( ticking ) >> do you know what percentage of the florida population had been denied the vote? >> up until amendment 4, approximately 10% of the voting age population was denied the franchise. >> desmond meade came up with amendment 4. a felon himself, convicted of drug and firearms possession, he 9couldn't vote for 30 years. >> florida disenfranchised more people than the populations of over ten states and u.s. territories, and over 40 countries in the world. ( ticking ) >> we really believe with our

patent pending system we can bring sexy back to construction. >> this man's promises of high- speed construction at low cost got president trump's attention, and his company was recently awarded about $2 billion worth of contracts to build a border wall. "60 minutes" has been investigating the company and its record of building, and let's just say we found some holes in it that taxpayers will want to know about. ( ticking ) >> the living world is a unique and spectacular marvel. >> in his stunning new film, sir david attenborough celebrates nature's wonders, a warning against humans overrunning the natural world itself. you call the film "a witness statement." a witness statement is given when a crime has been committed. >> yeah, well, a crime has been committed. and-- and it so happens that i'm of such an age, that i was able to see it beginning. ( ticking ) >> i'm lesley stahl.

>> i'm bill whitaker. >> i'm anderson cooper. >> i'm sharyn alfonsi. >> i'm scott pelley. those stories and more, tonight, on "60 minutes." ( ticking ) people everywhere living with type 2 diabetes are waking up to what's possible with rybelsus®. ♪ you are my sunshine, my only sunshine... ♪ rybelsus® works differently than any other diabetes pill to lower blood sugar in all 3 of these ways... increases insulin... decreases sugar... ...and slows food. the majority of people taking rybelsus® lowered their blood sugar and reached an a1c of less than 7. people taking rybelsus® lost up to 8 pounds. rybelsus® isn't for people with type 1 diabetes or diabetic ketoacidosis. don't take rybelsus® if you or your family ever had medullary thyroid cancer, or have multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2, or if allergic to it. stop rybelsus® and get medical help right away

if you get a lump or swelling in your neck, severe stomach pain, or an allergic reaction. serious side effects may include pancreatitis. tell your provider about vision problems or changes. taking rybelsus® with a sulfonylurea or insulin increases low blood sugar risk. side effects like nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea may lead to dehydration which may worsen kidney problems. wake up to what's possible with rybelsus®. ♪ please don't take my sunshine away... ♪ you may pay as little as $10 per prescription. ask your healthcare provider about rybelsus® today. ait feels like step after step.t not at capital one. you can open a checking account in just 5 minutes. that's right, 5 minutes. plus, the checking and savings accounts have no fees or minimums because that... is how it should be. and you can do your banking

right here at a capital one café. or from anywhere with the top-rated capital one app. this is banking reimagined. what's in your wallet? to deliver your packages. and the peace of mind of knowing that important things like your prescriptions, and ballots, are on their way. every day, all across america, we'll keep delivering for you. seeing what people left behind in the attic. well, saving on homeowners insurance with geico's help was pretty fun too. ahhhh, it's a tiny dancer. they left a ton of stuff up here.

welp, enjoy your house. nope. no thank you. geico could help you save on homeowners and renters insurance. >> leslie stahl: president trump campaigned this past week in florida, a crucial swing state he won by a narrow margin in 2016. then two years later, florida voters in a brief bipartisan moment, approved an amendment to the state's constitution, that restored voting rights to as many as 1.4 million residents

who'd been barred from voting because they had a prior felony conviction. amendment 4 had only two conditions: those convicted of murder or felony sexual assault did not qualify; and felons first had to complete, quote," all terms of sentence including parole or probation." it was the single largest addition to the country's voting population in half a century. but then things got complicated. do you know what percentage of the florida population had been denied the vote? >> desmond meade: up until amendment four, approximately 10% of the voting age population was denied the franchise. >> stahl: desmond meade came up with amendment 4. a felon himself, convicted of drug and firearms possession, he couldn't vote for 30 years. >> meade: florida disenfranchised more people than

the populations of over ten sttes and u.s. territories, and over 40 countries in the world. >> stahl: and how many of them were african americans? >> meade: one in every four could not vote because of a prior felony conviction. >> stahl: well, tell us what some of the felonies are in florida that make it unusual. >> meade: releasing helium- filled balloons in the air is a third degree felony in florida. then you have things such as catching a lobster whose tail is too short, disturbing turtle nesting eggs, driving with a suspended license. those are the type of crimes that, if a person is convicted of, they would actually lose the right for the rest of their life. >> stahl: most of the convictions in florida are for more serious crimes. but the history of disenfranchisement in the state goes back to the years after the civil war. >> meade: now we know that the original intent of these policies were to keep newly freed slaves from being able to

participate in democracy. but like a tumor left unchecked, it just grew. and it affected everybody. >> stahl: well, tell us about you. you committed crimes. you had a drug addiction. tell us your story. >> meade: well lesley, you know, i always start my story back in august of 2005, when i was standing in front of railroad tracks in south florida, waiting on a train to come so i can jump in front of it. i was homeless. i was addicted to crack cocaine. i was unemployed, recently released from prison. and i didn't see any light at the end of the tunnel. and so i waited and i waited there. >> stahl: so the train never came? >> meade: the train never came. in one of the busiest tracks in dade county, the train did not come that day. >> stahl: so he moved into a homeless shelter, and went to school: college, then law school. >> meade: and in may of 2014, i graduated with a law degree. >> stahl: he has the diploma,

but he can't practice, because he's a felon. and unlike in the vast majority of states, he couldn't vote. so he used his law school training to help write amendment 4, building statewide support-- >> our vote? our voice! our time? right now! >> stahl: --winning endorsements from the a.c.l.u. but also the conservative koch brothers. the amendment passed in 2018 with nearly 2/3 of the florida vote. when amendment four passed, did you register to vote? >> clifford tyson: the first night that it passed, i went on the internet and i registered, yes. >> stahl: pastor clifford tyson was politically active back in college, before committing robberies and theft. that was long ago. still, he thought he'd never get a chance to vote. but last year he cast a ballot in the primary for mayor of tampa.

>> tyson: when they handed me my ballot, i started crying. i'm 64 years old. i remember when my grandmothers and my mom, them, had to vote, and what they had to go through. getting all the way to the polls, even after they had their rights, and then they would have to count the jellybeans in the jar just to go in. >> stahl: they weren't allowed to vote if they couldn't guess how many jellybeans were in a jar? >> tyson: yes. >> stahl: desmond meade also got emotional when he registered-- >> this represents me being a citizen again! >> stahl: --but the euphoria was short lived. several months later, after a reported 12,600 felons registered, mostly as democrats, florida's republican legislature passed a law called sb7066 to clarify the amendment. why did it need clarification? >> jeff brandes: we needed to parse through the law and figure

out what "all terms of sentence" meant. >> stahl: republican state senator jeff brandes, who helped write the law, says it defines" all terms of sentence" as more than just time served, parole and probation. it also means that felons have to pay their financial penalties. and so, out of nearly 1.5 million felons who regained the right to vote, 774,000 lost the right because of debt. if you have some money, you get to vote. if you don't have money, you don't get to vote. is that right? >> brandes: well, that's not really the question in florida. the question in florida is, "are you a felon?" and if you are a felon, "have you completed all terms of your sentence?" part of that sentence included fines, fees and restitution. all we've said is, "they must complete all terms of their sentence," which is exactly what the voters voted for in the state of florida.

>> stahl: i think a lot of 'em didn't quite understand this part about paying off-- >> brandes: well, then the question is, was the constitutional amendment ambiguous? possibly. >> stahl: early on, advocates of the amendment also said that financial obligations are part of the sentence, because florida lets felons pay their debts long after their probation and parole are over. but the new law says so long as that debt is still owed, felons can't vote. how much does the average ex felon owe in terms of money? >> meade: from what we're seeing, the majority of folks, anywhere in the neighborhood of around $1,500. >> stahl: and can most of these ex-felons afford that? >> meade: no, i would say that they couldn't. >> stahl: isn't it unconstitutional to make someone pay to vote? >> meade: the 24th amendment, i believe made that unconstitutional, that you

should not. but unfortunately, that's what we're facing here in florida. >> stahl: the new law mandates that felons certify they're good to vote, in other words: that they've paid up. lying on the form, well, in florida that's a felony. but here's the rub- a lot of these felons can't find out how much they owe in fees, fines, and restitution. like pastor tyson. right now, do you have any outstanding fees or fines or any money you owe? >> tyson: miss stahl, nobody knows. this is the problem. there is no way of tracking who paid what for the last 40 years. >> stahl: that's because each of florida's 67 counties has its own archive of sentencing documents-- this one's in hillsborough county. with no one centralized system,

records can be missing, conflicting, inaccurate, or scattered. and restitution to victims is often not tracked at all. we saw old debts handwritten on index cards; some are only available on microfiche. we visited a hotline in orlando run by felons who help other felons figure out how much they owe so they can register to vote. clearing one case can take up to three weeks. >> chaz: so if they have four separate felonies in four separate counties, two of those counties may be very helpful and, "sure. whatever information you need. how can we help?" while the other two are just draconian and slow, and seemingly unwilling to help us in our quest to help these returning citizens. >> stahl: pastor tyson sued

florida to get his right to vote back, after trying in vain to figure out how much he owed. >> tyson: i'm represented by about 30 lawyers between the brennan law group, naacp, array of people. and they can't find out. >> stahl: this is crazy. >> tyson: it's crazy but it's designed. to me, it's like a poll tax. okay? voter suppression. >> stahl: whose vote are they trying to suppress? >> tyson: black and brown, lower income voters, it affects them most. >> stahl: what do you say to people who argue that the law, sb 7066, is kind of like the roadblocks that were put up for black voting back in jim crow days, where there were literacy tests and poll taxes and jelly bean tests, all kinds of hurdles to voting? >> brandes: i have worked every year to try to improve the lives

of those people involved in the criminal justice system in florida. and even in this piece of legislation, i have tried to create opportunities for individuals who can't pay- or have some financial difficulty paying-- to go back to the court and convert them to community service or to go to the court and ask for those fines and fees to be reduced. >> stahl: but the election's coming up. there's a cut-off for registration, october 5. and a lot of these people cannot find out to this day what they owe. >> brandes: well, i think that's where we need to be working with local clerks of court, and moving this process along as quickly as possible. >> stahl: in may, a judge ruled in pastor tyson's favor, saying that florida has created an" unconstitutional pay-to-vote system." but this month, an appellate court reversed that judgment, saying the law is "legitimate" and constitutional. both sides expect this will end

up in the supreme court. but for now, even though amendment four passed with overwhelming bipartisan support, most felons in florida won't get to vote in november. so desmond meade is raising money to pay off the debts of felons who want to vote, from people like john legend, lebron james, and michael jordan, as well as michael bloomberg who has raised a reported $16 million for the effort. >> meade: if the courts, the state of florida, want to hold our democracy hostage in florida, we've got patriots around this country that's gonna step up and say, "you know what? we gonna pay these people fines and fees. we're gonna free democracy. we're gonna pay the ransom." >> stahl: he's collected at least $23 million, which he estimates will clear over 20,000 felons. that's led florida's republican attorney general to question whether the donations are an illegal incentive to vote.

desmond meade paid off his debt, so last month, in the florida primary, he finally got to vote i'm going to read you what you said at the time: "when i went in there to vote, i didn't just take my family in there with me, i brought all of my ancestors that were hung on trees, that were burned, that was bitten by dogs, that was sprayed by fire hoses. i brought their spirit with me in there." >> meade: our people went through that. we've been constantly fighting. amendment four was nothing but a continuation of the civil rights fights. and we're still fighting. ( ticking ) advanced non-small cell lung cancer can take away so much. but today there's a combination of two immunotherapies you can take first. one that could mean... a chance to live longer. opdivo plus yervoy is for adults newly diagnosed

with non-small cell lung cancer that has spread and that tests positive for pd-l1 and does not have an abnormal egfr or alk gene. it's the first and only approved chemo-free combination of two immunotherapies that works together in different ways to harness the power of the immune system. opdivo plus yervoy equals a chance for more days. more nights. more beautiful weekends. more ugly sweaters. more big hugs. more small outings. opdivo and yervoy can cause your immune system to attack normal organs and tissues in your body and affect how they work. this may happen during or after treatment has ended and can become serious and lead to death. some of these problems may happen more often when opdivo is used with yervoy. see your doctor right away if you have a new or worse cough; chest pain; shortness of breath; diarrhea; severe stomach pain; nausea or vomiting; dizziness; fainting; extreme tiredness; weight changes; constipation; excessive thirst; changes in urine or eyesight; rash; itching; confusion; memory problems; muscle pain or weakness; joint pain; flushing; fever;

or tingling in hands and feet. these are not all the possible side effects. tell your doctor about all your medical conditions including immune system problems, or if you've had an organ transplant or lung, breathing, or liver problems. here's to a chance for more together time. a chance to live longer. ask your doctor about opdivo plus yervoy. thank you to all involved in our clinical trials. i'm a delivery operations manager in san diego, california. we were one of the first stations to pilot a fleet of electric vehicles. we're striving to deliver a package with zero emissions into the air. i feel really proud of the impact that has on the environment. we have two daughters and i want to do everything i can to protect the environment so hopefully they can have a great future.

plan matters more than ever. unitedhealthcare medicare advantage plans have so much to take advantage of. see a doctor from the comfort and safety of home with zero copay. call today to get more of the care you need.

>> sharyn alfonsi: this summer, federal agents arrested president trump's former chief strategist, steve bannon, on a yacht off the coast of connecticut. bannon and three others are accused of defrauding donors to we build the wall, a conservative fundraising campaign that raised millions of dollars to privately build sections of wall on the border with mexico. prosecutors say the defendants took hundreds of thousands of dollars from the fund for their own personal use. they've plead not guilty. before the arrests, we build the wall had completed two walls. less than a mile in new mexico and three miles in texas. tonight, you will hear about the contractor who built both of those walls, fisher sand and gravel out of north dakota and how they leveraged those jobs to earn billions of dollars in government contracts with support from president trump. last month, reports surfaced that one of their private walls was falling apart.

so, we went to mission, texas, to see for ourselves. we drove over the flood levee, down a dusty road that dead-ends at a sugar cane farm. and there it was. the so-called "wall" looks more like a fence. it's steel spine curves three miles down the banks of the rio grande and stretches upwards of 18 feet high. it sits on private property, so the only way for us to get a better look is from the water. from here, it appears fine. but javier pena, an attorney who represents neighboring land owners, noticed erosion from summer storms was quite literally covered up. he hired engineers to inspect it. what have you seen? >> javier pena: massive erosion. there's cracks in the foundation. the foundation is crumbling. there was an eight foot hole under the fence. there are these trenches all along the wall, the sand just washing away. from the experts that have actually reviewed the site there is no differing opinions. >> alfonsi: what is the opinion?

>> pena: that it's not a question of whether it will fail, it's when it's going to fail and it already started to fail. >> alfonsi: to understand why this is happening, pena says you have to go back to the fall of 2019 when a character called foreman mike, from florida, a mouthpiece for we build the wall's fundraising drive, showed up in mission, texas. >> foreman mike: we're building three and a half miles of wall. the people of texas are rising up because we build the wall and fisher industries are going forward with this build. >> alfonsi: we build the wall was founded by iraq war veteran brian kolfage, a triple amputee. they wanted to raise a billion dollars to "build trump's wall." they targeted mission, texas in the rio grande valley, one of the busiest illegal border crossing areas in the country. >> foreman mike: all along the border, we're here building, you've got to help out. >> pena: they had started producing the videos promoting this project. and they were on the property. they started clearing the property before anyone really knew what was going on. >> alfonsi: the company clearing the river bank to build the private wall was fisher sand and

gravel. tommy fisher, the company's c.e.o., had been trying and failing to land a lucrative border wall contract from the government since 2017, when the trump administration began soliciting wall design concepts. fisher was one of the companies to put up a prototype. officials at the department of homeland security said it had design flaws. a second bid was also rejected. frustrated, tommy fisher took another approach. >> tommy fisher: we really believe with our patent pending system we can bring sexy back to construction. >> alfonsi: he became a fixture on fox news, the president's favorite network at the time. >> i love it! >> alfonsi: at times, sounding less like a contractor and more like a contestant on a reality show, pandering to an audience of one. >> fisher: you know, hopefully the president will see this as well and he's a guy who says he can cut through bureaucracy. >> alfonsi: two weeks after that appearance on fox, in april of 2019... >> i don't know if you heard about this contractor that said he can build the whole wall for a lot cheaper than anybody else?

>> yes, i am, we're dealing with him actually. it's fisher. comes from north dakota. recommended strongly by a great new senator as you know, kevin cramer. >> alfonsi: by may of 2019, tommy fisher had the president's attention but still couldn't land a contract to build the government's wall. the army corps of engineers, which oversees border wall construction, pointed to the company's lack of experience buiding border walls. to prove they could, fisher teamed up with we build the wall. first in new mexico, and later, here on the banks of the rio grande in mission. building on the banks of any river is difficult but building on the raging rio grande is especially challenging, made more complicated because the u.s.-mexico border runs straight down the middle of it. so any plans to build on it must be approved by the international boundary and water commission or i.b.w.c. fisher sand and gravel didn't

get that approval before they started bulldozing. what steps did they skip? >> pena: all of them. >> alfonsi: what should they have done?? >> pena: they should've gone to the i.b.w.c., to the e.p.a., and presented their plan, an actual plan. >> alfonsi: what about this idea that, you know, this is private money being used on private land and a landowner can do whatever he wants to do-- >> pena: they absolutely can do whatever they want on their property as long as it doesn't affect other people's property. >> alfonsi: and you think the wall infringes on other-- >> pena: clearly does. the way the bollards were built, it's going to cause clogging of that wall. >> alfonsi: so those bollards, trash or debris could get stuck in there and then the water's going to change direction? >> pena: it's a giant rake, just like a rake in your yard. and it's going to catch all that debris and redirect that water. >> alfonsi: pena filed a lawsuit on behalf of a neighboring wildlife refuge called the national butterfly center, which feared the wall would cause flooding to its property. the u.s. government also sued on behalf of the i.b.w.. good walls make good neighbors,

but this wall did not. >> foreman mike: we've got rogue priests running around, anti- trump, anti-wall. >> alfonsi: we build the wall's brian kolfage launched attacks against anyone who opposed their wall, falsely saying the national butterfly center was the site of a "rampant sex trade." and that the army corps of engineers was part of the "deep state." he even took aim at father roy snipes, a local priest who opposed the trump wall, accusing him of promoting child trafficking. also not true. we build the wall people came after you personally. >> roy snipes: isn't that something? i didn't even know who they were. >> alfonsi: they're coming after the local priest. >> snipes: yeah. i guess they're not from around here, 'cause from around here, we can-- even mom and dad can disagree about things without being mean and nasty. >> alfonsi: last december, brian kolfage bragged in an interview that we build the wall had a direct line to the white house. >> brian kolfage: we have chris kobach and steve bannon and a lot of people that are tied in with the trump administration so we are able to back channel things to the administration and

let them know what we're doing. >> alfonsi: but what they were doing was falling apart. a recent engineering inspection, after summer storms, revealed deep gashes under the foundation of the wall. that's marianna trevino-wright, who runs the butterfly center, lying underneath it. >> trevino-wright: this was a normal seasonal rainfall. >> alfonsi: and what happened to the wall?? >> trevino-wright: the foundation washed out from under enormous sections of it. >> alfonsi: his attorney said after this that this is just a normal part of new construction. >> trevino-wright: if you walked out of your new house and had a 30 foot hole under your home foundation, would you consider that normal?? >> alfonsi: there's the end of the wall right there, there's nothing to stop you from just walking around. the fisher wall doesn't attach to anything on either side. we were there while part of the federal government wall project was being built, directly behind fisher's wall, on top of the levee to protect it from flooding.

rudy karisch is the recently retired station chief for the border patrol in the rio grande valley. so you were the station chief when tommy fisher started building his private wall. >> rudy karisch: yes >> alfonsi: did at any point get a chance to look at the specs before it was built? did they ever-- >> karisch: no. it should not be placed directly on a river to where when you get a heavy rainstorm-- you have a probability of having that fence washed away. >> alfonsi: i mean, a kid builds a sandcastle on the edge of the ocean, they know what's going to happen, right? >> karisch: yes, correct. >> alfonsi: karisch wasn't the only one at customs with concerns about fisher's work. in a leaked memo about the private walls, customs officers reported fisher inflated claims about the quality and speed of his work "due to lack of experience." we wanted to ask him about that, but tommy fisher did not respond to our request for an interview. earlier this month, he did speak to the washington post and told them that he paid $20 to $30 million to build the wall in mission and that his partners at we build the wall only sent him

a single payment for $1.5 million, far short of what he was expecting. he says he cut ties with the group even before steve bannon and brian kolfage were arrested for fraud. he's denied any involvement and hasn't been charged. but tommy fisher's showcase wall seems to have paid off. despite questions about his partners and the quality of his work, fisher sand and gravel has been awarded almost $2 billion in government contracts to build miles of wall. >> peña: we live in a very divided country right now. we build the wall, kolfage, and fisher took advantage of that, found a way to target that fight and profit off of it. >> alfonsi: and when you say profit. it's not just-- filling the coffers of we build the wall. i mean, fisher now has almost two billion dollars of contracts to build more walls-- >> peña: of taxpayer-funded contracts to build more walls when this wall is already

falling down. >> alfonsi: so how did that happen? three former administration officials tell "60 minutes" that president trump "pressured" government officials to direct wall contracts to fisher sand and gravel. those same sources say that on march 7th, 2019, the president summoned d.h.s. officials and lt. general todd semonite, who ran the army corps of engineers, to the oval office. sources inside the room say the president wanted to know why tommy fisher, who promised he could build the wall cheaper and faster, wasn't selected to build it and "exploded into a tirade." they say d.h.s. officials explained to the president that it was inappropriate for the president to influence the bidding process. but according to those sources, the "pressure continued" with a handwritten note from the president, an email from his personal secretary and calls from his son-in-law, jared kushner. administration officials did not respond to our request for a

comment. fisher sand and gravel was awarded the single largest border wall contract, $1.3 billion. congressman bennie thompson, a democrat from mississippi, is the chairman of the house committee on homeland security. what is the problem with the president advocating for a specific contractor? >> bennie thompson: it's against the procurement regulations of the federal government. >> alfonsi: fisher sand and gravel has a checkered past. in 2009, the company admitted to tax fraud. they've racked up thousands of environmental and safety violations in six states, and almost $2 million in fines. do those things figure in typically when you're-- when you're deciding who should get a contract? >> thompson: fisher could potentially have been debarred from bidding on any federal contracts. but they weren't. the president made no bones about his support for fisher. and guess what?

fisher got the contract. it speaks for itself. >> alfonsi: sources also told us that republican senator kevin cramer of north dakota had been aggressively trying to steer contracts to fisher sand and gravel. they say senator cramer demanded sensitive information from the army corps of engineers about competing bids. >> thompson: when some of those documents you request-- gives an individual a potential unfair advantage in the procurement process, then i think that has to be reviewed. >> alfonsi: we asked the inspector we asked the inspector general to look at it. senator cramer says he was just exercising congressional oversight and gave fisher no information. the department of defense inspector general's investigation is ongoing. >> peña: they need to look at tommy fisher's and brian kolfage's and bannon's own words when they say that they were working back channels with the trump administration to get these contracts.

>> alfonsi: you know, they might say it's-- that's just politics. >> peña: that's not politics. that's corruption. that's the swamp that trump claimed he was going to be draining. ( ticking ) >> cbs presented by progressive insurance, i'm james brown with the scores. the niners easily defend the giants, eagles and bengals remain winless after a rare tie. going the browns d dominating with five takeaways in their triumph over washington. for 24/7 news and highlights go to cbs sportses hq.com. really paid off this time. nah, just got lucky. so did the thompsons. that faulty wiring could've cost them a lot more than the mudroom. thankfully they bundled their motorcycle with their home and auto. they're protected 24/7.

mm. what do you say? one more game of backgammon? [ chuckles ] not on your life. [ laughs ] ♪ when the lights go down my 9:12 no-days-off migraine medicine. it's ubrelvy. the migraine medicine i can take anytime, anywhere migraine strikes without worrying if it's too late, or where i am. one dose of ubrelvy works fast. it can quickly stop my migraine in its tracks within two hours-relieving pain and debilitating symptoms. unlike older medicines, ubrelvy is a pill that directly blocks cgrp protein, believed to be a cause of migraine. do not take with strong cyp3a4 inhibitors. few people had side effects.

most common were nausea and tiredness. migraine hits hard. hit back with ubrelvy. the anytime, anywhere migraine medicine. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

and raise property taxes w$11 billion a year? ♪ small businesses get saddled with big tax bills they can't pay. they're forced to cut jobs. or, pass on higher costs to consumers. that means we pay more for everything like gas, food, utilities and health care. and the cost of living in california gets even more expensive. now is the wrong time to raise taxes on californians. vote no on prop. 15.

( ticking ) >> anderson cooper: for nearly 70 years, sir david attenborough has been exploring the planet, taking hundreds of millions of television viewers on eye- opening journeys through the natural world. jungles and island archipelagos, deserts and deep under the sea, no place has been too remote, no animal too elusive, for sir

david and his talented team of filmmakers to document. the man known as a national treasure in his native britain is 94 years old now, but age and the pandemic haven't slowed him down. he's coming out with a new book and a remarkable and stunning new film, "a life on our planet," which premieres on netflix next week. they are what he calls, a witness statement, a first-hand account of what he has seen happen to the planet and a dire warning of what he believes awaits us if we don't act quickly to save it. >> david attenborough: the living world is a unique and spectacular marvel. >> cooper: in his new film, sir david attenborough's voice is the same... >> attenborough: of million kinds of-- >> cooper: ...sonorous and soulful, reassuringly familiar, >> dazzling in their variety and richness. >> cooper: but his message is uncharacteristically alarming. >> attenborough: the way we

humans live on earth, is sending it into a decline. human beings have overrun the world. we're replacing the wild with the tame. our planet is headed for disaster. >> cooper: you call the film "a witness statement." a witness statement is given when a crime has been committed. >> attenborough: yeah, well, a crime has been committed. and-- and it so happens that- i'm of such an age, that i was able to see it beginning. and so it isn't that i enjoy saying, "doom, doom, doom." on the contrary, i'd much rather enjoy-- take thrill, excitement, pleasure, joy, joy, joy, joy. but if you've got any sense of responsibility, you can't do that. >> cooper: sir david spoke to us via zoom near his home in london where he's been living in isolation due to the pandemic. i imagine you living in a house

full of things that you have collected from travels around the world a sort of cabinet of curiosities. >> attenborough: well, that is true in the sense. and-- and certainly i've got a cellar full of rock. lots of rocks. and sometimes you pick it up and you say, "good lord, "what on earth is this, or indeed, why on earth would i have bothered to pick this up. >> cooper: he studied geology and zoology in college, and was working as a producer at the bbc in 1954, when he convinced his bosses to let him loose and start traveling the world. he was just 28 years old. >> attenborough: wherever i went there was wilderness: sparkling coastal seas, vast forests, immense grasslands. you could fly for hours over the untouched wilderness. it was the best time of my life. >> cooper: david attenborough became a household name in 1979

with his ground-breaking bbc series, "life on earth," which was seen by an estimated 500 million people worldwide. >> attenborough: i know it sounds like a publicist slogan, but it is the greatest story ever told. it's the story of how life developed on this planet and led to you and me sitting here, talking across an ocean. >> cooper: viewers were drawn in by attenborough's enthusiasm and sense of wonder. this was his first filmed encounter with endangered mountain gorillas in rwanda. >> attenborough: it's really very unfair that man should have chosen the gorilla to symbolize all that is aggressive and violent, when that's the one thing that the gorilla is not and that we are. i remember it very vividly. they ended up, two of them, sitting on me. two of the babies sitting on me. was i alarmed?

was i frightened? was i-- concerned that the mother of those two baby chimps was going to turn on me? not at all. not for a microsecond. it was the biggest compliment i can remember receiving. "you are-- you are being accepted into that family." and it was unforgettable. >> cooper: unforgettable moments in the wild is what sir david attenborough has become. >> boo! >> cooper: there is barely a corner of the earth he hasn't been to, or a species he hasn't shown us in a new way. he's done more than just bring the natural world into our homes, he's helped us make sense of it... >> attenborough: they are on parade. >> cooper: given it a story... >> attenborough: she's seen enough. >> cooper: ...full of characters and complexity, not to mention excitement. take a look at this from bbc's "planet earth ii."

>> attenborough: a snake's eyes aren't very good. so if the hatchling keeps its nerve it may just avoid detection. >> cooper: i saw that on a plane. and i started talking to the person next to me in my seat saying, "you have to watch this, this is extraordinary." they thought i was crazy. >> attenborough: well, i mean, it's-- the job of a narrator for natural history films is-- is a great-- is-- is a bit of a doddle. i mean, it's-- >> cooper: a bit of a doddle? >> attenborough: a bit of a d-- a piece of cake, how's that? it's really pretty easy. because the animals are so fantastic. >> cooper: sir david has always been an animal advocate. in the early 1960's he was a founding member of the world wildlife fund, but in his films, he rarely focused on the destruction of their habitat or climate change. you were skeptical of-- of climate change and i think that's-- that's interesting, because i think it makes your warnings now all the more powerful. >> attenborough: yeah, yeah,

certainly so. and if you're going to make a statement about the world, you better make sure that it isn't just your own personal reaction. and the only way you can do it, do that, is to see the-- the work of scientists around the world who are taking observation as to what's happening. as to what's happening to temperature, what's happening to humidity, what's happening to radioactivity, and what's happening ecologically? >> cooper: you've said that-- that "climate change is the greatest threat facing the planet for thousands of years." >> attenborough: yes. even the biggest and most awful things that humanity has done, civili-- so-called civilizations have done, pale to significance, when you think of what could be around the corner, unless we pull ourselves together. deserts in africa have been spreading. there could be whole areas of the world, where people can no longer safely live. the hottest temperatures yet recorded-- in death valley and yet we s-- are such optimists

that we say, we go to bed at night and say, "ah, well, that was exceptional. gosh, that was interesting, wasn't it? that was the highest temperature. good lord. well, that's the end of that." not at all. wait. wait another few months. wait another year. see again. >> cooper: over the years sir david has repeatedly visited australia's great barrier reef. >> attenborough: a coral reef is one of the most dramatic and beautiful and complex manifestations of life you can find anywhere. >> cooper: but on his last trip he was stunned by what he saw. >> attenborough: we went on this reef, which i knew. and it was like a cemetery. because all the corals had died. they died because of a rise in temperature and acidity. >> cooper: there are still people who are gonna see this and say, "well, look-- it's not that bad. and technology--" >> attenborough: who are these people who are saying this? >> cooper: ...and technology wil evolve to come up with some sort of a solution that we can't even imagine? >> attenborough: no. we live in a finite world.

ultimately we depend upon the natural world for every mouthful of food that we eat and indeed every lung full of air that we breathe. i mean, if it wasn't for the natural world the atmosphere would be depleted from oxygen tomorrow. if there were no trees around-- we would suffocate. i mean-- and actually, in the course of this-- particular pandemic that we're going through, i think people are discovering that they need the natural world for their very sanity. people who have never listened to a bird song, are suddenly thrilled, excited, supported, inspired by the natural world. and they realize they're not apart from it. they are part of it. >> cooper: so, by saving nature, we are saving ourselves. >> attenborough: oh, without question. >> cooper: you say in the film, "we're not just ruining the world, we've destroyed it."

is it-- is it that far gone? >> attenborough: it's not beyond redemption. >> cooper: redemption, he says, depends on a complete shift to renewable energy and an end of our reliance on fossil fuels. the fossil fuel industry does not want the world to move off fossil fuels. >> attenborough: no, it doesn't, but in fact we know ways in which we can get from the sun up tere just a tiny fraction of the amount of energy that sprays on this earth 24 hours a day one way or-- or another, for nothing. if we can-- solve the problems of storage and transmission, the world is ours. we have all the power we need. why should we go on poisoning life on earth? >> cooper: it sounds simple when you say it. >> attenborough: so it is. >> cooper: sir david also wants to see what he calls a" rewilding" of the planet, giving plants and animals on land and

in the ocean time and space to bounce back. the world wildlife fund says that two thirds of the earth's wildlife has disappeared in the past 50 years. >> attenborough: repopulation of the oceans can happen like that, in-- a decade. if we had the will to do it. but we require everybody to agree that. >> cooper: if you were to pick up the phone and speak with president trump or-- or president xi of china or prime minister modi in-- in india, what would you say? >> attenborough: i would say that the time has come-- to put aside national ambitions and look for an international ambition of survival. >> cooper: it seems politically the tide is moving in the opposite direction from that, of-- of nations more looking inward and not as being part of a larger international community. >> attenborough: that's what's gonna sink us in the end.

that's what's gonna sink us. >> cooper: can you be optimistic at all? >> attenborough: we don't have an alternative. i mean-- what good does it do to say, "oh, to hell with it, i don't care." you can't say that. not if-- not if-- if you-- if you love your children. not if you love the rest of human-- how can you say that? >> cooper: it's the young that sir david now puts his faith in, and they, it seems, have faith in him. ( cheers and applause ) just listen to the reception he received last year when he popped up on stage at britain's largest music festival. >> attenborough: thank you! thank you very much! ( cheers and applause ) there's a huge movement around the world of people from all nations, young people who can see what is happening to the world, and demanding that their government should take action. and that's-- that's the best hope that i have. i mean, it's-- obviously my generation failed. we've allowed it to happen.

>> cooper: we've allowed this to happen, sir david attenborough says, despite being the smartest creatures that have ever lived. now, he warns, we need more than just intelligence. we need wisdom. after all, this planet is all we have there is nowhere else to go. do you believe there's life elsewhere? >> attenborough: no, not really. but also, i think-- that's-- i mean, it's an interesting theoretical question, but it's a theoretical question. why would i want to go and live on the moon when i've got this world of badgers and thrushes and jellyfish and corals and-- why would i want to go and live on the moon? because there's nothing else there but dust, i'd say, "well, thank you very much, i'll stay where i am and watch hummingbirds." ( ticking ) >> why sir david attenborough is optimistic about the future.

>> i think we have some hope. >> at 60minutesovertime.com. but when i started seeing things, i didn't know what was happening... so i kept it in. he started believing things that weren't true. i knew something was wrong... but i didn't say a word. during the course of their disease around 50% of people with parkinson's may experience hallucinations or delusions. but now, doctors are prescribing nuplazid. the only fda approved medicine... proven to significantly reduce hallucinations and delusions related to parkinson's. don't take nuplazid if you are allergic to its ingredients. nuplazid can increase the risk of death in elderly people with dementia-related psychosis and is not for treating symptoms unrelated to parkinson's disease. nuplazid can cause changes in heart rhythm and should not be taken if you have certain abnormal heart rhythms or take other drugs that are known to cause changes in heart rhythm. tell your doctor about any changes in medicines you're taking. the most common side effects are swelling of the arms and legs and confusion. we spoke up and it made all the difference.

ask your parkinson's specialist about nuplazid. but she wanted someone who loves with the cats.ng. so, we got griswalda. dinner's almost ready. but one thing we could both agree on was getting geico to help with our renters insurance. yeah, switching and saving was really easy! drink it all up. good! could have used a little salt. visit geico.com and see how easy saving on renters insurance can be. neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair®. we've got the retinol that gives you results in one week. not just any retinol. accelerated retinol sa. one week is all it takes. neutrogena®.

>> stahl: next sunday on "60 minutes," comedian jerry seinfeld has spent a career observing the absurdities of life. now, jon wertheim asks seinfeld about finding comedy in the age of covid. >> jerry seinfeld: the first thing they told you-- remember, they don't say it anymore, but they said, "don't touch your face." okay, so we're gonna stop the whole world, and you can't-- you can't do this. but don't do this. how-- how do you not do this when they tell we're-- we're shutting down the world, but don't go, "oh my god. oh, my god." >> stahl: i'm lesley stahl. we'll be back next week with another edition of "60 minutes." i felt like... ...i was just fighting an uphill battle in my career. so when i heard about the applied digital skills courses, i'm thinking i can become more marketable. you don't need to be a computer expert to be great at this. these are skills lots of people can learn.

i feel hopeful about the future now. ♪ ♪ think it ♪ solve it ♪ try and crack it ♪ breathe it ♪ calm it ♪ and renew it aarp staying sharp is part of renew active. get medicare with more. ♪ ♪ ♪

captioning funded by cbs and ford. we go further, so you can.

captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org >> previously on big brother all stars... three secret powers were hidden in the bb basement and dani found the replay. >> i have the replay power, which gives me the opportunity to play in the outgoing hoh play in the new hoh competition. >> the committee alliance of six was completely dominating, and their winning streak continued when memphis won hoh. >> congratulations, memphis. you are the new head of household. >> so he put up two people not in their crew. >> i nominated you devon and you kevin. >> looking toward the end game,