captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> ifill: good evening, i'm gwen ifill. >> woodruff: and i'm judy woodruff. >> ifill: on the newshour tonight: it's a super tuesday sequel. voters in five states head to the polls as candidates count on tonight's results to save or seal their presidential ambitions. >> woodruff: also ahead this tuesday, as russia begins to withdraw forces from syria, we look at the prospects for peace talks as that devastating civil war enters its sixth year. >> ifill: and, how elite schools are boosting student diversity by attracting military veterans. >> we're capable of more than what we've been pigeonholed into. i think it's important to know that we're not just, you know, these broken people coming back, incapable of succeeding within society.

>> woodruff: all that and more on tonight's pbs newshour. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> lincoln financial-- committed to helping you take charge of your financial future.

>> and with the ongoing support of these institutions: >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> woodruff: five big states come to the fore on this tuesday night, and six candidates are waiting for their judgment. it could move frontrunners closer to wrapping up the races, or give challengers new life. >> we're going to win, i feel terrific! >> woodruff: the message was positive this morning from john kasich in westerville, ohio. the governor is aiming for a home-state win that slows republican front-runner donald trump. >> there were probably missed opportunities to get attention early on, but by continuing to run the race the positive campaign is now starting to shine through like a beacon all over the country.

>> woodruff: ohio is one of five states going to the polls, along with florida, missouri, illinois and north carolina. in all on the republican side, 358 delegates are up for grabs. trump started the day picking up nine delegates in caucuses held in the northern mariana islands in the pacific, for a total of 469. winning big tonight could give him an insurmountable lead toward the 1,237 needed for the nomination. that would mean beating kasich in ohio, and trump sounded confident today in a phone interview with abc's "good morning america." >> i think we're going to do well in ohio for all of those reasons. your steel industry has died, your coal industry has died. i think we're going to do really >> woodruff: meanwhile, marco rubio is pinning his remaining hopes on his home state, florida, although recent polls had him flagging. and ted cruz, with the most

first-place finishes aside from trump, has his eyes on strong showings in illinois, missouri and north carolina. on the democratic side, bernie sanders began his day in illinois. the vermont senator is coming off an upset win in michigan, and talked of achieving similar results tonight. >> i think that if there's a i think that in the states that are coming down the pike we have great opportunities to win many of them so we're feeling really good. >> woodruff: hillary clinton was in north carolina, where she urged her supporters to turn out. you know somebody might say well my candidate is so far ahead i don't need to come out, but everybody should come out. there's so much at stake in this election. mocratic nomination.hee 2,383dy we'll hear from reporters in several key states, after the news summary. >> ifill: in the day's other news, the language and violence in the presidential campaign

drew criticism today from both parties in washington. president obama spoke at an annual st. patrick's day luncheon. without directly mentioning donald trump, he deplored what he called the campaign's "vulgar and divisive" rhetoric. >> while some maybe more to blame than others for the current climate, all of us are responsible for reversing it. for it is a cycle that is not an accurate reflection of america, and it has to stop. >> ifill: on the republican side, senate majority leader mitch mcconnell said he spoke to trump by telephone about attacks on protesters at his rallies. >> we had a good conversation and i mentioned to him that i thought it would be a good idea for him, no matter who starts these violent episodes, to condemn it and discourage it. >> ifill: trump has rejected criticism that he is sowing division. instead, he says he's a "uniter." >> woodruff: the obama

administration and its interior department, in a major policy reversal, today banned oil drilling in the atlantic ocean. a plan floated a year ago would have opened drilling lease areas off virginia, the carolinas and georgia. today the department dropped the plan, citing local opposition, plus military and commercial interests. >> ifill: also today, the administration eased the trade embargo on cuba again, five days before president obama travels to havana. the announcement ends the ban on cuban access to international banking. it also opens the way for cubans to play major league baseball, and to relax limits on travel to cuba. >> woodruff: hundreds of migrants who crossed into macedonia from greece yesterday, were forcibly returned today. the group of about 700 had bypassed a border fence and forded a river to gain entry, but they were made to walk back to greece. one syrian woman said she had to shelter her children under plastic bags overnight.

>> ( translated ): they told us walk, keep walking, they'll let us in, and we'll be done with all the rain and the cold, but they didn't let us through. we got scared for our children, and up there it's very cold. we didn't have tents or anything with us. >> woodruff: other refugees said they were beaten and stunned pwin forces. >> ifill: the u.s. military now confirms a top islamic state commander has died after being severely wounded in eastern syria. omar al-shishani, an ethnic chechen, was targeted by a u.s. air strike on march 4. a news agency affiliated with isis denied the report of his death. >> woodruff: in myanmar, half a century of military domination formally ended, as parliament elected u htin kyaw to be president. he's a close ally of pro- democracy leader aung san suu kyi. lawmakers broke into thunderous applause when the result was announced. suu kyi says the new president

will act as her proxy because she is constitutionally barred from the office. >> ifill: back in this country, the washington, d.c. subway system announced an emergency shutdown starting at midnight, due to safety concerns. officials ordered an inspection of all electrical components on the tracks, after two fires in the last year. the shutdown runs at least into early thursday morning. >> woodruff: the national football league today backed an executive who's acknowledged a link between football and the brain diseases like c.t.e. yesterday, the nfl's top health and safety official said research "certainly" shows a connection. today, a spokesman said the comments "accurately reflect" the league's view. >> ifill: and on wall street, the dow jones industrial average gained 22 points to close above 17,250. the nasdaq fell 21 points, and the s&p 500 slipped three. still to come on the newshour: the latest from today's

primaries with the highest stakes. russia's withdrawal and the syrian peace process. the mutual benefits of having more veterans on college campuses, and much more. >> ifill: voters got their say in five key states across the country today. for ohio governor john kasich, today's home state outcome could determine whether his republican campaign continues. and on the democratic side, bernie sanders is angling for an upset. john yang is at kasich headquarters outside of cleveland, and joins us now with the latest. jon, in ohio we're talking about 66 delegates on the republican side, 143 democratic delegates at stake. and yet it seems as if the act they're we have seen throughout this campaign is cutting across both parties. >> john: that's right, gwen. we're in the fieldhouse at the

university here, and in another part of the building, there is voting going on at the polling place. i talked to some of the voters there, and some of the democratic supporters of bernie sanders are expressing the same sorts of things you hear at donald trump rallies. they feel the establishment has failed them. they aren't getting the attention or the benefits they want from the government. it's the flip side of it. i talked to 29-year-old joe dukonowski. he is a software engineer. he told me he makes about $90,000 a year, but because he owes almost as much or a little more in student loans, he feels he can't buy a house. he has health insurance, but the deductible is so high he feels he can't afford to get sick and go to a doctor. he says he's going to be paying off those student loans for so long that once the loans are paid off, he's going to have to start saving for retirement then. he feels that the system has not helped him. he says he feels he's too rich

for the democrats to worry about, too poor for the republicans to worry about him. we heard much the same thing from christine hamlet, a young woman who went to college to be a teacher. unable to find a teacher's job, she's working as an insurance agent. she says she wanted to be a teacher, can't find a job, and now she's going to be paying for it for the rest of her life. she voted for bernie sanders too, but she was voting today because she didn't think she was going to be able to vote for him in november because she thinks the deck is stacked against him and that hillary clinton will get the nomination. >> ifill: briefly, john, do you see any sign of a stop trump movement on the ground? >> >> john: there is some of that. one voter i talked to was a lifelong democrat who took a republican ballot today for the first time in 42 years of voting. he said he's a democratic, but he wanted to vote for john kasich to try to stop donald trump. he said it's first time he ever

asked for a democratic ballot. i asked him how it felt. he said he felt his father spinning in his grave. >> ifill: you talked to john kasich briefly at the polling place. do you have a sense that this is do or die, that he thinks it's do or die for him? >> oh, he knows that if he doesn't pull it out today it's all over for him. he talked about the pride he felt as a young... as man from a small town in pennsylvania voting for himself today for president. he also said that he is still proud of the fact that he ran this positive campaign, the byte you heard earlier. he knows he missed some opportunities for attention, but he says if he goes on, he's going to be harsher and tougher on what he calls the very disturbing rhetoric of donald trump on minorities and on women. >> ifill: john yang doing great work out there for us. we'll talk to you again. >> woodruff: florida is a make or break moment for senator marco rubio's campaign. hilary clinton is expected to continue her southern sweep with

a win the state. joining us from tallahassee is matt dixon, florida bureau chief for politico. so, matt, first of all, the republicans, why does donald trump seem to be doing so well in florida? >> i think sort of the feel that we've seen nationally and previous early states is absolutely showing up here in florida. one of the sort of best numbers to exemplify that going into election day, about 1.1 million republicans had voted by mail or early voting. 23% of those, nearly one quarter of that, had not voted in the past three elections or the past three primaries. so the electorate is expanding and folks who have not historically voted are voting in fairly large numbers here. and i think that speaks well for trump and certainly to a lesser extell the senator cruz. >> woodruff: quickly, matt, what do voters say to you about why donald trump? >> i feel the same sort of sentiment that we just heard

from ohio is very much evident here, as well. there's large pockets of the state. south florida, which is a stronghold for senator rubio, might have a bit less of this, but in large sort of northern swaths of conservative north florida, there's the same sort of sentiment, the anti-establishment stuff really bubbling over. the past few election cycles we've kind of heard about it, this idea that the establishment or those who sort of run the political class are mad, but we hadn't seen it sort of personified at the polls the way we are this year. and in florida that's certainly the case. donald trump has a very large lead. there have been a few outliers that have him beating marco rubio by just seven or eight points. but those are outliers. he's had pretty large leads in all recent polls. a lot of the things we've been hearing about for a while now. >> woodruff: so why home state boy marco rubio not doing better than he is? >> well, i think he's kind of

gotten caught up in the wave. to begin with, before senator rubio got in, some people didn't think this was his year when jeb bush was running. there was a lot of people sceptical he was even going to get in and challenge him. once he did, i think he topped a lot of people's expectations. it's just he got caught up like a lot of other folks, including governor bush new york this trump anti-establishment wave. and he's got a few positive signs here and he needs a good showing. one thing going into election day, the hispanic portion of the electorate here is voting 2% to 3% higher than it has in the past or has historically, which would be a good sign for cuban-american marco rubio, but it's not going to be enough more than likely, and if the electorate is doing what it looks like it's going to do in probably a record turnout, he might finish third place to ted cruz. >> woodruff: wow. >> right now he's going to be

fighting for third because it looks like a record tubout in florida, which might not be a great sign for him because that's a lot of few voters. >> woodruff: we're out of time, but hillary clinton seems to be in comfortable shape. we have to leave it there. matt dixon reporting for us. thanks very much. >> thank you. >> ifill: for both the republican and the democratic candidates, the stakes are especially high and uncertain in illinois. for that, we turn to amanda vinicky. statehouse bureau chief for illinois public radio and wuis. she joins us from chicago. we're talking about 69 g.o.p. delegates up for stake in illinois tonight. but there is so much uncertainty about what's happening there. >> yes, there is a lot of uncertainty. so you had early on donald trump ahead in the polls. of course, we had that big chicago rally. that wasn't necessarily an area where he was expected to do well when he was here in chicago on friday of last week. he was walking really into a hotbed of activism right there, but of course that doesn't seem to bother his supporters any.

they love that he isn't concerned about p.c., and he did have a very well-attended rally about 150 miles to the south of chicago in bloomington just days later. the only problem there was that so many people attended apparently a local cemetery nearby became a parking lot and that of course got some locals angry. nonetheless, we have seen ted cruz rising in the polls here and that's largely expected to be because down state illinois really is more... is that typical evangelist, god-fearing rural country. it may with they're turning there. also illinois already has sort of swept into what donald trump is selling with our current governor bruce rouner who campaigned he was a successful businessman that couldn't be bought and self-funded his own campaign, but illinois is in its ninth month without a budget and that's really hurting down state. so that may be what is turning down state voters toward cruz instead of donald trump. >> ifill: we talked about how

marco rubio's home state is florida. john kasich's home state is ohio. an now we have hillary clinton's home state of illinois, which people forget, but this is not a slam dunk for her. >> no. it was largely expected to be. early polls had that. she is a hometown girl, and she really does have most of the illinois democratic leaders, that power base of the chicago cook county "machine" behind her. so it would be huge for both those leaders as well as for hillary clinton if she were to lose. she had her husband, bill clinton, working the polls in chicago this morning. but also this morning bernie sanders was at a very popular chicago restaurant, and he was doing all he can to drum up support. >> ifill: bernie sanders, in addition to talking about trade a lot in these midwestern states, missouri, as well, which votes tonight, has also been bringing attention to her ties to the mayor of chicago, who is not as popular as he once was, to put it mildly. >> to put it mildly.

you're right. this gets back to what i said, that kind of hotbed of activism that donald trump walked into in chicago. there are still a lot of angry, particularly progressives and liberals, about a video that showed chicago police shooting 16 times a black teenager, and there is a belief that mayor emanuel glossed over that and had that come out before his mayoral election, somebody who has been campaigning with bernie sanders, chewy garcia, we may have a different mayor of chicago right now. so, yes, bernie sanders is doing all he can to bring chewy garcia out on the campaign trail with him, and that has led to a whole lot of applause at these chicago rallies. >> ifill: amanda vinicky of illinois public radio and wuis, thank you. >> thank you. >> woodruff: now, to north carolina, where donald trump leads in the polls by double digits. despite controversy surrounding his campaign, he continues to attract strong support. we talked to one family with

differing politics, spanning three generations, to hear why they're going all in for trump. >> this is my first time voting. being 33, that's kind of crazy, but it says a lot. >> i'm actually a registered democrat, but i'm voting for trump this time. >> this is my first time i've ever worked on political campaign. my family members are joining me, my son, my daughter-in-law, my grandchild. it's been such an awesome experience. >> we just thank you that you're going to use donald trump for your glory in your kingdom, father god. >> amen. >> my biggest point is if you want to be here, conform to the country. if you don't want to be here, go home. i was born in montreal, can dark and when i started school, for us, we were told, speak english or you're not going to pass your class. and in today's society, it's like we cater to the people, whatever language they speak. i came in the states, i joined

the military, and then i even went and got naturalized, an i'm very proud to say i'm an american citizen. >> hello. my name is grace. i'm a volunteer for donald trump's presidential campaign here in north carolina. this is a very big military town with fort bragg being right there. my father-in-law and my husband are both veterans, and the whole idea of the care the veterans being subpar is very true. my whole family is supporting trump down to my 11-year-old. >> no other candidate stands up for americans like donald trump. >> it was both our idea for him to stay home from school today so he can see democracy in action. >> do we love north carolina? do we love them? [cheering] beautiful. beautiful. >> crowd: u-s-a, u-s-a! >> i think trump's business savvy, his mind, i think he's going to be the best one that's going to be able to help us.

our family has been impacted in a very big way by the recession. we definitely at times are living paycheck to paycheck. my husband is having hard time finding work, as well. >> it hurts my pride. i'm a person that is used to being able to take care of my family. one of my biggest goals in life is to give my children an easier life than my own, send them to college, get them good degrees, and right now be what i'm making and how little i'm working, i don't know if i'm going to be able to do that. >> we built massive company. oh, no. get out of here. go home to mom. >> all these protesters and all this stuff and people saying he's racist and the black lives matter, you know what, red lives matter, because when you bleed, we all bleed red.

>> he cheers assaults on protesters. this is the very brand of anger that has led other nations into the abyss. >> what mitt romney is doing is only solidifying our reasons why we love donald trump, why we're going to vote for him. >> donald trump is on point when he says this is for the people, this is not for him, that he represents the people and without his people, he wouldn't have nothing. so now we're ready for another day of going out and helping donald trump. >> ifill: you can follow all of today's races on our live results page, and on our homepage, pbs.org/newshour.

>> woodruff: today marks five years since the armed uprising in syria began, before it turned into a full-blown civil war, and this grim anniversary was marked with significant diplomatic and military moves. we start with some background from chief foreign affairs correspondent margaret warner. >> warner: a hero's welcome awaited the first russian pilots to return home from their air campaign in syria. they flew out of syria hours after president vladimir putin's surprise announcement that the main part of russia's several thousand forces would withdraw. >> ( translated ): i believe that the goal set out to the ministry of defense and the armed forces has in large part been fulfilled, and that's why i order the minister of defense to start the pullout. >> warner: moscow has said its six months of intensive bombing was aimed at islamic state forces. but by all accounts, the

principal targets were western- backed and other rebels fighting the government of bashar al- assad. in geneva today, site of talks to resolve the conflict politically, opposition leaders welcomed the russian decision: >> i believe if they are serious about pulling out, this will be an end to dictatorship, it will be an end to crimes in syria and it will help us to put an end to terrorism there in syria. >> warner: syrian officials, meanwhile, insisted putin's move was made "in full coordination" with the assad government. >> woodruff: and margaret joins me now. >> warner: and margaret joins me now. so margaret, u.s. officials think this pullout and do they think it's significant in. >> warner: yes, they do, judy, surprisingly given all the mistrust. they had no advanced notice of this, but there was an obama-putin phone call scheduled for 3:00 p.m. here, and they think it's for real. what they look at was how it was

ballyhooed in russia. they broke into the dinnertime television hour. he proclaimed the troops were coming home and victory. and one of the headlines in russia even said, "mission accomplished," which is, of course, perhaps rueful. secondly, russia had reached a fork in the road militarily, because their theory had been use air strikes and then have syrian forces take ground. the syrian forces didn't turn out to be quite competent enough, so putin was facing a choice, does russian put in ground forces? did not want to get into that quagmire. then there were three, of course, putin on the eve of the syria peace talks, putin has achieved what he really wanted, to be seen as major player in the middle east that has to be reckoned with, number two, and, two, to establish there would not be another leader anywhere in his neighborhood that would be removed by force by western-backed forces. >> woodruff: so why did the sources, you've been talking to americans and russian, why did he do this and why right now? >> warner: they think he did

this now because of the talks beginning right now. and they wanted to send a message to assad, that, look, we've come in, we've helped you, as one official said. they're trying to let assad know, you have to check that it's not a blank check. there's a number in it. and you have to get realistic with the talks. and the foreign minister of syria said last week, a red line for us, there's no discussion of any change in government or that assad might go. and they were just saying, whoa, boy, we're not going to be watching your back that way. so i think that was the number-one thing. there is no love lost between putin and assad. i mean, one of his top officials has been quoted as calling him a bastard and a butcher, not that putin acts for sentimental reasons. and then finally, as i said, he's been recognized... putin, they think putin is ready to do this because he's been recognized as a world power and he will be now more interested in cooperating. >> woodruff: i was asking because people would say,

they're pulling out, why did that go in in the first place if they thought assad was a butcher and a bad actor? >> warner: it was in russian interests. they build an air base and they're keeping troops an planes at both. the u.s. will be monitoring that closery. and they prevented a leader from being deposed. and i think that was the number-one reason. >> woodruff: two other quick things, margaret, effect on the peace talks? >> warner: peace talks, judy, they're not wildly optimistic. one official said to me, it opens the door more to some kind of agreement, but you have all those players, as we all know, the u.s. and the europeans and the russians and the iranians and the opposition in the gulf states. it's a real, as somebody said to me, if it were easy, we wouldn't be here five years from the start of the conflict. >> woodruff: and very quickly, finally, situation on the ground, where does this leave this? >> warner: basically assad is

in a stronger position. the question is can his forces keep and hold the territory that the russians have cleared open for them? they believe the opposition was badly pounded by the russian, so some groups are intact. some are in worse shape. and isil, the u.s. intelligence believes has been slightly weakened, has lost a little more territory, but that was not said with huge confidence. so we are really still on a stalemate on the ground and just hoping that all the sides are so tired that they might be ready to deal. >> woodruff: margaret warner, some terrific reporting. >> warner: thanks. >> ifill: now, offering higher education to those who have served. many americans join the military right out of high school. and once they return, some colleges are now giving them a chance to learn at the country's top-tier schools. special correspondent jackie

judd reports for our weekly education series, "making the grade." >> reporter: this was the classroom that taught nicole leadenham the lessons of war, during deployments in iraq and afghanistan. >> i left for basic training 10 hours after i graduated high school. so that was going to be what i was going to do. >> reporter: today, this is the 34-year old's classroom; vassar college, in new york's hudson valley. >> i think that this is the time that i was meant to be here, at this stage in my life, where i can really take advantage of the academics and you know, learning. >> reporter: leadenham, a junior and one of 30 post 9/11 vets at vassar, is here because president catherine hill wanted to somehow close the education gap between young people who go off to elite campuses like this one and those who enlist and go off to fight the wars.

>> more of the young men and women who are enlisting are coming from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and it just seems to me that part of the reward or the return for doing that is that they get access to education when they come back. >> reporter: did you feel that this grateful nation notion was words and not action? >> i think the evidence absolutely suggested that it was words and not action. >> reporter: the veterans administration says more than one million vets are using g.i. benefits. most attend public or for-profit schools. the number at top-tier colleges and universities is so small it is not even known. a few years back vassar invested in a campaign to attract veterans to apply. none did, even though their education would have been fully paid for. so, the college turned to the posse foundation, which is

expert at reaching non- traditional students. for 25 years, it's been sending groups-or posses-of students to elite colleges; students with academic and leadership potential who don't fit the mold. founder debbie bial thought the same model would work for veterans. >> posse is about helping the top colleges and universities think about how to build a diverse student body. how to get as rich a dialogue going on campus as they possibly can. how to create community and build bridges across the various communities on campus. it made sense to us to include a piece of our population that served the country. >> i think it's going to allow for the trajectory of my life to be more vertical, by virtue of being here. >> reporter: posse veteran michael smith, who grew up on chicago's southside, is a sophomore at wesleyan university in middletown, connecticut. that school joined the program

two years ago. >> by virtue of the educational experience i'm getting. by virtue of the skills i'm developing. and by virtue of the resources that are here-- that i just wouldn't have had access to. >> reporter: before arriving on campus, the veterans go through a kind of boot camp in new york. it is four weeks of preparing for rigorous academics, learning how to craft a college term paper and team building--so the vets know, once they arrive here, they have a circle of support when they need it. there are still hurdles. leadenham needed to brush up on some old, forgotten skills. >> i had problems with knowing how to study. that's a very tangible skill that i didn't have anymore, and i couldn't even remember how i had done it before. so i had gone to my professors' office hours, stuff like that, being like, how can i better absorb the material. >> reporter: another vassar vet, eduardo de la torre, lives off campus with his young family. as the leader of a first

responder medical unit in iraq, he frequently faced life and death situations. with that past experience and his current family obligations, he admits that mixing with other younger students can be awkward. >> they're like, "yeah, we're going to do a study group today, i'll text you later." and the next thing you know, you're getting a text at midnight, "hey we're going to go meet up at the retreat to go study for an hour over this." so it's been difficult building relationships with the students. >> reporter: wesleyan sophomore bryan stascavage found himself in the middle of a full throated culture clash on the very liberal campus. stascavage, an iraq war veteran and a conservative, was vilified after writing a column for the college newspaper critical of black lives matter. >> the veterans that live here at the house with me looked at me wide-eyed like what did you do, what did you write. i knew that the articles that i were writing were not the prevailing opinion on campus.

and i knew that it was only a matter of time when, i like to say, that i connect with a beehive. >> unlike a fighting unit, where you really need cohesion and you all have to point in the same direction, at a university, you can afford dissent and controversy as long as you learn to listen while that's going on. >> reporter: though difficult in the moment, wesleyan president michael roth says the episode ultimately was good for the community. >> that's what you want. because if you're learning to listen, you're learning to learn. >> reporter: it became a teachable moment. >> it became a very teachable moment. >> i don't want to be in an environment where everybody thinks the same as me. because you just don't learn that way. >> i think the military is stereotypically seen as something very conservative, and being in a very liberal campus, you can feel shut off, and you can feel like my voice isn't going to be accepted here, and it's not going to be heard. >> reporter: still, many of the younger, more traditional

students clearly appreciate being exposed to the experience and worldview of their ex- military classmates. >> i think it's great because it gives a lot of different perspectives, especially at a liberal school where a lot of people maybe aren't pro- military, per se. >> it's easy in a class to criticize american foreign policy. you know, we're so distant from things like iraq and afghanistan, but when you have a soldier that's been there, it really changes the conversation. >> a student came up to me and said, "i really appreciate you talking about that, because your service reminded me of my grandfather, and he was a world war ii vet, and he was-- it was really hard for him to talk about anything. and it just made me really appreciate your service and what you did for me." that's a meaningful gesture. >> reporter: 1,000 veterans applied to posse for the 30 slots in the next freshman class which, along with wesleyan and vassar, will include dartmouth college in new hampshire. posse's debbie bial expects that in five years about a dozen

private liberal arts colleges will be a part of the program, giving other vets opportunities they never would have imagined, while also bringing their hard won perspective to campuses previously shut off to military culture. the veterans also say the program has something to teach the entire country. >> we're capable of more than what we've been pigeonholed into. i think it's important to know that we're not just, you know, these broken people coming back, incapable of succeeding within society. >> reporter: a vassar education has given leadenham the confidence to plan for a future that includes helping other veterans find their own way back from the war. for the newshour this is jackie judd in poughkeepsie, new york.

>> woodruff: march madness has arrived, and once again, the university of north carolina is very much in the hunt for a national title. a new book has a behind-the- scenes look at the school's unique history under a coaching legend, and two rivals who became legends in their own right. jeffrey brown has that. >> brown: three universities within 25 miles of one another and a rich basketball history of great rivalries and bitter defeats lansing friendships. three men are at the heart of the tale, dean smith, the hall of fame coach for the university of north carolina for 36 seasons who died last year, jim valentin, the fun-loving, wise-cracking coach who led north carolina state to a surprise national championship in 1983, and died of cancer ten years later, and mike krzyzewski, coach at duke since 1980, winner of five national championships with the most recent coming just last year.

their story is told in the new book the legends club. author john feinstein joins me now. welcome, john. why these three? what did they mean to you? >> well, i cut my teeth as a reporter covering for them in the "washington post" in the 1980s. they were all there in the research triangle at the same time. dean smith had been there since the early '60s and was already an iconic figure when mike krzyzewski and jim valentin arrived within nine days of each other at duke and n.c. state. i got to know them all very well. i spent hours and hours late at night with valentin, with krzyzewski, not as much with dean because he was more of an introvert but probably spent more time with him over the years than anyone in the media. as their relationships evolved, it came to me there was a remarkable story to be told. >> brown: this is partly your story, from starting as a young journalism student at duke. >> correct. >> brown: up to today. but for those who don't know the role of basketball, the role of

these guys in the state of north carolina, what it is? >> well, you have to understand that until the mid-1990s, there were no professional sports teams in north carolina. acc basketball was king. it still is to a large degree, even though there are three professional sports teams in the state now. and there were great coaches going way back to everett case at n.c. state, frank maguire at north carolina. dean smith succeeded frank maguire and built a dynasty that went on for the 36 years he was there. >> brown: it's a story of friendship, but it certainly didn't start that way. there were all these jealousies, rivalry, anger, charges of double standards. there's a lot of... and everything hinges on who is winning. >> the irony is that when krzyzewski first came into the league, he resented dean smith because dean was the bar. and he did say there was a double standard for dean with referees for dean's team with referees. there was one game where he refused to shake hands at the

end of the game because he didn't think the game was over, there should still be time left at the clock. that upset dean that he behaved that way. at one point krzyzewski esen said to his assistant coach, if i ever start to act like him, don't ask any questions, just shoot me. years later he became dean. he became the standard. he became the bar everybody was trying to jump over and he became the guy about whom they said there were double standards and the refs gave duke all the calls. that's when he began to understand dean and respect him more as a result. >> brown: they all ended up in a pantheon, especially the two, dean smith and krzyzewski, but they all flirted with or felt failure at different times. >> absolutely, and you go back the dean in the 1960s in his fourth season, he was hung in effigy after a loss at wake forest and billie cunningham... >> brown: that tells you right there the role of basketball. >> yes. this was on campus. this was the students doing it to him. and billie cunningham was the one who pulled the effigy down. mike krzyzewski was 38-47 after

three years at duke, and there was a night in atlanta when they lost 109-66 to virginia in their last game of the season when tom butters, the athletic director who hired him was literally pushed up against a wall in a hotel with boosters demanding that he fire this guy. seven years later, he said he got letters from those same people when krzyzewski was offered the celtics' job saying, pay him anything, but keep him. >> brown: there is part of me that loves college basketball and college sports generally but wants to push become at you here. when we've talked about this on the program, it's the rising role of the coaches, so much emphasis on the coaches. they become the most powerful person in the state in some cases, right, at these universities. and here you are, i want to say, john, are you sort of raising them even higher, by focusing on these three? >> that's a good question, but i think these are three who did it right. i don't apologize at all for saying that they are good men in addition to being great coaches.

>> brown: you're saying it's beyond the winning with these guys? >> absolutely. dean smith helped desegregate restaurants in chapel hill in the 1950s when he was still an assistant coach, before he was star, before he had power. he went into a restaurant with black member of his church and basically dared the management not to serve them. jim valentin, when he was dying, started the v foundation, helped by krzyzewski, who was in his hospital room almost every day the last two months of his life, and the v foundation has raised more than $150 million for cancer research. krzyzewski will tell you, that was his greatest coaching job. krzyzewski has raised millions and millions of dollars for charity in north carolina and in durham. he started the emily kay foundation named after his mother, which sends kids with no money to college. and they've had something like 100 college graduates in the last few years. so they all went beyond the basketball court. they were all great coach, but i find them all to be admirable men, and that's why i don't have any trouble saying, yeah, i knew these guys, i spent time with these guys, and i learned from

these guys. >> brown: you're writing as fan in an age where there is so much criticism in college sports. what do you want people to take from this story? >> i don't want anyone to think i'm saying there aren't any problems with big-time college athletics. we're rife with them right now. but what i'm trying to say is this is a unique perfect storm. you had two of the four coaches who were on coaching's mount rushmore, krzyzewski and dean smith along with john wooden and bob knight. and you had this third coach, valentin, who has this unique niche because he won this amazing national title in 1983, because, frankly, of the way he died, the famous speech. , you can look it up, the espys speech when he won the award for courage and spoke for 11 minutes and literally passed out when he was finished that everybody still looks at to this day. >> and i got one last thing, i said it before and i'm going to say it again, cancer can take away all my physical abilities. it cannot touch my mind. it cannot touch my heart. and it can not touch my soul. >> i guess the message of the

book is these were three special people and the way their relationships evolved from the hostility of the 1980 to genuine love at the end of first jim's life and then at the end of dean's life between them and mike krzyzewski, i think it's unique in the pantheon, as you said, of college athletics. >> brown: all right. the book is "the legends club." john feinstein, thank you. >> thanks for having me. jeff. >> ifill: we'll be back in just a moment. but first, take this time to hear from your local pbs station. it's a chance to offer your support, which helps keep programs like ours on the air. >> woodruff: for those stations still with us, we bring you an encore look at the story of one man's attempt to bring cinema back to the democratic republic of the congo, a place that has seen so much destroyed by war.

pbs newshour contributing editor soledad o'brien reports. >> reporter: cinema virunga is just another shell of a building, on another unpaved street in the democratic republic of congo. >> here is where we used to buy our tickets from. >> reporter: oh this is the ticket booth. >> yeah, but now it's the main entry. >> reporter: yet filmmaker petna ndaliko still sees something special behind these rusty gates. he remembers the time he snuck in as a boy. do you remember the first time you came to watch a film? >> oh yeah, i remember. i was still young and i got in illegally. i was not even supposed to be in here to watch that film. >> reporter: what was the movie? >> the film was "black jim le magnifique." it was a film about kung fu. the main character was a black guy and it was so good for me to see a film where a black guy was the main character and it was like-- he was, like, kicking everybody. >> reporter: cinema virunga was

a rare sight. the only modern theater for hundreds of miles. it had opened in 1955, when congo was a belgian colony, to serve the booming population of goma-- a city in the shadow of a volcano that beckoned tourists. inspired by cinema virunga, ndaliko became a filmmaker. yet by the 1990's, cinema virunga itself was no more. the rwandan genocide had forced a million refugees into goma and the cinema became refugee housing. after the crisis, a series of civil wars kept it closed. what's lost when you don't have cinema? >> not having a cinema, it is missing that moment of a "wow". that wow. dream and it is that dreaming big. being capable of imagine things from just your room and then come up with this crazy beautiful idea and that's that

is what cinema brings to people. >> reporter: now ndaliko wants to bring that "wow" moment back to the congo. it needs a little work. the building briefly housed a nightclub, then government offices, now storage. how much work does bringing back the cinema require? >> wiring of installation for the power, we have to redo all of it. we have to also insulate so that we can have a good sound isolation inside here. and then all this speakers-- we have to put new ones. we have to add all the curtain. the roof, we sort of have to re- do the entire roofing. >> reporter: ndaliko is not the only one dreaming of a cinema. he started a film school in goma ten years ago, yole africa, where there are dozens of students with a message in search of an audience. >> i dreamed one day to become a filmmaker to change the way of thinking of my people. >> reporter: young filmmakers like yannick chishibanji have a new narrative to share: that

goma, their city, is coming back. >> when you have 20 years, 25 years, all this generation was grown in the war. we didn't have so much good examples. >> reporter: new goma is emerging from war. the students' films touch on modern issues like women in the workplace, and reconciliation. a cinema would bring those stories to life. do you think it makes a difference if they see a film here, or if maybe one day there was a big cinema where the community could go? >> if there is one cinema, i think that every night we can hope that 100 persons who have been changed. >> reporter: you think that cinema is powerful enough to change the hearts and minds of people? >> of course. >> reporter: getting there is half the battle. to make a film, the school uses

a gas-fueled generator to power cameras and computers because the electricity often goes out. the wi-fi is also unreliable. chishebanji made a film anyway, all about his country. it's about a man choosing between reconciliation and revenge after his family is attacked. >> sometimes we think that it is the other person who is our problem. >> reporter: and in your film, who is the problem? >> the problem is the way of seeing things, the communitarianism, the tribalism. >> reporter: communitarianism and tribalism. without cinema virunga, the only public space for a film about those issues might be a street cinema with blaring sound and blurry images. there are places to watch films now. there are sort of makeshift movie houses if you will. why is a cinema better than that, or different from that? >> because the cinema take you into the film itself.

and watching on the dvd, the quality is not the same. and also create this space where a family can sit and enjoy and have teir popcorn. it is a different experience and also be in a cinema and feel safe with other people. it is very important psychologically for the people around here. >> reporter: what do you mean? >> yeah, like, be in this dark place. you are with more than 200 people and then you still feel safe. >> reporter: does that not happen in goma? >> not often, not often. >> reporter: and is that because of all the conflict. >> because of all the conflicts. >> reporter: yole africa tries to create that feeling with an annual festival of film and art, with dj's pumping and music thumping, kids spinning wildly in the air, with a dance contest. ndaliko's wife, cherie, sees the difference public art can make. >> it's incredible to see what happens when they learn that they can tell their own story, and in their version of the story they can be the hero.

>> reporter: without cinema, the best yole africa can do is fly in a blow up screen from north carolina. it deflates if the power fails, fights to be heard over street noise, and ndaliko's worry about being out at night. but as that familiar rectangle of light appears something magic is happening too. a wow moment-- even if just once a year. for the pbs newshour, i'm soledad o'brien in the democratic republic of congo. >> ifill: that brings us to the newshour shares this evening: something that caught our eye that we thought you would like too. lin-manuel miranda, creator and star of the blockbuster musical "hamilton," scored a white house first: performing a freestyle rap with the president. miranda joined the rest of the "hamilton" cast in meeting with, and performing for, high school students yesterday at the white house. but it was the three-man

performance in the rose garden, steps from the oval office, that went viral. >> drop the beat. ♪ he's rolling up some words i'm getting to say some ♪ freestyling that you never heard ♪ constitution the potus ♪ i'm freestyling you know this ♪ obamacare okay i'm looking up because it ♪ was hopeless before you enacted that system ♪ the federalist papers hamilton wrote the other 51 and greater ♪ and sunny and bo this canine is insane, asinine ♪ oh, my gosh i'm freestyling down the line ♪ nasa i want to see if we can get over to mars ♪ and rap more bars and leave a carbon footprint up on it ♪ and lower my emissions and this is lin-man freestyling in congress ♪ i hope congress works to our agenda ♪ you really got a sense of yourself ♪ create something we need a new justice for the ♪ supreme court

in short ♪ oh my gosh this is my book report ♪ and immigrants can we get the job done ♪ this is so fun. potus is holding up the signs ♪ i'm not done it's the oval office ♪ oh my gosh i can't believe i'm there ♪ it's so much more intimidating than if it was square ♪ opportunity knocks and i can't stop ♪ i'm here with the president and yo the mic drops ♪ >> ifill: yo, the mic drops. i'm a crazy "hamilton" fan, so that is fun for me. >> woodruff: i can't wait to see it. > >> woodruff: and that's the newshour for tonight. on wednesday, how the presidential campaign shapes up after today's voting. i'm judy woodruff. >> ifill: and i'm gwen ifill. join us online, and again here tomorrow evening. for all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you and good night. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by:

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of international peace and security. at carnegie.org. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and individuals. >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

>> this is bbc "world news america." >> want to know hong kong's most romantic spot? i'll show you. i love heading to repulse bay for an evening stroll. it is the perfect, stunning backdrop for making romantic moments utterly unforgettable. i've lived in this city for years, but hong kong still makes me fall in love with it time and again.