captioning sponsored by wnet >> sreenivasan: on this edition for sunday, july 17: a shooting in baton rouge, louisiana, leaves three police officers dead. on the eve of the republican national convention in cleveland, where do the delegates stand? and, who is donald trump? we'll ask two biographers of the presumptive nominee. next, on pbs newshour weekend. >> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: bernard and irene schwartz. judy and josh weston. the cheryl and philip milstein family. the citi foundation. supporting innovation and enabling urban progress. the john and helen glessner family trust. supporting trustworthy journalism that informs and inspires. sue and edgar wachenheim, iii. corporate funding is provided by mutual of america-- designing customized individual and group retirement products. that's why we are your retirement company.

additional support has been provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting, and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. from the tisch wnet studios at lincoln center in new york, hari sreenivasan. >> sreenivasan: good evening and thanks for joining us. baton rouge, louisiana was often high alert today following a deadly shooting involving law enforcement officers this morning. authorities say two police officers and one sheriff's deputy died in a shootout that occurred behind a gas station about a mile from the city's police headquarters. three other officers were wounded by gun fire. police say they killed the lone gunman 0 had a rifle. later on, the governor and mayor said the responded to a 911 call

about a gun wielding man. >> these men risking their lives to protect and serve this community, were taken out the way that they were. they are real-life, everyday heroes. >> sreenivasan: louisiana's capital has been tense since the shooting of alton sterling july 5th. charlie, you have been covering the shooting and the killing of alton sterling since july 5th. tell us what the atmosphere is there now? >>reporter: things are very peaceful and celebrative funeral of alton sterling.

that nervousness and anxiety was brought.again. i live only about a mile away from the scene. about a mile has been cordoned off and church, little old lady that was trying to head back from church was told there's an active shooting underway and it's time to just not go home right now, maybe go out for dinner. but right now it was just too unsafe. >> sreenivasan: give me an idea of whether the community has begun the process of open conversation and dialogue of the underlying forces at work between the public and the police there. >>reporter: it really has. i was part of a meeting on tuesday that was put together by a group called together baton rouge, the one thing i took out of this there were people black and white, young and old getting together very confused. you could see the heartbreak on their faces but also had a sense of hope, had a sense of openness

that they really wanted to see what someone else was thinking about this no matter what age, no matter what race to try and move this city and state forward. >> sreenivasan: all right, charlie, thanks so much for joining us. >> hari thank you. >> sreenivasan: get the latest information on the shooting in baton rouge that left multiple police officers dead-- online at www.pbs.org/newshour. we turn now to cleveland, where the republican national convention, expected to nominate donald trump for president, begins tomorrow. following the police shootings in baton rouge today and in dallas ten days ago, the head of cleveland's police union called on ohio's governor to suspend the state's "open carry" law, which allows gun owners to carry their weapons in public, even in designated protest zones near the convention arena. but the office of governor john kasich told the newshour he does egal authority to suspend any state laws. in the meantime, trump campaign chairman paul manafort said today the convention's goal is help americans understand donald

trump the man, not just trump the candidate. for more of a preview of the coming week in cleveland, i am joined by the newshour's own judy woodruff and gwen ifill. >> so, gwen this is the week when we get to stop saying presumptive republican nominee. >> ifill: yes, that's right, the interesting things about these conversations, every four years, during all the talk during the primary season, presumptive nominee gets to have the stage to him or herself. we'll see it at philadelphia with hillary clinton. but today we are seeing all the preps, the make america great sign mind us and we're watching them prepare themselves for the message they want donald trump to deliver and the message he wants to deliver, it's going to be fascinating hari. >> sreenivasan: judy, who's going to make the case for the

trump audience and the republicans in general? >> woodruff: they are sprinkling this out to us in the media. we know there are going to be senators, senator jeff sessions of alabama who has supported trump and others, governor chris christie who was passed over for the vice presidential. but nonpolitical names whom they are hoping will be the memorable speakers. some television stars, the stars if you will from the field of athletics, and some figures, i think you have to say out of the world of national security. people who have been affected either by that word that is not music to the ears of hillary clinton or any of the people around her, benghazi, that is going to be a theme tomorrow night. national security. and then we're going to be seeing members of the trump family from mrs. trump to the grown children. it's going to be a very

trump-convention. >> sreenivasan: gwen, picking up on the idea of national security, given events that have been happening in the past week and a half, both overseas and here domestically, how tight is the security, how hard is it for you to get where you are now? >> ifill: it's always difficult to get into these convention arenas. but it won't be as difficult today as it will be tomorrow when the delegates rierveg. i don't think it's anything to do with what we've seen in the past couple of weeks, that's what happens when you put these many people in one place at a moment of what could happen. >> sreenivasan: just a quick preview of what we can expenditure the audiences to speak. this is also a partnership with n pfortr. >> woodruff: it is, we're happy pbs weekend sunday host rachel martin will be with us and sharing the table with gwen and me will.domenico montinaro

and mara liason. >> ifill: and david brooks and moork shields. whom we get to see all the time on the newshour. >> sreenivasan: all right, you can tune in on pbs around npr. thank you so much. the >> sreenivasan: when donald trump announced his pick of mike pence as his running mate yesterday, he said it was, in part, a bid for party unity. but achieving that can be easier said than done. special correspondent jeff greenfield in cleveland has this a tale of two delegates who personify the gap between trump's most ardent supporters and detractors. >> reporter: carl paladino is a millionaire real estate and business entrepreneur from upstate new york. he was the republican candidate for governor in 2010 and an early trump supporter. >> he's bringing salvation. i think america right now is in a big transition, and no question, this is the second american revolution that we're

witnessing today. >> reporter: new hampshire's gordon humphrey served two terms in the u.s. senate, where he was known as a staunch conservative. a kasich supporter, he was part of the failed "never trump" movement that tried to "unbind" pledged delegates from having to vote for trump on the convention's first ballot. >> i am utterly concerned and even frightened for our country. i think donald trump is burdened by a pretty sick psyche. he seems to me a man who operates without a conscience; he has no sense of guilt, shame, embarrassment, remorse, regret. this man should not be president, much less commander- in-chief. >> reporter: humphrey believes the republican establishment, including the party chairman and senate majority leader, bear heavy responsibility for the trump's rise. >> this impending train wreck for my party and our nation could have been averted if reince priebus, for example, mitch mcconnell, and others of

their stature had stood up and said, "this is not going to work. this man is unfit." if they had encouraged others who are qualified, including those who were running, to persist. >> reporter: paladino also points to the g.o.p. establishment as a source of trump's success-- but for very different reasons. >> the rank and file, and i'll describe them as basically the middle class, blue collar, white collar, working men, they've been festering with a lot of anger. they gave congress a republican majority in that last congressional race, and unfortunately they didn't use it as a bully pulpit, as an opposition government. >> reporter: for humphrey, trump's language and demeanor demonstrates his unfitness for the oval office. >> he's a demagogue; he's gotten where he is on the basis of appeals to fear, insecurity,

envy, a bit of bigotry, xenophobia. these are all the basest human emotions to which trump has been appealing. that part is exceedingly unhealthy. >> she's crooked hillary! >> reporter: no, says paladino, the blunt talk is just what trump voters love-- that he doesn't talk like a politician. >> we became familiar with, "oh, well, you know, you can't do that, that's going to insult somebody. don't you say 'merry christmas,' because you're going to insult somebody, you can't do that. you have to be polite, you have to be politically correct." >> reporter: as for the future? here too, the views could not be more different. >> one likes to think of donald trump as the result of a perfect storm, the convergence of factors that can happen only once in a century. i'm not so sure that's the case. this may be a new phenomenon, this conjunction of circus clowns as candidates and greedy media as promoters.

>> the republican party is us, we won. okay? we won the majority in all those states we came out and our, our candidate, our primary candidate is donald trump. >> reporter: while these comments may not be typical of the republicans gathering here in cleveland, they do reflect, even if in a heightened state, a quality that unites trumps most fervent supporters, and opponents-- a passionate, intense sense of anger. >> sreenivasan: on this eve of the republican national convention, we decided to talk to two biographers of the presumptive presidential nominee. michael d'antonio is the author of "never enough: donald trump and the pursuit of success," just reissued in paperback as "the truth about trump;" and david cay johnston is the author of "the making of donald trump," which will be published on

august 2. for tonight's signature segment, newshour political director lisa desjardins sat down with them. >> desjardins: let's go all the way back to his childhood, which i think might be one of the least talked about items. >> well, you know, the defining moment of donald's childhood was when he was sent off to military school at age 13. but here's a kid who's been raised in luxury, attended by servants. he even had a chauffeur take him on his paper route when it rained. but he was a kind of wild little boy and his father got tired of answering calls from the school. so in august of his 13th year, donald is packed up, and his four siblings get to stay home. and this place, new york military academy, was a pretty rough place for a little boy to be ensconced. so i think this moment of being essentially banished and then placed in this very disciplined,

very hierarchical environment taught him, you know, life is tough. it's always a fight, and you're supposed to win at everything. and he did thrive there. even in his posture, when you see how sort of straight he stands, that's new york military academy visible in a man who's now 70 years old. >> he and his brothers also, as boys, were trained by dad in the business. so they would sweep out basements, collect coins from the coin-operated laundry machines in the apartment buildings, sometimes do little repairs. and when they got a little collect rents, because he expected them to all go into the business with him. >> desjardins: fred trump, as you're saying, he was a real estate developer. he's the one who really built that initial business. how much of a role did he have in this idea donald trump has that he must win at all costs? and that he must have an incredible drive, a work ethic? >> i think what's really fascinating is to see the drive that fred implanted in donald,

in part, by rejecting him. you know, i actually think a lot of what donald is doing today is still seeking his father's love. >> desjardins: how much of a role did his father play in funding trump's business and in establishing him? >> so, when donald was still in diapers, he had an annual trust fund income of $12,000, which was about four times what the typical american family with a full-time worker made back then. when he started out, his father put him into deals. his father's lifelong friend abe beame became mayor of new york. so donald got all sorts of deals from the city, including 40 years of no property taxes on the grand hyatt hotel that-- donald had rebuilt from the wreck of the old commodore. >> desjardins: sort of how he made his first mark was that-- >> that's right. >> desjardins: grand hyatt project. >> what's really kind of laughable is he says, "i borrowed $1 million from my father." well, he got access to $40 million in financing for that commodore hotel renovation. so if you can walk into a bank,

and they'll say, "you're fred trump's son. here's $40 million in construction funds."-- that's a pretty big advantage. >> desjardins: no question. but what was he able to do? how creative was he, and how good of a deal maker was the young- and middle-aged donald trump? >> the trump tower deal was impressive. donald went to tiffany's and made an arrangement with them where he got their air rights. then he got the bonwit teller building. you can't take that deal away from him. now, it was aided by his dad and it stands as, i think, the singular achievement of his career. >> he owns the chicago trump tower. he owns an apartment building a couple blocks from trump tower new york. he owns 19 golf courses, which are his. where he's gotten into trouble is, he has issued things saying, "a donald trump development," or "i'm a builder. people follow me." and then, when you find out later that a, he's only licensed the use of his name, and here's the really bad part, lisa, you decide to put your money into a building because the trump name, it'll be a more valuable apartment. and what you don't know is that,

well, he's not only, only licensed his name. there's renewal clauses and he can take his name off the building. he could build one right next door and nobody told you that. and that's what's led to a lot of litigation against donald accusing him of civil fraud. >> desjardins: mr. trump has also said that the trump name, his brand itself is worth a billion dollars. how big of an asset is that for him? >> i think it's a substantial part of his wealth. he is a pioneer of self- promotion. and, and our culture has changed radically in his lifetime. i write about how in the '60s when kids were asked what they wanted when they grew up, they said, "i'd like to have a nice marriage and some kids and be well-known in my community." by the '70s, it was, "i want to be rich and famous." and that rich and famous response has become more intense as time has passed. donald led the way in this. he was doing selfies before anybody else knew what a selfie was. >> desjardins: what in his past do you think informs his decision to make statements on the campaign trail that are very controversial?

statements about muslims, for example, or about mexicans? >> i think he understands who archie bunker is. donald's from queens. he knows the anxieties of people facing change and how they resent that change. i don't think that he is in his heart-- a superficially racist guy. but i think he knows what will reverberate with people. >> that's where i would disagree with you, michael. i mean, the-- the-- the trump family has a long history of findings of racial discrimination in the rental of housing. the federal government got an agreement with them. as soon as the supervision was over, they went right back to coding so that blacks were not in the buildings. and donald tried to describe this as wanting people on welfare, when these were people who had jobs and incomes. but they were black. they didn't want them in the buildings. >> david is right that in the early '70s, the first thing, the first chance he got, he-- he cried reverse racism when the trump organization was accused of not renting to minorities. and his lawyer called the feds "gestapo" and "storm troopers." >> desjardins: the trump

campaign, of course, has said, and donald trump himself has insisted that he's not racism; he's just fighting a culture of political correctness. but i want to talk to something else that gets a lot of attention in donald trump's business career. let's talk about atlantic city. >> donald never had a dollar invested in atlantic city. he borrowed every dollar he had. and in his own book, "the art of the deal," he boasts about how he deceived his partners, the harrah's company, holiday inns, in the building of the first casino. >> desjardins: some of his casinos filed for bankruptcy in atlantic city... most of them. but who lost in that deal, michael? >> oh, bond holders. people who bought trump stock. there was a trump stock. there, people who worked in these facilities, contractors who didn't get paid. there were a lot of victims in this. >> i don't think he lost a penny. >> oh, he made money. >> with donald, there have been real victims. you know, this trump university thing is a terrible scandal. you know, i interviewed the people who invested up to $35,000 to be educated by donald trump, and many of them were pressured to put the money on

their credit card. so it's a really slippery slope, i think, from-- being tricky and crafty and sucking money out of atlantic city and profiting on gambling; and truly exploiting people who are vulnerable. >> desjardins: one overall theme that i cannot miss in this whole conversation is donald trump's ability to adapt. i think trump and some of his supporters say, "maybe we don't need to know exactly what he's going to do, because we know that he's able to adapt. maybe it's okay that he's changed his position on abortion, because he's adapted to what the voters wanted." >> he is so adaptable that there's not really a core there. >> desjardins: but he's making the argument that it is not about proposals but instead about his own skills and abilities. >> yes. and, he thinks that he is supremely gifted at decision making and leadership. i think people do admire his flexibility, his adaptive qualities.

he's gone through the tabloid press era, the television era, the internet era, the social media era. he's mastered all of this. this brand building promotional skill is breathtaking to behold. but whether that really tells us anything at all about how he'd act as president, i think, is uncertain. >> well, lisa, as a businessman and as a tv host, he can say, "you're fired," and get rid of you, and say, "i don't want to deal with you." the president of the united states doesn't have that luxury. he has to deal with foreign dictators, with democratically elected foreign governments that he has no control over. he has to deal with congress, which may not want to do what he wants to do. he doesn't have the unilateral power to impose tariffs, which are a kind of tax, to build a wall, to do almost any of the things he says he's going to do, because our constitution doesn't provide for that. >> desjardins: what in his past has prepared him for this complicated moment in world and national politics? >> he is pretty resilient.

he's a very buoyant person. so i think he's learned that the moment of defeat is not necessarily permanent. and in fact, he's very good at turning what the rest of us would see as a defeat into a victory. >> donald's very good at bouncing back. and when things don't work out the way he wanted, moving somewhere else. and you've got give him credit for that. so he's made himself a household name. i don't know how that helps you as president, but bouncing back and, and shifting when it's going to make him look bad, donald's real good at that. >> sreenivasan: in turkey, president recep erdogan appears to be intensifying his crackdown following this weekend's failed military coup. turkey's justice minister said today the government has detained 6,000 people, including three generals and hundreds of soldiers. today, tens of thousands of turks showing their support for the erdogan government, marched

through the streets of the capital, ankara, and other cities. large crowds attended funerals for some of the 265 people killed in clashes since thursday. erdogan is now pressing the u.s. to extradite cleric fethullah gulen, an opposition leader, who lives in pennsylvania. secretary of state john kerry said turkey must show evidence gulen had anything to do with the attempted coup. in france today, nice's main catholic cathedral held a special church service in honor of the 84 people killed in the terrorist attack on civilians on thursday. france's health minister said today 85 of the 200 people injured in the rampage remain hospitalized, 18 of them in critical condition. two americans reported missing since the attack remain unaccounted for. the paris prosecutor's office says only 35 bodies of the deceased have been identified. french police detained two more people today, to bring the total to six in connection with the investigation. they released the estranged wife of the truck driver, mohamed bouhlel. he was killed by police at the end of his rampage. france has not confirmed any link between bouhel and isis,

though the group claimed yesterday he was a one of its soldiers. >> and updating our lead story, louisiana police have detained two persons of interest in connection with today's shooting ever baton rouge law enforcement officers, three of the six are dead. president obama condemned the attack. >> we as a nation have to be loud and clear that nothing justifies violence against law enforcement. attacks on police are an attack on all of us and the rule of law that makes society possible. >> you can follow our coverage of those shootings in baton rouge as well, and the republican convention online, and that's it, i'm hari

sreenivasan, have a good night. captioning sponsored by wnet captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

>> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: bernard and irene schwartz. judy and josh weston. the cheryl and philip milstein family. the citi foundation. the john and helen glessner family trust. supporting trustworthy journalism that informs and inspires. sue and edgar wachenheim, iii. corporate funding is provided by mutual of america-- designing customized individual and group retirement products. that's why we are your retirement company. additional support has been provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting, and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you.

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