captio nnewshour productions, llc >> nawaz: good evening. i'm am nawaz. judy woodruff is away. on the newshour tonight: fallout in russia. fear lingers after nuclear engineers are killed in a mysterious rocket explosion. what it means for the country's weapons program, and for vladimir putin's hold on power. then, the artistic world is micked as legendary operatic tenor placido dongo is accused by multiple women of sexual harassment. and, digital casinos: where you can't win, but you can lose everything. an inside look at how gambling companies target vulnerables uso play online-- where there's zero chance of reward and every chance of financial ruin.w >> you don't kis until you play this game, but you've got a problem.av

if youan addiction, you're screwed. >> nawaz: all that and more on tonight'pbs newshour. >>ajor funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: life well-planned. learn more at raymondjames.com. >> text night and day. >> catch it on replay. >> burning some fat. >> sharing the latest viral cat >> you can do the things you like to do with a wireless plan designed for you. with talk, text and data. consumer cellular. learn more at consumercellular.tv

>> babbel. a language proam that teaches al-life conversations in a new language, like spanish, french, german, italian, and more. babbel's 10-15 minute lessons are available as an app, or re information on babb. >> and with the ongoing support 6of these institutions: and individuals. >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> nawaz: clashes rocked hong as anti-government demonstrations crippled the busy international airport for a d seco. scuffles broke out when riot police armed with pepper sprayon and batons cond pro-democracy protesters inside levion news" has our report.ent >> reporter: midnight hong kong time, and the protestors who'd forced the cancellation of all outbound flights for the second day running,me

beca suddenly agitated as a thin blue line tentatively entered the arrivals hall, terminal e. laser pens blinded the officers, who were immediately forced to retreat.s the blackshithought for a moment they'd seen the police off. then the riot police arrived. initially they picked off individuals.be some weraten, then cuffed one riot policeman became immediately trapped inside the doors to the terminal. you see him attempting an arrest, then he's set upon. s beaten withn i his own baton. the intensity of the mistrust and hatred that has plbuilt up, exing. the cop pulls a hand gun but shows restraint; he does not fire. he's finally rescued. beijing's rhetor of "no leniency, noil mercy" l echoing round hong kong, a city in the throes of chaos and

escalating violence and ow gripped by fear of what china might . at 12:40am, the protestors surround another cespected poli spy and cuff him with plastic cable ties.it the edor of a chinese per, tist party pa english-language "global times," tweeted that fu geo hao is o h is hong kong-based reporters. there is an ugly symmetry to all this. it followed other violent incidents on sunday in which hong kong police fired tear gas into underground stations, chased and beat fleeing protestors, and, across the harbor, shot a young female protestor in thewiye a baton round. carrie lam, the pro-beijing political leader of the semi-autonomous territory, held a news conference this morning.

>> ( translated hong kong has become unsafe "vd unstable, iolence, not matter who commits it, is pushing hgng kon onto a road of no return." >> reporter: this is china's counter-terrorism force and tellingly, the protests in hong kong were yesterday described by beijing as "emerging terrorism." hong kongers watch anxiously; as carrie lam sticks to her guns, they know it's big brother beijing who's calling the shots. >> nawaz: that report from jonathan miller of "independent television news." also today, the u.s. announced it's delaying tariffs on some chinese goods until december 15th while removing other items from its tariff list altogether. the duties had been set to go into effect next month on products incding laptops, cell phones, and video game consoles. president trump was asked about the timing of the delay before departing for an event in pennsylvania. >> we're doing this for christmas season, just in case some of the tariffs would ha

an impact on u.s. customers. but so far they've had virtually 10ne. >> nawaz: plannetariffs on about $300 billion in other chinese goods will still be imposed.e word of riff decision sent stocks soaring on wall street today. rae dow jones industrial age gained 372 points to close at nearly 26,280. the nasdaq rose 153 points and e s&p-500 added 42. scrutinyntensified today of the manhattan jail where accused sex trafficker jeffrey epstein was found dead on saturday. the justice department said the two guards assigned to watch epstein have now been placed on administrative leave. the jail's warden ws also temporarily reassigned, pending the outcome of both the f.b.i. and justice department investigations into epstein's death. a coalition of 29 states and cities filed a lawsuit against the trump administration today to sp a rule easing restrictions on coal-burning power plants. the trump rule rolled back anob a-era regulation that set

limits on carbon dioxide pollution from power plants. the outcome of the case could set a precedent for how futuremi strations can fight climate change by restricting pollutants. most of the southern ud parts of the midwest were under heat advisories and waings today, from texas to south carolina. the triple-digit heat wave was st intense across arkanss, tennessee, mississippi, louisiana and alabama. but some relief is on the way. the national weather service said an approaching cool frontdu will help the heat and humidity in some areas tomorrow. cbs and viacom have agreed to reunite. they'll merge their networks and the paramount movie studio in the face of growing competition from streaming services like netflix. the combined company is estimated to have $28 billion in revenue. the merger is expectedo completed by year's end. and, a new report out today finds child care costs in most states exceed federal subsidies

for low-income parents. at's according to the inspector general for the department of health and human services, or h.h.s each state decides how to allocate funds from an $8 billion national block grant, meant to offset child care costi for over a m children. but many states set their payment rates much lower than commended. h.h.s. has now put 33 states on watch to ensure they comply with equal access requiments. still to come on the newsh ar: what we knnd what remains hidden about the shadowy russian nuclear prram. the multiple sexual harassment allegations against celebrated operatic tenor placido domingo. how online casinos target gambling addicts and the devastation it wreaks on their lives. plus much more. e >> nawaz: losion at a remote site.

shifting stories frovethe russian ment and nuclear officials. public concern about radiation exposure. we're not talking about chernobyl 33 years ago. we're talking about two russian military accidents near the arctic circle, one just last week. our william brangham has the details. >> reporter: somber crowds lined the streets of sarov today, bearing witness to funerals cloaked in mystery after a nuclear reactor explosion at a nearby missile testing sit killed at least seven scientists. the final death toll is unknown. russian nuclear officials have been slow to disclose details. but with long faces, they admitted thursday's blast at the nyonoksa testing site was a tragedy. >> ( translated ): a chain of ndagic incidental events uncertainties led to this happening. although, after a preliminary analysis, we ha seen the testers were fighting to get the situation under control, unfortunately, they did not cceed.

authorities say they will evacuated the town. gamma radiation there is four no 16 times greater thabackground levels. analysts believe the accident involved a new nuclear powered cruise missile, the kind russian >> ( translated ): a real technologic breakthrough is the creation of the advanced strategic missile system with a totally new combat equipment,se programming crnit, its testing was completed successfully.

>> reporter: moscow's push for new missile technology is aimed at outsmarting defene se systems s. is building, and this resurgent arms race has cost other lives. just last month 14diussian sailor after an explosion on one of their nuclear submarines. >> the people who were a killed we very high ranking, and that's not typical to have so many high-ranking officers on a submarine. as relations between the united states and russia get worse, tha ru are stepping up all these kind of traditional cold war behaviors. so, we're seeing allinds of new systems and new systems often have problems. so it's-- it's sad that these people keep dying, but this is kind of what an arms race looks like. >> repter: these developments come as a major u.s.-russia arms control treaty is set to expire in 2021, and after the u.s. withdrew from the intermediate range nuclear forc treaty, saying that russia was in violation of that agreement. on top of that, with westernsa nctions mounting, the russian economy and putin's approval ratings are both dec. moscow has also been erupting in

enormous protests, as russians took to the streets to complain about the kremlin's tight grip on domestic politics. police turned violent as they arrested more th a thousand nd whstrators this wee were out demanding more open elections. >> brangham: for more on what these military mishaps and protests mean, we tuangela stent. she directs the center for eurasian, russian and east european studies at georgetown university's school of foreign servic her latest book is "putin's world: russia against the west, and with the rest." angela stent, welcome back to the newshour. i wonder if you could... is there anything else that you can tell us about russia'testing or this accident that happened around this missile? >i think no more than what we already heard on troadcast, which is they really are giving the minimum amount of b information, bause of chernobyl and because of what happened 33 years ago, the

russian people are very suspicious when they heard about this. this is why there was a run on io dine immediately after they heard rumors. i think most american specialists will say the u.s. tried to develop a nuclear powered cruise missile and gave it up in the 1960s. it's just not practical. it's, as we heard, lying a flying chernobyl, and so w don't really know what the russians do or don't have. we do know that last year vladimir putin, as youaid, demonstrated a picture, a video of this misse, which c evade u.s. missile defenses and finall landed in florida and dropped something on what suspiciously loed like mar-a-lago. the russians are trying to develop weapons that can totalld the elaborate missile defense systems that the u.s. has been creating. >> brangham: with this secretive shifting story,

tight-lipped response from various russian officials, is w thhat we're just supposed to expect when this kind of a ilitary mhap occurs? >> well, we have never hiseen an else from the russians. when the kursk submarine sank, there was a total blackout n information for a long time. they are not good about giving outccurate information or at least enough information to try and save their population from needless radiation and other effects. myself was in moscow during the chernobyl explosion, and i know how frightening it was for everyone to figur out what as happening, where the radiation was, and this pattern doesn't teem to have changed. >> brangham: amidst these two different accidents that have happened, this seeming escalation in the arms race between russia and the u.s can you give sense of the lay of the land with regard to arms control and arms developmenbetween the two nations? >> certainly.

so as you said, the treaty on intermediate range nuclear forces is dead since august 2nd of this nth. so neither the united states nor russia abound by that, and whe will bow be developing new classes of intermediate range missiles our defense secretary has said that we will. pclold be dd is in asia.ace they that's if we'll have any allies or take tem. the russians have also said they're developing a new class of weapons. i think the real to watch is the new star treaty regulating strategic nuke welowr ons. it's set to expire in 2021. it could be extended for five ioars just by mutual agreement, but our nl security advisor john bolton says he regards these kinds of arms control agreements as antiquated and useless and, in fact, he said in a spwoch teeks ago that he didn't really see any reason to exteid ths new start agreement. so what we're talking about is in 2021 we could be in the situation, this new start

agreement isn't extended, where for the first time since 1972, since president nixon went to moscow and signed similar agreement with boston brezhnev,s will be the first time we won't have anaty agreement regulates the nuclear arsenals of the world's two nuclear superpowers who between them control 90% of the world's nuclear weapons. >> brangham: shifting gears a tiny bit, w we saese protests erupting in moscow over what seemed like somewhat provincial local elections. does this crack down and this response by the russian citizenry in moscow say anythint broader about and his hold on power? >> i think it does. i think this is more than just a isswawbl about who will i on a 45-person municipal council and regulate taxi licenses. i think younger russians who

have been t on the street, 50,000 people on saturday, realize looking ahead that they have very little control over their political system. they have very little choice. they understand that even though president putin's term doesn't expire until 2024, this interagency and the rivalry for power and the questioning about succession, t already going on, and they would liketo have a different system. they would like to be able to have, again, more choiche system. so it is not just about a municipal election. it's about the principle of having people who are not a homber of the official united russia party and have independent views have some say in this system. >> brangham: we've certainly seen here in the u.s. a lot of discussion about russia's lastrference in ou election. we've also seen russia trying to flex its muscles in europe and the middle east, syria, and in turkey. you wrote a recent piece whweere yo trying to get americans

to recognize that judo is putin's sport of choice, not chess as a game. that?id you mean by >> so what i meant by it, and vladimir putin became a judo champion as a young man. he said in an essay it helped him to get out of the rut and the hardscrabble background he had. what i meant by that was that in judo, even if you are maybe weaker than your opponent, if you sense their own distraction, if you sense their owweness, if you can distract them, you can in fact prevail over what would appear to be a stronger opponent. and i think what putin has done very effectively is to take advantage of the opportunities presented to him by distraction in the west by the divisions and by the polarization and by the fact, i would argue, that the united ntates didot have a very coherent idea about what it wanted to do after the soviet union collapsed.

when putin came to power hin 2000, ad a good idea he wanted to restore ruia as a great power. he's managed to restore russia as a global player. when you look at the fundamentals in russia, g.d.p.m. which is size of that of italy, a declining population, an economy that's overwhelmingly dependent on raw materials revenue, he's played a weak hand quite effectively. and he's been in power for 20 years now, and he's seen american presidents and other leaders come and go, and he feels that he has the upper hand in many ways, despite all themse prob >> brangham: all right, angela stent of georgetown university, thank you so much. >> thank you. >> nawaz: with more performances than any other opera singer i history, placido domingo holds a special place in the performing

arts. domingo is not just one of the most recognizable faces after a career that's lastedly five decades. he's also a leader and performer with real power. t in the wake of "me too," there are now a series of revelations by the a.p. about his alleged personal br. allegations that raise disturbing questions about the use of that power. ♪ ♪ >> nawaz: for decades, placido domingo has been one oesf the binames in opera. ♪ ♪ a multi-grammy award winner and one of the iconic "three tenors", his star power and industry status are beyond compare. the 78-year-old spaniard currently conducts and directs the los angeles opera, ande still attracts sell-out crowds across the globe. but a new "associated press" report out today says that rise to fame was littered with sexual misconduct.

the story cites nine women,s eight singd one dancer, who say domingo harassed them and tried to pressure them into sexual relationships over 30 years, often at venues where he held a managerial posi all but one requested anonymity. patricia wulf sang at the washington national opera in the late 1990's and 2000's. domingo was the artistic or there and later th general director. h would come up to me this close and he would say, "patricia, do you have to go homeonight?" and it was arresting, it was very difficult. >> nawaz: wulf said she started hiding from domingo. >> i don't know how it could have been shoved under the rug as long as it has been. 's gone on long enough. it needs to stop.me

>> nawaz: the s stories followed a pattern. they say domingo would push for private meetings, underhe guise of offering professional advice. that domingo offered them jobs and en sometimes punished professionally those who refused his advances. seven of the nine said they felt their careers were negatively impacted when they told him "no." sethree said he forcibly k them and one said he put his mind down her skirt. in a statement, o called the allegations "deeply troubling, and as presented, l accurate. i believed that my interactions and relationships were always welcomed and consensual. however, i recognize that the >> when someone comes this close and kind of smiles in a wry smile and says "do you have to go home?" i think that was pretty clear. there were no misconceptions in my mind. >> nawaz: none of the women had documentation of domingo's actions such as phone messages.

but the a.p. talked to three dozen singers, dancers, musicians and others who said they had witnessed domingo acting in a sexually inappropate way. >> nawaz: let's further explore the reaction to this news and wider questions about this abus of power in eld. peggy mcglone has written about this issue extensively for the e shington post. peggy, welcome to ws hour. now, the story broke just today, but tell me, what has been the broader reaction with the opera and the classical music world? >> wellthere was swift reaction today. the los angeles opera announced an outside investigation and then several organizations, the philadelphia orchestra and the san francisco opera, canceled itcoming performances w placido. >> woodruff: there's been some reaction and actis already taken. one of the commonalities i've ken away was this idea of a whisper network when it came to

placido domingo, that it was an open secret among women, he was someone to be avoided. u've reported in this space for a while is. that anything that had ever come up before. >> right at is a common thread that we've heard. my colleague and i did a big report last year. we talked with more t50ha musicians about others, not pls ido domingo, but that wa common thing that we heard, that women would help each other by sharing what they thought with rumors or other, you know,th fid experiences, don't be alone with him, don't ride the elevator wit him, don't let him walk you to your car, have an escape plan. it was a myriad examples of h to deal with these kinds of people. >> naalz: one of the gations is that he retaliated against women who refused his advances. help us understand a little bit about how power is distributed.d plo domingo held a number of

top managerial positis at a number of organizations. what kind of influence did he exert? >> these top people have control for reasons li cketing, for recommendations, especially with young artists who are starting ou and we heard this a lot last year, ann anhed i, you wouldn't want to rebuff someone who could give you a recommendation or sign you up for an audition or get you int the next training program that would be the next step in your career. d so part of it was that there were these choices that had to be made that, you know, that these young women, many of them starting our didn't want to ruin things before they even got going. >> matt: eggy, you reported put that domingo was invested and active in a ot of those young artist training programs. you spoke to a woman wpaho icipated in one of those. what did she have to tell you? >> yes, she was not to targeted

herself, but she said it was well-known. nt's again that open secret i the community. you know, you just go about your day knowing that he s going to make unwanted advances or in thr she was telling me, have a very open, everybody knows about it, sexual relationship with a young artist. and no one knew whtat to do ab it. and then she said that that sort of creates a culture where people feel like this behavior is acceptable or there will be no consequences, and then others, maybe people who are not superstar status, then have the opportunity or take advantage of that to do terrible things themselves. and she lso talkedout how that power dynamic, who is goitg elieve a young artist over, you know marriage superstar, that's also part of this equation. >> woodruff: you mentioned obviously l.a.ey e investigating. philadelphia has rescinded an invitation for domingo to perform there in september.

but salzburg austria said he wi still be performinghere later in august. peggy, i want to ask you, because you have written about a number of other high-profile figures in this world, who have faced similar allegations. what have you learned from their cases that tell you how kinds of allegations can be handled in this world? >> you know, it does matter, and it is different organization to organization.ye las the cleveland orchestra also investigated with an outside company, and they posted their findings on their website, and not only did they nfirm the allegations that were in our story about william prusel, but they found another musician who was also accused. they fired both of them. s t jamevine sued after he was fired from the metropolitan opera last year, the resultf similar sexual harassment allegation, and they settled recenely. her side will say what the

agreement was. so it's hard to say what thafe rmath of these things are. >> woodruff: still remains ton. be see peggy mcglone of the "washington post," thank you so much. >> thank you. >> nawaz: stay with us. coming up the newshour: democratic presidential candidate mayor bill de blasio of new york on why he's runnint. and a hiddenistory of theft. how one million black farmers in the u.s. we robbed of their land. every year, more people are playing games on their phones. and one category, called social casinos, has quickly become abi multlion dollar industry. but new evidence shows game developers are targetig vulnerable users, all with the help of facebook and its massive trove of personal data. for the record, pbs newshour

produces some content as part of a business relationship with facebook. from "reveal" at theenter for investigative reporting, nate halverson has the story. >> reporter: suzie kelly is a grandmother from suburban dallas. ve years ago, she and her husband were thinking about retirement. but, all that changed one afternoon, when she sat down to watch tv. >> there was a commercial for big fish casino. i thought it was a casino-casino at first, and then i realized it was a game. >> big fish casino. play for fun. play for free. >> reporter: the game she downloaded is part of a rapidly- growing industry called social casinos that chla on facebook about ten years ago. these apps bundle together games like poker, roulette and slot machines. ( slot machine sounds ) kelly's slot machine game was free to play, at first. but, once her free chips ran out, she had to buy more to keep playing. >> i wou say that my spending increased to hundreds of dollars and thousands of dollars within the first month>>.

eporter: how much could you ?in playing big fish casino >> real money? zero. nothing at all. >> reporter: why? >> because they don't pay real money. they only take money, to give you virtual chips to continue to play on their app. >> reporter: fully aware she could never cash out her chips, that first month, kelly still spent nearly $8,000. >> i just couldn't stop. you know, it's like, holy cow what the hell have i done? >> reporter: nine months after downloading the "free" game, kelly had spent more than $40,000. >> i have ai n addiction. needed out. >> reporter: she decided to quit, and emailed the ge company. kelly showed me hundreds of messages between he cand big fishino. and you write to them-- in the subject line it's cel caps-- "caccount." >> right. i wrote, "i just can't do this anymore i've maxed out my amex twice." >> reporter: did they close the

account? >> no, sir. >> reporter: kelly a csked big fiino to delete or permanently ban her from playing, nearly a dozen tiths. company never did. d.e continued spending, hiding it from her husb in total, kelly would lose more than $400,000. >> you know, i had to come clean with my hband. i took a breath, i remember this, and i said, its like i said, i'm sorry, chuck. i said, i think we might lose. i don't want to lose everything. >> i mean, it's absolutely predatory. and it should be unacceptable. >> reporter: keith whyte is the executive director of the national council on problem gambling. he said real casinos would be quired to cut her off, or face big fines. but the are no regulations on social casino games. >> those people who,ike suzie, appear to have very severe gambling problems, or gambling- like problems, they can't just walk away. >> reporter: whyte said their

helpline is increasingeo filled withe addicted to social casinos, and they've lost serious money. he said social casino games appear to be five times more addictive than traditional casinos. >> in the u.s. alone, you're talking well over 100 million people who report playing somewhat regularly on social casino apps. and again, no one's tracking this, because it's not being regulated. >> reporter: last yeinar, social ccompanies earned more than $5 billion, nearly as much asos all the casn the las vegas strip. but companies like big fish aim their games are jus entertainment, and hve avoided any gambling regulations. >> it's a very highly lucrative but somewhat secretive industry that has exploded across the united states in the past decade. >> repter: big fish declined our request for an interview, but sent a written statement saying the company is "dedicated to delivering great entertainment experiences," and that "we strive to ensure that our social games comply with all applicablstandards, rules and requirements."

i oke to former employees these social casinos. none wanted to go on camera, but described a darker side, saying it was widely known some players were addicted, and their warnings to management went ignored. one player spent so much on the game, she couldn't afford her prescription medicine, and they told me another's home was in foreclosure. suzie kelly said the fid t time she tr quit, big fish called her on the phone, not to cancel her account, but to p assign hersonal v.i.p. host, byron scott, who gave her free chips to keep her from leaving. where would this relnsatp with byron scott go? what did it become? >> this was day thing, back and forth. it was like a friendship. and you know, my mother passed away in 2016. they sent me flowers. and they also sent, of course, chips. you knowto keep me playing. >> hi, guys. >> reporter: we tracked down footage from a 2013 tech conference of jose brotons, who

helped pioneer ther .i.p. system cial casinos. he is speaking on stage to a roomful of game developers. >> reporter: brotons worked for aristocrat, the same company that owns big fish casino. he designed the v.i.p. system to target the tiny fractions of playo will actually pay to play the games. >> you've got to think that about 3% of yo users are going to be generating 80% to 90% of the value for thcompany. >> reporter: we obtained leaked company documents that show how his v.i.p. system tracks players by their facebook i.d.s, closeli rs their gameplay, and then prods people to keep them spending.er they ro their v.i.p.s as "whales," a term taken from the casino industry to describe big spenders. social casinos n use behavioral analysis software to quickly identify people who are likely to become big spenders. behaviors like increasing your bet, or playing frequently, ar signals to the companies, and they target these players with heavy marketing, and label them,

proto-whales, as brotons explained to a roomful of game developers back in 2015. >> we are now capable predicting proto-whales within their first gaming session, so we can assign a very high likelihood tt a person's going to be a proto-whale. >> reporter: i show kelly documents outlining the creation of the v.i.p. program, >> yeah, bingo. for me, that's like, let's find the weakest person and destroy their life. >> reporter: does it fke they're targeting your addiction? >> absolutely.re >> reporter: ts another company profiting from these games. facebook makes hundreds of millions of dollars selling rtual chips to players like kelly. julien codorniou, a facebook executive, spoke aa game conference in 2014 about social casinos. >> it's the number one category on facebook. it's a category that never ops growing. every year, we see new companies coming up with amazing games, launching on facebook, launching on mobile, making significant money. >> reporter: facebook's website

shows how it tracks people online, and can predict who is likely to spend big by analyzing user data. facebook helps social casinos find those potential whales. it charges a premium to nudge players to spend more,o target people whose online behavior might be a sign oiof addi >> it's very good for gaming companies because they can decide to target on facebook, or on mobile, you know, specific users, or just the whales. i reporter: facebook decld to speak on camera, but sent a written statement saying that while they "don't build ad products specic to social casinos," they "understand that certain games or products can impact some people differently," and they are working "to understand the long term impacit of cerinds of content." sam lessin is a executive at facebook. he now runs his own venture capital firm. but back in 2012, he wrote an email to his then-boss and clos frierk zuckerberg. lessin wrote that he wasn't proud of their work with slot machine companies.

"i'm fine with it," he wrote. "just not proud of it." lessin won't discuss his time at facebook, but agre to speak generally about how companies are targeting people like suzie kelly. she end up spending over $400,000 playing a slot machine game. >> yeah. i mean, it sounds disgustinrig. t. you know, we're going to have to live in a world where both very, very good people, and very, very bad people have better tools. >> reporter: do we want hyper- targeted ads from beer companies to alcoholics? do we wad nt hyper-targes from casinos to gambling addicts? >> no, of course we don't want those things right. like, no thinking person is like, "that's great." but en the question is, okay, let's be really clear, what rule do you want to write?ow right, andre you going to enforce that rule? >> reporter: suzie kelly joined a lawsuit last year in the state of washington, where big fish sino is based, arguing tat the game constitutes illegal gambling, and she is asking for her money back.

she is now getting help for her gambling addiction, and says she no longer spends money on big fish. but, she is stileadng with near financial ruin from the game. if you could go back in time to that moment when you were about to download the app, what would you tell yourself? >> don't do it. you don't know this until you play this game, but you've got a problem. a if you have iction, you're screwed. >> reporter: and there is nothing stopping companies from continuing to target people's addictions. for pbs newshour, i'm nate halverson with reveal,n plano, texas. >> nawaz: ifou have spent hundreds or thousands of dollars playing a social casino game on facebook or a mobilee, "reveal" wants to hear from you. to share your story, go to nuvealnews.org/whale. >> nawaz: we cone our series

of conversations with 2020 presidential candidates. last week, judy woodruff sat ity mayoh new york c bill de blasio to talk about his run for the democratic nomination. >> woodruff: mayor bill de blasio, thank you for being here. >> thank you, judy. >> woodruff: why are you running? i ask because there were already when 20 people in the rac you announced that you were going to jump in. and frankly you already got a big, complicated job. >> i do have a big job. that's one of the reasons why i'm running. to take on the role of president, you better be ady for it. i have what has often been described as the second toughest job in america. it's a bigou place, a place, the most diverse place on earth. we gote. pre-k d we lowered crime while getting rid of thingsop like nd frisk that were dividing us. we did the $15 minimum lot of fundamental wages. i know i can make change. and i'm running because i have

this fundamental belief that what's happened over the last 40 years since t election of road rage is the country is less and less serving working americans more and more serving the vry few, the wealthy and the big corporations. we have to fix it. we have to put working people first again. i can do it. i have donek.t in new y i want to do it for the whole country. >>roodruff: you clearlya candidate with progressive ideas. there are already two other prominent progressives, bernie sanders and elizabeth warren.ar they running well ahead of you in terms of recognition and support. why not leave it to them? >> judy, i think very highly of both bernie sanders and elizabeth warren, but i remiyond it's six months until anyone even starts voting. we have a long way to g and what i bring to the table is something different. both of them are very legislators. i'm someone who is running one of the biggest, most compx places on earth and has been able to make real change for everyday people. that experience,ab thaity is

different from other candidates. you can respect people. you can share values with them but still bring something different to the table. what i a a concernut is the democratic party, at this point there is a big debate, what's the heart and soul of our party? i say we need to be a no -- we need to be a progressive party. we need to show people we're not about the status quo. i think folks are more intereed in action than words i'm able to say, look, you want to know who i am?e look at what ine for 88.6 million people. >> woodruff: you mentioned a minimum wage. you brought that up in th te deba other night. we noticed that the governor, andrew cuomo's aid, one of them tweeted after you said that that you had zero to do with the statewide $15 minimum wage. an you raised the minimum wage for new york city workers only after workers in other parts of the state of new york -- ct that's not accurate with all due reso that.

ty proved the wage for ci workers and for non-profit organizations that were funded by the city before the state new york acted. that was one of the things that spurred the state of new york to act.by i stanhat statement. we did it on a very big scale. when the $15 minimum wage idea first came out and got currency, i supported it from the beginnofg. a lo other democrats hell back and said it wasn't realistic. i fought for it from the beginning and helped to achieve it. >> woodruff: another economy-related question. you delivered what many people would say is nea memorable t the debate. at one point you said you planned to tax the hell out of w thelthy. >> yes. >> woodruff: what exactly does that mean? where does it start? >> look, the reason i was dramatic about it is to say, near a dramatic problem where the rich have gotten richer to such a point w that t top 1% have more wealth than the bottom 90% combined. it keeps getting worse. in fact, thst big action on taxes was a huge giveaway to the wealthy and corporations. so i said tax the hell, b i want to make it very clear, we

can't just do this ineeementally. weto go back to the tax levels associated with those well-known radicals, j.f.k. ad dwight d. eisenhower. the plan i put out, and you can go to taxthehell.com, the plan makes very clear, we should have a 70% income tax rate for the wealthiest individuals. >> woodruff: starting at what income? >> at $2 million. and we should -- we should repeal the trump tax cuts. we should repeal the loss of state and local tack deductibility. thateeds to go back to the way it was for 100 years. it was fair, we need to put it back. for the wealthiest americans who have benefited for four decades fr favorable tax policies and all sorts of other benefits, we have to rebalance things. i can tell you, you talk to folks all over america, the that society is not fair, that's a dangerous reality we have to solve. >> woodruff: 're not worried that people in the middle class, he says he's only going to taxth

e rich, but we know what that means. >> i would say look at what i have done. i've worked very consistently on behalf oworking and middle-class people. the fact is this stat tuts kwo, i think you'll find this all over this country. folks look at the statu quo. they know it's broken. we will not fix it with half measures. we have to do sog really strong to rebalance the equation many this country. >> you've had an up-and-down relationship with the new york city police. and you're now -- >> with the unions. i want to be clear. the rank and file are 36,000 people with a sorts of different views, but with some of the unions. true statement. >> wdruff: you have not called for the firing of officer pantaleo, who was responsible in the chokehold death of eric garner. what do you say to those people? >> so one, the city of new york was told by the federal justice department soon after the tragedy of eric garner, and i know the famil they've gone through hell. it's a horrible tragedy. it how old not have happenedan. we let it happen again. we're focused on making sure

a tragedyer is such again in new york city. we have changed the way we police profoundly. implicit bias train, g, deescalatil sorts of things to make sure it never happens again. but the federal justice department told us, do proceed with a departmental trial, because the justice department wanted to do it the way they wanted to do it u garding criminal charges. i will tell yin retrospect i thought i was dealing with an honest broker in the justice department. that proved not to be true. five years passed. i said we would never make that mistake goagain, and forbid there is another tragedy, but anre's why i do not issue opinion. a police department judge, this is something you wouldn't have assumed in the history of new york city, under today's nypd, a police depsatment judgid officer pantaleo must be terminated. we have two weeks now just procedurally it goes to the police commissioner. i believe this has been a fair, open, transparent process that will yield justice. my voicing of an opinion only complicates it and prolongs icat e that culled lead the a court case and prolong this case for a long time. we got to clhiose tcapture for

the garner family and our city and our nation. we have to close this chapter with justice. >> woodruff: mayor bill de blasio from new york city, thank you very much for joining us. >> thank you very much. >> nawaz: when it comes to understanding financial inequality in this country, economists often point to the absence of african-american generational wealth as a principal factor-- resources passed from parent to child. as john yang reports, for many african-americans, one source of the problem goes back decades. >> yang: over the paentury, african americans have lostll ns of acres of farms they owned across the south. ed not justd propell by economic forces, but by white racism and local white political and economic power. it's not just a legacy of the jim crow south, eithe r. most of the losses have occurreh

sinc1950s. that history and its lasting effects are the subjects of the cover story of theeptember issue of the "atlantic" magazine. it's written by vann newkirk, who's a staff writer at the magazine. van, thanks for joining tonight. what is important about this story? why did you want to tell this story? what is important, you think, that people should know from it? >> well, right now, the country is in the middle of a lot of debates-- over the racial wealth gap, over the status and economic prosperity or lack thereof of african-americans here, and also about reparations, perhaps. and i wanted to, with pithis e, re-center the conversation on the sblouth, on k folks in the south who often get left out in this conversation.pl on one of thes where the deficit has been the most extreme. arming, and then the ownership of land. >> yang: you call this, as the headline, is "the great land robbery." what hapned? give us an idea of what happened. >> so, what happened was,

during-- pretty much after the middle of the 20th century, federally-funded farm programs, they were put out there to give small and middle-sized farmers loans to support farms, to keep them going through bad economic times. they systematically disenfranchised and also discriminated against black farmers. so they didn't get the loan amounts. they were denied loans that they were entitled to. and often, these local u.s.d.a. programs were used as bully- pulpits, or forces to actually push black farmers off their land. >> yang: some of this was tually accelerated or exacerbated as a result of the civil rights movement, that this was a reaction to th civil rights movement. >> right. so, most of the u.s.d.a. funding was actually leveraged through locally elected boards.

and guess who could not vote in the south? so what would happen is, these boards were dominated by the segregationists, andre if you a black farmer who needed money to grow your crops, next year, one of the ways they couldev ensure you joined the n.a.a.c.p. or never went out to vote or to march against segregation was to hold that money in their han and say, "you're not getting this money unless you toe the company line." and so what they did to black farmers who didn't do that, who did go out and join the n.a.a.c.p. and the organizations, they took their money from them. >> yang: and you also talk about the lasting effects of this, not only the loss of sort of family wealth, but also the polical effects. >> right. mississippi, alabama, south carolina, these were states that were, if they weren't majority black going into the great deeession and beyond, or cl to being about half black. and what you saw, what prompted the "great migration" that saw millions of black people leave the south, was a fact that a lot of them had their land stolen maybe, and i think this is probably what happens.

if they hold onto that land, if they're able to make money in the south and have vote in the south and have some type of ake in the future of their kids living in the south, perhaps those three states at ast stay majority black. what happens to the electoral college if we have three majority black states? what happens to the senate? you know, those are esbig ons. >> yang: you told the story through, in part, through a woman in her 60s. now she's the third generation of her family to be working the same farmland. the family was able to hold onto this land. te, name is lena scott w and let's take a listen to a little bit of what she told you: >> it's dear to that my children know what my ancestors went through, fit be where we are and who we are, because i'm a firm believer that if ovn't know our history, then we repeat the mistake and over again. >> yang: "knowing your history." she sa that families were denied their history by having their rm land taken away.

talk about that and the other effects of this, the impact it has on families. >> well, i talked to dozens of farm families for this story. and the reason why lena's particular story and character got to m historian. she is a this is in her bones. she wants to build a museum in the delta to honor not just hera fath grandfather, but all the other farmers who came before her. i think she embodies the idt ea that w're talking about here is not just money, not just the access to land, but the ability to put down cultural a roots, to have place to call your own. that's history, right? that's a thing that i do not believwe quite understand. it's lost when people are forced re denie when they a the ability to own the land under their feet. they are denied a bit of their history. these people who live in the delta now, black fol who live in the delta now, they are in this place that was built with their hands and work, that they are part of but not allowed to tually hold any part of.

>> yang: you're also talking to serve out a lot of this land through various transactions is now held by pension funds by venture capitalists by hedge funds. you seem to hint that you think these transactions were somehow unethical?t >> i believe t's possible through totally ethical means at this point. so many decades away from the original theft, to receive the land legitimately, you know, if you buy it from somebody who owned it and they don't have thf lineaghe land, they don't know where it came from. that's a legal purchase. what i try to make the point of in the piece is that it probably doesn't matter whetheromn individualny got its land portfolio in a place where predominantly black folks lived and worked and should own the land. doesn't really matter.

they gpl it, individuas of land, ethically or legally. what matters is that at some point, the land was taken unethically and was taken away from the black folks illegally. what is our legal, ethical, moral responsibility as a people to rectify that? >> yang: well, i really ask. you talked about reparations earlier. how should we be thinking about rectifying this? >> i do not believe pathe curret tions debate-- and it is a well-meaning and well-intended effort to try and quanti every single thing that was done to black people since slavery. that's an amazing effort, and i believe over the last five ten years, there have been people doing work that folksn have not ble to approach. 150 years on quantifsy, in te of a dollar amount, i think that approaloch, though, ha the focus on land and land ownership and collective land ownership in some ways. and the sentimental and c and generational meaning of attachment to a place, and having mobility be by choice instead of by being forced out.

i think that's a dimension that should be added back to this conversation. the original promise opaf tions was a land grant was 40 acres and a mule. people didn't love it cause it had certain monetary value. they loved it because it gave them a place to call home forever, gave them something to give to their children not just money, but a sense of belonging, a place they can put their name on. and that's-- i do believe the current reparations debate is missing a little bit. >> yang: vann newkirk. its cover story, "the great land robbery," in the september issue of the "atlantic." thanks so much. >> thank you. >> nawaz: on the newshour online right now, the supreme court plans to hear one gun-relatedne case in itterm beginning in october, but two pending cases could have far wider impact on the current gun debate if the justices add them to their docket. learn more on our web site, www.pbs.org/newshour. d that's the newshour fo tonight. i'm amna nawaz. join us online enand again here tomorrow g.

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