captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> woodruff: good evening, i'm judy woodruff. on the newshour tonight, a test the u.s. senate-- dueling bills fail to open the government as airline workers offer a dire warning: the i shutdothreatening safety in the skies. then, an uncertain road ahead for american truckers. we ride along for the story of one long haul driver as his profession approaches a turning point. plus, a prisoner in iran for 544 days. i sit down with "washington journalist jason rezaian about documenting his captivity in a new book. >> it was such a huge relief to get on that plane and lift off and leave iranian airspace. but it was also enormous loss for both of us.st so you know i'l riddled with mixed emotions about thewh

e thing. >> woodruff: all that and more on tonight's pbs newshour >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> on a cruise with american cruise lines, you can experience historic destinations along the mississippi river and across the united states. american cruise lines fleet of small ships explore american landmarks, local cultures and calm waterways. american cruise lines, proud sponsor of pbs newshour.

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>> woodruff: they've been voting in the u.s. senate today, onen ng the partial government shutdown, but to no avail. meanwhile, thousands of federal workers are about to miss another pay check. congressional correspondent lisa desjardins has our report.rd >> dess: "no deal" on day 34 of the government shutdown. there were fiery speeches, from democrs blaming republicans... >> how ludicrous it is that the government is shut down over a promise the president couldn't keep, and the american people don't want him to ke >> desjardins: and republicans pointing at democrats. >> they want to win a political victory against the ent. their objective is to have the president back down and have not a single mile of border wall built. >> desjardins: the real action was inaction, on two measures to end the shutdown.

both needed 60 votes to move ahead. first, just 50 senators voted to back president trump's offer of temporary status for daca recipients in exchange the wall money he wants. just one democrat voted yes. next, 52 senators voted for what democrats wa, a bill to fund agencies until february 8th. six republicans joined democrats on that one. both failed, and that was the point. to show that neither side's current stance has the votes right now. chuck schumer tried to find a way forward. >> if they come to a reasonable agreement, i would support it, yes. >> even if there's no wall money or does it have to havwall money? >> look, i have other alternatives if i have to ad i will use those alternatives if i have to. we want to go through the system. we have to have a wall in this country. >> but as leaders struggled to negotiate, federal workers's

strugge growing. tomorrow, some 800,000 federal employees miss a seconpa heck. but bills are approaching, including, in two weeks, those workers' premiums for dental and vision coverage. the government is paying for medical coverage right now but not vision and dental. and lines at food banks for fesral workers and contract continue to grow. >> desjardins: but, commerce secretary wilbur ross was asked about reports of people going to homeless shelters and food banks and seemed confused: >> and i don't really quite understand why, because as i mentioned before, the obligations that they would dertake, say borrowing from a bank or credit union are in effect federally guaranteed. so the 30 days of pay that some people will be out is no real reas able to get a loan. be >> desjardins: while som federal workers can get short- term loans, that is not true for

many, possibly millions of contractors, who will not receivback pay and have lost a month's worth of salary. house speaker nancy said ross's suggestion shows the white house is out of touch: >> is this the "let-them-eat- cake" kind of attitude? or "call-your-father-for-moy" or "this-is-character-building-for- you," it's all going to end up well as long as you don't get your paychecks >> desjains: this, a day after pelosi won a kind of proxy fight with the president, after a battle over whher his state of the union address would happen next week, as he wanted, president trumtweeted last night that he would delay it - as speaker pelosi requeste he wrote, "i will do the address when the shutdown is over," and, "i look forward to giving a great state of the union address in the near future!"ke the house spdirected her thoughts about the change to the president himself. >> thank you for recognizing onat it's inappropriate to have a state of the uddress with people working hard, very

hard to protect all of us in that room, and not getti paid for it. >> desjardins: pelosi and democrats are expected to present a new border security proposal tomorrow, with no wall funding. w druff: and lisa and yamiche alcindor are joining me with the latest.er lisa, we know was a meeting going on between the senate majority leader and the minority leader. what do we know has come of th? >> judy, this is an important moment. seems to me -- they did meet. it seems to me thator sen lindsey graham speaking to the president and democrats is suggesting somethingwill go like this, permanent statusfo t.p.s. and daca recipients, different than the president's offer, but also wall money. the president's spokeperson says the president wants a down payment on hisl walmoney. i came from walking with house

speaker nancy pelosi. she said she wasn't sure what that meant and she's not sure if that is a reasonable agreement that the president said he could support. she's obviously analyzing this. we have good cop bad cop on both sides. nancy pelosi and president trump sort of beg the bad cop here keeping their sides while mitch mcconnell and chuck chuck are trying to actually negotiate. the biggest significance inhis hour right now, judy, is there's radio silence from the offic that are engaged. in history and my experience dealing with these tough fiscal crises, it's a sign there are actual talks hapening. how far they will will go, i can't say, and what this down payment means, who noassments but seems like there are real attempts, the first in weeks at progress. >> woodruff: yamiche, we heard the president say whatever comes out of this, there has to be ney in it for a wall, but what else is he saying about the poibility of some kind of an agreement between mcconnell,

schur, other senators? >> well, the bottom line is the president says whatever deal those lawmakers strike, it has to include border funding and a prorated downpayment for thell that means the president wants to see some sort of money, even if a little, as a good fath gesture to show i'm going to get some money at some point for the wall. it's important to note the president from the white houseid today e has no choice, has to have the wall. drones don't wo technology doesn't work. he repeated misleading claims he's done, says drugs are pouring in and the country is invaded. whey know drugs are usually smuggled in at legal points of entry and border crossings are at historic lows in the last decade. the president sayes hels republicans are holding the line and he's honored they are.he alked about wilbur ross' controversial comments and said wilbur ross perhaps should have said something differently butal

suggested, and had a lot of people scratching their heads, that grocery stores might work with people,some idea federal workers will be able to run up tabs at grocery stores d pay them when they get paid. the president is talking differently about speaker nancy pelosi. he decided the reason he decided to postpone the state of the union address is he found nancy pelosi's office to be reasonable. reasonable is not a word he's 'med in the past, but with nancy pelosi, he saysot going to give you a nickname and i'm going to call you reasonable, st that miean some sort of changes are coming ahead. >> woodruff: we are watching it c sely and the two ofu more closely than anybody. yamiche cdor, lisa desjardins, thank you both. in the day's other news, venezuela's president nicolas maduro ordered his diplomats to oave the united states, and he accused washingttrying to put a puppet in his place. the main opposition leader, juan guaido, proclaimed himself interim president on wednesday, and the u.s. recognized him.

maduro fired bk, in a speech today in caracas. >> ( translated ): he assumes, in the most inform, vulgar way, that he, is the president of a country. is that constitutional? in venezuela, from now on, the president is elected in washington and whomever wants to, swears in, on the street to be president. >> woodruff: on state tv, the venezuelan defense minister and top generals insisted maduro has the full support of the armed rces. but in washington, secretary of state mike pompeo warned the regime against harming guaido or his supporters. >> the regime of former pres nicolas maduro is illegitimate. his regime is morally bankrupt.o it's emically incompetent and it's profoundly corrupt. c we therefosider of all its decisions and actions illegitimate and invalid.

>> woodruff: this evening some diplomats were ordered to leave cuvenezuela for sety reasons. vladimir putin expressed support for maduro in a phone call today. china, iran and turkey expressed backing for his government, also.gu congo inted a new president today in its first peaceful transfer of power since gaining independencely 60 years. felix tshisekedi, an opposition leader, was the surprise winner of december's electiong- at the swear today, he shook hands with outgoing president joseph kabila. and he pledged to free all polical prisoners. there've been claims that kabila rigged the election, in a secr deal to avoid corruption probes. thousands of students skipped school in belgium today, to demand more action on imate change. it's the third straight week y thng people have taken to the streets of brussels. police say today's crowd, at 35,000, was the largest so far. another climate march is planned

in brussels on sunday. an american-born anchor for iranian state television has been released from jail in washington. marzieh hashemi was let go last night, after 10 days id custody. she stified before a federal grand jury as a materian witness in asclosed meiminal case. hashemi holds dualcan and iranian citizenship. owlice in sebring, florida say the victims in a mass shooting at a bank were killed execution-style five women we found lying face down, shototn the back of the head, after wednesday'assault.y, toolice said 21-year old zephen xaver walked in, and set about lining up victims. >> he immediately contacted bank employees and a bank customer and overtook the bank force. he then shot everyone in the bank. after shooting them, he called 9-1-1.

this occurred at approximately 12:36. he told dispatchers that he had killed five people in the bank. >> woodruff: a swat team finally burst into the bank and captured xaver. kvestigators say there's no indication that w the victims, and no clear motive yet. president trump's former personal lawyer, michael cohen, has been spoenaed to appear before the u.s. senate intelligence committee.he s lawyer announced it today. he said cohen will comply, but ousterday, cohen delayed testimony before a panel there's word that access to the microsoft search engine bing has been at least partially restored in china. h been cut off yesterday, in an ongoing crackdown on online speech, by the ruling communist party. bing is the only major foreign search engine available in , ina. on wall street tode dow jones industrial average lost 22 points to close at 24,553. the nasdaq rose 47 points, and

the s&p 500 added three. and, a new york penthouse, still under construction, now the most expensive home ever, in the united states. "the wl street journal" reports billionaire ken griffin paid $238 million for the property. griffin founded the citadel hedge fund. still to come on the newshour: tuulence ahead-- a dire warning from airline workers on security ris of the shutdown. an american healthcare worker is held prisoner in syria for two years. film director bryan singer faces multiple allegationsf rape and abuse, plus, much more. >> woodruff: for a couple of weeks now, we've seen more reports of temporary shutdownss of some termin security checkpoints at major airportsn

likeuston and miami. there have also been reports of growing security lines. periodical and a rising percentage of t.s.a. workers calling in sick. but on wednesday, the unions that represent pilots, flight attendants and air traffic corollers issued a joint letter warning that the prolon threatening air traffic safety. they spoke at reagan national t today and were joined senator mark warner, a democrat from virginia. >> there are 6,300 projects going on at airports across the auntry, many of them safety related, that ha been stalled by the shutdown and when the shutdown ends, it's not like you can immediely the day after get back to normal. the day after it will take a 45 to 60 day delay even after shutdown to get us back on these

safety products to business as usual. >> woodruff: air traffic controllers have been working without pay for over a month. some have been forced to work overtime, sometimes six days a week. trish gilbert is executive vice rresident of the national traffic controllers association and joins me now from new york. ms. gilbert, thank you very much for joining us. across the board, how have air traffic controllers been affectedby this shutdown? >> well, you know, depending onr where th working, they're handling it differently. they're all casing to work, you mentioned, since the shutdowns occurred without receiving pay. they're working overtime without receiving that pay, working holidays, weekends, nights to bp there vide the service that the public deserves, safeou passage througr airspace to get goods where they need to go, to keep the economy moving, they're there, but the strain is becoming signtnifi each day this shutdown continues, they worry aboth

r next paycheck, and now we're set to get a second paycheck without any pay int it. and it's not just about the pay. it's the fact that they don't know how long this is going to occur. so, now, a job, where you need to be focused 100% of the time on making sure planes don't hit each other, they're woried about the length of the shutdown and whether they will have to find other employment, ether they will have to take jobs before or after their shift, which could add more stress and fatigue to the w.k environme some are already doing that. or will they have to sell their homes or move? what are they going to be able to do? k they donow how long their savings will last because they don't know how long the shuwitdn continue. it's really an unreasonable thing to ask of american citizens that provide service for american citizens. >> woodruff: trish trish, how are -- trish gilbert, howu getting information about what these air traffic controllers are feeling now? >> i represent the 20,000 safety

.,professionals in the f.a 3,000 furloughed without coming to work and getting pay. they will get the back y as the law says, when we open, but i epresent many air traffic controllers along with other siation safety profession that are coming to work, as we previously mentioned, and they are writing e letters, notes, i've taken phone calls. i was an air traffic controller 21 years in houston, texas fore elected to this position, so i know them well. i see them in pain. ey're heart broken. the system they hold and safeguard, they hold so dear to them and they safe guard the people who fly through it is strained and unraveling. the safety components that are so critical to our system are being stripped away each and ovary day and they're watching it happen, and they're upset abouts. thi they feel like there's nothing they can do. they are at airports, they've

come to d.c. on d aay off when they have it to talk to their elected representatives.ey re also talking to the media across the country. they are really, ally trying to help all of us that would like to see this government running at full capacity so we can ensure safety back open. we need the goverent back open and we need it back open yesterday. we cannot sustain this irresponsible and reckless government shutdown. >> woodruff: ths has to be, if not alarming, at the very least concerning to americans who are listening to this, who we watching you right . give us a sense, take us inside the job of an air traffic controer who comes to the job, is worried about whether they can make the next mortgage payment or have what their family needs, how does that affect the work they do >> they are already work very

long hours because we are at a 30-year low of fully certified air traffic controllers and now the staffing crisis will continue well after the government opens. so they argoing to look forward to many, many years of mandatory overtime to keep the system running because they've quit hiring. they've shut our academy ila ma city where our new hires start the career. we have 2,000 eligible to retire, likely to go out offr tration, so they're looking at a career of many months and years of working six daywes a . so they're frustrated with that. so they come into the professiot hey love but nobody wants to work thalong every -- forever and ever. they need to get some relief. they need some -- we need to start hiring morie, once ths ends. we need to work on training. all the things that we' not doing now in this government shutwn. 're not training people to replace those that are getting fatigued and need toocus on,

again, separating planes, preventing tm fromitting each other. i'm getting notes from people that are saying they're making mistakes that they hadn't made in the ten, 15, 20 years of service they have been an r traffic controller. they're making them because they're stressed out, because they don't know when this is going to end, and they're distracted.h we cannot have in our system. it's unsafe, and we need to open the government, get th paid, get their support team there, ple,quality assurance pe our training teams, all of them there. m >> ae no mistake about it, we hear you saying that safety es being compromised right now. >> i think we a less safe than we were a month ago, absolutel there are less processes in place. we report safcety inents, like we always have, in the last several dedes or the lat decade, but nothing is happening with those reports. the peoplet would not -- would take action and mitthigate

risk being reported by the front line workforce are furloughed, so we're not seeing that occseur. we'reing maintenance of the infrastructure, our raiders and r technology not being maintained at the level that it is when we're open. it's a fix on fail type y,l and that's not adequate as well, so all of these things add risk in a system that needs to be completely safe for the american public. >> it is an alarming account, and trish gilbert with the air traffic controllers association, we thank you very much. >>hank you. >> woodruff: today in syria, isis and u.s. backed forces fought over one of isis' final holdouts. and the u.s. is reinrcing the area with additional troops, tor

prfor a withdrawal. but as the u.s. draws down, there are still americans being held by the syan regime. nick schifrin brings us one of their stories, with family that is just now going public. al>> schifrin: when majd kz wasn't throwing the football, hiking up a mountain, or fishing in the ocean, he was with his children.gra >> he was an amazing grandather. we have family in indiana, texas, iowa and virgand he was the glue that brought everybody together.ri >> sch khalid kamalmaz is majd's son. and when majd wasn't with his children and grandchildren, he was helping other people's red througho'd suf conflict or natural disasters. >> he had a big heart, and he couldn't help seeing anyone in pain. he saw a shortage and felt there was a need, and so we was an advocate of that need. >> schifrin: after the war in bosnia, the tsunami in indonesia, and hurricane katrina, he led an n.g.o. that w treated childr needed help. in 2012, he told an arabic news

outlet how children can be resilient, with their parents' support. >> (anslated ): the parents should always stand with their children. this giv the child confidence in his or her family and ensures they can overcome any issue in the future. >> he's a father, a husband, a brother, a son, he is a friend of many, a colleague, and he is mied very deeply. >> schifrin: kamalmaz was last seen in damascus in 2017. his family says he was not part of the war, or helping rebel fighters, but instead, paying respects for his father-in-law's death. a western diplomat told the family he was picked up by police, and transferred into a syrian prison.n >>"cbs this morning," the daughters of a syrian... >> schifrin: and now after two ayears of no progress, th going public with a media blitz to deliver a direct appeal to the president. ey wrote him a letter asking for his assistance. t >> we'ing to approach president donald trump to see if

we can get his attention so hehi can takematter personally. he's the only one we feel who can bring our father back home to us. >> we are very happy to have aya back home. >> schifrin: president trump has secured the release of several americans held hostage overseas. aya hija spent three years in an egyptian jail. last may the president greet americans at the airport after negotiating their release with north korean leader kim jong-un. and two months later, the presidt welcomed pastor andrew brunson, who'd been held by turkey. >> lord god i ask that y put your holy spirit on president trump.>> here hasn't been a day we haven't been praying and thinking about him, is he ok, is he alive? we believe president trump has the ability and the heart to do it. >> schifrin: but the u.s. has cut all diplomatic relations with syria, and so has little leverage over syrian president bashar al-assad. assad is believed to be holding

at least one more american: journalist austin tice. on the anniversary of tice's disappearance last august, his mother debra pleaded for his release. >>keur beloved austin was tan captive in syria. we have had no contact at all with him. five years is a very long time for any parent to be missing their child. >> schifrin: a state department spokesman says "our embassies and consulates abroad have no greater responsibility than the protection of u.s. citizens overseas," and is in regular contact with the kamalmaz family. majd's children say they government has been helpful. and they have a message to their father. >> we love you and that we're working very hard, as hard as we can to bring you back home. and we haven't given up on you. >> please know these two years have been hard for us, not knowing where you are, your health.ng we are dur best. our very

best to bring you back home. >> schifrin: all ty can do now is wait, and try to hold on to the resilience their father gave them. for the pbs newshour, i'm nick schifrin. >> woodruff: stay withs, coming up on the newshour: an uncertain road ahead for long haul truckers. and jason rezaian's new book docunting his time as a prisoner in iran. there are new allegations of sexual misconduct and assault by a proment filmmaker, bryan singer.d singer direcohemian rhapsody," which was just nominated for a best picture oscar earlier this week. he was behind a number of other major films as well, including peveral of the "x-men" movies and "the usual ss." his movies have earned three

billion dollars at the box office. amna nawaz looks at the allegations and how they once again raise questions aboutho ywood.aw >>: judy, bryan singer has faced similar allegations and even lawsuits before that were eventually dismissed. but an investigation published w "the atlantic" details claims of abuse and sexualr assault from fn who say they were minors at the time. three of them remained anonymous in the pce. a fourth went public by name. in somcases, singer is accused outright of rape and assault. in others, he's accused of seduction, sexual encounters and misconduct when the men were underage. the article also reports that singer engaged in other predatory behavior dating ck to 1997. and that he was sometimes aided by people around him. singer has disputed these claims

and hit back hard at the article which he called a "homophobic smear piece." alex french is one of the two journalists o worked on this investigation. he joins me now by skype. alex, welcome to the "newshour". this isn't the first time these allegations have been made against singer. sohat was it now about these four men and their stories that made you and your reporting partner max potter, sesn,hed mentook into this? >> we kicked things off last december after caesar goodsman accused mr. singer of raping him in 2003 when sanchez guzman was 17. not long after that, my reporting partner max pointed out to me that, youow, mr. singer had been trailed by alletions of sexual misconduct against underaged men for two decades. we spent a year researchingnd reporting around mr. singer's behavior. we spoke to, you know, 50s sourd, as you mentioned in

your intro, along the way, we met these four guys, you know, none of them had ever spoken to lae media before. all four of them that they had sexual contact with mr. singer when they were underaged. you know, i think these guys had watched the #metoo movement unfold and decided it was time to tell the stories. what was really striking about them, especially the alias guys, was they didn't want anything. yoknow, thehaven't filed suit, they're not asking for money, they're not looking for attention, they just really felt like it was time to tell their story. >> so, obviously, in a story like this where the allegations are this serious, granting anonymity a very serious decision you have to make. why did these three help want t remain anonymous and why did you decide their stories were gedible enough that younted them that and moved forward with the story? >> that was not something we took lightly. i can assure you these guys are very, very real to max and i. you know, we didn't ewter them just once, we interviewed

them, you know, a doen times, in person, over the phone. got to know all about their lives. you know, we really soaked in the details that they provided to us about these encounters with m. singer. and max and i spent a lot of time working to corroborate their claims. you know, we -- y know, one of the men in the story claims that he was assaulted in a house in beverly hills in a specific bedroom and we we and found floor plan for the house to corroborate those claims. you know, along the way, one of the guys said to us in reaction to, you know, qustions about going on the record and #metoo, if it's me, you know, alex, i work paycheck to paycheck, this sort o bvery that you are asking me to have is really a luxury. you know, like thiguy is not an actor still pulling tenmi

dollarion a film. a lot of these guys had reservations because they weref afraidme sort of retaliation. >> you and max were reporting this for another publication, esquire, where you both work r. and you arified in a statement later that it went through a fact-checking procese. executives there decided not to run it before you took it to "the atlantic" where it s eventually run. do you know why it wasn't run ridgeiin "esquire," why they killed it? >> it was conceived of by "esquire magazine." we went through their process including fact checking in an extensive legal-vetting process. when that was done ou sto and the full support of the esquire executive in chief and executive editorial director, the guys fought hard for the story, andh inend it was killed by executives at hurst and we don't

know why. we weren't provided rationale. bringing the story to "the atlantic" was not a long conversation. the mregazine has putation of journalistic excellence and max and i are grateful to those at "the atlantic" for giving the story a home andutting it through another rigorous fact check and vetting. >> before this came out mrsinger issued a response knowing that it was being reported. he claimed you werking assumptions that were fictional and irrponsible, rehashing lawsuits, and heeiterated a lot of these comments when the lished.as pub he said the timing was suspect. he has a big movie out now, claims you're get getting attention by publishing this now. what do you have to say to that?

>> in past in these allnsegat mr. singer resulted to countertactics and victim shaming. in his statement in october when he first caught wind of the story and yesterday, we failed to address a very detailed accusations made by the men in this story. they just don't hold water >> alex, oftentimes when we've heard similar stories against poweul figures first reported, additional accusations oren allegations urfaced since this has run. have you been approached by anyone else who's made similar allegations? >> i'm n at liberty to sa that now, sorry. >> alex french, who latest piece yow is in "the atlantic," thank you so much for time. >> thank you so much for your time. >> woodruff: last month the

newshour brought you a series of stories looking at the future of work, including a segment in which economics correspondent paul solman explored the seeming contradiction between the fear of job loss due to the rise of driverless trucks and the carrent shortage of truck drivers in ameri tonight, paul takes a closer look at e life of one of those drivers, and the state of his profession, part of his weekly series, making sense >> reporter: so now, when did you first start driving? >> 1981. >> reporter: you were how old? >> 21. >> reporr: and why. >> why. oh... >> reporter: a man whose job mab or may nthreatened by technology: long haul truck driver, finn murphy. >> i was at colby college. >> reporter: up in maine. >> waterville, maine. and then i'd come back to connecticut in the summers that' worked for callahan brothers moving and storage. and i took a road trip with a driver, my first ride in a big

trk. and it was amazing. over the george washington bridge in a big trk down route 13 through delaware, chesapeake bay bridge tunnel into virginia beach. i had never been in the south. i was seduced by it, i loved it. and so after my this was my junior year summer vacation and that's when i decid i wasn't ing to finish college. >> reporter: and so murphy got his commercial license and his a carea truck driver and professional mover of high priced home furnishings. he's distilled the experience into a memoir: "the long haul: a trucker's tales of life on the osad," describing an odd job for a college kid whe father was a well-known illustrator, the cartoonist behind "prince vaant." >> after i told him i was leaving college after completing three years and was going to work for north american van lines, he came down and he handed me a bill for three years of college. ree years of rent and sa if this is the path that you choose then you need to pay me back the college that you've squandered. i never did pay him and he never did ask me again.

>> reporter: but what drove a colby kid from a literacy-laden family; brother cullen is editor at large of vanity fair; to hit the highways? it can't just be the allure of the road, i mean. >> well it was the work too. vmoving people's stuff isy fun and complicated and hard. i enjoyed the camaraderie of working with a group of men. i mean, that's how human beings lived for 100,000 years. we all lived in small societies and we all did manual labor and we a did it with you know ar our brothers. >> reporter: but there was a long period of time when you did not drive, right? >> correct. so i drove for 10 years in the i'0s. and then i drove been driving since 2009. so another 10 years now. so i've had two stin10 years. >> reporter: and 20 years in between. >> and 20 years in between. >> reporter: in those two decades, he and his wife started a successful cashmere importing business, and murphy became a city councilman in nantucket.

that life all fell apart when his marriage did, so he dusted off his commercial drivers license angot back on the ad. >> when i climb up into the truck and i turn on this engine and i know i'm going tbe gone for four months.s and therlot of guys like me out there. you know we're running away from situations or. bankruptcy or bad relationships or anything. this is a great way to be out on the lam and still get paid. >> reporter: driving again, and helping move peopoe and their essions around the country, murp salvaged a sense of purpose. >> and i was making a ton of money because all i was doing was high end executive relocation. so i'm moving all these rich execs. >> reporter: how much ye you makingr. how much do you make a year? >> well if i work 50 weeks a year i can make a couple hundred grand. >> reporter: that's e absolute

high end of... >> it's the high end of trucking. a furniture mover who's doing corporate relocation is going to be the high end, yeah, the very >> reporter: but what does a typical trucker make? >> i think the average is about you know 36 to $40,000 a year. and that's for a guy who's he's getting paid by the mile. he could be gone for months at a time. this isn't a you know a highly skilled or highly paying job at all. i read "the economist" every week, probably the only long ha driver who reads "the economist" every week and this is a conundrum right now in today's bor market. which is you know we're at 3.9% unemploymentut wages are stagnant. >> reporter: indeed, wages have barely kept up wh inflation in the past year. for truckers, as for so ma jobs that aren't highly skilled, they've fared far worse, for decades.pa >> cd to what this industry paid in the 1970s we're way behind the eight ball because this was a solid middlet class job backn.

even into the 1980s and now it's a poverty profession. >> reporter: and why was it so well-paying back then? >> it was unionized and you had freight rates you had a regulated freight market that was regulated by the federal government just like the airlines. this all happened in the motor carrier act of 1935 with f.d.r., because all the trucking companies were going out of business in 1935. reporter: and this is when he propped up prices. >> exactly. he did it with the airlines. t did it with the trucking business he did wi railroads. and that's why these were middlu class jobs b you had the management and unions working together. because the prices were fixed.ep >>ter: and then that was deregulated further under jimmy carter, or at least the airlines were. >> yes, it started with y carter in trucking and it ended, was finished up by ronald reagan. >> reporter: but of course that means it's cheaper for the consumer right? >> it was a great consumer benefit. freight rates fell almost overnight. and this is the question-- this is the question that everybody needs to asks a citizen of any place.

which is: how mu money do you want to save at the expense of good jobs, communi character. you know we all have our nine dollar sneers from walmart now and that's great. but in order to get those ninell s sneakers we had to export all of our manufacturing' so now we have good jobs but we have nine dollar sneakers. is that a good tradeoff? in my opinion, no. >> reporter: well a lot of americans seem to agree with you, and that is a lot of the impetus behind donald trump's ghke america great again, >> it is. and yoknow i certainly nduldn't want to be cast into the trump camp a don't care who knows it. but, you know, 250 million people have been taken out of poverty in the last 30 years in the far east in and other places. and a lot of that has too with free trade and the decisionsat thountries like the united states have made. and i think i thinthat's

great. but we need to kp our eye on the ball about our own people. the middle class has been hollowed out in the united states. certainly in the trucking business and i'm not an expert on anything else. but this is not a middle class job anymore. id>> reporter: well it's ae class job for somebody like you. >> it's upper class job for somebody like me. right. well it's an upper class income, still not an upper class job. >> reporter: for thebs newshour, this is economics correspondent paul solman, out on the road. >> woodruff: now, to my conversation with the journalists jason and yeganeh rezaian. jason rezaian this week published a memoir that recounts s 18 months in an iranian ison. it's entitled "prisoner."

the airy kitchen of their washington home is now quiet comfort for jason and yeganehza n, three years after jason's release from an iranian prison, following 544 days in captivity rezaian was the "washington post's" tehran bureau chief when, in july 2014, he and yeganeh were arrested. they were newlyweds, both holding official journalist's permits, re-authized the very day they were detained.ab you were just as unlikely a political prisoner as i can y ink that. why do you think tose you? >> i think they chose me because i was the best available option. an american cizen working for major american media organization. one of the few based in iran. few media organizations. the only american and a duel iranian national so they could

have their cake and eat it too. you know treat me as an iranian tizen, put me through the rigmarole of a judicial process there. and at the same time try and extract concessions from the united statess i ing my job. and like any journalist i had contacts in the u.s. government, the iranian government, in the iranian construction of thia cainst me, the idea was that by doing all of this work and making all of this information gathered on the ground in iran publicly available to the united states in the washington post newspaper, this is a threat to our national security. i >> woodrufs two different worlds. i mean they had one understanding of what you were ing and it was completel different from what was. >> well i think they understood. i think they understood exactlyt was doing. how they interpreted how that could hurt them was their ownf sortazy conclusion.

al>> woodruff: of course i took place during the negotiations over the iran nuclear deal. did you feel you were a pawn?n >> i mdon't like the term "pawn" and i don't think anybody would. but i do believe that i was taken by the forces in the iranian regime that captured us to cause problems for those and kill our negotiations. t >> woodruf rezaians were held at tehran's notorious evin prison. yeganeh was released after three months; jason would remain imprisoned for another 15 months. you write so vividly about how terrible it was of course. edu said you were not tortured but you were treorribly and you were left in a room with a light on all the time. you were pulled in for daily constant interrogations. how did you get through it? >> well a year and a half is a long time.

and when you are surrounded by the same people you see the best and the worst that they're capable of in that pof time. i believe as time went on that i built a rapport with some of my terrogators and captors that they let their guards down ale liit. i thought in the moment you know better to be as myself as possible in the hopes that i might be able to get a slightly better situation because you're just trying to survive. >> i didn't want to be released without jason. i was resisting to leave the akeson because i wanted to sure if we do we do we do leave it together. it was not a sweet happy moment for me. >> woodruff: how do u how did you deal with the worst of this in terms, were there times when you thought he was not going to come? >> i was told many, many times at we won't ever be together

or he will be executed or at least he will be in prison for ten years. i contemplated suicide. interestingly one day i went to visit him and i was crying. and i said i think it was sevenh months thris imprisonment, i said jason i can't do this anymore. and we're meeting behind these windows and lking through phones.

and he said we came this far we can go a little bit longer. and he told me as soon as we are released we're gng to go to america, i'm going to take you to america and you're going , be an americere's no can't. american can do so i mean always remembered his words. it was just funny to me how he had energy to play with words to make me happy. i hink those little kind of things that gave you hope. >> i had no idea about thego ations that were going on. although my captors talked about it at certain times, you know, there's going to be a prisoner swap. i was incredibly skeptical, angry. if you remember, it was during

that period of time where they started admitting, you know, we know you didn't do anything wrong, you know, but we needed something to work with. it was suchre huglief to get on that plane and lift off and leave iranian aiac but it was also enormous loss for both of us. so, you know, i'm still, you know, riddled with mixed emotions about the whole thing. >> many people go through this harrowing experiences and they never come back as who they re. also, i think after he was released and we filly came to the united states, we are going through two different experiences. for him it's coming back home. for me is leaving home maybe forever. >> woodruff: can you talk about your feelings about your country and about the people in your >> i'm very proud of being iranian. i love my country.

i love my land. i love my people. i miss my friends. i just miss everything about it. but at the same time i know i most likely won't be able to go back anytime soon. >> i mean i think about the people that we left behind friends and family all the time. i think that's the biggest heartbreak of this whole experience especially for yegi not being able to see your family and you know by no fault of our own. that's the part of this that is so heartbreaking.f >> woodruff:u each could deliver a message to thenieaders of thed states and iran at would you say? >> i would say in both cases do a bett job of trying to figure out what's ming the other one tick because on both sides

they're off base the leaders of iran should be treating their people much better. open the doors let peoe out of prison. let people flourish. let them live their lives. >> i want to say both sides for their own political agenda or >> woodruff: jason rezaian how do you now think a aut your role ournalist? i mean you think of yourself as having a particular mission connected to what happened to you? how do you feel about your future? >> i just went back toork about a year ago. and the role that i'm in has evolved over that time. i'm on the opinion side now.s therpossibility for me to use platforms available to me to talk about issues relating toci iran and scally foreign t tionals being held there because i know tory as well as anybody. but also about why it'sms he atd the world. so i going to be doing that

long as i have the opportunity to.g as l i have a platform to do that, i'm not going to stop doing that. >> woodruff: but amid that mission, jason admiton the lasting,deep recollection of those 544 days changed him profoundly. >> it still affects me and everything that i do. i waa carefree person that traveled the world with a backpack and a o way ticket for many years. there's none of that anymore. i need to know exactly where i'm going, how i'm getting there, who's going to be there waiting for me and how i'm coming home. i'm a different person now. oo >>uff: finally, tonight, fans across africa and the world are mourning zimbabwe music legend oliver mtukudzi, who died wednesday of diabetes.

he was widely known as "tuku," a with distinctive style, in the shona language, that spanned more than four decades.♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ over the years, he recorded more than 60 albums and toured internatannally. he largely cut across zimbabwe's political divides,th playing foruling party and opposition alike. oliver mtukudzi was 66 years old. and that's the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. join us on-line and again here tomorrow evening with mark shields and david brooks. for all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you and see you soon. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has beeprovided by: >> babbel. a language app that teaches real-life colaersations in a new nguage, like spanish, french, german, italian, and more. babbel's 10-15 minute lessons are available as an app, or

online. more information on babbel.com. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions og >> this m was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station fromiewers like you. ank you. captioning sponsored by newsur productions, llc

captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org hello, everyone, and welcome

to "amanpour & co." here is what is coming up. 33 days without a paycheck for federal workers. former vice president al gore joins me. also ahead, president trump transgender troop ban. reaction from a trans captain in the u.s. military. ead capturing the human cost of war. ng to the serious correspondent