captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> woodruff: good evening, i'm judy woodruff. on the newshour tonight, taking to the streets-- cuba sees its largest protests in decades as thousands gather across the country in a call for freedom. then, getting the vaccine-- the spread of the delta variant prompts questions about the possible need for booster shots in the future. and, raising the future-- covid 19 exacerbates the already daunting challenge of accessing child care for parents in the u.s. >> america's working families have had to cobble together their own child care solutions in a privatized market that is costly, often lacks quality, and fails to pay caregivers a living wage.

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thank you. >> woodruff: police are out in force tonight in havana, after thousands of protesters rose up sunday. they took to the streets across the country, in the largest demonstrations against communist rule in a generation. nick schifrin begins our corage. >> freedom! >> schifrin: on the streets of havana, thousands of cubans walked to the center of the capital, to demand their“ freedom.” >> ( translated ): we are here because of the repression against the people. they are starving us to death. we have no house, we have nothing, but they have money to build hotels. >> ( translated ): homeland and life, down with the dictatorship, down with the castros, down with the communist dogs. >> schifrin: they filmed on their phones and spread the call to demonstrate via internet they've only recently been able

to access. first, in san antonio de los banos, south of havana, and then, to hundreds of cities throughout the country. it wasn't all peaceful. 90 miles east of havana, protestors overturned a cop car. in response, police arrested dozens, and plain clothes officers administered the state's justice. >> ( translated ): state security beat me and my daughter, they beat us because we were walking down the street. >> schifrin: the nationwide release of anger, from protestors willing to personally yell at cuba's president, the product of acute shortages of covid vaccines and other medicines, despite a covid outbreak, and more cubans getting sick. anger over inflation that could hit 500% this year. and because of trump administration sanctions, cubans no longer have access to remittances that were once their second largest source of income. but it's also the product of long-standing outrage over an economy that for years failed to lift up working class cubans.

yesterday cuban presidt miguel diaz-canel accused demonstrators of being u.s. sell-outs. and today, he blamed the 70- year-old u.s. trade embargo. >> ( translated ): lift the blockade and we will see what our people are capable of. >> schifrin: but in washington today, president biden took the protestors' side. >> the cuban people are demanding their freedom from an authoritarian regime. i don't think we've seen the u.s. stands firmly with the people of cuba as they assert their universal rights. and we call on the government of cuba to refrain from violence in their attempt to silence the voices of the people of cuba. >> schifrin: it's been 27 years since cubans protested en masse. but those demonstrations, were only in havana. yesterday's protests were across the country, spontaneous, and leaderless. to talk about the significance of these protests, we turn to lillian guerra, professor of cuban history at the unirsity of florida.

lillian guerra, welcome to the newshour, so how historic were yesterday's demonstrate-- dem straitiond. >> they were really unprecedented. we have not seen anything like this in 60 years or more in cuba. they are not just extraordinary in their magnitude but they are also gee graphically vast in terms of the numbers of cities and places where they have taken place. and the quality of people denunciation, the diversity of voices, and also that people are openly calling this a dictatorship. and today even calling for the end of communism and openly in far eastern cuba. this is all really unchart ared waters. >> schifrin: we reported some of cuban's most recent concerns over covid, over medical shortages, inflation, but also long-term economic hopelessness. what do you think lead to yesterday's demonstrations? >> i think this is a culmination of three decades of the cuban government making reforms that

really have most served its own stablization and koition of control over the capitalist sector of the economy that was created by the dom nis party in 1991, really because of the collapse of the soviet union. and the need to do something to maintain power. so what we have is a lot of anger. we have now multigenerational disappointment with the lack of change and most recently we have a lot of hypocrisy on the part of the cuban state that claims it is so humanitarian and so interested in its people's welfare but really has ot even been able to supply people with tylenol and basic food. and also will not admit, and that is the key here, that the new leadership and the old leadership have held hands. >> and they will not admit that anything is wrong with their model or their one party rule. >> schifrin: in fact today we have seen the cuban government blamed united states for these protests. also shut off some access to the internet. do you believe the government is

willing to make some of the changes that are required to respond to those longer more medium and long-term concerns expressed by the population? >> i think that they are very unwilling. in april the cuban communist party held its-- weight in congress, they said at the congress that they were committed to the idea, that social media and the internet and all the means by which cubans are expressing them are an affront to the nation, that they are anti-cuban and that they are a source of subversion. that was several months ago. yet so far the tune has not changed and the story line has pretty much gotten narrower as mig el diaz canal has gone on television accusing those protesting of being criminals, mercenaries. none of that is believable. the people protesting are your neighbors, the people you know. there are people of all backgrounds. and the diversity of that community of cubans in every place that they are protesting makes it really difficult for

this to be discredited according to the traditional means. >> candidate biden exromsed-- promised to lift some of the trump administration actions on cuba. the biden add plrgs is close to finalizing its cuba policy. let me play you a clip from an interview i did earlier today from mike gonzalez, a heritage foundation senior fellow who says after these protests, the biden administration should not open up to the cuba. >> i think this is now off the table because it will be widely seen, and it will be a leline to a thruggish murderous totalitarian regime rejected by its own people. so i don't see how biden can send back an ambassador or lift prshures the trump regime imposed wants do you think they should do. >> i think they should do the opposite of what this gentleman suggested. if he were to take a position of loosenk the embargo or do things

like obama that poked holes into it, that would call the cuban state's bluff. theaferg is going on in cuba is result of united states and united states block aid, the embargo. when cubans on the ground know it is really the internal block aid thrarks is how it has been used mow for more than 30 years to describe the kinds of controls that the communist party exercises. and so i think we need to stop being the aggressor. we theed to start take on the scrichted role that has been z our role since 1960 at least, 1961. you know, it's time to be a radical friend of the cuban people. even as we maintain our criticisms and perhaps some of our sanctions, certainly, against the revolutionary armed forces. >> and that debate over u.s. policy continue, lillian guerra, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> woodruff: in the day's other news, president biden issued fresh appeals to get gun violence under control.

he called in attorney general merrick garland plus law enforcement and local officials today, amid a spike in shootings across the nation. >> we recognize that we have to come together to fulfill the first responsibility of a democracy, that's to keep each other safe. that's what the american people are looking for when it comes to reducing violent crime and gun violence. >> woodruff: mayors and other leaders from new york, chicago, washington and memphis were among those attending the meeting. drug maker pfizer met today with the u.s. food and drug administration to advocate covid-19 booster shots. the company wants authorization for a third dose of its vaccine. federal officials say it is not needed, yet. meanwhile, the world health organization appealed for shipping vaccines to poor nations before anyone adds booster shots. firefighters across e western u.s. have faced another day of searing heat. the largest wildfire of the year in california has already

scorched about 140 square miles along the nevada state line. a fire in oregon damaged transmission lines, forcing california's power grid operators to call for conservation. the death toll reached 94 today at a collapsed condominium building near miami. crews found four more bodies, leaving 22 people still missing. the mayor of miami-dade county acknowledged it's getting harder to identify decomposing remains. >> at this step in the recovery process, we must rely heavily on the work of the medical examiner's office. they're undertaking technical and scientific processes to identify the human remains. the process is very methodical and careful and it does take time. >> woodruff: local officials also said they're tightening security at the site, to reassure the victims' families. in afghanistan, the top u.s.

commander formally stepped down today, as the u.s. withdrawal winds down by august 31st. army general scott miller handed authority to marine general frank mckenzie. he will operate from u.s. central command in tampa. police in britain have opened investigations into racist abuse of three black soccer players. they missed penalty kicks on sunday as england lost to italy in the european championship. the loss triggerednline attacks that prime minister boris johnson joined in denouncing today. >> to those who have been directing racist abuse at some of the players, i said shame on you and i hope you will crawl back under the rock from which you emerged because this entire team played like heroes. >> woodruff: johnson himself was criticized last month for not condemning the booing of players who took a knee to protest

racial injustice. back in this country, dozens of texas democrats walked out of a special legislative session hoping to block new voting restrictions. they're trying to deny majority republicans a quorum to do business, as they did last month. the democratic lawmakers headed to washington to demand federal action on protecting voting rights. on wall street, stocks turned modest gains into record closes on three major indexes. the dow jones industrial average was up 126 points to close at 34,996. the nasdaq rose 31 points. the s&p 500 added 15. and, edwin edwards, a flamboyant four-term governor of louisiana, has died. the veteran democrat was known for his sharp tongue, high living and populist style. but, he ultimately served eight years in prison for racketeering and other crimes. edwin edwards was 93 years old.

still to come on the newshour: haiti grows increasingly unstable in the wake of the assassination of the country's president. the spread of the delta variant prompts questions about booster shots. raising our future-- we kick off a special week-long series on the child care crisis in the u.s. plus much more. >> woodruff: now, to the crisis in haiti. it'seen less than a week since the shocking assassination of hiti's president by gunmen in his home. now, a possible conspiracy involving a haitian-born doctor from florida has further roiled an already fraught situation, as political rivals jockey for

power. there is now a new lead suspect in the assassination of president jovenel moise. haitian authorities said over the weekend that he is this man: 63-year-old christian emmanuel sanon, a haitian american who lives in florida. in 2011, he appeared to promote himself as a leader for haiti. >> with me in wer, you are going to have to tell me, what are yodoing with my uranium? what you going to do with the oil that we have in the country? what are you going to do with the coal that you want to exploit? >> woodruff: police chief leon charles said sanon had arrived in haiti in june. in a search of sanon's home, officers found weapons, bullets, and a hat with an emblem from the u.s. drug enforcement administration. >> this is a d.e.a. operation, stand down! >> woodruff: video shot at the scene of the crime appeared to show someone purporting to be a d.e.a. agent.

charles said sanon was in police custody. >> ( translated ): he arrived in haiti on a private airplane to fulfill political objectives, according to the information we he has contacted a company specializing in security to recruit some bandits. >> woodruff: haitian authorities have arrested 23 colombians and two haitian-americans they say carried out the attack. colombia's police chief said a florida-based security company, c.t.u., bought 19 plane tickets for the colombian assailants, many of whom were retired soldiers. the tickets were from bogota, colombia, to santo domingo in the dominican republic. from there, the assailants allegedly crossed over the border into haiti. meanwhile, the power struggle continued in haiti. two men each say they are the rightful prime minister of haiti: claude joseph had the role when moise was killed. but a successor, ariel henry, was supposed to take over that

day. joseph's opponents are alrea callg for his ouster. >> ( translated ): if he had we consider him as a usurper who should be in jail. >> woodruff: remaining members of the mostly-disbanded haitian senate voted on their leader, joseph lambert, to serve as acting president. the white house said a u.s. delegation met with all three men sunday. haiti's powerful gangs also seemed to be taking advaage of the power vacuum. notorious leader jimmy cherizier, known as barbecue, urged gangs to avenge the president's death. >> ( translated ): i ask all the gangs to mobilize. take to the streets. we demand explanations about the assassination of the president. >> woodruff: port au prince resident yvens rumbold said moise's murder has led to fear on the streets. >> the feeling is, if a president can be assassinated at his home, so everything can happen to anyone in this

country. >> woodruff: in the midst of the chaos, haiti still has presidential elections scheduled for november, which the united states says should proceed. president biden spoke this afternoon: >> the people of haiti deserve peace and security and haiti's polical leaders need to come together for the good of the country. >> woodruff: for more i'm joined by eduardo gamarra, professor of political science at florida international university. he's written widely on haiti, the caribbean, and latin america. professor gamarra thank you so much for talking with us. first of all, what do you make of this new information about the haitian american who says he is a doctor living in florida who is now been arrested? >> well, i think it signifies more than anything else the wide net of conspiracy that really lead to the murder of president

moise. and it also involves, obviously, a significant component of the haitian private sector. this man other than saying he is a doctor also claims to be a business person. so that possibly leads to a whole series of other names that will come up in the next few days. that will help us more readily identify who financed this operation. >> you mentioned the haitian private sector, the business community in haiti. what would be the mot of for them to get rid of president moise? >> well, the unfortunate fact is that president moise was unpopular across the spectrum in haiti. but he also stepped on a few toes in the private sector. was facing the wrath of some of the most important business people who not only were his political opponents, but who

also in essence pledged to have him removed. >> woodruff: and what you are saying is it may be difficult to draw a line between what they may have said about him and what finally happened to him. >> exactly. that's the most difficult part to decipher. and so i think that you know, in a sense, there were so many different, how should i put it, gangs already in place in haiti funded by different actorses. the gang related to drug trafficking. simple gangs related to street, neighborhoods, for example. but also, and this is very important, a pattern that we have begun seeing in haiti around the turn of the century, of foreign security teams coming in to provide different sorts of security from ministers, for the president or for the private sector for that matter. >> do you think haiti law enforcement will ultimately get to the bottom of who did this?

>> well, what surprised me is that given the weakness of the nonexistent judiciary but also the fact that the police is essentially dismantled, that they got so quickly to the culprit. they arrested so many of the mercenaries and that they are really moving fairly quickly in terms of finding out who financed this operation. >> professor gamara whack about the political piece of this. there are now what, three people, different people who are saying they should be in charge, who may be laying claim to being prime minister, where do you see this? how do you see this playing itself out? >> this is going to be probably determined largely by who the international community supports. and as of right now it has been the prime minister who is nominated in april but who was essentially replaced by president moise on monday of last week.

but the international communities is putting their support behind that gentleman, mr. joseph. so i imagine that that is where the direction, at least politically, that haiti will take. but again, even in that context, holding elections in haiti which i think is what the international community expects, is going to be difficult given the fact that ing thises are so unraveled at the moment and that really, there appears to be chaos at least in port-au-prince. >> i was struct that you told my colleague, our producer that when you asked if haiti say failed state, you said i can't have a failed state when there is no state. i mean did you mean that? >> yes. unfortunately haiti has been in a very precareious situation in terms of institution plg. and probably going back since the collapse of the duvalier reg

eem in the middle of the 1980s, this reg nem refer really gelled, never produced political party, stable constitutions even a cnstitutional regime. and in e context of natural resource-- natural catastrophes and recurring political crisis, what you have had is complete, complete political implosion. and so here we are now wth two prime ministers who in a parliamentary system, with a parliament that doesn't exist, with a judiciary that has collapsed, with police that essentially half of what it used to be four years ago, with no armed forces, with no institutionallity, it is very difficult to see the presence of a state. >> woodruff: such a difficult set of circumstances. professor eduardo tbamara, florida international university, thank you very much. >> thank you very much, judy.

>> woodruff: how to stop or at least slow the rise in gun violence across the country? lisa desjardins talks with one local leader, who joined others at the white house today to tackle this urgent question. >> desjardins: washington, d.c. is one of five areas nationwide where the biden administration is launching strike teams to address gun trafficking. like many regions across the country, homicides and gun violence in the city have been on the rise. homicides this year in d.c. have already surpassed those in 2020. that's afteromicides in 2020 rose nearly 20% from 2019, according to data from the d.c. police department. communities of color are disproportionately impacted. according to the kaiser family foundation, in 2019 in washington, there were about 18 firearm-related deaths per 100,000 white resident compared to about 40 per 100,000 black residents.

for more, i'm joined by d.c. mayor muriel bowser, a democrat, who was at the white house meeting today. who let's start with the big question, mayor bowser why is gun violence rising in your city? >> well, i don't think any person can point to one thing, lissa on the the rise in shootings. certainly we see a prevalence of illegal guns in our city and we see a repeat offenders usingns >> we are attacking the problem from all sides including law enforcement strategy but community policing, excuse me, community violence intervention strategies as well. >> i'm going to come back to that, there is a debate over really who should be responsible and solve this problem. some republicans say that this is an issue for mayors like yourself. and it is under your watch that we have seen these numbers go up. what do you say to those

republicans who say this is not a federal issue, this is something for local mayors and police to be dealing with? >> well, i have been mayor six years, i have seen crime numbers go up and down, and always our strategy is to focus on opportunities, prevention and enforcement. but the federal government does have a role to play. at the white house where the american rescue plan under president biden's leadership is allowing us to fund new officers, new police cadets but also allowing us to fund new jobs, new cleeb jobs where our public heaft programs can place individuals. pilot programs to assist returning citizens with housing and cash assistance. so it is also true that there needs to be real action around limiting the illegal trafficking of guns. >> you know, i'm so interested in those strike forces that your city will be getting one of. and to deal with the idea of

guns coming in from areas with, in the biden administration's words, weaker gun laws, talk to us about what does that actually look like, what do these strike forces do and what are they actully achieving, especially how do you know these guns are illegal. many are legally purchased in other states. >> well, we find that they may have been il legally purchased-- legally purchased but if they end up in the hands of somebody who is committing crimes than they are illegal here. and we have a long partnership with the atf and fbish and the department of justice. and now that partnership is going to be focused on tracing illegal guns, figuring out which guns were used in all crime, crimes here and crimes elsewhere focusing on straw purchasers, people who were illegal purchasing for vuds who shouldn't be able to buy a gun. all of those efforts will keep guns off of our street. one thing our law enforcement professions tell us, one trend

that they see is that in a group of peesm ten years ago there may have been one of those individuals who had a gun. now four or five of those individuals have guns. and when you see the incidents, the shooting go up with lethal weapons like nine millimeters that are very prevalent on our street, sometimes they are modified so they can have rapid fire. we have to get to those guns before they harm somebody in the hands of the wrong tern. >> i know you spoke of the money are putting towards increasing the police cad elevator corps and to dealing with violence in your city. if tens of millions of dollars, about 60 million but the city received 3 billion from the american rescue plan, why not more and how do you hold those new police officers accountable? >> well one strat dpee we have for new hires is to make sure they are out in the community and getting to know their community. and we're also funding for

example electric bikes. we know that our communities like to see their officers on the beat, out of their cars and that is one thing that we're doing. and while we tlked about alternative to policing program costing about $60 million, there are other huge programs that are part of that $3 billion including 400 million that we're putting into our producing production trust fund that will allow us to create more affordable housing in the district which addresses public safety. >> such an important time for all local dpoft in this country. mayor muriel bowser of washington d.c., we thank you for joining us. >> thank you. >> woodruff: even before its meeting today with the f.d.a., pfizer's recent push to add a booster shot to its covid-19 vaccination protocol seemed to be at odds with what many people thought they had understood

about the drug's effectiveness. and, as william brangham reports, it also has prompted real concern among healthcare professionals. >> brangham: judy, late last week, pfizer said it recommended adding a third dose to the original vaccine, a booster shot, at about six months after initial immunization. that's when the company said its own internal study showed the vaccine's initial protection began to decline. but those findings contradicted other research. and many medical practitioners disagreed over whether boosters were necessary, appropriate, given the large number of people who have yet to receive even a single dose. one of those weighing in is dr. kirsten bibbins-domingo, a professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at the university of california at san francisco.

dr. bibbins-domingo, great to you have back on the newshour so this pfizer announcement, it caused a good deal of confusion because what we had been told thus far, i mean pfizer said because of the delta variant we're going to work on this booster. but we've been lead to believe thugs far that the vaccines including pfizer's are quite protective against the delta variant. help us unpack all of this. >> right, it it turns out that both of those things are true. and i think the question is not whether pfizer should be constantly looking to understand whether their vaccines are working in all people as well as it possibly can or whether a booster might not be necessary in a specific group of people, let's say older adults. the question really is right now, do we have confidence in the vaccine. we absolutely do, does this pfizer vaccine work against the dealt ta variant, it absolutely does and is the most important thing that we need to do now making sure those people who

don't have if i doses, making sure that they get their first and second dose. that's absolutely the most important thing now so both things are true. we need to look for the possibility for boosters in the future but stay very focused on getting everyone vaccinated today. >> brangham: let's talk about that vaccine response in a secretary but in issue that pfizer is saying that there does seem to be some waning of protection after six months, should that alarm people, because on its phase it stownds alarming. >> right t sounds alarming and i think that is what leads plane public health people to be worried that it will distract people from the actual issue at hand which is getting vaccinated. it turns out all the reports from israel which is where a lot of this data is coming from, actually suggests that the pfizer vaccine is 93 percent effectsive against preventing against hospitalizations with severe disease and death. that is in the face of the delta

variant so highly effective in preventing severe disease and death against the variant. but it may not work in exactly that same way in all people. so i think many people who are willing to think about whether a booster is necessary, are really asking the question in whom is it necessary. it might be that those who have more compromised immune systems or an older people who oftentimes don't mounter as feblghtive an immune response, might need an extra boost later on. but right now every study that has been pub lushed, all the data that we have available to us, suggests that the pfizer vaccine, the moderna vaccine is actually quite effective at the delta variant. >> brangham: so let's talk about as you mentionerred before about what the u.s. is can do to help spread this global vaccination campaign. we know the u.s. has secured enough vaccine for every man, woman and child in the united states, and still have tens of

millions, hundreds of mms of doses left over. should we be doing more to get more vaccine into all those nations that need it? >> right, i mean the i think the big issue when we look at the surges around the world, when we look at even the surges in the u.s. is that there are people who are not yet vaccinated. and so even though we have a little more than half of the people in the u.s. vaccinated, it is absolutely essential that they focus on getting the rest of the people in the u.s. vaccinated, and then globally, we have less than a quarter of people globally are even vaccinated. and there are some estimates that it will still take another year to get we get enough people in other countries vaccinated. that is really a catastrophe for the world. it is a catastrophe for many of these or individuals in the global south. massive inequities because we are not vaccinating. it is important that those countries like the u.s. that have substantial portions of

their population vaccinated turn their attention to making sure that the rest of the world also is protected. it's in our interest, it is is an essential interest for equity, but also we know that as long as the virus is being transmitted, variants, new variants develop. so ultimately this is in our own self-interest as well in addition to just our sphobility for the world population. >> all right, dr. kristen bibbins-domingo, always good to sigh, thank you vich. >> thank you. >> woodruff: tonight we begin a special week-long series examining a problem that's taken on renewed importance for america's working families: child care. during the pandemic, the federal government spent more than fifty-billion dollars to shore up the child care industry, but

advocates say cost and access are still major issues. over the past several months, special correspondent cat wise and producer kate mcmahon traveled across the country for our series "raising the future: america's child care dilemma." they begin with how we got here and what's at stake. >> reporter: america's fragile child care system was thrust into the national spotlight last year. >> daycares across the state are closg its doors because of the coronavirus. >> reporter: forcing parents to scramble, and driving millions of women out of the workforce. today, as the country emerges from the pandemic, with businesses and the economy roaring back to life, the same can't be said for the child care industry. >> now many parents who want to go back to work are faced with a new problem: child care shortage. >> reporter: child care has been one of the biggest struggles for working families for decades. >> we were blown away by the cost of child care. >> reporter: heidi lohman and her wife marenda chamberlain

live in portland, oregon with their two-year-old daughter autumn. heidi is a high school counselor and marenda is an electrician. when they began their child care search, they were shocked by what they learned. >> she was born in 2018 and some of the places i toured were touring for the 2021 school year. so it was even like a year plus down the road. so it was a scramble. >> reporter: eventually they found a program that cost nearly as much as tir mortgage, and then covid hit. >> i had to lay myself off for about four months. >> reporter: as essential workers, they later found an opening at a center, but it wasn't a great fit. >> it was for four days a week and we were paying 1650 a month which was-- that did exceed our mortgage. it's absolutely not sustainable. i don't think that working families should have to-- this juggle. and i don't know how some families do it. >> reporter: before the pandemic, nearly 70% of children

in the u.s. under the age of six lived in households where all parents worked. america's working families have had to cobble together their own child care solutions in a privatized market that is costly, often lacks quality, and fails to pay caregivers a living wage. >> it literally took a pandemic in order for child care to be a part of everyday conversation. >> reporter: lynette fraga advocates for affordable, quality child care. the science shows that during the first few years of life, more than one million neural connections are formed each second. >> why then should we leave that kind of importance not only for the current workforce, but for the future workforce, to the market? how about we tnk about this as a public good? >> reporter: studies have shown

investments in child care can pay off, including one that shows a dollar invested in quality child care for economically disadvantaged kids returns more than seven dollars in savings. but not everyone wants more government funding for child care. >> the focus on non parental group care for young children is detracting from our focus on supporting parenting and enabling parents to spend more time with their children, if they want to. >> reporter: katharine stevens is an early childhood researcher and author. she says more research is needed to understand the impacts of child care on all children, and she thinks the federal government should stay focused on helping lower-income families. >> budgets are reflections o values. if we are directing large sums of money to subsidize parents parenting less. that's a very significant

statement to be making about the importance of parenting in our society. >> reporter: but in today's world many parents do need child care and demand exceeds supply. >> child care programs are really struggling and finding staff. >> reporter: nationwide, the child care industry has suffered a loss of 20% of its workforce since the pandemic. one of the hardest h states? oregon. 24-year-old olivia pace of portland lost her job at a child care center in march of 2020. >> most of us got laid off, most people didn't go back or have gone back and then left since then. >> reporter: she has a degree in child and family studies, and planned on being in the field a long time, but now she's not sure she'll ever go back. >> even though i love working with children,he structure of the field is such that if that's what you want to do, you're going to be worked to the bone and you're going to be really tired. and i don't want to do that anymore.

>> about 97% of early educators are women. about 40% are women of color. and the majority of women are black, brown and immigrant women who are doing this work. >> reporter: lea austin is director of the center for the study of child care employment at u.c. berkeley. she tracks workforce issues nationally. >> the median wage right now for early educators in this country is 12, 12 an hour. we know from research that we've done at the center that about half of this workforce utilizes some form of pubc safety net program. and that's a huge number. we have subsidized the system on the back of the workers. >> reporter: austin blames the fragility of the system on the failure of the private market. >> it is a critical part of our infrastructure. but the way it is designed now is it's a market based system and it is based on what parents can pay. that's how you access child care, where we're saying, you know, go out and see what you can afford.

>> reporter: but there was a time when affordable child care wasn't so hard to find. >> when married women with small children have to take jobs, everything possible will be done to provide day care for the children. >> reporter: that time was during world war ii. i am standing on a warship here in portland built largely by women during that era. the federal government recognized that women were essential for the war effort. but to build ships like this, they needed child care. about 75 years ago, just across the water from me, there was a federally-funded child care center that provid high quality care for about 400 children whileheir parents were hard at work. but when the war ended, the government shuttered the oregon center and 3100 others like it across the country. the last time the u.s. government seriously considered child care policy was in 1971, but president nixon vetoed it, saying that a national child care system would weaken american families. >> child care would have been

not only an administrative monstrosity but it would have >> that kicked childcare back to the bottom of the policy public policy mountain. and it hasn't recovered since. >> reporter: elliot haspel wrote a book recently on child care reform. >> you can't understand early childhood in america without understanding a deep history of sexism. ere's a sense that it is the duty and obligation of the mother to take care of the young child. the problem, of course, is that since especially since the 1960s, women have entered the workforce in very large numbers. but there's been no adjustment on the policy side to that reality. >> reporter: until now. the pandemic has pushed child care back to the top of the political agenda. >> this legislation includes the biggest investment in child care since world war ii. >> reporter: president biden has proposed $225 billion dollars in new child care spending over 10 years. but there is still stiff opposition. >> we can't have everything. we cannot advance women's careers and boost the economy

and optimize early childhood development all at the same time. this is just this is just a tough reality. >> we need a system that's going to support parents, whatever they want to do. the american child care dilemma can be summed up in the fact that we don't have an american child care system. >> reporter: while the politics play out, america's child care dilemma continues for families like heidi lohman and marenda chamberlain. >> next week i'm asking for a reduction in hours because our daycare is changing their hours. >> reporter: their long term plan? moving away from portland to raise autumn near extended family. for the pbs newshour, i'm cat wise in oregon. >> woodruff: more than six months since the january 6 attack on the u.s. capitol, former president donald trump is working to rewri what happened. here he is speaking to fox news yesterday about the events.

>> there was such love at that rally you had over a million people there they were there for one reason, the rigged election they felt the election was rigged that's why they were there and they were peaceful people these were great people the crowd was unbelievable and i mentioned the word love the love the love in the air, i have never seen anything like it. >> woodruff: but as we saw, the events were anything but peaceful, as rioters broke into and ransacked the capitol building, resulting in millions of dollars of damages as well as physical and emotional trauma for the officers, staff, and members of congress there that day. it had a devastating impact on law enforcement. three officers died in the immediate aftermath. at least 140 suffered physical injuries ranging from concussions to cracked ribs and in one case, a minor heart attack. and more than 70 rank-and-file capitol police officers have since retired or resigned.

our politics monday team is here to analyze all this and more. amy walter of the cook political report. and tamara keith of npr. and we thank both of you for being here. it is so good to see you both in person at the desk. tam, i do want to come back to what frmer president trump said. love is in the air. he said it was all about love and it was peaceful. can he rewrite history? >> he has been rewriting history since january 6th. well, actually since before but o january 6th. he tweeted these are the things that you get, essentially, with regards to the election. and then he ends his tweet go home, with love and in peation. remember this day forever exclamation point. he was rewriting the story of what happened that day on tha day. and this is a contied

evolution. it's obviously not just him, there are republican members of congress who have said oh, it was just a tourist visit. there is is a very concerted effort under way to say that what we all saw with our eyes, wasn't what we saw. >> and amy, you and i have both been covering this city ang american politics for a long time. maybe even-- me longer than you. have you seen an instance where someone in the former president's position could actually just sort of rearrange what happened. >> make things up. again, asking us to not believe our own eyes. and rest records. something like 500 people have been arrested for what happened there. we know a commission is going to begin lacking into this. we know the fbi is looking, more stuff is going to come out. people videotaped themselves doing the damage, being proud of the damage that they did. but what is really worrisome,

judy, is not just you didn't see this, which is really what happened, but the continued attacks on this rigged election. and this idea that ultimately, this election-- this president, that president biden is illegitimate. and once you undermine faith in democracy, once losers believe that they only lost because it was unfair, you've lost everything. our system works as well as it does because losers know at some time they are going to be winners and winners know at some point they are going to be losers, and that balances this out it cannot be sustained, this level of attack, on the very found daitionz of our democracy when 75% of republicans believe that joe biden is an illegitimate president, when more and more people believe that this election truly was rigged. when people who stood up against the president now personally attacking them for not doing

silg legal. that say really big problem that can go beyond whatever donald trump says. >> woodruff: and you have, tam, i know, we're waiting to see whether rep wants in the house of representatives are going to point their members to this select committee investigating january 6th. do we expect there is ever gong to be a-of-be a fact-finding, that everyone, that most americans can expect? >> do we expect a shared success of fact? >> it seems pretty unlikely given everything that the former president said, given that he was at this c-pac conference and there were any number of people who were talking about joe biden leaving office and donald trump coming back in this year. which is just not technically possible. it cannot happen so the likelihood of there being a universally accepted 9/11 commission style reports seems pretty unlikely at this point

given that republicans in congress ultimately didn't go along with the bipartisan deal to create a by part san commission. instead you will have a committee that will easily be portrayed as partisan swons it just hangs over the next election and beyond as you just said unresolved. >> unresolved. the real question is what kind of people will kevin mccary appoint. is he going to put on the sort of fire brangd, the ones who are the trump accolytes who are going to not just pushack against the commission findings saying well, this is partisan, but really go full throated into many of these same conspiracy theories or will he put people on there who will look at this, maybe make some good recommendations but ultimately say this wasn't president trump's fault. whatever happened here, he was not the fault of the president. which is really a lot of what the debate about the impeachment was too. we acknowledge the violent things happened. you can't make the connection between trump asking them to do

these things and createk that. >> woodruff: i also want to ask you both about something president bied endealing with again and that is the rise in violence, violent crime, gun violence. how much pressure is on this president to do something about this? we're waiting to see whether this is police reform legislation what do you see in. >> serge the biden white house for the second time in about a month drawing attention to concerns about crime, talking about strike forces in the city to help assist with violent crime. in a memo pointing out to local leaders that yes, you can use covid relief funds to fund the police. the biden white house is doing everything they can to say yes, there has been talk about defunding the police but president biden never supported it. and in fact he wants to fund the police more. why are they pushing so hard on

this? one, because crime is up and that is a political liabilities. and, so that is the maining reason why they are pushing forward with this making it an agenda item gaws it is an issue, a real issue. >> and it was tell theag inited as one of the people to its white house today, eric adams who won the democratic primary, new york city mayor, former police officer, who ran as a more conservative, liberal democrat, more conservative on this issue. pushed back hard on this idea of defunding the police and so they are using that as an example. both using each other as examples that you can be a progressive democrat. you can be for police reform. but that does not mean you have to be for defunding police and it does mean that you believe in public safety. >> but democrats are, tam, sorting their way through this chai os.

>> issue. >> on the one hands calls for spending a lot less money on police, defunding even or cutting back and on the other hand saying wait a minute, crime is up swns absolutely. and president biden has been trying to strike this balance but it is not clear that is he actually where the center of his party is. it is not clear what the center of gravity is among democrats for how to deal with crime or how to deal with police reform. how much money should go to community policing, whether community policing is actually the solution that president biden says it is. there is a lot of debate under the surface there and the fact that they have not been able to come up with a bipartisan agreement on police reform indicating s-- indicates that there isn't a breakthrough just yet. >> woodruff? just a few seconds t say tough one. >> it absoluty is, it is also very tough for the federal government to have much impact on what is happening in in individual cities sthand also the challenge. democrats overwhelmingly

represent cities, urban cores and inner su bur bushes. and so it is easier for republicans to say well, it say democrat, democrat problems, they're the mayor, the city council people it is i bigger challenge than for democrats to get out their message on this. >> woodruff: amy walter, tamara keith, politics monday. thank you both. >> you're very welcome. >> you're welcome. >> woodruff: and >> woodruff: and that's the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. thank you, please stay safe, and we'll see you soon. >>ajor funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> a raymond james financial advisor tailors advice to help you live your life. life, well-planned.

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