researchers found in how the manufacturers are covering it up. ♪

♪ welcome back to al jazeera america, it's 7:44 eastern time, taking a look now at today's top story, refugees again being allowed to board trains in budapest, hungry this morning but still cannot depart the country, one train left earlier headed for a city and the austrian border and comes to a two-day standoff when it was shut down and the prime minister this morning told refugees not to come to the country at all. guatemala's president resigned coming hours after the attorney general issued an arrest warrant

for otto-molina on corruption charges and the congress voted away his immunity and says molina will fight charges and sony settled a lawsuit of who claim their identity was stolen and it was tied to the release of the film the interview set in north korea and the employees say that sony's negligence caused them harm and at risk of identity theft. a new report outlines a list of failures at the ferguson, missouri police department during the protest that followed michael brown's death and says officers inbridge fringed on first amendment rights and improperly used military tactics and failed to communicate with other law enforcement agencies and the report says it hopes the study can help police

departments across the country better handle future protests and improve community relations. michael brown's death is one of several that have given fuel to the black lives matter movement over the past year and paul looks at how the movement began and where it's headed. [chanting] the catch phrase of what many call the modern civil rights movement was spawned by a victim in florida two years ago. >> we the jury fine george zimmerman not guilty. >> reporter: when a nearly all white jury acquitted george shimmer man with the unarmed black teenager trayvon martin alecia vented grief and anger on facebook writing black people i love you, i love us, our lives matter, her friend patrice shared her message adding the hash tag black lives matter. [chanting] a little more than a year later the slogan caught fire in

ferguson, missouri after 18-year-old michael brown was shot dead by a white police officer. the movement gained steam as the nation bore witness to more deaths of unarmed black men at the hands of police. >> what do we want? >> justice. >> we want it know. >> reporter: like eric garner in new york and freddie gray in baltimore but activists say the roots of the fury and frustration run much deeper. [chanting] black lives matter started not just with mike brown in ferguson, missouri, black lives later did not start with trayvon martin in florida and black lives mater did not start with grant in oakland, california and it really started with this man. >> murdered in mississippi 60 years ago for allegedly flirting with a white woman. today the phrase black lives matter resonates like black power or power to the people did

a generation ago. officially black lives matter has some two dozen chapters and a new website on the way. [chanting] but the movement seems to draw strength from decentralization and scores of activists groups working separately linked not by charismatic leaders but by organiz organizers and social media. >> black lives matter is a leader full effect and not leaderless event and it's lifted up and supported and thrusted in motion by everyday people who are taking to the streets and becoming a leader in their own right. >> reporter: as the 2016 presidential camp page ramps up activists have been confronting candidates on both sides. demanding they address police killing, profiling, excessive

force and other problems in law enforcement. >> you are going to have to come together as a movement and say here is what we want done about it. >> reporter: others like south carolina governor niki haley say the violence that has accompanied some protests threatens to undermine the movement. >> black lives do matter and they have been disgracefully laid in ferguson and baltimore. >> reporter: when the stakes are life and death there will be times when the backlash can boil over. >> for black people it's fundamentally about an issue of survival and seeing regularly the slaying of black bodies which is pretty much genocide and so what we are seeing is a resistance to this mechanism of the state that is continuing to kill us. >> reporter: paul with al jazeera. new details today on the dangers of e-cigarettes, a

health watchdog group says many of the products contain high levels of chemicals that can cause cancer and the group is suing manufacturers for keeping that information secret. john henry smith is here and john many smokers have long believed that e-cigarettes were a safer alternative. >> randall e-cigarettes have been around a decade and is a coveted millionty billion industry and much appeal comes from the thought they are much healthy than regular cigarettes. the large scale lab testing of e-cigarettes that simulates how they are used in the real world and environmental health looked at products from 24 e-cigarette manufacturers and it found that 21 of them had at least one product containing hazardous amounts of one or both of the known cancer-causing chemicals formaldhyde and tested 97

products in all and 50 contained hazardous chem ms in high amounts. >> some were ten times as high and one was 470 times the legal limit for selling these products without warning people about the fact they might cause cancer. >> according to the study even the products that delivered nicotine without the high levels of other toxins are problematic. >> nicotine is a really strong, reproductive toxin and causes birth defects. >> reporter: industry funded study out last month argued e-cigarettes are safer than tobocco. >> is it easier to be hit by a car or a bus? a car but i don't want to get hit by one. and if you have cancer or birth defects it's obvious. >> reporter: they are suing e-cigarette makers in california for failing to worn users about the risks of using their

products. >> we are not asking to ban the products, we are saying adults who are well informed have the right to smoke cigarettes on to vape or anything they want in this category of products and what we are saying is the companies cannot withhold the information about the health impacts. >> reporter: one question the study did not address was the idea that e-cigarettes are a good way to kick the smoking habit but in a university of toronto said smokers did quick regular significantrys for 3-6 months before returning right back to them randall. thank you, john henry, going artificial in the middle of a crippling drought, turf versus real grass in california. ♪

>> the show's called "third rail". we'll be talking about topics that you wouldn't ordinarily touch. people are gonna be challenged, we're not gonna take sides... an approach that treats every single player in a particular story equally.

it's something fresh and something new. a yale university research team has determined earth has eight times more trees than previously estimated, three trillion to be exact and study shows tree cover has been cut in almost half since civilization began. with force water restrictions in place to ease a year's long drought more california residents are installing artificial turf to replace their dried up lawns and sounds like a good yesterday but there are consequences and nicole has the environmental impact to explain what are those consequences, nicole. >> i was recently traveling through the west and california and saw more artificial lawns than i have seen and seems like a great idea with the drought because people use 70% of water use on outdoor use so the lawns

use a lot of water, fertilizer, pesticides if people use those it gets in the groundwater and mowing is powered by fossil fuels so that is the environmental impact of having a grass lawn so the artificial side of this, benefits easy to maintain, definitely less water, but there are different concerns. it mostly ends up in a landfill once its done with the use and made with environmentally damaging petroleum products and recycles tires that don't break down and doesn't hold water and it runs off and instead of being absorbed that can be a worse situation in the drought and this is most fascinating i did not know about this, temperatures, it can get incredibly hot so these are of clemson university and if the temperature is 94 the grass temperature will run about 104. now, asphalt for example at that

same temperature will run 136 and we know how hot black top can get on our feet, turf temperatures, 165, it can be dangerous and burn you so if you have kids in the yard for example that is definitely an impact. it also impacts insect life in the soil and birds not able to nest in the area and everything that feeds into the food chain so the best resource are the kind of natural landscape projects. >> maybe just rocks, thanks. and finally meet the world's heaviest flees. it's chris the sheep. chris was rescued near australia's capitol barely able to walk because of the wool and took it off him and makes it the global world record holder and i'm randall pinkston and stephanie sy is back in two

minutes with more al jazeera america news.

♪ a kentucky clerk who refuses to issue marriage licenses goes before a federal judge in just a few hours, kim davis faces charges of contempt as she answers to an authority higher than the courts. trains start rolling from a budapest station where refugees camped out for days and still blocked from traveling outside of hungry. a pledge of loyalty to the gop and why the republican party wants presidential candidates to promise they won't run as independents. >> how many of you are going to

college? >> reporter: the woman's simple promise helped dozens of students get a higher education. ♪ good morning this is al jazeera live from new york city i'm stephanie sc. the county clerk now at the center of the nationwide gay marriage debate heads to court this morning and has refused to issue marriage licenses to anyone in rowan county because she does not want to give them to gay couples and supreme court has refused to take her case and she and her case must go before a judge in three hours over her continued defiance of the law and diane is outside davis' officers in moore head, kentucky and diane good morning and what could kim davis be facing this morning, could she be arrested and brought to jail? >> good morning, stephanie. well, she could be jailed but

the more likely scenario is that she will be fined and that is actually what the plaintiffs are seeking. they say if she is jailed that would make a martyr of sorts out of here and do not want to see it. >> they ordered her to issue the licenses, can she be removed from office? >> that's tough because she is an elected official so she really -- the only way they could remove her from office is to have her impeached and this is a very conservative state and that is a long process and something that is not likely to happen and, in fact, a couple of days ago davis issued a statement saying she fully intends to stay in office but clearly there are people in this area who say she is not doing her job. >> not issuing a marriage license today. >> the united states supreme court has authority over you, okay, you do not work this a religious institution, if you wish to discriminate. >> we are not issuing the marriage license today and i'm

not discriminating because i'm not issuing a license to anybody. >> yes, you are. >> reporter: clearly a very contention issue in rowan county and you have people on both sides of this issue. >> yeah, and you know we have not heard too much from kim davis and she has not been doing a lot of media interviews so that clip that we played from the clerk's office really got to the heart of her argument which is that she is answering to god. i'm curious what people in moore head have been saying do they support this after taking the stand after all they did elect her? >> that is right, some people don't and some people do and we were around town all day yesterday talking to neighbors and talking to people who have known her over the years and they stand behind her. some people say they support gay marriage but they respect the fact that she is standing true to her convictions and they say she is a good person and there are people in this country who do support her. >> well obviously we will see what happens in court today,

diane esterbrook and we will talk to an attorney about what is next for kim davis and if she can be forced to hand out those marriage licenses. breaking news out of camp lajune in north carolina there are reports one marine was killed and at least nine others hurt when their helicopter made a hard landing and the group was carrying out a training exercise last night, 16 marines were on the helicopter at the time and the accident is under investigation. several refugees and migrants are finally on a train out of the main station in budapest hungry this morning and headed for a city near the austrian border and reports of a standoff on that train. it departed moments after the prime minister urged refugees and migrants not to come to the country at all and he is building a fence and tightening asylum laws to try and stop the influx. >> please don't come. why you have to go from turkey to europe?

turkey is a safe country. stay there. it's risky to come. we can't guaranty you will be accepted here and from a moral point of view it could relate a human moral point also because we would not like to falsify the dreams of the people. >> al jazeera's andrew simmons has more from the outskirts of budapest. >> reports that the train, one of the trains was stopped there and they boarded the train and started searching people and got off the train and then apparently there are people there right now which the refugee is chanting no chap p -- camps. this is a camp which has conditions which is not good but people are put into that camp

and they are free to leave it providing they have the right papers but they are not in prison there by any means but this is quite extraordinary really because everyone was expecting to go to the border and get into austria, the train service has been suspended. the train appeared to be a scheduled train. the destination was for a town further up the line where you can move on from there to a border town where the austrian rail ways link up to international train and people were thinking this was at least going in the right direction and there was a lot of concern on refugees and some deciding not to get on the train because they were suspicious of being taken to camp so there are other camps

also and another train may be stopping there and it is a situation whereby the refugees are angry and they feel they have been duped and thought they like monday would be able to get on to trains going to austria and germany. >> andrew simmons reporting from the outskirts of budapest, hungry. a boy we told you about yesterday morning and his name is alan and he is three years old, he and his five-year-old brother were among those who drowned making the dangerous crossing to the greek island and the boy's mother and sister survived and the family put in a refugee application to go to canada sponsored by a relative in vancouver but the canadian government denied it. david miliband is ahead of the rescue committee and told antonia this refugee crisis is about far more than europe and the u.s. must also get involved.

>> america needs to step up as well. this is a crisis that is existing within europe and america since the war began in syria has taken 1434 syrians in total and historically america has been the global leader on refugee resettlement but it has been marked by the three or four years of the syria crisis and it's important if the burden is to be properly shared out. europe is a continent of 500 million and the largest, richest, single market so to get it in perspective 500,000 is 1% of the european population and what is broken down is any sense that the burden of these people is going to be shared among the 28 countries of the european union until the last couple of months it has been italy and greece who have their own problems and expected to bear the whole of the share of the responsibility and germany has stepped forward and expecting 800,000 asylum seekers and

refugees this year and doing so with calmness and commitment. >> the u.s. recently said it will take up to 8,000 syrian refugees and officials from italy, france and germany are calling for revising asylum rules and a more fair distribution of refugees among european nations. the search is on right now for any survivors in the sinking of a ship carrying migrant workers off malaysia coast and officials say at least 14 people died when the wooded boat carrying 70 people capsized near the costal town of bernan and 19 people have been rescued, most passengers were migrant workers returning to indonesia. president obama has the senate support he needs to prevent them stopping the nuclear deal and barbara became the 34th democratic senator to support the agreement but may not be the end of the political fight as jamie mcintyre reports. >> you wouldn't have known it from the full throated defense delivered by secretary of state john kerry in an hour-long

speech in philadelphia but the obama administration appears to have won its battle with congress over the iran nuclear deal. the announcement by maryland democrat mccolsky gives enough votes to promise the veto to kill the multi national agreement an assuming nothing happens to make any of the senators reconsider. kerry's main argument it's not just a good deal, it's a done deal because there is no going back to the bargaining table. >> it is clear if we reject this plan the multi lateral sanctions regime will start to unravel and the pressure will lesson and our negotiating leverage will diminish if not disappear. >> getting 34 votes was not easy and they were holding their nose and picking the lesser of two ev evils, nothing is perfect with

the iran regime but concluded this is the best option available to block iran for having a nuclear bomb. democrat chris coons of delaware in announcing his support also expressed deep ambivalence. >> i support this deal with my eyes wide open, aware of its flaws as well as it's potential. >> reporter: the deal's opponent remains prime minister benjamin netanyahu and he said he takes a back seat to no one in support of israel's security. >> while i respectfully disagree with prime minister netanyahu about the benefits of the iran agreement i do not question for an instant the basis of his concern or that of any israeli. >> reporter: but that was under cut from a tweet by the white house which mocked the famous bomb drawing netanyahu used in a 2012 u.n. speech. >> when should a red line be drawn? a red line should be drawn right

here. before iran completes the second stage of nuclear enrichment necessary to make a bomb. >> reporter: the tweet from the at the iran deal account says this is what the famous drawing looks like now and shows iran's progress to a bomb at 0% with the burning fuse snipped by a pair of sc ishgscissors. out spoken opponent of the iran nuclear deal and told al jazeera he is concerned that the inspections rely on iran self reporting. >> i negotiated for arms control agreements when i was a master and chief negotiator and the other three i was advisor or delegate and if we came back to the united states saying by the way there is this international inspectors work with the soviets and they will tell us the

soviets will tell us what they have. >> yeah. >> but we done -- don't get to find out about it and would be laughed out of the senate. >> how they will conduct inspections at iran sites are confidential and has drawn consideration. president obama ended his historic trip with a new initiative to tackle climate change. >> we have to do more and move faster and we are not moving fast enough and for the sake of the kids we have to keep going and when it comes to climate change there is a thing such as being too late. the effects can be irreversible if we don't act and that moment is almost here. >> reporter: the plan provides nearly $20 million in funding to help provide alaska communities that includes grants to enhance water systems and relocate families that are threatened by environmental changes. donald trump will meet with the

head of the national commutety as the organization pushes him to rule out an inrun for president and rn c asking all presidential candidates to sign a pledge of loyalty to gop and trump is the only one to refuse to rule out the possibility of a third-party campaign during a debate last month and the campaign will not say if he plans to sign the pledge. meanwhile the latest poll suggests the race for the republican is a dead heat with trump and carson and a survey shows both candidates with 23% support, it's the first poll since july to show trump without a clear lead, one of the aids will revoke the right to remain silent before a committee and helped the former secretary of estate for a private server. a display of military might, china's forces commemorate 70 years since the end of world war

ii and leaders announce major cuts and soaring water bills in one michigan city have led to a class action lawsuit.

welcome back to al jazeera america, it's 8:17 eastern and looking at headlines across the nation and schools in one north carolina district were sanitized overnight after 100 students and teachers contracted a stomach virus and north of duram said people were sick at lunchtime and dealing with the same virus since everyone was showing similar symptoms. a death and out break of legionarres and eight died and four infected at a veteran home and all had under lying medical conditions and an out break in

new york city this summer killed 12 people. sony settled a lawsuit with people saying their identity was disclosed and it was tied to the release of the film the interview set in north korea and they said the negligence caused economic harm and risk of identity theft. military might in china today and commemorating 70 years since the defeat of japan in world war ii and we report from beijing, leaders are promising changes for the country's forces. >> reporter: a nation's pride and military might on display on tinemin square and remembering those who died in world war ii fighting japanese aggression. the square has not seen this since 2009, it is only the fourth since 1960. 12000 military personnel past

and present representing the chinese armed services marched to precision timing and more than 80 went to the show and unveiled for the first time and tanks, armored and more and this happened a few kilometers down the road and not everybody wants to watch the parade from home and many people have come to vantage points like this to see the parade, not necessarily passing them on the road but up in the sky. >> translator: i have watched past several parades on t.v. and feel like this is the most spectacular one. it is the biggest in terms of the size. this is a historical moment for china. >> reporter: many waited for a much anticipated speech from chinese president including heads of state and delegations for more than 100 countries. >> translator: people and liberation army of china is the

people's army. the duty is to protect security and well-being and carry out the noble mission of upholding world peace. here i announce that china will cut the number of its troops by 300,000. >> reporter: despite the significant statement many leaders from western nation and prime minister of japan did not attend and see china flexing its muscle sending a muscle it can and will defend itself and any disputed territory it aims to claim and china was on the winning side during world war ii and military personnel from ten nations including several republicans and russia and the close asia partner pakistan and 70 years on like other global

nations china needed to look at fallen heros and pay tribute to sacrifice and there is a clear message too of the new military might, a global super power that never wants to see another world of war again, roman, beijing. pentagon is tracking five chinese navy ships in the bearing sea near the islands and u.s. officials say the ships are not behaving in a threatening way and are in international waters but close enough for u.s. officials to track the movements and they arrived on the final day of president obama's trip to the alaskan arctic. joining us from providence, rhode island is lyle goldstein associate professor at the war college and author of meeting china halfway, how to diffuse the e merging u.s., china rivalry and what do you think of the timing of chinese navy ships

in the bearing sea during president obama's visit? >> it is somewhat striking, stephanie. i think there is a good chance this is not coincidental and the chinese new the president was visiting alaska and that there is some sort of message here that of china's new strength, undoubtedly china's navy is reaching out, is becoming, let's say it's not a global navy yet but they are moving in that direction. >> president obama is the first u.s. president to visit the arctic circle, how much did this visit up the anti-in this region where there is rivalry between china and russia already and it seems the u.s. is also getting into the game? >> that is right, stephanie. things have been heating newspaper the arctic to some extent although i would consider china a lesser player here but it's true russia has been very

active in the arctic of late, they have held a major exercise in the region this spring and set up a new arctic command and they have gone forward with some of their quite extensive claims in the area so you know i think that the president's trip to alaska certainly reminds us the united states does have interesting in this key region which is witnessing enormous change because of climate change. >> what are the u.s. interest in the arctic circle and are they vital? of course there are a lot of oil resources potentially in the arctic, but what other vital national security interests are there for the u.s.? >> well, it's quite a contentious issue and i would say that i do want to suggest that the security issues related to the arctic are not entirely new, that is during the cold war

there was a major fear that russian attack would come from over the ice cap and indeed a lot of let's not forget the u.s. navy was the first to navigate up to the north poll in 1958 so these are not entirely new issues and some issues remain, u.s. submarines and russia submarines are active in the area but what is new is that because of the ice retreating there is a possibility of exploiting some of these resources, that is a very contentious issue in alaska and i think your own channel has been reporting on that recently and the president has had to weigh in on these issues. so unquestionably the issue of that the united states whether it should exploit these resources and how resources are adjudicated among the major powers that is a major issue. there are some other issues maritime transit and so forth but i think the united states is certainly a lesser player in those issues.

>> lyle goldstein thank you for your insights on in this morning. puerto rico power company reached a deal to cut some debt to save $670 million in principal and interest payments and there are hopes it will inspire deals with state agencies and in june puerto rico said it could not pay $72 billion in debt. a healthcare crisis is also unfolding across puerto rico as we report from san juan says the debt issues could cost them doctors. >> reporter: practicing medicine really is an act of charity. most of his patients rely on medicaid and i has not paid him he says in months. owing him $200,000. >> it's a problem because i need to pay for a doctor, to the nurse and lights and telephone.

>> reporter: a staggering number of people here, two million, more than half the population rely on medicaid or medicare. and the island simply can't afford it. for years puerto rico has been borrowing to pay the bills and now owes $200 million. is it fair the doctors are not paid for the work they are doing? >> it goes beyond fairness. it goes to the fact that my principles don't allow me to owe people money. >> reporter: and it clearly bothers you personally. >> of course. for me that is something sacred, if you owe somebody you pay, period. >> reporter: even though puerto rico is part of the u.s. the rules here are different, decades ago they capped medicaid for territories and the federal government only pays it about $300 million a year. the island must cover the

remaining $2 half billion itself and america gets billions in help from the federal government. >> what we are asking is fair treatment. we pay the same social security, we pay the same medicare tax, so basically we want to receive the same benefits from what we are paying. >> so what does fair treatment look like to you then? >> in the case of medicaid and treatment and that is all we ask, treat me as the lowest jurisdiction that you have. >> reporter: u.s. is working with the island for solutions and help it get by puerto rico got a $6 billion grant to keep the programs operating, that money is expected to run out a year early which health leaders fear could face the island to drop more than a million people from medicaid. >> the reality is things in puerto rico will get worse before they get better. >> reporter: the pain is already being felt.

patients have seen prices rise and thousands of doctors leave the island. >> everybody is cutting corners. the hospitals get paid 25% less. we only have two nurses per floor except a nurse per four patients and you go there and there are four people waiting there and no no more transportation support and everything will get a little more difficult. >> reporter: as a teacher perez has private insurance and still has trouble finding doctors and won't accept credit cards much less her insurance. >> you want to feel better and get better and it's not a luxury, you are not buying something for you. >> reporter: at 6 four-years-old the doctor says he is too invested to leave and too committed to cutoff patients, are you still accepting patients who have medicaid coverage? >> yes. >> reporter: even though you are not getting paid for it? >> yeah.

they need medicine and you can't yank this patient because you need. >> reporter: still practicing on an island with a lot of need. john than betz, al jazeera, san juan, puerto rico. a new warning about e-cigarettes and thought to be a safer alternative are raising concerns about cancer and one group is suing for keeping that information secret. i'm john on lake eerie where water quality experts say it could be a bad year for pollution in the great lakes.

we -- welcome back and refugees are allowed to board trains in budapest this morning but still cannot depart the country, one train left earlier this morning headed for a city near austrian

border and comes after a two-day standoff when the train was shut down and told refugees not to come to the country at all. presidential hopeful donald trump meets with rnc leaders to talk about stopping a third-party bid if he fails for the republican nomination and challenging every gop candidate to sign a pledge not to sign a campaign. a kentucky clerk who refuses to hand out marriage licenses will go to court in 2 1/2 hours and charges of contempt and she will not give out licenses to anyone to avoid giving them to gay couples and the supreme court has refused to take her case and a judge will decide to punish her for defying the law and we are joined by a senior fellow for american progress action fund and thanks for being with us and how should we expect things to play out in court today? >> i expect them to play out pretty badly for ms. davis.

she has already been to three different courts asking them to let her to continue to get away with this at least while her appeals play out and the courts including the supreme court told her no. the morning after the supreme court denied her request to not continue not issuing license she in a high profile way refused a license to a same sex couple and the question is not if she is held in contempt i think the questions are how stiff the fines are against her once she is held if contempt. >> penalizing her with a fine if she is found in contempt is to compel her to issue marriage licenses and does kim davis feel she will give in because of a fine and her lawyer told us yesterday she will probably stick to her guns even faced with the possibility of going to jail. >> right, and you know it's interesting that the lawyers for the same sex couples asked at

this stage she not be sent to jail. i think folks are concerned about making a martyr after her and trying to have people emulate her because of that so right now we are sticking with fines. and if she wants to be a conduit whereby the antigay movement is taxed in order to, you know, let her continue to go on and be a martyr that might have to be the way that it's going to be for a few weeks or a few months. ultimately though i don't think that this is a tenable position. if she holds out forever or she tries to hold out forever eventually the court will get fed up and sent her to jail and what is interest about kentucky once she is sent to jail then the law allows another official to step in and start issuing the license. >> that was going to be my next question. so the court for example can't order a deputy to hand out these marriage licenses until they have sent her to jail?

>> yes, so it's a touchy ground here. the court can definitely fine her and the court can definitely send her to jail if they want to in order to get her to comply with the order. it is touchy whether they could do something else, whether they could remove her from office and appoint federal receiver in place who will provide the licenses. that would be something that given the very conservative supreme court we have, this judge may be reluctant to do. >> i want to get a little bit into her argument of why she is refusing to issue the license and we had her lawyer on yesterday and this is what he said. >> kim davis is well aware of consequences of her actions. what people don't understand is that conscious is something that we can't disobey with any safety or expectation that we will be able to live full lives. kim davis being denied her right to living according to her conscious is really the ultimate

insult to human dignity. >> so it sounds like the lawyers still believe they are on firm legal ground here constitutionally with the first amendment protection for religious freedom, what is your response to the argument, can she refuse some duties if they violent her conscious? >> she is on extraordinary weak legal ground here and first of all there have been a number of cases where people tried to use religious conscious as a justification for what is essentially bigotry. the piggy park case in the 1960s where somebody said i don't want to serve black people and my religion compels me to do that and supreme court said no way you don't get to use conscious to justify bigotry. there is another case in the 1980s involving women and the employer wanted to give them less benefits and again the court said, no, way you don't get to use religious conscious in order to justify that kind of discrimination. so i'm not expecting her to win here and her case is especially

weak because she is a government employee. you know, i mean, when she is denying couples' marriage licenses she is not just saying i kim davis disapprove of you, she is saying the government disapproves of you and she can believe what she wants to believe but she doesn't get to hold a government job and continue to perform it without any consequences whatsoever if she is not going to do what that job requires. >> ann, thank you for joining us this morning. authorities in northern illinois are asking for the public's help as they expand the search for who shot and killed an officer, his body was found tuesday morning in a swap by wooded area north of chicago and police believe who shot him was familiar with the area and may have planned an escape route. they are asking anyone with any information to call them. . >> all it takes is one tip or a good lead to break a case wide open so we are vetting through

those right now. we've got hundreds of those coming in. >> reporter: hundreds of people gathered late wednesday this an fox lake park to remember the veteran officer, his widow thanks the community for the support it has given her and their four children. a new justice department report due out today outlines a list of fael urs -- failures at the ferguson department following michael brown's death and first amendment rights improperly used military style tactics and failed to communicate with other law enforcement agencies and justice department says it hopes it can help handle future protest and improve relations. protest in baltimore after a judge ordered six orders to be tried separately in the freddie gray case. >> no justice. >> no peace. >> reporter: at least one person arrested and one officer injured during wednesday's demonstrations, the judge denied a motion to dismiss charges against the officers and decided

the case should be split to make sure each officer gets a fair trial. freddie gray died in april of a severe spinal injury sustained during a ride in a police van. new details this morning in the police killing of an unarmed college football player in texas, the autopsy report shows 19-year-old christian taylor was on marijuana and psyche drug when he died and he was shot four times at an arlington car dealership and he was jumping on vehicles and crashed a car in the showroom and officer was fired from the force. in flint, michigan they pay some of the highest water bills in the state and as we explain the judge's order to slash prices may not be enough to help those in need. >> how are you supposed to live without water? it's sad. it's reallied is a sad and people are living in third world or whatever. >> reporter: she considers

herself fortunate. >> the first time they shut me off. >> reporter: how long were you without water? >> i wasn't long because i went down the day. >> reporter: other people in flint, michigan have gone months without running water and the city raised rates by 35% in 2011, just months before the state took over the struggling city's finances. >> i'm either going to let the house go or i'm going to move in with somebody, you know, it's sad but you know that is what is is happening and i understand people when they leave. they got to do what is best for them. >> reporter: before the increase nelson who was 6 four-years-old and lives on a fixed income says she paid about $30 a month. now she pays close to $200 and can barely afford the bill. >> so i blame the city councilman and i believe the mayor because they are the ones who initially supposed to be running the city. >> reporter: flint is a predominately black community where more than 40% of the people live in poverty. and residents have been flooding the city with complaints about water rates for years.

now nelson is among 30,000 people who joined a class action lawsuit against the city. attorney val washington is leading the case. he says it's estimated that nearly a third of the people here are delinquent on their bills and some lost their homes because of it. >> people had to make decisions about whether or not to eat, whether or not to pay their consumer energy utility bills and gas and electric and pay mortgage payments or their water bill. >> reporter: on tuesday the city responded. >> we are complying with the judge's order, water and sewer rate also be lowered for the coming bills and that will provide some relief to our customers. >> reporter: flint is cutting water bills by about $20 a month, a 22% reduction that falls short of a judge's order for the city to stop collecting the full 35% rate hike. flint recently e merged from its financial emergency but some officials estimate cutting water

rates could force cuts and other services. >> really i would like for them to sit down and get real and just tell us the truth like they say the truth will set you free, we need to know what is going on. >> reporter: as residents like nelson push for financial relief from high water bills they caution that any more reductions could eventually lead to flint's financial collapse, al jazeera, flint, michigan. u.s. army ranger training will now be open to all qualified women. the army made the announcement two weeks after two women became the first to graduate from ranger school and held to the same standards and orders to lift bans in women in combat roles by next year. forced water restrictions in place to help ease a year's long drought more people are using

artificial turf to replace the lawn and sounds good but has consequences and the environmental impact and this is not a better alternative? >> it saves on water but has other impacts and it's not just california and it's through the west and sales of the art official lawn are booming, in some cases up to 70% of household water use goes toward outdoor use like the lawn. so watering the grass, you know, a lot of people over water, there is certain fertilizers that get in the ground and it's powered by fossil fuel and that is a down side of a real lawn. artificial turf has less water but often made with petroleum and sometimes recycles tires and once it goes in a landfill it doesn't deteriorate and also doesn't hold surface water, it runs off and you are not getting the water in the ground like you need and this is one of the things that fascinated me, the

temperatures it holes so if you have a day where the normal temperature is 94 degrees for example grass temperature runs 104, the asphalt and black top is 136, turf 165 and creates a heat island around your house and kids can't play on it when it gets hot and air conditioning bills to go up because the air is hot and you can't have the insect life and nesting for birds in the area and it causes that negative impact as well. so those kind of rock gardens they say that is really the best. >> or a cactus or a japanese zen garden would all work and nicole mitchell thank you. lake eerie experiencing another green summer and talking about potential toxic algae in the water and shut down water for half a million residents and john reports the problem is blamed on agricultural runoff.

>> each summer a growing under water forest of toxic algae suffocates lake eerie. former farmer ed says he is doing everything he can to stop it. to prevent run out from feeding the blooms he plants tall grass along st. mary's river and corn that doesn't disturb the soil and after he harvests he plans with rye grass. >> doesn't erode like bare ground is. >> to keep it from washing out the soil. >> reporter: when city of toledo declared the water unsafe for drinking they put much of the blame on farmers like him and say two thirds of pollutants feeding the algae came from farms. >> i guess it upset me personally because i'm trying to do all i can i guess to keep the soil pa partibles out of the rir

and urbanization, industry, there are other people who dump things into the river. >> i'm going to grab a sample. >> reporter: he might have a point, when we watched conservationist bin and the rotary club test the river that feeds lake eerie and before that it was five parts per million and after the plant the level tripled. >> this one is 15 on the phosphate, first reading was about five. this one is 15. >> reporter: the problem is none of the states along lake eerie require disclosure of sources of solution, that is required in the fox river that feeds wisconsin green bay and chesapeake bay on america's east coast. >> cannot put raw sewage in the water and think it's good for the water and look at the sources and seeing how much we can get reductions at the lowest cost to bring the lake back to health again. >> reporter: heavy rains have not helped. this might be a particularly bad

summer for algae blooms and early rains washed over the side of the river and across the way the water encroached into the tree line and has taken soil into the river and the maumee feeds into lake eerie and where the algae blooms have grown the worst. in the shall of the lakes eerie is the first to develop the blooms and great lakes supplies 20% of the world's freshwater and until the surrounding states start reporting where sources of the pollution are lake eerie will continue to choke on algae, toledo, ohio, making good on a promise, the california woman who sents kid to college. changes coming to one of the nation's story ballparks. ♪

e welcome back to al jazeera america, it's 8:49 eastern and looking at some of the global headlines, guatemala president has resigned and happened hours after the attorney general issued arrest warrant for molina on corruption charges and guatemala congress voted to strip his immunity and his lower says he will fight charges. turkish officials say this morning they released two journalists from prison and police in turkey charged them earlier with aiding terrorism. one of the journalists is still being held. >> maximum thrust and lift off for the 500th time from the start a rocket. >> reporter: three new crew members on their way to the international space station, a russian and a danish will dock tomorrow and briefly raise the population to nine and the 500th

manned launch from kazistan and dangers of e-cigarettes and say many of the products contain high levels of chemicals that cause cancer and suing manufacturers for keeping that information a secret. and john henry smith is here with more. so john i thought a lot of smokers thought these were the healthy alternative. >> well, stephanie, e-cigarettes have been around a decade and a multi-billion industry, to your point and much of their appeal comes from the thought they are much more healthy than traditional cigarettes and the study is casting doubt on that claim. it's being billed as the first ever large scale lab testing of e-significant cigarettes and environmental health looked at products from 24 e-cigarette manufacturers and found 21 of them had a product containing hazardous of one or both of the cancer causing chemicals

formalhy dshg e and tested 97 products in all and 50 contained the hazardous chemicals in high amounts. >> some were ten times and one was 470 times the legal limit for selling these products without warning people about the fact they might cause cancer. >> reporter: according to the study the products that delivered nicotine without the high levels of other toxins are problematic. >> nicotine is a strong reproductive toxin and means it causes birth defects. >> reporter: an industry-funded study out last month argued e-cigarettes are far safer than smoking tobacco. >> safer to get hit by a car or bus, yes but i don't want to get hit by a car and in the same way if you are choosing either to live a healthy life or to live a healthy life and be exposed to chemicals that cause cancer or birth defects the choice to me is of course. >> the center for environmental health is suing e-cigarette

makers for failing to warn users of the risk of the products. >> we are not asking to ban the products but saying adults who are well informed have the right to smoke cigarettes or to vape or anything they want in this category of products. what we are saying is that the companies cannot withhold the information about the health impacts. >> reporter: now one question the study did not address was the idea that e-cigarettes are a good way to kick the smoking habit but university of toronto researchers looked at that earlier this year and found smokers did quit regular cigarettes but around for 3-6 months before going right back to tobocc oshgo cigarettes. boston will band chewing tobacco and takes effect at all stadiums including fenway park and has the backing of the boston red socks and former pitcher who survived mouth

cancer and the similar ban in san francisco. sat are at the lowest level in ten years, the college board says the average sat score for 2015 was 1490 out of maximum 2400 that is down seven points from the year before, there was at least a two-point decline on all three sections of the test, critical reading, math and writing and it's tough to single out what caused the decline but poverty and low levels of education among parents are continuing challenges. for almost 30 years brown has been working to make sure kids in oakland, california have a chance to go to college and started with 10,000 in one elementary class and impacted hundreds of families, lisa bernard has more from oakland. >> how many of you are going to college? >> reporter: she has been asking this same question for nearly three decades.

>> how many are going to college. >> reporter: in 1987 ms. brown as the kids call her made a promise to a first grade class in oakland if they beat expectations and graduate from high school she would pay for them to go to college. >> she saved my life. >> reporter: jeffrey tony was in that original class. today he is 33, works in construction, owns a clothing line and records music. >> ms. brown, my real life angel. >> reporter: he says it was her emotional support even more than financial support that made the difference. >> ms. brown because when you grow up in inner cities you don't see anything positive that you can model yourself after. and so she is telling you you can do this and you can do do that, do not allow anyone that you can't. >> reporter: like the kids she helps she was born into poverty. she picked cotton as a child in mississippi before moving to the bay area to attend college. a chance encounter in her

neighborhood with a child begging for food during school hours haunted her. she impulsively adulted a first-grade class offering love, tutors and food and clothes if necessary. >> in life we are going to pay for these kids now we can either pay for them to get an education and have control or we can pay for them in prison and we have no control. >> but brown herself could barely pay. she was making just $45,000 a year as a realtor but still set aside 10,000 a year to fulfill her promise, 12 years later 19 of the 23 kids walked across the stage to claim their high school diplomas. >> so if you are thinking about ds and cs forget it. always strive to be the best. >> reporter: the most resent statistics from the oakland unified school district show less than 70% of students

graduate from high school a year. ms. brown says 82% of her students graduate from high school. nearly 30 years after she made her original promise brown has now inspired and paid for 80 students to graduate from college, 17 more are currently enrolled. she does take donations and there is financial aid. >> it's been 27 years, i've never missed a payment for college >> she makes sure everything is all right. >> reporter: her kids don't miss a chance to thank her. >> paid tuition. >> reporter: al jazeera, oakland, two weeks away from the pope's first to the united states and during his stop in washington d.c. he will give the mass in spanish and to a nod of the spanish population and meet with president obama before traveling to new york city and philadelphia. that is it for us in new york, i'm stephanie sy and thanks for

watching and have a great morning. >> follow correspondent roxana saberi on a personal journey. >> this is the first time in 20 years i've been back to my mother's homeland. >> a special in-depth look at japan. the legacy of the atomic bomb. controversial american military bases. and the country's evolving identity.

>> from going pro, >> i never know that was really a possibility. >> to becoming president of the us tennis association. >> we're about getting rackets in children's hands... >> building the game... >> ...sky's the limit for growing tennis in america. >> and expanding access to play... >> at the end of the day, it's about the kids... >> every tuesday night. >> i lived that character. >> go one on one with america's movers and shakers. >> we will be able to see change. >> gripping. inspiring. entertaining. "talk to al jazeera". only on al jazeera america.

♪ >> announcer: this is al jazeera. ♪ hello and welcome to the news hour, i'm laura kyle in doha. bewildered, exhausted and beaten, hungarian riot police stop a train bound for austrian border an order passengers to get off. syrians of all background have been subjected to crimes of humanity and they set out in forensic detail of what people are fleeing from. ♪