captioning sponsored by wnet >> sreenivasan: on this edition for saturday, january 9: lawmakers weigh next steps in the wake of the riots at the capitol. how social media is playing into the political divide. and, how the power of words can shape political culture. next, on pbs newshour weekend. >> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: sue and edgar wachenheim iii. the anderson family fund. bernard and denise schwartz. the cheryl and philip milstein lfa barbara hope zuckeleerg. thard and norma klorfine o oundation. we try tve in the moment, ht to not miss what's rign front of us. at mutual of america, we believe taking care of tomorrow

can help you make the most of today. tual of america financia group, retirement services and investments. >> for 25 years,onsumer cellular's goal has been to provide wireless service that helps people communicate and connect. we offer a variety of no-contract plans, and our u.s.-based customer service team can help find one that fits you. www.consumercellular.tv. additional support has been provided by: d by the corporation for public broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the american people. and by contributions to your station from viewers lik you. thank you. >> sreenivasan: good evening, and thanks r joining us. calls for president donald trump to resign, and plans to impeach him a second time, coinued to iday, fiting wednesday's deadly rampage at the capitol. the president remained at the white house, with 11 days remaining until president-elect joe biden's inauguration. mr. trump is nobanned from twitter, his favorite social medthia platform.

re were more arrests of members of the mob that broke the capitol among them, derrick evans, a lawmaker who lstreamedia state himself unlawfully entering the capi.tol building he waans arrested yesterdayd resigned today. chansley, a supporter of theny q-anon conspiracy theory who wore face paint and a fur hat with horns antlers at the capitol, was arrested. and florida authorities announced today they arrested adam johnson,eg who aly removed house speaker nancy pesi's lectern, and was photographed walking away with it. yesterday, the department of justice charged 13 people with federal crimes, and saha about 40 oth been arrested on lesser charges. five people died in thattack. fls were lowered to half-staff at the capitol today in honor of capitol police officer brian sicknick, who was killed in the hours-long rioting anattacks. >> sreenivasan: juliette kayyem is a former assistant secretary of the departme of homeland

security, and a professor at the harvard kennedy school. inshe me recently to talk about the events of this week and the potential consequences for national security. juliette, what are the longer- y term securplications of what happened the other day? i mean, now we are hearing that nancy pelosi's laptop has been stolen. again, there might be lots of e other things that ssing from different members' offices. >> so the long-term consequences are unknown at this stage, and ts hay there has to be a thorough review of, why were they so ill-prepared for the preparations? what happened in the building? and then, what was taken, for national security purposes? or was it just, you know, sromeone wanted to take laptop and threw it out, you know, on their way to the airport? and so, the idea that somehow, you know, we can have a understanding of how bad this wass absurd at this stage. this was a security breach of ranch of co-equal government, no different than if they had done it at the white

house or at theupreme court. and, it was not just physically threatening. it was threatening to our national security secrets, and to, you know, basically comentinuity of gove, for some period of time. >> sreenivasan: and when you think about how many times the f..i. in the last couple of years and department of homeland secity has said, "look, white supremacy," for example, "we're monitoring these places, we're watching these groups." and this was almost out in the open. i mean, we had articles leading up to th where these groups were talking about exactly what they wanted to accomplish. and to think that all of that went by the wayside, when you juxtapose that to how prepared washington, d.c. was for the black lives matter marches. >> it is so inexplicable. and i know people think they undestand, you know, maybe because they-- because the maer or progressive groups.es, that's why they were so, you know, heavy-handed with them. it's ine we don't know the answer. i will say, this started four

yearsright? you actually think about what erwas going e-- this is the culmination of the language and the organizing that a president has done from his pulp o, twitter, tl office, statements that he makes, atements that his proxie make, which is to the language of fighting. n.the language of disrupt right? he wants to-- you know, he said, that's why he isheresident, was as going to shake things up. ominous, i would say, since the government and people that are just looking at public sources, like me, were very nervous about what could happen this week. it wasn't a surprise. this wasn't a-- this wasn't an unplanned event. this wasn't, you know, something that, like an earthquake, right? this was-- this was a noticed event. so the gap between what everyone knew and the capitol police's

positioning is inexplicable, and something that we have to understand. is it-- was it a questio race? was it a question of, they thought that the group wouldn't be violent? or was it actually really, re nally bad planning thatds to be addressed? >> sreenivasan: you know, as we speak, again, everything the president says could change in another couple of minutes. but at the moment, the president sangys he is not go attend the inauguration. and we're also hearing that there is another march, another rally planned at the same time. i mean, this was-- this is a day wh we are used to-- well, in the old-fashioned days, we're used to seeing presidents and thr first ladies walk alon the motorcade, along a massive parade route, go out, sometimes shake hands, right? and thentire scene is so different now. >> yeah, i mean, and it's different, you know, for a variety reasons. one, of course, is trump, and the-- and the-- and the domestic terrorism that heort of gives a red carpet to, rig?

i mean, essentially, he gives oxygen to it. and the fears that the secret service who are running the security event-- that is run out o--f the secret servior the inauguration, the concerns that they will have of an elevated threat. so when i did transition, many, many years ago, we wer worrying-- we were worried about foreign countries and whether they were goingoo be attacks m foreign countries. the threat is inside the house. in fact, it's-- it's down the street. so i've been struggling all morning to figure out if there's a german word for something that is both petty, but-- but good, right? i think-- i think the president not going to the inauguration is petty and part of his pnaerty. i actually think that in the end, it will decrease the security and safety threat, beoecause hise won't think that they're going to see him. he won't be able to say anything. the orientation will be towards the new. which i think will be very helpful in terms of minimizing

risk-- not going to g it to zero-- minimizing risk. >> sreenivasan: all right, juliette kayyem, thanks so much for joining us. >> thank you. 57,000 posts, and amassinghan nearly 89 million followers, the social media company twitt announced last night that it was permanently suspendisident donald trump's personal account. in a post explaining the move, the company wrote that it made the decision, "due to the risk of further incitement of violence." the institutional "at-potus" account is still active, and in posts that were quickly deleted, mr. trump tweeted that he may build out his own platform in the future. his campaign account, and those of several prominent supporters that also spread misinformation, were also taken down. there was immediate pushback from many supporters, including the secretary of state, and the president's son, donald trump jr. he tweeted, "free speech no longer exists in america." the permanent suspension comes after a 12-hour suspension on wednesday for posting a video that repet ated lies abe outcome of the 2020 election.

facebook announced on thursday that it was suspending the presidens account at least through the inauguration on january 20. >> sreenivasan: for more on the social media bans and the disinformatotion that continue spread, i spoke with joan donovan, research director at harvard uniy'versshorenstein center on media, politics and public policy.on so what rebilities then, do the social platforms have? after january 20, president biden, which say he hopeful makes it through inauguration day and onward, what doese have to do, or his administration have to do with social media platforms? and what can they do?ay in lots ofs you can say trumpism is an idea and will tlast donald trump's time at the white house. >> we have, post-january 6, seen the radical break of the maga movement from repubnli politics as usual, if you look at the, you know, the events

airport ere people were saying basically every day, we're going to do this. we are going to follow you. d in that sense, it can no longer be a moral imperative or a moral duty for tech corporations to take action. welso have to think about the roles that political elites have played in sowing disinformation. so it extends beyond trump. there's an entire partisan media ecosystem, all of these groups are using social media in order to get the message out, as well as to financially and politically benefit. and so the biden administration is going to have a to lo those inctives, and then also look at the design of these communication technologies, and communication tecies back down to the scale of human modeantion so that theyo

longer be weaponized in this way people who have either large >> sreenivasan: does that mean that a facebook would have to be broken up? i mean, righnow, they serve, twa, who billion-plus humans onl thnet. there's just no way humans can modera all the information that comes- comes on to the plam every second. >> yeah, there's a few different ways that they need to do this, which is that they need to look internally at their a.i. systems and understand that when thingst t to go viral, you have to look very closely at what are the-- what is that content? what is it saying? what is it implying? if it's te speech, ift's incitement, if it's harassing content, y have to take issue with it. if it's being pushed out through politicians' accounts, they ned a different set of standards. and so there are a bunch ofes meashat can be taken in order to do this, as well as

breaking up some of the and so, we need technologyan cos to understand what's at stake when they build for growth and what that leaves open for different kinds of bad actors, to take that product and turn it into a social vulnerility.>> sreenivasan: evee president is taken off of twitter, an't there other places, other pools where like-minded people gater? isn't that the sort of strength of the internet, that you can't shut any specific voice or location?wn from just one >> yeah, and that's why we need to treat these commucaon infrastructures as a process and not a product. you have to build regulation that undstands that there will be circumvention. i'm thinking last nig how t

president trd to evade his twitter ban by using his friends and trying to tweet from the potus account. there are always going to be technologies that pop up. the coming battle ahead for policy make sers to look at this and look at the entire ecosystem and understand that if we put these rules in place and we make sure that everybody works by the same standards, then c.e.o.s that fashion their technology spaces, when they anmoderated certain limit, or when they a reach a certaunt of people, have to be treated more like radio stations news media. and so we need rules for strategic amplification, and we need rules for the amount of people tt these apps claim to serve. and that will be an interestingt efs well. because if you say-- you know, if your technology seres over a

million people, then you have to have a plan for content moderation, that changes everything about the business model becathe in case, sometimes you might end up with more-- more smaller apps and a much larger ecosystem. >> sreenivasan: joan donovan of shorenstein center, thanks so much for joining us. >> any time. >> sreenivasan: for more analysis from joan donovan and juliette kayyem, go to www.pbs.org/wshour. >> sreenivan: in the midst of the political turmoil in washington, d.c., there is still a growing covid-19 crisis as the pandemic continues to rage. the united states recorded a record number of daily coronavirus cases fothe second there were more than 300,000 confirmed new cases, according to the "new york times" database, a 40% increase, on o.erage, compared to two weeks

ag the u.s. recorded 3,890 deaths on friday, near a daily record in all, the death in the u.s. is now nearly 300. as cases spike, vaccine rollout in the u.s. continues to be slower than projecte according to the centers for 6.7 million people have received a first dose. in the uted kingdom, much of the country remains under a tight lockdown to prevent the nsread of coronavirus, including the more-tramissible strain that is spreading there. officials are opening mass vaccination sites and there is a goal of vaccinating all elderly, vulnerable, and frontline workers by mid-february. that includes eligible royal family members. in a statement, buckingham palace said queen elizabeth and her husband, phillip, both in their 90 dose of the vaccine today. in indonesia, a plane carrying 62 people crashed into the java sea shortly after taking off from jakarta this afternoo

local time. the indonesi navy says it has pinpointed the location of the crash and is looking for survivors. according to the indonesian transportation ministry, the domestic flight had been delayed at least 30 minutedue to heavy rain. it disappeared from radar four minutes after taking off. the plane was a 26-year-old bo 7ei-524, a much older ve trsion boeing 737-max, which was pulled from service foter 20 months two crashes. one of those crashes was in indonesia in october of 2 and killed all 189 people on board. michael apted, the british director of the "up" documentari es, and films including" coal miner's daughter" and the james bond film "the world is not enough,"as died. apted chronicled the lives of a group of british chi oren in a serifilms that began in 1964 when they were seven years old, and revisited them every seven years. the first film was called he most recent, 3 up," was released in 2019.

apted moved to the u.s. after directing "coal miner's daughter" in 1980, and serveds president of the directors guild of america from 2003 to 2009.es a retative for the directors guild said apted's family informed the organization that he died thursday night in los angeles. no cause was given. michael apted was 79 years old. >> sreenivasan: there have been many discussions this week over the language used to describe the capitol building.ital and at newshour weekend's christopher booker has more. >> d reporter: it's h find the words to describe what happened on wednesday. was it a riot? was iurt an insrection? it cerertainly than a protest. t it's often said tjournalism is the first rough draft of history. bet how will the words that we choose to descri what happened in washington thiseek impact

the way america remembers? >> even st to describe the attack othe capital, you know, are-- was it a mob? is it terrorism? is it insurrection? is it a coup? >> reporter: joanne freeman is a professor of history at yale university who speciales in the politics and political culture of the revolutionary and early national period american history. she's written extensively about turmoil inmerican politics. as a historian-- as a historian who studies journalism and history-- what does the coverage look and sound like to you? and, what are the words that are being used sound like to you? >> in many ways, i think americans don't quite have the words to describe what's going on. this morning i saw some people referring to what happened on wednesday as the "storming of the capitol." >> supporters of president trump stormed the complex. the gry mob burst through barricades and police, while... >> and i actually object to that.

"storming" romanticizes it. there's nothing romantic about what happened. it's not just born oions, you know, noble passions. and repercussions. implications it was an attack on the government. in aesll of ways, it's not just a peaceful expression of passion. >> reporter: yet "passion" is a word often used. >> we gather together at a momenof great division. at a moment of great passion. >> reporter: senator ted cruz reachiting fon the senate floor as he lodged objections to the state vote certifications on wednesday. >> so, speakings a historian who's always interested in the meaning of words, in e past, in the right context, we're in one of those moments that, yo know, 50 years from now, historians will look at us grappling to find the right language to talk about this ment. there's been a lot of words being thrown around that are ing thrown around more as buzzwords than as words with meaning. and some of those words are pretty significant ones.

so, you know, "fascism," "socialism," "communism." even "democracy," "liberty," "freedom," "patriotism." >>looking out at a the amazing patriots here today, i have never been more confident in our nation's future. >> we're in a-- a battle of words, as well as a battle of politics. particular when you have extreme circumstances like we're experiencing right now, those kinds of words can be used as masks, to mask extremism, right? "this is demracy!" "this is liberty!" "this is freedom!" now here's the ging, and it's ng to sound obvious, but i think it's important to realize iden cratic form of government. you know, a democracy is gserounded on publiiment and public opinion. that's really basically where the power is. a pronouncement made from "on algh"-- meaning the nati stage, a congressman, a presidt-- those words have added meaning, and those words

canse taken-- are almost alw taken seriously by some of the public. ( screaming ) >> help! >> reporter: the words, and the way the words are being used, are also being ud, i assume, to recruit more amongst the far right. r instance, i'm thinking of tweets that we saw, instagram postings of revolutionaries inside the capitol. "patriots taking back the people's house." >> right? "revolutionaries!" people are grabbing at moments in the past out of conte, and using them to frame what they're doing, right? this is supremely american. "our revolutionaries did it. we are just like them. that's what we're doing." and on the surface, you could happily sort of nod with that. if you actually look at the reality of what happened during the revolution, what happened now, and what these people are doing, no, that's not an easy comparison to make.

and the this is the problem with propaganda-- how do you-- how do you disprove that, right? pei can say,le who attacked the capital aren't patriots. that's unpatriotic." sahow-- what do if someone says "no, i feel very patriotic. i'm defending government as i see it." that's a hard-- these words are powerful for a reaecause they're hard to refute. they're-- they're fuzzy, and they have aut impact and a profound political meaning. now, that leads to another point, w accountability in a broad way right now, because if there isn't, the mess clearly, "well, that was fine. that was okay." and, why, if youre somne who engaged in that kind of of any kind and there's nopact consequences, why would you not do that again? >> this is pbs newshour weekend,

saturday. >> sreenivasan: there was a ht ead-spinning amo news this week, so we wanted to dig back into one story that may have gotten lost in the shuffle for some viewers: leases in previously protected public land in alaska. >> good morning. >> sreenivasan: in a live- streamed auction in anchorage on wednesday, federal officials accepted bids for leases to explore oil and gas across 1.6li m acres of land, part of the arctic national wildlife refanuge, or . congress's direction, and fulfilling that commitment to thela nation and toans to develop a responsible oil and gassi l program. >> sreenivasan: but the sale, taking place just two weeks before the end of the trp administration, was not the blockbuster some supporters had hoped for only half of the 22 tracts made available received any bids at all, and none of the major energy companies took part. the vaitst majof the

purchases were by a state-owned economic development group. in total, the aucon raised $14.4 million, half of which goes to the state of alaska. that's far less than the $1.8 billion that supporters estimated the leases could generate when the republican- controlled congresopened the refuge to oil and gas exploration in 2017. >> it was a massive flop for the trump administration. >> sreenivasan: am colton is the executive director of the alaska wilderness league. he says the sale shows that it's not ju environmental advocates and indigeno groups that think drilling in anwr is a bad idea. >> even the oil companies themselves are understanding the new landscape, where it doesn't make sense to make a 70- or 80-year bet that's only going to exacerbate climate change, face enormous environmental opposition, and when you do have a president- elect coming in that is committed to permanently protect this incredible landscape.

>> sreenivasan: that's all for this edition of pbs newshour weekend. for the latest news updates, visit www.pbs.org/newshour. i'm hari sreenivasan. thanks for watching. stay healthy, and have a good nht. captioning sponsoreby wnet captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org >> pbs newshour weekend imade possible by: sue and edgar wachenheim iii. bernard and denise schwartz. the cheryl and philip milstein family. barbara hope zuckerberg. the leonard and norma klorfine foundation.

charles rosenblum. we try to live in the moment, to not miss what's right in front of us. at mutual of america, we believe taking ce of tomorrow can help you make the most of today. mutual of america financial group, retirement services and investments. additional support has been provided by: nser cellular. and by: and by the corporation for ca public broing, a private corporation funded by the erican people. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. you're watching pbs. two other single moms.

>> gabst: we're gonna interviewe faced the same obstacles. >> sarah: how do i survive? how do i get these kids food? i knew i could just let it bury me and that moment was like you better figure this out. >> kiera: i was my kids to see that mbecoming bett. mom's coming a better mom. >> amy: what's the louacy you're gonna leavekids? what do you want them to remember you by? >> speaker: roadtrip nation is madetiossible by ecmc foundaon, ecndation's mission is to inspire and facilitate improvements that affect educational outcomes. especially ang underserved populations, through evidence based innovation. learn more aboc foundation by visiting ecmcfoundation.org.