ycaptioning sponsor newshour productions, llc woodruff: good evening. i'm judy woodruff. on the newshour tonight: in the hot seat. thu.s. intelligence chief faces questions over the whistleblower complaint centraln to the impeachment inquiry, and why it took so long to get to congress. inside the mind of manrity. reshaping modern china. president xi jinping, and his pursuit of chinese de inance on thworld stage. >> ( translated ): in chinese modern history, china has been bullied for a long time. when we are rich, our country can protect us. when we feel like when we are in danger, we will be protected by our country.try. not like before. >> woodruff: and, a view from the south.er a cotion with the south korean foreign minister on the lingering threat of her country's nuclear neighbor. pbs newshour.more, on tonight's or

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educ democratic engagement, and the advancement of international peace and serity at carnegie.org. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions: and individuals. >> this program was made possible by the corporation for publ broadcasting. and by contributions to ur pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. woodruff: coercion and cover-up. that is what the newly-released whistleblower complaint alleges. the complaint says t ukrainian leader tstigate the his democratic rival joe biden and his son.

according to the whistleblower. white house officialsen ried to cover it up, the complaint was released just moments before acting director of nationaldi intelligence joseph maguire congressionacorrent lisaongress. desjardins has more. a desjardins: at the white house and capitother day centered on another explosive document. this morning, the house intelligence committee released the full text of the original whistleblor complaint, that alleges president trump pressured a foreign country,in uk to investigate one of the president's main domesticri politicals, joe biden. idl part of a phone call with the ukrainian prt in july. the whistleblower authte that they d not witness the call, but "multiple offithals" recountefacts to them. the nine-page complaint lodges other serious charges: that senior white house "lock down" all records of the ukraine phone call, includingra moving thecript from its usual server, to one for classified or sensitive information.

>> the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. >> desjardins: the release happened minutes before a much-awaited hearing about the complaint, one with a new sense of gravity. from democrats: >> yesterday, we were presented with the most graphic evidence yet that the president of the unitedtates has betrayed his oath of fice. >> desjardins: republicans: >> in the democrats' mania to overturn the 2016 elections,er hing they touch gets hopelessly politicized. >> desjardins: and the acting chief of u.s. intelligence: >> i believe that everything here in this matter is unprecedented. >> desjardins: joseph mague, who became director of national intelligence just last month, explained why he did not forward the explosive whistleblower complaint about the president to congress, as the law indicates. he wasn't sure it was an intelligence matter, and ov mo, the white house said the call was privileged. >> we consulted with thee white hounsel's office and we were advised that much of the information in the complaint was in fact subjecivto executive ege.

a privilege that i do t have the authority to waive. >> i'm just king about the sequencing here.rs did you go to the white house, to determine whether you should provide a complaint to congress? >> no, sir. that was not the question. the question was whether or notu it has eve privilege. not whether or not i should send it on to congress.ja >> dins: maguire said he is not political or partisan, but made it clear he saw this ai icult situation. he forwarded the complaint, he said, and charge of iminalng wrongdto the justice department. democrats questioned if the president's own d.o.j. was a reliable arbiter. >> if ur office of the inspector general is not able s to investigate, then whole to investigate? >> although it did not come to the committee, to the judicial department for criminal investigation, this was not swept under the rug. >> desjardins: another question: who knewbout the complaint? >> did you discuss this subject, this whistleblower complaint, with the president? >> my conversation, no matter

what the subject is, with the president of the united ates, is privileged conversation between the director of national intelligence and the president. >> desjards: maguire did say e ite house never ordered him to withhold information. republicans fired back at democrats,ccusing them of litical warfare.ti >> gentlemen, i want to irngratulate the democrats on the rollout of tatest information warfare operation against the president, and ty ir extraordinility to once again enlist the mainstreamai media in their campaign. >> djardins: john ratcliffe texas insisted president trump did nothing wrong. >> the united states is allowed to solicit help from a foreign government in an ongoing iminal investigation, which is exactly what presidentharump did in tt conversation. >> desjardins: the president's strongest defender was himseo . he spoke treporters in washington after returning from the u.n. >> it's a disgrace. it's a terrible thing r our country.an they do any work. they're frozen, the democrats.'r they're going to lose the election.

they know it. that's why they're doing it. and it should never be allowed, what's happening to this president. >> desjardins: and now, mo is happening. intelligence committee members to newshour, they will now investigate a possible cover-up of the ukrainian call. this, as late today, a newre rding of the president appeared-- audio the "l.a. times" obtained of mr. trump speaking to staff this morning, targeting those in the white house who gave the whistleblower information. >> because, that's close to a spy. you know what we used to do in the old ys, when we were smart? right? the spies and treason? we used to handle it atleen differy than we do now. >> desjardins: meantime, house speaker nay pelosi indicated that democrats are now focusing impeachment work othe ukraine phone call. >> this is the focus of theth moment, becaus is the charge. all of the other work that relates to abuse of ignoring subpoenas of severnment, of congress, a

contempt of congress by him-- those ings will be considered later. but right now,e're in the investigating-- the inquiring stage. >> desjardins: a few hours later, outside the capitol, progressive groups added tthe pressure on pelosi, calling for not just impeachment votes, but impeachmt votes soon. for the pbs newshour, i'm lisa desjardins. >> woodruff: earlier, i spoke with chairman schiff, and i started by askg him if today's testimony gave him a better understanding of how the trump administration handled the whistle-blower's complaint against the president.t. >> well, it did, and it raised profound concerns that a process that was meant to allow a whistleblower to provide informion to congress broke down, and it brthke down on advice of white house counsel and the department of justice.

considering that the complaint volved activity, misconduct by the president, considering that bill barr himself wads implica in the complaint, the idea that a director would go to those two sources for dance in whether this complaint needed to beid pr to congress shows i shothink the most direct conflit of interest, and that meant this complaint was withheld weeks after it should have been turned over to congress, and it was being withheld at a time when the president was stilll withholding itary aid, vital military assistance to ukraine. so we have a problem here, but, of course, the far broader problem is that we have a president who has tried to leverage the power of his office helping in yet another u.s.menn presidential election, this time by manufacturing different dirt on a different opponent, d we're determined to fully get to the bottom of this. >> woodruff: so do you have evidence that this was aevidl suppressed deliberately to protect the president?

goal of white house counsel and it was certainly the goal i think of the jus justice depart. after all, when youth reae tortured opinion of the justice department it says the director of national intelligence has no jurisdiction when it comes to foreign election intreere. that's absurd. the justice department said essentially thre's nothing see, we're not going to investigate it, even while it's said the inspector generalsdo t have jurisdiction to investigate. so i certainly believe the white house and the department of juice are coplicit in trying to keep this from ongress. in terms of the director, look, i strongly disagree with his decision, but i respect his career ofservice to the country. at the same time, when congress says that somethinghall be motived to congress, we me it. >> woodruff: so when you mentioned the white house unsel, you mentioned the torney general, are yooing to be calling them to testify before the committee? and who else in the administration? >> well, i don't want to get into our witt ss list.

i caun tell that the whistleblower has given us details and credible allegations, a road map, if you will, as to how to find out the contours of thiofs presidential misconduct, that is what happened before this call, what happened after this call, who knows the rationale that was given for withholding this bipartisan support to ukraine. what about theseh allegations that this record of call was sequestered away to a computer that'srusually used the most sensitive information like covert actions by the ce community and that there might be other things that have been similarly sequestered for reasons of concealing presidential misconduct. so we kntialhat we need to do to get to the bottom of this and we ll move with all expedition to do so. >> woodruff: and subpoenadu indis, if necessary? >> i have no doubt that that

will be necessary, and we're noo ing around. we don't have a long time to a'k people for compliance and thenem subpoena tand go through contempt proceedings. we are going to move very quickly to ulsion if we're told that there's no willingness to cooperate, because we l a sense of urgency here. one thing that i thinkeally left out about the hearing today anyone else, disputed the nor whistleblower's complaint was urgent, that it was credible, that it needed to be investigated and, as the apartment of justice is out of the business,pparently,f investigating wrongdoing if it involves dald trump, that is, and the inspeor generous can' do it, it's left to us to do. >> woodruff: airman schiff, now that you've beeen namd head of house of representatives move to peachment insofar as ukraine is involved, can you give us an understanding of how

that moves forward? is that now going to be the main focus of the impeachment investigation? >>t is certainly to be our main focus in the intelligence committee, and i think there's a gener sense among the members of our caucus that this is at its core the most serious allegation, that it was bad enough ands seriouse enough, when esident of the united states, as a candidate, caught help from a foreign power in a s. presidential election, that it was more serious, still, when, as president, he used the powere of the office to obstruct investigation in his own misconduct, but it is still a more seriou serious when a prest use as foreign president to manufacture dirt in a presidential election. we all understand the seriousness of that and it's the priority of our caucus that this y, the top priorthat we to do

our best to get the facts and we c so as quickly as possible. >> woodruff: to ar, this investigation into the whistleblower is now folded into the impeachmentinvestigation? >> it is certainly being conducted under the brella of an impeachment inquiry, and that is that this may form thse bais of an article or articles of the decision ha made to gogoforward and that is a decisn wel make when we're in possession of all the facts. but the facts we do have,ad al are pretty damning, and what took place before thison intersecbefore the two presidents, and what took place after, we still need to flesh and what has been admitted to iw believe is a clear viation of it will be for thucus tofice. decide when we have the full facts whether we should proceed with an article of impeachment. >> woodruff: nally, do you

believe any impeachment effort has to be bipartisan in order to be credible? >> well, i'm regtfully of the view that, at least based on performance to date, members of the g.o.p. do not stnd willing to confront this predent, no matter how repntug his conduct, no matter how much his condy transgress the law or the constitution. i hope that changes. i hope that changes. but i think that we cannot defer to the other party here if they have abdicated thr responsibility. >> woodruff: adam schiff, chairman of the house intelligence com comm >> woodruff: i'm now joined by kellyanne conw, counselor to president donald trump. she joins us from the white house. tee, thank you very much. >> thank you. kellyanne conway, thank you for talking with us. i know you heard some of what chairman schiff just waid, but i to come back to th be whistleblower's complaint, the essence of it is that the president essentially used the

power of his office to try to get a foreign government to interfere in the 2020 election d that he came to that concluon after talking with over half a dozen u. officials over some four months. >> well, judy, that's false, an we al know that because we have actually the complaint, but more importantly weave the transcript of the conversation between president trump and the president of ukrataine. o time did he in the 2020 race, at no time did he tale about den the frontrunner, who i don't know how to beat, i need your help be ating him. this president doesn't need ukraine's help to at joe biden or anyone else anymore than he needed ssia's help to beat hillary clinton. they're terrible candidates to self-emulate all on their n i must respectfully push back, judy. when chairman schiff says the president is using the stity of the office to dig up dirt on a political opponent, where is

that? i'm looking at the telephone it siply isn't there. no time was it mentioned of aid being withherald or 220. in fact, they're discussing the 2016 campaign, and they spend more time on emanuel maon of france and angela merkel offa germany and tht the ukrainian president is saying these countries are not helpi the u.s. as much and not sanctioning russia h. muc >> woodruff: the point you were just making, it wasn't stated outright in that conversation which, by the way, there was no transcript, this was a memorandum of people who listed, but what you have ia is set of circumstances because, a short time before this, president trump had stopped any military aid going to ukraine even though his defense department had sign o off that aid and said this is a country thatg s clean corruption, this aid should go forward. democrats in congress favoring it, yet president trump stopped

it. so you look at that ancomit ith this conversation, the reporting that the president was angry with the ukrainian government because of what had happened in 2016, and the concluon is what it is. le want it to be, and we sawatpe that today, in, i thought, aun veryfortunate public hearing with the acting d.n.i. director led by none other than chairman schiff who loves to be on tv. that entire hering could have been done behind closed doors. how do we know that?e because nate had a hearing with the same gentleman, the ting d.n.i. director behind closed doors right after the chairman schiff theatrical productione this is not y these things should operate. we do not impeach presidents because certain people who don't like him and voted against him hate him. te is not a high crime and misdemeanor. a phone call with a foreign leader in which st of the

conversation is congratulatory, it's about helping more thance frand germany, it's about the ukinian president actuallyed ing president trump for enforcing sanctions against anrussia whereas germany france won't. at no time did the president mention the 2020 election, yet you have the chairman of the intelligence committee and many others lyng to say the president is digging up dirt. we don't seet it in this phone call and it's not fair for it to >> woodruff: i think many people bype mentioning joe biden the inference is clear he's >> no, i need to say that the "new york times" had an article biden was oing in ukraine where it had the whole transcript of joe biden january 23, 2018, year after leaving the u.s. presidency bragging about loanholding $1 milli guarantees to ukraine. aboutople were talkin

that. >> woodruff: the reporting on that is he was referring to an ional effort to get ukraine to clean up corruption, and he was saying if that corruption isn't cleaned up there won't be aid forthcoming. but what i also want soto ask you about kellyanne conway, is democrats and others ar sayg equally more troubling than the phone call is the allegation thr ident went to such greatiden lengths to restrict all access to records of this call, to lck them down. i'm going to read from the whistleblower complaint. he said white house officials dolled me they were directed bya white housers to remov the electronic transcript from the computerystem in whch such documents are normally stored. he went on to say, instead, the transcript was loaded into a separate electronic system that is otherwise used to storen classifiedormation. he said, even though it didn't contain anything remotely classified. >> well, first of all, he's incorrect. any conversation with a foreign leader is classified. declassified for the president

to have released it, and he has. isn't that the point, that they all want to talk about how it s handled. do you know who has access to this doment now? everyone. this president who has led toe mock raytyization of information, social media and peopleike me speak and in this case release ago full transcript, a full memo as is the custom here of a call he had th the ukrainian predent, he released it. so they want to talk about how it was handled yet we all have access to it and can rd it. think the document is remarkable for what's not there. what's not there is a president worried about joe bid wh's self-destructing on the campaign trail. what's not there is thesa presidenng i'm going to withhold said until you do these certain things. none of that is there. the ukrainian president is talking about draining thesw ched they're talking about joe biden when they're talking about drainingoohe swamp. >>uff: again, it's

implied because of the timing of the withholdinunds. but i want to ask you what the president said just this morning to the ttaff of the u.s. mission to the united nations about people who talked to the distleblower being spice how this country handled spice. does the president believe anyone who talked to this whistleblower is, in efft, not s country?hi >> well, he hasn't said that ton mei think the president is always astosh when conversations like this leak early on in our -- in his presidency. conversations with the president of mexico, th president of australia, i believe it was, different than the presidents of those two countries now, thosesa convons leaked, some conversations he had with the he always surpripeople who are entrusted with these tremendous responsibilitieand have access to top information, secret information, classified information inur nation take on these positions where you are ab pulic servant entrusted with information to protect tt

public, rm the public, breech that trust. so there may be frustration and consternation there. but again i think we should also noteeople are inclined t listen to this whistleblower. the l.o.c. actually said this was routine diplomacy not intelligence activity by the blesident and this whister did not have direct access, they're getting it from other le. so wneed to find out more about that. >> woodruff: kellyanne conway at the the white house, thankh. you very mu >> thank you, judy. oodruff: now, to some of thongoing questions of national security, and law, raised by the whistleblowert, compland the trump administration's handling of it. john carlin served as the top tional security official in the u.s. justice department from 2013 to 2016, and as chief of staff to robert mueller when he was f.b.i. director. john carlin, welcome back to the "newshour". you listened, i believe, to much of what the whister comment -- or the head of the director of national lligence, acting directo had to say today about whahathe

whistleblower did and how this complaint was handled. wait handled in the proper way? >> well, i think really the important issue is that the complaint did reach congressch and,so -- and only because of that we are now aware of what the president of the united states said to a foreign leader. and what he actually said is quite troubling, as one of the republican congressmen reid today, this is not okay, and you can see why a career member of the intelligence community was so shocked because what you saw is the president of ie united stat his official capacity a foreign leader asked, quote, to do us a favor, and the favor he asked for, reportedly, on behalf of the united states was a personal favor, it was something to help his own political intests, because he only asked for two things, both of which he connected to his personal attorney, rudy giuliani. number one, he asked that they

help him look into the 2016 contradicte mueller reporty that russia was responsible for and, number two, he asked him to look into the son ofs 1:00 of his political rivals. that'sall he as for with the favor, so that's, to usefa a prosecutor's word, corrupt. his intent in the call was not on behalf of the united states, but was to further his personal interest. >> woodruff: and once that conversation took place, i mean to get to what happened to this after its happened, the memorandum that was put together describing what was said on the phone call, and just asked kellyanne conway about this, was put into a comfpletely diferent electronic system, a more secure system at the white house. and then you had others in the administration moving to dey congress access to this. what does this tell you? >> if it's true, then what that would say is ttire were mue people who knew that there was

something wrong about this conversation, and we're trying h take acts, some ofich may be illegitimate or unlawful, to hide tul, conversation from congress or from oper oversight. again, judy, let's not lose track of the fact that it didn't work, because we do have access to the conversation and we can't get so distracted by all the other atmospheris forget that what happened in this conversation is fundamentally wrong. the president of the united states should not be using a foreign country's prosecuted services to go after a rival. that should not invoke the attorney general of ae united statpart of that plan, and they should not be putting someone in touch with their personal attorney in order to make that plan going forward when they're in tir official capacity. >> woodruff: ebl you just heard kellyanne conway say that there was no quid pro quo in the conversation, that the president never mentioned the election. she's saying that people who are listening to this from the

into it that doesn't exist.ac >> i goto why the threpublican congressman a hearing today said correctly that this is not okay. they're not reading anhing into it. it's -- in the conversation, he only asks for two things from this foreign leader, and they then he asks them to talk to his personal attorney. trudy giuliani, the ethics of n attorney defending the t esident, are that he can only take into accoe president's personal interests, not the interest of the united ofstates, not the interthe american people, not the interest of the ukrainian people, you know, a country of 40 million people that's been invaded by russia and has lost u.n. estimates, beenaccording to killed. they're asking for military assistance. the president says in resnse, you need reciprocity, you need to do us a favor, and then the favors he asks for are personal. that should not be okay, no matter what your party is and no

matter which president does it, and the's no way to police that conduct icether than congress. >> woodruff: john carlin, thank you very much. >> thank you.oo uff: and our white house correspondent yamiche alcindor has been following the day's events. yamiche, thank you so much. a few minutes ago, u know, i was talking with kellyanne conway. it's clear that she and the president are pretty defiant in how are they processing ity. internally? >> while president is being defiant and saying the was really nothing wrong when it me to the call between him and the president of ukraine, privately he is lashing out and saying he wants to know the identity of this whistleblower. tonight the "new york times" is reportat a whistleblowerst was a man, a c.i.a. officer who was detailed to this white house to work here for some time. they also say that person is now working back at the c.i there's little else known about the person. white housis processing this, the white house is trying to counterprogram.

r day there was the direcf immigration and custom informant white house talking aboutat e so-called sanctuary cities atm e very ent the director of national intelligence was saying that t greatest challenge that the u.s. faces is election interference. the director of i.c.e. was talking about immigration and illegal immigration. it's also important to know the white house isr still fomulating its plan on how to push back on the impeachment inquiry. i'm told the white house does not have a plan athis tim i talked to a tru administration source that theos thought the researchers supposed to be dealing with the reelection bid are capable of lot of people think that won't be enough. >> woodruff: i want to ask youou the i want penalty issue, yamiche. we know from lisa desjardins'e report from hill about what congress can doirntion but you've also been looking at what are you seeing from the american people about this whole impeachment process? >> we conducted a poll

yesterday, and people are realli on whether or not the house should be focusing on this impeachmwat inquiry. to talk through numbers. 49% sad they approved of the house strting an impeachment nquiry. we believe thata 10-point jump from something from the past because we asked a similar question in apri after the mueller report was released. we also found that 46% of peoplt founy disd approved of the house focusing on this impeachment inquiry. i also want to say our poll found that vors think the impeachment inquiry won't impact whethey vote for prsident. when we askentwill impeachment quiry influence your vote, 25% said a major fator, 40% said a minor factor and 48% said not at ctor at all. pretty striking given what's happening. >> woodruff: yamiche alcindor, a lot to follow from the white house, as usual >> thanks. yamiche.

>> woodruff: in the day's other news, u.s. secretary of state mike pompeo said syrian government forces used back in may.a chemical weapon dhe said the attack happe during a battle with insurgents in idlib province. pompeo spoke to reporters along the sidelines of the u.n. general assembly in new york. >> the assad regime is eresponsible for innumera to the level of war crimes and crimes against humanity. today, i am announcing that the united states has concluded that the assad regime used chlorine as a chemical weapon on may 19 in latak province, syria. >> woodruff: pompeo also said the u.s. will provide $4.5 million in additional aid to investigate other suspected chemical weapons attacks.th death toll from a severe ieng illness tied to vaping hase now to 12 people. the centers for disease controla and preventio reported the

number of confirmed and probable cases surged to 805. rthat is a 52% increase oth the 530 illnesses reported just last week. a new pentagon report has found the suicide rate among memrs of the military rose significantly in 2018. 18.5 per 100,000 service members in 2013, to 24.8 in 2018. most were enlisted men under 30 president trump has issued an executive order that drastically cuts the number refugees admitt in the united states. to resettle in the u.s. inlowed fiscal year 2020. that is the lowest number in the history of the modern refugee program. the senateoday overwhelmingly approved a tempora government funding bill to avoid a

shutdown. it will fund the federal government through november 21. that gives lawmakers more time to negotiate money f more controversial items, like president trump's border wall.ow the billeads to the president' hdesk, where he's expected to sign it into law.th u.n.'s nuclear watchdog announced today that iran haste commanother breach of its 2015 nuclear deal commitments. it reported that tehran is enrhing uranium with advanc centrifuges, and plans to install more of those machines than previously announced. iran has maintained that its uranium enrichment is solely for civilian purposes.re at a press cone in new york, president hassan rouhani insisted his country has been transparent. >> ( translat): the supervision and the inspections of the international atomicy energy ave not been limited or decreased. the i.a.e.a.-- in the same shion since the beginning of the nuclear deal in 2015-- was supervising and inspecting and

carrying forward its activitiesr in the same fashion as in iran today. >> woodruff: today's revelation comes as iran is grappling with u.s. sanctions iosed after president trump pulled out of the nuclear agreement last year. the leading challenger in afghanistan's upcoming presidential election, abdullah abdullah, is accusing the incumbent of election fraud, days before vors head to the lls. he lost to current presidentnt ashraf ghani five years ago, in aelection that was largel dismissed as flawed. abdullah told the associated h press worried about ghani abusing his power. >> massively fraudulent elections will have an impact, h wie serious consequences. and that is why it might be too idealistic, calling on everybody to act responsibly. number of votes.t only the it will have an impact on the mentality of the people, on the views of the people, on the

democratic process. >> woodruff: there was no president ghani.se from meanwhile, the taliban renewed its threats today to attack polling stations during saturday's eleion. back in this country, the gap between the nation's rich and poor grew last year. the u.ensus bureau repord at income inequality reached its highest level in 50 years. it attributed the expansion to increase in median household incomes. but that income rise was not distributed even a noss the country. stocks fell on wall street today, over uncee ainty about peachment inquiry and new data showing a slowdown in u.s.g economwth. the dow jones industrial averag7 lopoints to close at 26,891. the nasdaq felmore than 46 pois, and the s&p 500 slipped ven. and, a passing to note. former french president jacques chirac died today in paris.

he was a fixture in french politics for decades, serving 18 years as the mayor of paris, and two terms as prime minister. chirac becpresident in 1995, and remained in office until 2007 he was the first french leader to acknowledge his country's role in the holocaust, and vehemently opposed the 2003 invasion of iraq. jacques chirac was 86 years old. still to come on the newshour: chinese president xi jinping's full-throttlquest to make his country a superpower. and, the south korean foreignhes minister on how best to kim jong-un's nuclear threat. >> woodruff: tonight, we launch our series, "china: power and prosperity." with the support of the pulitzer center, correspondents nick schifrin and katrina ,

and producers dan sagalyn and eric o'connor, conducted more than 70 on-camera interviews, traveled to eight chinese cities, and reported from, or collaborated with, producers in eight countries, to cover gherythi from trade, to technology, to the lifestyles of e young and rich. we begin our series at the top. ese president xi jinping philosophy has been written into he has sought to raise the.tu standard of living at home, and china's power and fluence ound the world. critics accuse him of consolidating power, and creating a campaign of oppression. onck schifrin reports from beijing on the sst chinese leader in more than 50 years. ♪ ♪ >> schifrin: in beijing's great halle people, the people clap in unison for one man. xi jping, communist party general secretary, commander in chief, president of the people's republic of china, says he's making chi great again.

>> ( translated ): the chinese nation has achieved a tremendous transformation. it has stood up, grown rich, and is becoming strong has come to embrace the brilliant prospects of rejuvenation. >> schifrin: it's october 2017, and xi tells party leaders one of his core beliefs-- china's- h destiny is to reclaim a centralo role in thd. >> ( translated ): the banner characteristics islyingse high and proud. it offers chinese wisdom a chinese approacho solving the problems facing mankind. >> schifrin: not since mao zedong, communist china's founding father, has a chinese leader suggested so clearly the world could emulate china. at since mao has china ha leader as powerful as xi jinping. if what the party leader says is the bible, the scholars who decipher it stud the national communist party school flies the party flag and teaches the party's version of china: united across 55 minority groups, and the torch bearers of

the communist flame. professor han qungxiang says xi inherits that legacy, and is now china's indispensable leader. >> ( translated ): the country's development needs xi jinping, and people's happiness needs xi jinping. if china wants to become a big strong country, it will need xi jping. >> schifrin: xi says his workifi starts at me. his goal is to double china's g.d.p. and per capita income by he says he wants to increase the prosperity many chinesalready joy, and now expect, and reduce poverty. >> ( anslated ): now in the xi jinping era, china has developed. xi is dealing with making china great and strong. >> schifrin: and that strength is also the military. nd calls for china to "sta tall in the east." he evokes memories of the middle kingdom, a term to describe

china's centuries-long role as an intnational power. xi has dramatically modernized china's army, navy and air force, and opened up china's first overseas bas and most controversially: china claims almost all of the south china sea, and has created military outposts, floutin objections and international law. ( leng feng roars) xi jinping's china flexes that muscular foreign policyta on the world sge, and the silver screen. "wolf warrior ii" is china's llhighest-grossing film of time. star and director wu jing plays forces soldier whothe dayations for the chinese military. when he's no longer a soldier, ' trouble comes to him. he becomes a rogue hero, launching a seeming suicide mission against the bad guys and teaming up with fellow chinese to save the y, again. if a story about a former wsoldier-turned-vigilanteho uses bows and arrows and takes a ride in a tank sounds miliar--

( rambo yelling ) --that's because it is. at the height of the cold war,d the u.s. had john rambo. wu jing asks, why can't the chinese have their own heroes? >> ( translated ): i think for leng feng, i want him o be a hero finary people. i think human beings need heroes.e there ny qualities in a hero, like bravery, selessness, dedication. >> schifrin: it's more than dedicaon to china. the good guys are the chese military. ( launching missiles ) the bad guy-- welcome to africa, son. >> schifrin: --is a violence- loving colonialist american. >> people like you will always be inferior to people like me! >> that's ( bleep ) history. bl rin: the film has made wu jing rich and famous. he says the film's nationalism is a product of the country's progress under xi jinping. >> ( translated ): in chinese modern history, china has been bullied for a long time.r when we are rich, our country can protect us.

danger, we will be protected by our country. not like before. >> schifrin: but xi jinping isn't only about protecting the people. he protects and restores the prominence of the communist party. xi has reasserted the party into people's lives and private businesses. hong cheng works for the medical anhigh-tech company, tidal star, but her main job ito lead the company's communist party committee. she shows off her party awards. >> ( translated ): this is for one of the service brands we quired being in the top ten of all service brands. >> schifrin: employees meet in tidal star's party room, where xi jinping thought is written on the wall, and hong ensures this private company adheres to party teaching. ( translated ): today we're going to study an article. please open the app, "study xi, strengthen china." >> schifrin: under xi, the party's primacy has increased, and targeted the youngest party members. company to use the "study xithe

strengthen china" app to read about xi and party leaders, and and hong ensures the company's vision aligns with the party's.( translated ): it not only leads our company in long-terman development, the app offers ourp y inspiration. >> schifrin: for a while, that inspiration came from xi himself. last year, there was a primetime tv show "studying xi ithe new era." a robot from a future, rejuvenated china challenges contestants on how much jinping thought they can memorize. ( quiz show in mandarin ) the cultf xi has included propaganda posters in city streets, suburban villages and rural roads. and, state media has called him him xi dada, or fath xi, a people and cares about the common worker. xi calls himself "core leader,"t ike mao. xi's travels recreate mao's countrysidvisits.

this year, the cult of xi has but in beijing's le. bookstore, "xi jinping thought," the book, has pride of place. despite the american celebrities nearby, bookstore mager qin hui says xi's books are best- sellers. >> ( translated ): because we're entering this new era of developmt, general secretary xi's thought points a direction for our future.e sove to seriously study the spirit of general secretary xi's speeches. >> schifrin: but fly 1,200 miles south of beijing, and hundreds of thousands of people reject xi jinping thought, and everything it stands for. xi jinping's critics say he'sno only spreading his ownhe ideas- closing the space foanyone else's ideas, both inna mainland cand here in hong kong, where these protestors say, they feel like city's .ndendence is being er police have clashed withong kong protesrs, and many of the

protestors connect the crackdo in hong kong to the restriction of rights mainland china. >> ( translated ): how can we expect that we will have democracy when the communist party is trying toan all human rights and freedom in china? ( chanting in cantonese ) >> schifrin: lee cheuk yan is an former hong kong legislator who's been fighting for democracy for decades. he's protested half a dozen chinese leaders, but says xi jinping is the most oppressive. >> xi jinping began to beven more aggressive in suppression. they banned the university professor from teaching about human rights, universal values, you know, and he is trying to, you know, build up his own chinese dream, which is a total control of people. >> schifrin: under xi, more than a million muslim uyghurs have been detained in camps. xi's china has created a network of more than 200 million surveillance cameras.

wd beijing posters on the streets of beijin the public to protect national secrets. what the party says is that thir is for thegth of china,of that if the party were to weaken, the country would weaken and there would be chaos. >> yeah, they are always brainwashing the people that, you know, without a communist party, there would be chaos. so what they are trying to say? if y have democracy, then there will be chaos? we believe in democracy, butie theyve in suppression. >> schifrin: inse mainland china, few critics are willing to echo that language in public. zhang lifan is a historian who'h made public appearances, but he says surveillance has ineased. so, we met him in the only place he felt comfortable: inside ou tel room. he wouldn't use xi jinping's name. >> ( translated ): because the communist party of china is unchecked, corruption issp wiad within the system. so if he wants to get rid of by finding evidence of their corruption.

many political opponents with an unstoppable force. >> schifrin: lifan says xi's eyes are everywhere. lawyers who have represented activists have been disbarred. journalists who write critically have been thrown out of theth country. and, as part of an anti- corruption campaign,wo million party members have been investigated for corruption.ce xi has repcollective leadership with centralized authority.an >> ( ated ): the current leader has changed everything. he first canceled the term limit of theountry's presidency, and then re-raised the idea that the party leads everything. as a result, some of the achievemen of the political exist.he 1980s no longer >> schifrin: xi's reversing those reforms, launched by predecessor deng xpiang, is a topic even xi's allies avoid. deng talked about that there shouldn't excessive concentration of leadership by one person. xi has removederm limits.

why has he done that? >> ( translated ): this is not a problem yet. not the right time to talk aut it. >> schifrin: why are the country's need is so great thatj ping needs more time? >> ( translated ): it's not the time to answer this question. >> schifrin: and then, he says> to our off-camvernment minder: >> ( translated ): this is a very sensitive issue. >> schifrin: xi and china face headwinds, both home and abroad. but, for the first time in sodern htory, the u. confronted with an increasingly assertive rising superpower that's integrated with the u.s. economy. and as the u.s. puts a first, china is led by a man who has china at the center.he world for the pbs newshour, i'm ni schifrin in beijing.

>> woodruff: all this week, world leaders are gathered in new york for the annual united nations general assembly. at his speech this week,this president trump reiterated his position that north korea could achieve economic greatness, if it's willing to give up its nuclear weapons program. william brangham gets a view of at progress-- if any-- is being made on that fro, from south korea's foreign minister. >> brangham: president trumpnd kim jong-un have had two summits and one historic handshake-- but not much else. the north koreans spent the summer testing short range missiles, while nuclear talks appeared shelved. but, in recent days, u.s. and so how does this look from south korea? for that, i'm joined by foreign minister kang kyung-wha. she joins me from new york. foreign minister, thank you so much for being here. president trump has continued to try to broker this grand dealwi north korea. they've had three meetings thus

lots ofnageantry but very much substance. do you thi nke north koreans do want to sign a nuclel? dea >> well, i think -- first of all, thank you for having me -- but the summits, i think, beyone pageantry, there's the significance of that is, of course, that it builds and maintains the trust between the top le bets of the two countries. i think the north korean commitment to con dialogue to reach a deal isth e. their recent public messas yso we verrmed tha much expect the working level discussions to resume from where things were left off n hanoi at the end of february. so i think president trump's messaging also confirms the readiness on the side of the ited states to pick up where things were ft off in hanoi,

and we expect, because hanoi didn't end in reement, but i think the silver lining to that was the two sides came out of it with a much betteunderstanding on the exec takes on the other side of the aisleso that when the negotiations resume, there could be quick progress on all agreement that wased inhe their fit summit meeting in singapore in june last year. >> reporte hear the optimism that you're conveying there, but the north koreans have been quite firm that thwa economic sanctio off, they want financial ai, and then th, y be willing to make moves on their nuclear weapons program. the united states wants that orderreversed. they want concessions on the weapons programs, and then sanctions. do you see a y tha yt those two comping threads can be married

together? >> i think that's the key and i think, therefore, things have to ve in parallel simultaneously, and that's also the basic agreement of singaporeyou know, t start building -- improve relations between the two sides, to start working towards a peace regime on the korean peninsula and the north korean commitment to denuclearization, and i think the u.s. side is committed to three tracks, the fourth track having been the excavation of the remains -- m.i.a. remains in -- that are in the hands of north korea, that has taken place. weexpect that to continue tota place, as well. so the fourth pillar being the confidence-building measures. but we, of course, work in vey close consultations with the

u.s.and our diswicussionsh our u.s. colinleaguecate that the readiness to move on all four tracks. >> reporter: is it your sense that there is a commonly derstood definition of what denuclearization actually means? because it seemslike we've had multiple different iterations what that means. does it mean that north korea gives up a weapons program but still might be able to have nuclear power for electricity? would that be acceptable, do you think? >> well, i think the concepts, the goal is very clear, for us, for the global community, for korea, the concept of denuclearization is spelled out in a joint agreement between south a and north korea dated backto 1993. we've lived up to our point. the question is how to get to

that goal, how to reach that objective, and i think north korea early has a different idea of how to -- how i want to reach that goal, but it has committed repeatedly from the p leader himself to that goal of comple denuclearization, and, so, the task is then to spll out a road map whereby we could reach that goal. >> reporter: i would like to turn to th issof the seemingly worsening relionship between south korea and japan. we've seen that this is over several issues, one about the forced labor that occurred during world war ii, another has moved towards the debate ovetowr do you think that this rift can be healed? it seems it's getting worse every day. >> well, history casts ang ays say, and --w but we are also very close

neighbors that have built very interdependent relations over the past seven decades. being anbe optimist, as you not, but also being the foreign nister of my country, you know, we remain committed to resolving the issues through dialogue, good faith, honest dialogue. i had my first meeting with the w foreign minister of japan, and my commitment to continue to rk with him an his team on all of these diffilt tracks remains very strong. i think the issue of the forced labor isfi cla in our court judgment of late laslat year, or supreme court judgment on the forced labor issue and, yes, it's a tough iss because we have different recollections, different wa in which we want

to approach the ast. but the trade restriction measures were for us clearly unacceptable and retaliatory. a way through this very difficulsituation through continued diplomatic engagement. >> reorter: foreign minister kang kyung-wha, thank you very much for being here.nk >> tou. >> woodruff: and thank you, william. d that is the newshour f tonight. i'm judy woodruff. join us online, and again here e tomorrning. for all of us at the pbs wshour, thank you, ande we'll seyou soon. >> majording for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> bnsf railway. >> consumer cellular.>> inancial services firm raymond james.

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