captioninsored by newshour productions, llc >> woodruff: good evening. i'm judy woodruff. on the newshour tonight: turmoil in russia: the latest on the diplomatic retaliation against the west and the fallout from the deadly shopping mall fire. then, on the front lines ofe: cyber warf inside the u.s. military's newest combatant command center. >> it's not like fighting a war in another domain where you deploy troops, you fight and go home. the conflict in the cyber domain is constant. >> woodruff: and it's friday. mark shields and david brooks discuss the top of the trump administration and adding ati nship question to the census.w plus, ad this: the latest entry in the newshour bookshelf, a conversation with author

mohsin hamid on his book "exit west". all that and more on tonight's pbs newshour. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided : ♪ ♪vi mo our economy for 160 years. bnsf, the engine that connects us.

>> consumer cellular. >> consumer cellular believes that wireless plans should reflect the amount of talk, text and data that you use. we offer a variety of no-co ract wireless plans for people who use their phone a , a lot, or anything in between. to learn more, go to or >> thefoundation. working with visionaries on the frontlines of social change worldwide. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions: and friends of the newshour. >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers lu.

thank you. >> woodruff: an american soldier has been killed in northern syria in the military campaign against islamic state fighters. a british soldier died in the same roadside bomb attack. a local syrian official says it happened overnight in manbij, where american troops are aiding anti-isis forces. president trump said yesterday that the 2,000 u.s. troops in syria will be leaving "very soon". but the pentagon's u.s. central comm information on that. palestiniaprotesters nfronted israeli troops along the gaza border today -- in thei blt day there since 2014. the palestinians said at least sr15 people were killed byli fire.nd reuters correst nidal al mughrabi witnessed the violence. he spoke with us -- via skype -- a short while ago, from gaza city.

>> we have seen lots of people, thousands and several thousands have started to come early to the location east of gaza along the border with israel. according to the organizers, people should have stayed 700 meters away from the boder, but many, many of the protesters have ignored the caution of organizes to stay that far. people throw stones. organizers resnded by tear gas, live fire and rubber bullets and casualties started to fall. >> odruff: why is this happening right now? we know that this has been a special day for the palestinians, whatas the immediate impetus? >> every year it's been some celebrations and some demonstrations tcomrade the day in 1976, you know, and loss

of land, but this day it was different. palestinian factions including the islamist gro wup hamich controls the gaza stip has s supported an idea of tens of thousands of people along the d border of israel to the right of return. >> woodruff: the israelis are accusing the palestinians, hamas, of deliberately sending women nd children toe bored, rutting them at risk, in ot word did you see that? >> the israelis, you know, they said hamas was exploiting the crowds for its own purposes in order to send civilians to be face to face with israeli soldiers along the border. what happened today -- you know, we've seen -- you know, people from all factions, but we've seen lots of people who are

frustrated of everything. they are frustrated of the lack of peace, they are fustrated for the lack of any horizon. it has maie no dfference to them whether they live or die aecause the situation in gaz was so terrible. >> woodruff: it is late at night there have things calmed down?y, >> m can say most of the protesters have returned home. the palestinian president has asked for the united nations to meet over what happened today in gaza. condemned it, and he asked the u.n. security council to afford the palestinians with international protection because of what happened. tomorrow, there will be national mourning day and also strike. so that is also another reason why we cou expect more clashes. >> woodruff: nidal al mughrabi with reuters,

thank you very much. >> you're welcome. >> woodruff: christians marked good friday across much the >> woodruff: christians marked good friday across much of the worltoday -- from jerusalem the vatican and elsewhere. pope francis began services atsi st. peter's ca, by lying prostrate before the altar. security was heavy for the occasion. and in the northern philippines, crowds gathered witness and record as seven roman catholics were nailed to crosses. the church has tried to discourage the ritual. back in this country: a jury in florida has acquitted the widow of the gunman who massacred 49 people at a gay nightclub in orlando. noor salman was found "not guilty" of lying to the f.b.i. and hiding her husband's extremist beliefs. liar mateen was killed by in the 2016 pulse nightclub tack. independent autopsy results raised new the police killing of stephon clark, in sacramento, california.

on march 18, two officers fired 20 times at clark, shouting that he had a gun.it urned out to be a cell omone. today, dr. bennet alu-- a pathologist hired by the famil - said eight shots hit clark, .d seven were from behind police had said he was coming toward them.>> he proposition that has been presented, that he was assailing the officers meaning he was facing the officers is inconsistent with the prevailing forensic evidence as documented at autopsy. >> woodruff: dr. omalu is known for his groundbreaking study of brain injuries in pro football players, that prompted the n.f.l. to adopt new safety rules. more than two dozen school districts in kentucky osed today, when hundreds of teachers called in sick. they are protesting a pension overhaul adopted late last night.

it says new teachers will be not be guaranteed a set benefit amount. this follows a teachers strike in west virginia and threats of job actions in several other states. and a russian hacker accused of tacking silicon valley companies is back in the united states to face trial, thczech republic extradited yevgeny nikulin 'sst night. harged with hacking systems at linkedin, dropbox,he and american firms. still to come on the newshour:ac russia strikes expelling 60 american diplomats out of the country, atlanta-- the target of a large-scale cyber attack. plus, inside the government command center tasked with fending off hackers, and much more. the diplomatic showdn between russia and the united states and its western allies intensified

this week, following the poisoning earlier this month in england of a former russian double agent and his daughter. the expulsions of alleged russian spies by more than 20 nations, and the retaliation by moscow, came amid a national tragedy there: last sunday's deadly fire in siberia. as nick schifrin reports,n relations betwssia and the west have reached yet another new lo >> reporter: today, russia tested a new intercontinental ballistic missile it claims can elude u.s. missile defense. but russia can't elude the current diplomatic crisis that's made russia-u.s. relations more dangerous than at any point since dae cold war. american diplomats packed their things outside the u.s. consulate in st. petersburg. d ssia ordered the consulate closed and expel u.s. officials in response to therd u.s. oing russia's seattle consulate closed a expelling 60 russian officials. these are the most significant expulsions since 1986. >> i've just returned from meetings in iceland.

>> reporter: but unlike 1986, when president reagan expelled soviet diplomats and held talks with the soviet union, today, the world isn't bipolar and the twsides have less interest cooperation. and that makes things more difficult to solve, says carnegie moscow director dmitri trenin. >> for the united states, it's hathe fundamental russian or that needs to change. for the russians, however, the goal is a compromise, achieved through the normal give and take process. and those two views are totally incompatible. >> president putin and i have been discussing various things. >> reporter: president trump expresses a desire to improve e relationship. but under the trump administration, tension has increased. over the baltics, nato jets have shadowed russian ministers' planes and russian jets have rocked their wings to demonstrate they're armed. in ukraine, the u.s. is sending

offensive weapons to soldiers fighting against russian-backed separatists. and in syria, us troop fired on pro-russian forces who had attacked them. this week, u.n. secretary general antonio guterres called for the two sides to reduce the cask of escalation. >> it's time for pions of these sorts guaranteeing effective communication, guaranteeing capacity to p.vent escalati i do believe that mechanisms of the sort are necessarytegain. >> rep for putin, tension's an opportunity, he's ghrtrayed himself as the only leader strong enou to stand up to a powerful, external enemy. but that doesn't mean he can ignore internal crises. siberian town kemorovo, when a fire ripped through and gutted at a memorial, a father e membered talking to his daughter on the ph she tried to escape. >> i was crying to my daughter. she said, dad, i love you. i'm suffocating. i'm losing consciousness.

>> reporter: t teragedy sparked mourning and protests. because the mall's exists were blocked and the firearm disabled. eputin visited to paypects and to present himself as a benevolent leader launching an investigation. he met with victims' families, letting them interrupt and question him. he ptrayed himself as authentic and local officials as corrupt. >> 100innvestigators are wo on this case. they >> 100 investigators are working on this case. they will inspect the whole chain of comnd. >> putin is an accomplished politician who's been very successful over the past 18 years. l t a lot of peoe under him, the bureaucracy, fat they are only responsible to the anar, that they are totally irresponsible, ande totally irresponsible, to the population.

>> reporter: putin's critics accuse him of facilitating the kind of low-level corruption ineffectual local governance that led to the fire. the fire shows the limits of putin's control. >> russia is a combinaon of top down control and anarchy. much of the issues around russia is not the poor management which exists on behalf of the authorities, it's also lawlessness and ck of responsibility among ordinary people. >> reporter: those ordinary people direct their ire at the local government, as putin portrays himself as confronting lo aggressive west. an the u.s. is considering further escalation, and russiaaintains blanket denials. neither side wants war. but it's not clear how they get t of the cycle of confrontation. for the pbs newshour, i'm nick scfrin.

>> woodruff: cit iof atlants sais slowly making progress in restoring its computer networks. hari sreenivasan explains how nine days after a cyber attack brought city services to a virtual standstill, systems are coming back online. >> reporter: atlanta is among the largest, but only the most recent victim, in a recent spike in ransomware attacks, where hackers gain entry to computers, seize files, and lock out users until a ransom is paid. the f.b.i. received more than 2,600 such complaints in 2016. a group known as "samsam" is thtaght to be behind the atl hack. they've already extorted moreth $1 million this year, from some 30 organizations. the f.b.i. advises not to pay extortion money to hackers, saying it emboldens criminals, and does not guarantee that the

seized data will be returned. atlanta officials have not saidt r they paid the $51,000 ransom demanded of them. for more on the scope and consequences of these modern-day shake-downs, we turn to allan liska, senior intelligence fianalyst with the securit "recorded future." put this atlanta hack in perspective for us. how significant is it? >> thank you for having me, hari. it is actually pretty significant in terms of the scope ofhe damage. this is, though, one of the things that the "samsam" group does as part of their attack structure. a lot of ransomware that we see is broadly distributed, so i ag tackering after as many targets as possible. the "samsam" group it a le bit different. they study their targets, they take their time getting in, and then once they've accessed the network, they make sure they keep the damage as small as possible, and atlanta is oth of biggest targets they've hit.

>> when we think of hackers oftentimes a stereotype by hollywood is a teenager sitting in theirasement by themselves. but when you talk about groups like this, is this one of the new faces of organized crime? >> absolutely. the "samsam" group is well organized, well funrid. they've ca out attacks since at least december of 2015. they've brought in sever million dollars over the last couple of years. so its -- i hate to u the term, but it's a thrivg enterprise. >> sreenivasan: let's talk a little bit about atlanta. they have been pretty tight-lipped on exactly what's been affected. but what kind of services if's ot atlanta but other cities who are switching from paper to digital that coulfall prey to this kind of attack? >> in atlanta, we see this with their court system having to switch back to paper and not being able to pay fines, speeding tickets or access other

services. this happens a lot. when you have a group tht plns their ransomware attack carefully, they will make sure that it's disruptive. we saw this last year with the attack on the san francisco bart system where an attacker got in and installed ransomware on the fare system so everybody who went to buy the ticket saw the systems had been infected with ransomware. >> sreenivasan: so it seems that cities and companies put up kind of fire wal to try to keep hackers from getting in emsd of directly, but it s that the human beings inside are the weak links. they get an email, click on link and all of a sudden the bad guys are inside the network, so to speak. >> in this particular case, that's not what happened, but that's the primary distribution of ransomwares through fishing e-mails, a fake invoice, a link to a bad web site. that is the primary distribution. the good news is that type of

ransomware is actually on thede ine. so we saw a big drop in that at the end of 2017, and that's continued into 2018. part of that is onsanizat are getting better at protecting themselves from that type of ransomware. this type of ransomware is a little b different because this is targeted, and this is a group that io willing ttake weeks or months in order to gais aco the networks they want to get to. that is much haarder -- that' much harder group to protect against. >> we see this ory because it's the city of atlanta, but if you go back and search google news, you will see the baltimore police department an the fire department here and colorado, state by state, city by city, they're experiencing these attacks and they're kind of under the radar.an >> this is a c in tactic that we've seen over the last year or s. so ransomware used to be, again, widely distributed, widely

attacked, but a lot of corporations have stepped up their security and made it much more difficult for these attackers to gain access. however, hospitals, health care facilities, government agenciesd state local governments specifically, don't have the resources to fully secure their systems the way some of these other companies -- you know, banks and so on -- do. so they have been more susceptible to these ransomware attacks. they also ha oftentimes a mandate to pay the ransom because either constituent or patient services are being disrupted, so they tend to be more likely pay. so they're good targets because they will often pah and tey're i don't want to say easy targets,ut becse their security teams tend to be stretched thinner, there's -- a bad guy is more likely find a

mistake. >> sreenivasan: allan liska, senior intelligence analyst with "recorded future," thank you so much. >> thank you. >> woodruff: stay with us. coming up on the "newshour." mark shields and david brookshe analyze antrump cabinet shakeup. author mohsin hamid answers youu tions about his newest book "exit west." and the accountant w play in the national hockey league. but returning to the murky world of cyber attacks, and defense. the newest u.s. military command is responsible not fiece of land or air, but cyberspace. special correspondent mike cerre, has this exclusive, inside view of the men an women protecting the military's digital networks at united states cyber command. >>uneporter: it looks and so like every other stateside

military base, far from the front lines around the globe. but fort meade, maryland, home base to the national security agency and u.s. cyber command, the military's newest ant command, is fighting a war every day. admiral mike rogers commands both the n.s.a. and u.s. cyber command. >> today, we face threats that have increased in sophistication, magnitude, velocity.nd volume and wa>> reporter: the interne largely created by the defense department in the late 60s mostly for research and development programs. now, like every other major institution, it depends on it for almost everything it does. as a result, the dee department's information network is now targeted by nearly 40 million malicious emails, everyday. colonel paul craft's cyber protection teams defend the network from this top secret operations center called "the j-soc."

>> we do not want the enemy toho get a fo into the department of defense's networks to gain or maintain any terrain just ley would in land. >> reporter: the newshour was granted exclusive access, under conditions we not identify team members or the cyber-defense technologies used. vice admiral nancy norton is the commander of the joint forces headquarters-dodin, which is responsible for protecting the military's network. >> t national defense strate has made pretty clear that we have near peer competitors in cyberspace from russia and china. north korea aniran are also routinely working to gain a timpetitive advantage by g into our networks.or >> rr: in addition to these adversaries, u.s. military cyber warriors fight thousands si non state actors, terrorist groups, and profal hackers all committed to cracking the firewalls of cyber's first, and presumably largest, distributed network, now used for everything from combat operations and to

military healthcare. >> everything starts with a thing called "an indicator of compromise." it could be a malicious spear phishing e-mail.it ould be a packet that looks foreign for some reason that could do something malicious to our network. the simplest thing is to block it. but if they're in your house, it's about getting that person out of your house and making sure we knew what they touched. and the network is again restored, hardened, and restored. >> reporter: once inside, hackers can disrupt a network'ss operatike they did last year to the british health system forcing hospitals to down, or they can steal confidential information likeeq fax's credit reports on more than 145 million americans. so far, the most serious cyber-b securityaches of u.s. defense and intelligence networks were inside jobs, like

arho p.f.c. bradley manning, now identifies as chelsea, a transgender soldier who copied and released nearly a million classified documents. the leaking of the n.s.a.'s ansurveillance techniques other classified material by a subcontractor, edward snowden. there are also accidental security breaches, like e careless use of a flash drive dd a military unit in the east in 2008 that temporarily created an opening into the defense department's network. these cyber teams are drawn from all the service some were trained by the military others were recruited for their cyber skills. >> it's not like fighting a war in another domain whu deploy troops, you fight and go the conflict in the cyber domain is constant. a line of code buried in this recruiting ad generated nearly 800,000 hacking attempts on a fake military website. 1% cracked the site and were invited to join the military's cyber warfare team.

en reporter: training and retaining this newation of cyber warriors is a challenge. armed with the technology, i could walk out today and get a-- very easily get a six-figure salary. it's not about the money. it's about the pride in your joo and what you dthe american people. >> reporter: lieutant general vincent stewart is a deputy commander with u.s. cyber command. >> the metaphor i like to use in this space, it's like playing hockey. you're constantly on the move.ns in both ofand defense and it's fast paced, it's ic and one goal can change the outcome. >> reporr: general stewart can't elaborate on cybercom's offensive tactics, like those they've cently used to try to disrupt isis' online recruiting and media operation, or what and media operation, or what if any involvement the u.s. had with the widely pubcized

reported, but officially denied a cyber attack on an iranian nuclear facility, using software virus called "stuxnet" which disabled critical equipment. >> what was create that was not just an operation to sabotage iranian nuclear research. it was a new>>ind of weapon. eporter: peter singer, with the new america foundation, and other defense analysts believe the iranian attack to be a major turning point in cyber-warfare. d they created a weapon something that cauysical damage. but it was unlike every other in history and that it was computer software such as zeros and ones. >> reporter: but it is a more recent cyber attack, on the 2016 presidential election, that is ncern.e , tecting, let alone stopping the russian meddlisn't cyber command's job. since it was largely executed on facebo and other public, social media networks the military is prohibited fro

intervening with. and more the those platforms are more responsibility of the department of homeland security. is is an issue of priority. at's what has clouded the debate over the 2016 is you have these intelligence agencies seeing things coming in, seeing things hit american political rse,itutions, but, of cou they're not supposed to be involved in american politicals questid then, on top of it, it throws them into a partisan debat' that's why s been so difficult. iceshe senate armed se committee recently challenged cyber command's admiral mike rogers on the u.s. response to the russian interference. >> intentionally, we have not taken on the russians yet. >>t's probably fair to sa that we have not opted to engage in sme of the same behaviors

that we are seeing. >> this is not just about th chinese. this is about the russians. this is about the iranians. these e all our potential adversaries who understand the things thadt unerpin western liberal democracies and are going after it. that's what keeps me awake. >> in the cyber realm, an attack can dismantle infrastructure and networks and also destroy faith in institutions. for thebs "newshour", mi reporting from fort meade, ryland. >> woodruff: it was the third week in a row where president trump fired a member of his administration. this week, it was david shulkin of the department of veterans affairs. that and other news brings us to the analysis of shields and brooks. that's syndicated columnist mark shields, and "new york times"

columnist david brooks. gentlemen, more turnover. this time it was the head of the rans affairs department. david, looked as if he and the president were gettiong well but then there was a dispute over how fast they should privatize, what the v.a. dose, anthen there were questions about a trip he took to europe with his wife last week, but he's out. >> can you imagine wrking at a place where every week somebody goes? there was a quiet wek but they still lost a cabinet member. it spes to how litle sense of camaraderie and trust there is bewiuse you don't know wh be there day to day and no assurance is a real assurance. to me the most interesting thing is the replacement with jackson and that's part of the belief of populism which donald trump stands for is experience is more corrupting than educational ande yo clean people from outside who are pure fro partisan interest and rotting in the swamp. we're about to test that

proposition because parently an extremely good man but with no administrative ability is being asked to run the second largest bureaucracy in the u.s. government, and with someone who has no administrative ability but hangs around people who do, it's just a different style of thought. i feel great sympathy for that guy coming into what's going to be an extremely difficult job. ronnydruff: we read dr. jackson, the president's personal white house physician, was reluctant, apparently, when this was first raised with him to takhee over.a. >> that's exactly it, he comes with very high personal recommendations -- the deputy chief of staff in the obama white house called him not only a patriot but a saint, and dan pfeiffer went on the record, and had hen there under tree presidents. so the personal credentials arei pretty s and he -- and the president likes him, and he did very well one tlevision

presenting the president's medical report in telling with a straight face the president weighed 239 pounds. so that endeared him. but i come back t the firing. this is quite a unique administration in the terms of public service. i can recall when donald trump was running, he said -- and i looked it up again today -- i know th best people, i know the best managers, i know the best steel makers, we're going to have th best cabinet. we're on the third national security advisor at this point. what's so bizarre to me is i can remember when the peace corps was created, and there was one ung man who put his career on hold and they said, why are you doing this? he said, i've never done anything plitical or patriotic

or unselfish because nobody asked me and, he said, president kennedy asked me. you know, that sense of public service that it's a high calling, that it'sor the common good, is totally absent from this president, from his lexicon, from his frame of reference. >> woodruff: well, and, you know, while we're talking about personnel, theroead of the enental protection agency, scott pruitt, david, appears to be in some hthot water is week because turns out he was living in a room orrenting a room near capitol hill last year and paying an unusually small rent,i $50 t, in an area where it's more expensive than that, and there'n a storyhe "the washington post" today about unusually inexperienced and not people who didn't do a great job in the white house personnel office. so just more questions. >> yeah, and this goes to the point mark made and to the notion of norms. i have been talking to lot of people like -- a lot of people

that the president's approval ratings are up. the economy is doing well, i tove him credit for that. there's a validit that argument but there's been a damage to the normse govern ourselves by, the capacity of stat he appoints people he personally likes where a personal relationship with the kinis all that matters. pruitt takes atm dept that has some ties to the wife ofta lobbyist. mott the biggest scandal in the history of the rep rick, it's just somebody who goes in with a mentality of i'm here to serve the people and country, it doesn't feel right to do that. alarm bells going off in your head ofny normal person, that's going to hurt my capacity to do my work. the fact the alarm bells didn' go off suggests the shift in capacity from private to pubctlc has not happened, they haven't crossed the mental leap

mark described that you can be corporate lawyer, do all that, and it's perfectly fie but, when you do public service, you're entering difaferent lm, you're probably not going to get fly first class which you're used to, there will be sacrifice bus you do it because you feel it's the right thing. ferentdruff: it's a dif recommend and typically the vetting is tough to get these jobs in the administration. >> it is, and the piece you ntedioned in the post poi out they started with a far smaller pool of talent. most administrions start with 30300 -- 300,000 names. they had, i think, one-fourth of at when they came in. many have been shot down because they didn't meet the loyty test at one point or another. lf course, the whole person staffing was absolutely blown up. it was done by chris christie. they had done according to independent observers a pretty darn good job and they just burned that. so they have been behind. most administrations, republican and democrat, at the office of

personnel management put ines pronals, i mean really talented people. i've known a number of them myself, and, you know, because they recognize that personnel is policy in any administration. you have the greatest ideas and policy in the making but unless you have able, committed people to execute those policies, it's for naught. that's exactly what's een the problem here. >> woodruff: change of subject, but relat in ay because it's administration policy, david, as we learned from the census bureau, from th administration, the trump administration, that what the census folks are going to do in 2020 is add a question about pele's citizenship, raising all kinds of questions about whether this is going toe a deterrent to people participating who are living here without all the proper documents. >> in normal ties, frankly, doesn't strike me as an odd question to ask, are you a citizen, and historically the census has asked that question.e

but intmosphere of fear that surrounds immigration these days, with i.c.e. behaving as they are andth the administration really cireatening in some situations to kick tizens or noncitizens out, what you're doing is this e comes at th of that climate and, give that climate, asking th question, making this policy shift now can only be interpreted as a way to get people to not answer the question. there is an important shift to political power because money goes to -- depends on how many people you represent in each jurisdiction, federal money follows the numbers and if you're scaring peoplaway om participating in the census, the jurisdiction will get les money. given the climate, strikes me as a menacing anobably counterproductive question. it's already clear if you have e gove person coming to the door and asking a question and the private person, people answer the private person more because there's no fear there, but the gernment implies force, so they would get a

higher turndown rate if you make it even more menacing because you're going to ask a question that could get you thrown out, people are going tose the door. >> woodruff: the administration is saying they think they're going to ge a more accurate count, but the skeptics are saying, no, they will hid >> put me down on the side of the skeptics. there's 132 government programs based on need, so you have to get, whether it'food stamps or whatever it might be, school lunches that are basthed - apportionment to the states is based on the need, and if the orer people, the ls affluent people who oftentimes are those who are recent immigrants to this country are silenced under timidity, fear, and we don't get an accurate count, that means people who need it most are not going to get it, will be-

deprived. it will mean less political power totates lik california and texas, too, because of the large latino population. but the motives -- the hands are not clean coming to this question.d it dt -- it wasn't something that came uh up out of a think tank. it wasy announced wilbur ross the secretary of commer who we don't think spent a ph.d.'s research looking at this. c it tid have aertain appeal to the president and the white house. >> woodruff: different subject, the event that really took over washington last saturday and that was the big march for our lives, davidled by those young people at parkland high school, the marjory stoneman douglas high school in parkland, florida. it was a huge turnaround around the country. is this something that's going to last? willt make a difference in the

argument against gruel? >> i'm skeptical it will make a difference. ibut it was instructive to me. i went to be with the marchers as a journalistic observer, of course, and shocked me as a ver. moderate mar it was focused on the specific issues of banning assau weapons, a few specific moderate pieces of legislation. i was hardened by it because seems like the extreme on this side feeds the extreme on this side and our entire postical system gyrating without any sense of moderation, but this was a moderate march and the people were good-hearted, there was a good spirit. there was no culre war fighting. there was norad callization. it struck me as democracy the way it's supposed to work. then i followed the feedback onh the man twitter, frankly, itd it was like i was at a different march was as if they were all set of radicals and one set was shouting at another. so it was revel tore to me that the world you see on twitter is

nt the real worldthat there are a lot of doesn't people who have positions, this ee that, you can agith them or not, but it gave me a much more hopeful sense about our >> woodruff: says something about social media. >> i think it does say an awful lot about social media. judy, no arrests here in washington. very littlrefuse t behind. they were a cleanrespectful group of people. i think david's absolutely right, good will and good nature was pervasive. there weren't taunts or any recly hostileivity. you know, i am more hopeful, quite frankly, hing lived through it and seen it, that there may be some hope, that they've sustained etthey've kept it going. i do think that the n.r.a.,

national headquarters is very much on the defwensive right n, and gun sales are down, you may haveo nticed. one went into chapter 11 this week after 202 years. >> woodruff: congress was away. they're coming back, maybe we'll gets a sense next week. >> we whether. >> woodruff: mark shields, david brooks, happy easte happy passover to both of you. >> thank you. >> woodruff: now, a work of fiction explores migrati, violence, love and fear: jeffrey brown sits down with the author of our march pick for "now read this," our monthly book club, a partnership with "the new york times." a brown: two young people fall in love i unnamed city in the muslim world and as violence takes hold they're nirced to flee, joi a mass migration that's become one of

the halmoarks anst contention events of our time. but this is a novel exit west that usndes realism some magic to capture life for milliona today anossible future. as we do every month, we've asked you to send in questions and author moshin hamid is here to answer someas we an fit. nice to see you again. >> thank you. >> brown: thanks for coming. i'll get right to it. there were a lot of people who wondered about how this matched up with you, right. so elaine from fyettesville, arkansas, is any part of this novel drawn from your own experience? another question, are your main characters based on real people you know? >> well, i have been migrating my who life, so in a way i suppose i was always going to write at some point a novel about migration. i moved to california when i was 3, back to america when i was 1r pakistan, london, now back to pakistan. so the experience of migrationon

and the emo pain and confusion that comes from it i think do in a way comfort m. but at the same time the horrors thaare things i'm not familiar . with nightmares, living in pakistan, is someone is terrified of what could happen as opposed to what isappening. >> brown: a lot of people noticed that not giving the names of the two characters bu not other characters, right? some places are named but not the city where they're from. so christina pe fro cherry valley, california.s ere hamid trying to give this story a timeless universals quality by notiving apecific location to the city? >> a bt. it's a good question. i think that, for me, the nameless city partly was because i didn't want to name it thehe town i live because

something terrible happens in that city and it would have broken my heart to do it to my own city, but partly i wten the reader to imagine it the city of their father, mother, best friend. >> brown: bob olson in minnesota, what was the thought behind giving the only two protagonist's names in the book? >> the novel covers a lot of ground, moves from place to place and different characters come into it. having only two named characters keeps the reader in touch with the emotional heart to have the story. who ever else you immediate thuy mattert the couple is what the book is about. >> brown: theyove, others move, this is the magic i was referring to for those who have ot read the bok, people move through open doors, explain that because obviously ier intted our readers. >> so in the novel these black doors begin to apear. so maybe you're in your apartment and the door to your

bathroom has been replaced by a dark rectangle. say you're across the world, suddenly billions of people start to move tapped whole world starts to change. >> brown: lots of people asked about the device. connor from st. louis said how and why did you dece not to write anything about the couple's fiscal journey outof the company? >> we have become so focused on the story of how somebody crosws the border, ho did you cross the mediterranean in a small boat or thu.s.-mexico border, crawl underneath a barbed wire, and weink people who have done that are different from us. it makes ust' imagine thaall their life consisted of and that's very different than us. when you take away that part of the story, you're left with people just likes, anyone can have that experience. taking away that story doesn't minimize the importance of that happening in the real world, but

it shows people are just like us. >>rown: that opens up a whole other issue, we wonder who are they, what's goowng on, does this even happen. >> i think technology works a bit like magic. most of us have a black rectangle in our pocket or backpack or purse and when we ouok ate our consciousness goes far away fror bodies, magically appearing somewhere else and looking at thene pho and suddenly you're by the moon or mars or antarctic i thought what would happen if your body could move asil easy as your mind. the doors give life to that. >> brown: there was a question i was terested in because it goes to your thinking about how you write. i've seen exit we described as a fairytale. lam not sure that's entirely accurate, but thguage in the book does v to me, this ader, striking style that reminds me of someone telling a. st i felt like a listener in some ways rather than a reader.

>> i'm really h happy toear that. i write by reading my stuff out loud again and again. >> brown: you walk around the room talking to yourself,ad g? >> yeah. if you see me from a distance, you would think i was crazy, a guy pacing around in his study talking to himself. i read two hours out loud for i've which one hour i write. the reason that matters is we imh ine we read witour eyes but we actually process words and nguage through circuitry in our minds connected to our years. >> brown: i won't give away the ending, but a lot of peoree wondering about where this leaves you. are you optimistic about the situion, the refugees situation? >> i'm optimistic about our species. you know, we ar descended from refugees, all of us. our people have my grated. evybody comes from the moher continent of affect and now people have moved on since then. so i think that we will find a way. human beings do, t andhe current fear that we have of the future,

i suspect, will overcome it. >> brown: all right. we're going to continue our tal d we'll have that entire conversation available online. for now, first, let me say tnk you, moshin hamid, for joining us. >> thank you. >> bro: let me tell you at home about our pick april as we turn back to nonfiction. the next book "the death and life of the great lakes," a wonderful story of hissctory, nce an about theea thrto the largest source of water in the world and america's wat dan egan will join us for online wetras all month and ayour questions right here at the end of april. so remember u can join "now read this" through facebook and the "newshour" site. we're at 51,000 readers and counting in the book club and, most importantly, everybody's reading along. join us. thanks.

>> woodruff: what starteoff as just another game in the n.h.l., last night's match-up between the chicago blackhawks and winnipeg jets, became one of the more improbable sports stoes of the year, as an unlikely hero stole the show. >> hey, who's this guy? >> woodruff: it was the question d by many watching last night's game in chicago. but by the end of the night, they had their answer: here's the shot, foster sucks up another one! ( cheers ) >> woodruff: that "guy" was 36-year-old accountant scott foster, pressed into emergency service for the blackhawks. the former college goalie is one of a handf of amateurs that n.h.l. teams hold in reserve if their pros can'tlay, and that's how "once in a blue moon" ended in a red jersey last

night, when the blackhawks backup goalie went down with injury. but the father of two,ho's never played professionally, looked eve bit the part. >> ( horn sounding ) and look at scott foster >> woodruff: in 14-plus minutes, foster stopped all seven shots he faced, and secured a 6 to 2 win for one of the league's worst teams, against one of its best. in the locker room, he met the news media: >> did you get any advice before you went out there? >> i don't think i heard anything other than "put your a helmet o now i'm standing here. >> did you see joel quenneville just laughing as you were getting on the ice? >> i think i would too. ( laughter ) >> woodruff: the blackhawks move on to play in colorado tonight. but scott foster will be at home in oak park, illinois, not on the ice...w. for now, to our newshour shares,at

something aught our eye. the video of a rescued chimpanzee flight to wildlife sanctuary recently spread like wildfire on the internet. the newshour's julia griffin tracked down the video's pilot anasked about his mission save africa's imperiled primates. >> reporter: it's a simple video that tugs at the heartstrings: a baby chimp bonds with, sleeps on, and even learns from the man flying him to a safer home. the pilot is anthony caere, a belgian aviator working for virunga national park in the democratic republic of congo. >> since i was a little boy, i had like two big wishes and i was flying small planes and animals. so-- and i got the opportunity to work for virunga national park four years ago, i grabbed it with two hands. >> reporter: on a noal day, caere is an "eye in the sky," assisting rangers in anti- poaching patrols, wildlife censuses and other duties.

but a few times a year, he ferries orphaned apes and monkeys 400 miles north to lwiro primate rehabilitation center. his passenger this time was mussa, a three-year-old chimpanzee recently rescued from poachers. >> it's actually a very sad story because they took that eyttle chimp away from his family. killed this family. >> reporter: poachers often sell slaughtered adult monkeys as bushmeat in local markets, but they prefer to peddle the bas. animals as p once confiscated from their captors, lwiro provides primates like mussa a safe space to cover. the organization cares for more than six dozen chimps and nearly 100 monkeys, many of which arrive malurished, stressed and physically wounded from small cages and tight ropes. whicis why, caere says, most baby chimps are not restrained during his flights. >> if you have like a really chill little babchimp who is happy to be on your lap and it holds you, then you have the

wrong effect when you put it in a cage, then it will totally freak out start to cry. it can die, actually. so we take the time to gain his trust, to feed him and when he feels comfortable and he jumps on your arms and he holds you then it's time to do the flight. >> reporter: and while he is happy his video went viral, caere emphasizes this flight should never have haened in the first place. >> i hope the people not only say ok it's a cute movie, but there still is poaching and the message is that that little chimp should be with his mom and not on my lap. >> reporter: mussa is now inqu antine with other rescued baby chimps. when he is ready he will be introduced to a new chimp family. for the pbs newshourjulia griffin. and, a news update before we go: one baton rouge, louisiana police officer has been fired over a 2016 tal shooting of a black man. alton sterling was killed in a struggle outside of a convenience store.ff the seconder involved was

suspended for three days. earlier this week, the stateg declined to briminal charges. charges against the white officers. and that's the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. have a great easter and passover weekend. thank you and goodight. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: supporting innovations in

>> and with the ongoing support of these institutions n and friends of tshour. and individuals. >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs statn from viewers like you. thank you. captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc captioned by tmedia access groupbh geccess.wgbh.org

widespread outra over the sacramento police shooting of stephon clark is sparking t nwide protests and calls for police reform. also president trump takes on amazon as ses and facebook continues to stumble.k and a speaeek at films that take you to the supreme court. welcome to kqednewsroom. we begin with the controversial police shooting in sacramento.o we want warn you the footage you're about to see contains graphic content that y be disturbing to watch. last week police officers shot and killed stephon clark an unarmed 22-ar-old african american man in sacramento. the officers were responding to calls fbt car break ins when