captioning sponsored by wnet >> sreenivasan: on this edition for sunday, october 8: hurricane "nate" makes landfall along the gulf coast. president trump battles with the g.o.p. and "america addicted"-- opioid addicts getting treatment in jail. next on pbs newshour weekend. >> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: bernard and irene schwartz. the cheryl and philip milstein family. sue and edgar wachenheim, iii. dr. p. roy vagelos and diana t. vagelos. the j.b.p. foundation. the anderson family fund. rosalind p. walter, in memory of abby m. o'neill. barbara hope zuckerberg. corporate funding is provided

by mutual of america-- designing customized individual and group retirement products. that's why we're 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." nate" is now a tropical depression, moving inland, after making landfall last night as a category one hurricane in mississippi. nate came ashore with 85-mile winds near biloxi and hit the mississippi coast with a 10 foot storm surge. the busy beachfront highway u.s. 90, and some gulf coast casinos were flooded. more than 100,000 residents of mississippi and alabama were without power for part of the day. but nate lacked the destructive power of this year's previous hurricanes. officials report no major damage or storm-related casualties.

new orleans, which had prepared for the worst and imposed an overnight curfew, was spared serious problems. nate is expected to cause flooding across the deep south by dumping six inches of rain through tomorrow. investigators into last sunday's mass shooting of an outdoor concert on the las vegas strip say a note found in the shooter's hotel room seems to show calculations on how to inflict the most carnage. police found the note on the nightstand of the 32nd floor room where the shooter fired into the crowd of thousands. according to law enforcement officials who spoke to the associated press and cbs news, the note includes the shooter's handwritten calculations about the trajectory of bullets and where he needed to aim. the shooter killed 58 people, and more than 500 people were treated at hospitals for injuries, including gun wounds. congress may soon consider a law banning the sale of gun accessories that allow semi- automatic rifles to fire continuously like machine guns. bump stocks, devices that do just that, were used by the las vegas gunman. today, democratic senator dianne

feinstein said she's looking for republican support for her bill. >> we have republican interest. i have nobody lined up, we have 38 cosponsors, they're all democratic. we've had individuals that have indicated an interest and particularly for a hearing. >> sreenivasan: but national rifle association executive director chris cox said today a new law isn't needed. >> well, we don't believe that bans have ever worked on anything. what we've said has been very clear-- that if something transfers a semiautomatic to function like a fully automatic, then it ought to be regulated differently. >> sreenivasan: president trump said on thursday he's open to a law that would ban bump stocks. vice president mike pence says it's not too much to ask nfl players to respect the american flag. in indianapolis today, pence walked out of the game between the hometown colts and the visiting san francisco 49ers, after more than 20 san francisco players knelt during the national anthem. president trump said he had told pence to leave, if that happened. within minutes of his departure, pence's office issued a written

statement saying: "...president trump and i will not dignify any event that disrespects our soldiers, our flag, or our national anthem." around the league, a handful of players in the early games either knelt or raised their fists during the anthem. there was some question as to whether teams were changing their policies on players' ability to protest during anthems. the mayor of charlottesville, virginia, mike signer, is condemning last night's small march by white nationalists as" another despicable visit by neo-nazi cowards." a few dozen marched with torches for about 10 minutes in the charlottesville park where a statue of civil war general robert e. lee still stands, though it's been covered with a black tarp. they chanted, "you will not replace us." the planned removal of the statue, held up due to a court challenge, was the catalyst for the large "unite the right" demonstration in august in charlottesville. >> sreenivasan: this weekend,

president trump once again reached out to democratic leaders on capitol hill to explore a new way to mend or end president obama's affordable care act. senate democratic leader chuck schumer says he rebuffed mister trump's overture, but like the president's previous deal with democrats on the federal debt ceiling, this is a sign of friction between the trump administration and the republican party. joining me now from santa barbara, california, to discuss these internal party battles is newshour weekend special correspondent jeff greenfield. >> jeff, pap out where the battle lines are. we can clearly say the democrats are one side and that side is opposite president trump but inside the republican party. >> you saw the president express displeasure with nart mitch mcconnelsenatormxg for a while e president's chief of staff telling donors think seriously about undercutting incumbent republicans who are not cooperating with the president. you have steve bannon celebrating the loss of trump's

own endorsed senate candidate in mississippi and other republican senators for primary battles. when you look at this enormous situation, party reps say this might threaten our hold on the senate, but cut it out we're in a different environment here. >> sreenivasan: somebody who wanted to be secretary of state at one point senator bob corker. >> they are two different things. i think we need to focus on the tillerson matter. it is a fundamental first order priority in diplomacy. the world has to believe the searkt is speaking in the words of the president. to be undercutting the president by saying don't waste your time, it was almost when henry

kissinger was feeling out china. , the head of the executive branch it almost lyn may as if he believes the president is one person who is almost independent of his own cabinet. >> sreenivasan: should the democrats be jumping for joy in this disunity? >> there are two cautionary notes here. in a state like mississippi or wyoming the odds ever a democrat winning the general election very small. maybe in alabama in december if judge roy moore doesn't winner handily, there may be issues. but when the democrats won the congress back they put up a bunch of blue dog democrats, centrists moderates. but moved left on the things like single payor, and things like bernie sanders around elizabeth warren have struck. that facing the democratic party

is going to want to see the democrats expand their ideolog ideological reach. >> >> sreenivasan: isn't playing well with the general audience in terms of support of the presidents even how republicans perceive where the country's going. >> the fact that the right track, wrong track numbers have shrunk is in part because republicans are less happy with the direction the country's going and you do make a really importantly point. if trump who was at 80, 85% among republicans, if that continues to drop then the dynamic that i described really is going to undergo a change. if trump cannot hold the greatly majority of republicans then this kind of freelancing he does is going to have political cost to him. but if journalists l have run out of things to say, hari,

there is always time will tell. >> thanks so much. >> sreenivasan: fueled by the nation's opioid epidemic of painkiller and heroin abuse, drug overdoses are now the leading cause of death among americans under 50. at the same time, the u.s. surgeon general reported last year, only one in five people who need treatment for opioid addiction are getting it. in tonight's signature segment, newshour weekend's megan thompson reports on a program of last resort in kentucky. it offers detox and rehab treatment to opioid addicts while they are in jail. this story is part of the newshour special series "america addicted." >> reporter: it's 8:30 in the morning at the jail in louisville, kentucky. for these prisoners, every day starts with something called a morning meditation.

they're part of the jail's voluntary drug treatment program called "enough is enough." like most in the program, shanna sermon is struggling with an addiction to opioids like pain pills and heroin. >> the more painful something is to talk about, the more important it is to bring it out for discussion. it's the-- my most favorite part of the day. i've never been much of a morning person. and we have goals. we say what we're grateful for. it gets use to being up early. it gets us use to becoming a habit of what we're supposed to be doing. >> reporter: sermon says she started drinking and taking pills when she was only ten- years-old, and eventually became addicted to heroin. she tried going to a treatment clinic, but kept using anyway. arrested for burglary, this is sermon's 16th time behind bars, but she says this time, jail saved her life. >> i didn't really think i would ever find this kind of help. but to find it in a jail-- you know, when i try to explain to the new girls that come in that

you know, there's hope. >> reporter: the enough is enough program lasts at least 90 days, and participants are housed in four dormitories-- one for women and three for men. they're kept separate from the mmon, because in here, the inmates hold each other accountable for their behavior. there's a strict daily schedule of meetings and therapy and classes on changing the way you think and act. some taught by the prisoners themselves. inmates the option of a vivitrol injection at the end of their sentence. it's a medication, heavily marketed to jails and drug

courts, that blocks a person's ability to get high. >> this is a corrections facility. it's not a healthcare facility. so, i mean, is this the right place to be doing this work? >> it's not a detox center. it's not a mental health facility. it's not an emergency room. but it is. >> reporter: steve durham is the jail's assistant director. >> it was a challenge that was given to us by what was happening in this community. and what we said is we're not going to do nothing. we're going to do something. >> reporter: kentucky is one of the states hit hardest by the nation's opioid epidemic. in 2015, it had the third highest drug overdose death rate, driven by opioids. in the louisville area alone, the number of opioid overdose deaths increased by 40% between 2015 and 2016. durham blames the opioid epidemic for the jail's population surge in recent years. the jail has 1,800 beds but there are 2,300 people here now, so many sleep in cots on the floor. >> it's the same old crimes, but

it's really driven by substance abuse. and if we look at it, we drill into it, we're really seeing the impact of heroin use. >> reporter: durham says 85% of his prisoners are struggling with substance abuse and 60% of those who go through this jail's detox program arrive addicted to opioids. >> jail's supposed to be punitive, so to speak, but we don't come from it, from that approach. we look at people as humans, not as inmates. >> reporter: ken wright runs the jail treatment program. wright says addressing drug issues in a jail setting just makes sense. >> well, first of all, you have a captive audience. they can't go anyplace. everybody wants to change. they just don't know how to change. >> reporter: despite the high levels of drug abuse among the jail population nationwide, few u.s. jails offer drug treatment programs. they don't allocate the funds or have the physical space. and jails that do provide

treatment struggle to meet the demand. in louisville, there are only 64 beds dedicated to the program. doctor joshua lee studies opioid addiction in jails and says providing prisoners treatment is essential. that's because when people confined to jail for weeks or months withdraw from drugs, their tolerance is lowered, which increases the chance of an overdose when they leave. >> they go usually right back to using heroin. and when that happens, their tolerance has been decreased and the risk of overdose is quite high so, if you're not doing anything to mitigate that risk or to treat the disorder itself, you're kind of blowing it in terms of a public health opportunity. >> reporter: in kentucky, 23 of the state's 80 jails offer drug treatment. between 2012 and 2016, the number of inmates here detoxing from opiates tripled, from around 2,000 to 6,000. authorities say the numbers are on track to be even worse this year.

on any given day, as many as 120 new prisoners are identified in need of detoxing. after being searched, they're sent to one of the drug treatment dorms. a key part of the "enough is enough" program is that participants monitor and care for those going through withdrawal. todd lega helps monitor the new inmates. he's a recovering heroin addict who's been to jail 14 times. >> it's definitely changed me. i actually care about people now. so i have a lot of empathy and sympathy toward the newcomer. >> reporter: before jail on the outside, had you ever tried to seek help? >> i was court ordered one time. i didn't want no help, i didn't think i needed help. i didn't take it seriously. i was high in the meetings, groups. >> reporter: while people like lega have been able to get clean

here in jail, ken wright says sobriety is a challenge when the 24/7 safety net is gone. have you seen people complete the enough is enough program and then come back in? >> yes. unfortunately, relapse is a reality. well, there's not enough resources in the community once they leave. that's the biggest challenge. so if those needs are not met immediately, they will revert back to what's familiar to them. they live very destructive-- type of life. they cry out for failure. and sometimes, we just don't have them long enough for them >> reporter: the louisville jail doesn't collect follow up data on participants in its drug treatment program once they leave the jail. but the kentucky department of corrections reports that, statewide, half the people who went through a substance abuse program in jail say they stayed off illegal drugs for at least a year following their release. three-quarters say they regularly attended alcoholics and narcotics anonymous meetings. since bridget wilder got out of the louisville jail a year ago, she's stayed clean and attends

a.a. meetings every week. she has a steady job to support herself and her two kids and is also pursuing an associate's degree. >> you know, i can't wait to wake up in the morning, because i'm just ready to live, you know? like, it's never been like that. >> reporter: where do you think you'd be today if you hadn't had treatment in jail? >> i'd probably be dead. >> reporter: wilder says medication was a crucial part of her recovery. before leaving jail, she received two injections of vivitrol. then, outside the jail, wilder had seven more monthly injections at a free community health clinic. in louisville, jail officials educate the inmates about vivitrol with videos and reading materials. but some experts worry about the growing use of vivitrol in jails. >> we're seeing a treatment that doesn't have strong evidence supporting its use being over- promoted. >> reporter: doctor andrew kolodny directs the opioid policy research collaborative at brandeis university. kolodny would rather see doctors prescribe two other drugs that

have been around longer-- buprenorphine and methadone. they have much more data supporting their effectiveness for treating opioid addiction. >> we have effective medicines that could be saving lives. and not enough people are accessing them. we should be giving them the treatment that we know will give them the best shot at survival and at a good quality of life. we know what works. and we shouldn't be gambling with vivitrol on that population. >> reporter: but joshua lees thinks differently. >> is vivitrol better than nothing? absolutely. i think all the three medications should be used routinely, commonly, and with as little barriers to access as possible in community treatment and criminal justice systems. >> reporter: vivitrol is not an opioid, but buprenorphine and methadone are. and that concerns steve durham. he doesn't want narcotics in his jail. >> so they have the potential for abuse. they have the potential to be used as contraband, they have the potential to become barter inside a detention facility.

and most detention facilities are hesitant to do that. >> reporter: shanna sermon wants to get the vivitrol injection before she leaves. she also hopes the jail's social worker can find her a spot right away in a residential treatment program, because she knows staying clean is going to be hard. >> i'm really nervous, but i'm excited. i'm excited because i've seen what this has done for me in here. i can't wait to get the real aspect of it outside. >> sreenivasan: how often does human activity trigger earthquakes? read more at pbs.org/newshour. >> sreenivasan: last month at the united nations general assembly, canadian prime minister justin trudeau promised to do more to help his country's 1.4 million indigenous people. he said there needed to be an effort to "correct past injustices and bring about a better quality of life." on friday, the canadian government took a step to repair that relationship. it agreed to pay $600 million in

legal settlements for a program that for years forcibly separated indigenous children from their families and put them up for adoption around the world. ian austen has been covering the story for "the new york times" and joins me now via skype from ottawa. >> ian let's first talk about how long running was this program? how many people would it affect? >> we're not sure precisely how many it affected but our best guess is 35,000 people and started in 1935 and petered out about 19 many 20 years later. >> sreenivasan: what determined whether a child needed to be taken out of their village or their family? >> there were two things in the outset. as the federal government was planning this program, they were aware there was a danger of eroding the program, whatever

reason that was never done. and what happened was, social workers were set up to these remote, often remote communities. and they had no training, about indigenous culture at all, tabbed biggest thing they didn't know about is indigenous culture has a heritage of communal child rearing. i was told, you never asked a kid who their parents. you say where are you staying? because at that point they might be staying with an aunts, with a grandparent. these social workers had no idea of any of this. looked around are around, it was the an at thi antithesis of, the anywhere better than than in their homes. >> sreenivasan: what happened to the adults? they sort of assimilate as the

goal was or did they find themselves in a many no man's land or back into the tribe? >> this program took away their birth names, they would get new birth names, often new given names. and the court case that spurned this settlement noound there was a terrible legacy of emotional, mental and social problems affecting these people. because as kids they were bullied by white kids at school, they never felt even if they were with a loving family, they never felt part of white southern culture but they couldn't go back home because they didn't know the language, they had been completely pulled from that cult as well. -- culture as well. there was a whole generation that grew up in social many emotional limbo. >> thank you ian joining us by

skype. >> thank you so much. >> this is pbs newshour weekend, sunday. >> sreenivasan: north korean leader kim jong-un says his nuclear weapons program is needed to counter what he call"" protracted nuclear threats of the u.s. imperialists." state-run television reported the comments made yesterday in a speech to the central committee of the ruling workers party. kim called his nuclear weapons, tested six times since 2006, a "...powerful deterrent firmly safeguarding the peace and security in the korean peninsula and northeast asia." around the same time yesterday, president trump said on twitter that talking to north korea hasn't worked for 25 years." sorry, but only one thing will work" the president said, but did not elaborate on what that one thing might be. american-backed forces say they are preparing what could be a final assault to retake raqqa, the de facto capital of isis inside syria. a leader of the coalition of arab and kurdish forces says

only 500 isis militants remain in raqqa, and they're holding only 10% of the city. the syrian observatory for human rights estimates more than 1,000 civilians have been killed by u.s.-led coalition air strikes on the largely ruined city. following its expulsion from mosul, iraq, this summer, the fall of raqqa would be another major setback for isis and the so-called caliphate it declared three years ago. in spain, there was a huge rally today against independence for the catalonia region in northeastern spain. police say 350,000 people turned out, but organizers claimed 930,000 did. they marched through barcelona, the capital of catalonia, which accounts for one fifth of spain's economy. catalans voted for independence last sunday in a referendum that spain's government called illegal, and spain's prime minister said today spain won't allow catalonia to secede. the anti-independence group that organized the march wants to mobilize what it calls a "silent majority" of catalans who reject independence.

>> finally tonight, gaylen rupp is the first american man in 15 years to win the chicago marathon. he ran the race in a total best of 2 minutes 29 seconds, he also won the olympic medal last year in rio. i'm hari sreenivasan, 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. the cheryl and philip milstein

family. sue and edgar wachenheim, iii. dr. p. roy vagelos and diana t. vagelos. the j.p.b. foundation. the anderson family fund. rosalind p. walter, in memory of abby m. o'neill. barbara hope zuckerberg. corporate funding is provided mutual of america-- designing customized individual and group retirement products. that's why we're 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.

[♪] did you feel that there was a glass ceiling? there were people, who said to me, i don't think a black person could ever be ceo. on september, the 11th, tragedy occurred not far from here. i talked to them about the fact that i cared a great deal about them and their families. somebody bought $175 million work of art, was that to get points? do you ever leave home without your american express card? i never leave home without it, and when i'm at home, it's always with me. woman: would you fix your tie, please? well, people wouldn't recognize me if my tie was fixed, but okay. just leave it this way. [♪] [david reading onscreen text]