judy: good evening, i'm judy woodruff. on the "newshour" tonight, the road ahead, as the senate continues to work through the massive infrastructure package, we examine the potential investments me in the country's water systems. then, the covid economy. the recovery continues but questions remain about the strength of the job market, inflation, and variants of the coronavirus. and lebanon in crisis, a year after the explosion that shook burt -- burt, beirut, the

country is beset by economic collapse. >> i have no peace, no peace of mind, no peace in life. judy: all that and more on tonight's "pbs newshour." announcer: major funding for the "pbs newshour" has been provided by -- bnsf railway, consumer cellular, johnson & johnson, financial services firm raymond james. >> supporting social entrepreneurs and their solutions to the world's most pressing programs, scol --

skollfoundation.org. >> the lemelson foundation, on the web at lemelson.org. supported by the john d. and catherine t. macarthur foundation, committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world. more information at macfound.org and with the ongoing support of these institutions. this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. vanessa: i'm vanessa ruiz at news hour west in for stephanie sy. the world as reached another sob aring -- sobering new covid-19 milestone, 200 million infections and counting

including 615,000 in the united states. a few countries have plans to offer booster vaccines as the delta variant spreads but today the world health organization called for delaying boosters for two months until more countries can get vaccines. >> high-income countries have 100 doses for every 100 people. meanwhile, low income countries have only been able to administer 1.5 dose for every 100 people due to lack of supply. vanessa: in washington, the white house argued the u.s. has enough vaccine for boosters if needed and for shipment to other countries. defense secretary lloyd austin is expected to seek authorization to make covid-19 vaccines mandatory for all active duty troops. a white house official has told the "newshour" that the biden administration is developing a

plan to require nearly all foreign visitors traveling to the u.s. to be fully vaccinated against covid-19 and also today, illinois became the latest state to mandate facemasks for public school students this fall. new york governor andrew cuomo is facing more pressure today to resign over sexual harassment allegations. the associated press reported a majority of state assembly members support impeachment proceedings if he does not step down. the three-term democrat denies state investigation findings that he harassed at least 11 women. mexico is suing big-name american begun -- gunmakers and distributors. the suit was filed today in federal court in boston, charging companies' practices fueling gun trafficking and bloodshed in mexico. the mexican government is seeking $10 billion in damages. at least 10 people are dead and more than a dozen injured after an overloaded van carrying 29

passenge crashed in south texas, two miles from a border patrol checkpoint. the brooks county sheriff said the van, designed to carry 15 passengers, tipped over when the driver lost control on a curve. most of the passengers are believed to be migrants. in lebanon, violent protests erupted on the first anniversary of a deadly explosion at the port of beirut. as night came on, demonstrators fought with police who used tear gas and water cannons outside the parliament building. crowds denounced corruption and the failure to hold officials accountable for the explosion. >> it is a painful memory. we remember our victims. they called them martyrs but they are victims. victims of their corruption, victims of the authority's negligence and victimsf their deals. they do not deserve to be in power. vanessa: the beirut explosion

killed at least 214 people a wounded thousands more. we will return to this later in the program. the british navy reports that hijackers who briefly captured a tanker outside the persian gulf have now left it. they seized the vessel yesterday off fujairah, a major port in the united arab emirates. radio transmissions indicated the gunmen were iranians. there's been no explanation of why they seized the ship. the european union has promised aitoday to greece and neighboring nations facing a wave of wildfires. one major fire charred scores of homes, businesses and cars just north of athens on tuesday. thousands of people fled but some stayed behind and told harrowing stories today. >> bam, boom. >> there were explosions all around, m, boom, the utility poles were falling, there were explosions inside homes and cars. it was like we were in hiroshima or something. something like this has never happened here.

vanessa: in neighboring turkey, another fire reached an electric power plant, forcing evacuations. back in this country, california's largest wildfire is growing again as hot gusty weather returns. flames and smoke from the dixie fire painted skies a glowing orange tuesday. the fire jumped containment lines, prompting evacuation orders to another 15,000 people. a trump backed republican and an establishment democrat have each claimed their party's nominations in ohio for open seats in the u.s. house of representatives. democrat shontel brown won tuesday's primary in a cleveland district over a progressive rival. she is favored in november's special election. and mike carey won the g.o.p. primary in a columbus district. he faces a democratic opponent this fall. and at the summer olympics, daily covid-19 cases in tokyo reached a new peak at more than

4100. in the competition, american sydney mclaughlin broke her own world record and won the gold medal in 400 meter hurdles. still to come in the "newshour," despite a strong housing market, questions remain about the larger economic recovery. confronting the biden administration over the controversial expulsion of migrants to mitigate covid-19. lebanon in crisis. one year after a massive explosion. and much more. announcer: this is the "pbs newshour" from weta studios in washington and in the west from the walter cronkite school of journalism at arizona state university. judy: millions of americans lack safe drinking water as waste water overflows power -- pour

bacteria in rivers and lakes. one of the key provisions in the infrastructure bill in congress targets those issues. lisa desjardins has more on the difference it could make. lisa: the bill would be the largest investment in clean water in american history and it tackles enormous issues. as many as 22 million americans get their drinking water from systems with lead pipes, known as potentially toxic, and twice as many americans rely on systems in violation of safe standards. the senate infrastructure bill would spend about $50 billion to overhaul those systems. i'm joined by erik olsonsenior strategic director for health anfood at the natural resources defense council. erik, let's start with the big picture here. how seris are the issues with clean water in this country right now? and how is this bill trying to tackle them? erik: unfortunately, the whole issue of water infrastructure has been out of sight, out of mind.

we've got water systems all over the country that are falling apart, that are aging. many of them 50 to 100 years old. so it's a huge problem nationwide in all 50 states and it's not just the lead pipes but it's also things like sewer, combined sewer overflow with raw sewage going into lakes and streams. it's contaminated water with toxic chemistry so it really is time to make investments, a wise time with low interest rates to make these investments so we're glad the senate bill will start to address these problems. lisa: we reached out to one of the many communities affected and one that senate staffers went to when they were trying to write one version of the bill. jackson, mississippi, where they've been under water boil alerts off and on much of this year. we talked to the mayor about their aging system and what that means for his residents. >> when i think about the

challenges of families in jackson. we have to realize that how they feel is more than just a mere feeling of inconvenience. it is fear associated with the inability to get water in their homes. and so residents are tired. they want to know that their lives have value. they want to know that they don't have to live in substandard conditions. lisa: one of the problems jackson has is a money problem. like many lower income communities, including many communities of color, they can't really afford the large costs of new war infrastructure. can you talk about how this bill tries to tackle those problems? erik: what we've seen especially in black and brown communities, tribal communities across the country, this disproportionate lack of investment with water infrastructure, water problems, that are really severe in many

of these communities. a lot of these, lead pipes, contamination with toxic chemicals and sewer systems falling apart, drinking water supplies that aren't up to the task so we're seeing a nationwide problem that affects all 50 states. it affects communities all over but it's especially hitting hard on some of the lower income communities and communities of color across the country. lisa: from our reporting, i know the bill tries to set aside some money to make it easier for those communities to get grants they don't have to pay back. you mentioned lead pipes. those are something many communities across the country have and also toxic chemicals. pfsa, is goes into nonstick pans. that chemical is hard to pull out of water once it gets in there. there is some $25 billion in the bill to deal with those things. how far is that going to get us? does that replace all the lead

pipes? what does it do? erik: there are two chunks of money specifically directed to those two issues that you mentioned. one is, there's $15 billion to help pull out some of the lead pipes in the country. so the estimates from the environmental protection agency areised going to -- it's going to cost at least around $45 billion or more than that pull out the lead pipes so the downpayment will take care of about a third of that problem. the other issue you mentioned, forever toxic chemicals, they're used in nonstick pans but also are still used in some places as fire fighting foam and often sprayed on to the ground and seeped into the ground water, ran off into streams and they've contaminated tens of millions of people's drinking water now. they're hard to get out of the

water. you have to treat them with advanced technology so the bill puts $10 billion towards pulling some of those out of our water. lisa: it sounds like it would do something significant, maybe not solve the problem. you mentioned tribal communities. we know those are the areas in the country with the least access to water. we wanted to hear their thoughts and i spoke to the president of the navajo nation today. >> 30% to 40% of our navajo people do not have running water. people drive miles,ours just to get water to their homes. it's not just about drinking water. it's about agriculture. it's about getting water to our livestock, getting water to our farms here because that is also what sustains life here. lisa: he's hopeful about this bill. can you take us through -- that's a big problem.

what does this bill do for that if it passes? erik water problems date back to the 1800's where reservations were created and native americansere forced on to these reservations and often without clarity about where the water was to come from and they're still living with those problems and the bill includes $3.5 billion specifically for the indian health service to help with sanitation. there's limited funding specifically targeted to help drinking water. lisa: erik olson, we appreate your time. erik: thank you for having me on. judy: now, the prospects ahe for the economy, jobs and housing, as the country grapples

with the pandemic. let's start with the ever rising cost of housing. what's behind it and the concerns over affordability for tens of millions. according to the latest s&p index, nationally, home prices are up almost 17% over the past year. in some markets, buyers and sellers are looking at even larger hikes. our economics correspondent paul solman has the story for our series making sense. paul: boise, idaho, a bustling downtown, space for walks galore, watercraft of every description and compared to west coast cities close by, safer, quieter, cheaper. no surprise, the place is booming. especially given covid, says realtor kevin rush. >> we see a lot of people moving here that can work wherever they want to work. it's like, wait a minute, i'm re-evaluating my life. paul: nationwide, home prices soared to another record high in

june, thinks -- tanks to historically low interest rates, lack of supply. >> lumber, there's been a copper shortage. there's been concrete difficulties. we have so many materials that are difficult to get. paul: boise is a poster child for the housing price boom. in its metro area in the past year, the median sale price surged to $525,000, 40% higher than a year ago. >> we have been seeing offers go 100,000 over the asking price and 11 to 20 people that might be making offers so bidding wars that are unbelievable. paul: boise born realtor becky enrico crumm has been working around the clock. >> we're not sleeping this year.

that's ok. paul: the boise market was heating up before the pandemic. >> prices have been escalating double digits for four or five years now. this isn't new to us here. it just got accelerated and turned crazy in the last six to eight months. paul: that's been windfall for sellers like wade tracy who bought his house just outside town four years ago. >> we paid about 305, maybe 310. then we just sold it for 620. paul: tracey is moving his family to cheaper rural ohio with his newfound capital. >> we sold it for cash, no appraisals, nothing, as-is. paul: the buyer? >> police officer from san francisco doing early retirement. paul: they're coming fromll over california. >> this is the kitchen. paul: caitlin smith a writer, moved wit her husband from encinit encinita, north of

san diego. >> we had to do an escalation clause. we offered $20,000 over. paul: if it were in encinitas? >> it woulde a million dollar home. paul: she can work at home because her company went fully remote at the start of the year. >> you don't need to be in the big city anymore and employment people -- a lot of people realized mental health and quality of life are more important during covid. paul: casey and justin killian relocated from seattle. >> we sold our home in seattle, 1200 square feet, and were able to purchase a home here for the same amount of money and triple the square footage. paul: the killians work from home, pay less for daycare but to get into this market had to be strategic. >> we realized that houses were going within a day and if you

had anyontingencies whatsoever you were not competitive so we d to first sell our home in seattle before we could compete in this market. >> we were classic millenials crashing on my mom's couch for three months. paul: justin is from boise but left for the coast after college. >> boise back in the late 1980's, early 1990's, when i grew up here, comparing that to now, there's a lot more going on. >> the influx of people are bringing -- it's making boise more exciting. five years ago, i would not have moved here. paul: to some in some conservative state, the urban influx can seem like invasion. >> it's causing heart heartburn for the locals. if you're coming in from california, you're getting license plates changed to idaho as quick as you can. paul: john cavanaugh moved here from sacramento. >> did you change your license

plates right away because you didn't want to be known from california? >> we haven't. paul: originally from ghana, and his wife came here to escape sacramento's rising homelessness and blue politics, but the license license plates? >> we were driving, somebody held a sign, go back to california. so we came and park in the garage so nobody sees the license plate so we decide to change them. paul: much of the resentment is economic. with wages nowhere near keeping up with home prices, locals are out of the bidding. >> our first time home buyers that qualify for a loan but don't have an extra 50,000 extra to win a bidding war, those people are priced out. paul: like boise plumber ryan canke who makes $50,000 a year, has a strong credit score. he and his girlfriend looked for

months. >> we got a loan for $300,000 and everything that was priced underneath $300,000 just immediately had offers, some cash, that were way over. this is the new normal for house hunting. paul: not getting the house. >> not getting the house. paul: so he's renting instead but for disabled vietnam vet gary wiltermood, even renting is next to impossible. he's lived in a house at the edge of a trailer parkor 15 years and the owners want him out. >> they've tried every maneuver to get me out of there. they can put in like four or five apartment places in the property that i'm on. paul: but other boise rentals are out of reach. >> i'm pced out of the market. i can't find a place. i'm so desperate, i don't know what to do. paul: as wiltermood's lawyer, brian stevens puts it. >> if you're low income person, it's a hard time to be in boise.

paul: there are signs of cooling off in recent weeks. inventory is up and developers are scrambling to build more but as always happens while cities grow, neighborhoods gentrify, there will be heart rending losers like gary wiltermood. >> there's a statement, some gave all, some still give, on my vietnam sticker. well, i gave my life for this country and this is how i end up. paul: brian canke hopes boise real estate prices return to earth. are you rooting for the californians and the seattle folks to say, wait a second, this isn't what we bargained for? >> i would be lying if i said there wasn't a part of me that didn't hope something would change like that to be able to allow me to get a home. but everyone's doing what's best for them. if they can make another state's

wages and live way more comfortably here, got to do what's best for you. paul: for the "pbs newshour," this is paul solman in beckoning boise, idaho. ju: let's pick up on questions about the cost of housing as well as larger concerns about jobs and economic growth. mary daley is the president of the federal reserve bank of san francisco, part of the fed's board of governors that votes regularly on key decisions about interest rates, jobs, inflation, and the fed's role in the economy. welcome back to the "newshour." we appreciate your being here. paul solman's report just now, housing prices going through the roof, not just in boise but in many parts of the country. how concerned are you? >> it's hard. it's hard to the people who can't get the housing. they've grown up in these communities that suddenly lots of people have flooded into with cash on hand to purchase those

homes and then they're displaced. that's hard. in terms of concern. i see it as a difference in supply and demand that will resolve itself as more supply comes online and in boise, idaho, you're seeing that supply come online. building is rampant there. you see homes going up everywhere so over time it resolves itself but it's not there yet and for the communities struggling with this, it's a hardship right now. judy: you're saying it will resolve itself but some are saying what we're seeing right now is a housing bubble that could burst at any time. meaning a sudden drop in prices. we saw the federal resve governor for st. louis, james bullard, and i'm going to quote something he said this week. he said the biggest concern for me is in the mid 2000's we had a housing bubble and what we learned from that experience is that if these prices go down precipitously, there they went down 30%,, that caused

tremendous problems in the u.s. and global economies. he said housing is an interest-sensitive sector so we're feeding into a bubble. >> let me tell you what i see in these communities, when we study this, we look at the research of who's buying homes. one of the things that's very reassuring about the housing market right now is that the people buying those themselves -- homes are well prepared to pay for them. they have a lot of wealth and are able to spend it in the housing market. they're getting lower interest rates but they're buying owner occupied housing. if you look back into the housing bubble from a decade ago, it was really often people buying second homes, third homes, speculating. and those things actually caused repercussions. they were also highly leveraged so american households buying homes are really in good shape in terms of balance sheet so right now i see this as principally a supply and demand imbalance and one that will resolve as we go forward.

judy: would you acknowledge that the fed has, too a degree, played into this by keeping interest rates so low? >> low interest rates allow people to purchase homes, importantly, also, allows people to refinance homes even if they're staying in the one they own, have more money to spend and help themselves through the pandemic, buy cars. but it also helps small businesses get low costs of capital which help them keep their businesses open and so our lower interest rates are supporting a whole myriad of activities through the economy and that's actually helping the economy get through the pandemic and get back to full employment and price stability. judy: governor daley, i want to ask you about this, because at the other end of the spectrum, there are renters having a hard time making monthly payments. we have a federal moratorium reinstated yesterday by the biden administration. is this going to be enough to help them and if not, what more

needs to be done? >> i want to go back to something we've said since the start of the pandemic. as goes covid goes the economy and what we're seeing is that we're not fully beyond covid and people are still very disrupted from dealing with a global pandemic. they lost their jobs, lost their livelihoods, were on the brink of losing homes, housing insecurity is critical. so we have to get through this fully and getting vaccinated and getting through covid will help this be enough. so to your point, is this enough, it really depends o covid. if covid can be fully behind us, we can get fully back into economic activity and people can get jobs, pay rents, landlords pay their mortgages and we're returning to an economy that we recognize and miss. judy: i want to the ask you about inflation. there's a key indicator the fed watches closely that jumped 3.5%

last month from a year earlier, the fastest 12-month surge since 1991, the so-called personal consumption price index. does this suggest that the fed needs to somehow change crse when it comes to inflation? >> not to my mind. the inflation spikes that we're seeing, they really can be traced back to key sectors getting their feet back under them trying to reopen. so airline prices, travel and leisure prices in general are contributing to the spikes that we see in inflation. used car prices related not just to reopening and people wanting cars but to the fact that semiconductor supply is constrained, pushed down by covid and hasn't fully returned. there's huge demand surging and supplies not keeping up and some of the prices are just catching up. airline prices were very low in the depths of the pandemic and they return to normal, that spikes inflation. if you put those details

together, it foreshadows a temporary spike in inflation that lasts longer than we would have understand -- wanted, possibly into next year, but it's just a reflection of an economy that's reopening and the supply can't keep up with that reopening demand but it will and that's the reassuring thing, is that supply does respond and supply will come back online. you saw that in lumber prices, they went up, peaked and came back down. judy: in connection with that, you said a couple of weeks ago, strong economic recovery will allow the fed, the ctral bank, to slow its asset purchases before the end of this year. are you now prepared to say that that is definitely going to happen? >> i'm not prepared to say it's definitely going to happen because as you know we're a data dependent fed and the end of the

year is far away at this point in terms of counting the delta variant and other things that could happen so i'm looking for continued progress in the labor market, continued putting covid behind us, rising vaccination rates -- the things that are fundamental to us saying that the economy has achieved that metric of substantial further progress. right now my modal outlook is that we will achieve that metric later this year or early next but data dependence is how we've gotten this far and how we'll make good policy going forward. judy: it's something that looks likely at this point? >> my modal outlook, the one i think is most likely, is that we'll do something on the asset front, asset purchase tapering, by the end of this year or early next. judy: you mentioned employment. you wrote a blog post yesterday expressing confidence that the number of americans who right now are sitting on the sidelines, not returning to the labor market yet -- a lot of jobs are going unfilled right

now in this country. your argument is that's only temporary. how can you be so confident? >> my confidence is built on the fact that i have been through this a couple of times. i have been a labor economi since the mid 1990's starting at the fed and mid 1990's and especially in the last expansion, the same concerns we heard. employers couldn't find workers. they were worried workers were never returning, that the great recession we spoke of earlier with the housing crisis, it simply made it impossible for workers to come back. they didn't have the skills, maybe their preferences changed, maybe people didn't want to work anymore. and none of that proved to be true so my confidence really comes back to a simple phrase. americans want to work. they know it's what's important to their livelihood, communities and families and giving them an opportunity to work by ensuring we don't presumo that -- presumo

they don't want to and calling it a day, that's where i get the confidence. judy: yet as you said, there is this delta variant, the unknown course to come of this covid pandemic. how much of a monkey wrench is that throwing into your -- anybody's ability to be confident this economy will be ok? >> i said just a moment ago, we have to be data dependent. one of the reasons i'm focused entirely on data dependence is this delta variant has already taken too many lives, forced too many hospitalizations, is starting t temper activity across the country. and really it's about getting vaccinated and getting this thing behind us. that is the part that's so important. but if we don't keep up with it, it could definitely slow the rate of growth in our economy. right now i don't expect it to derail the recovery in the united states but it's already very seriously interrupting the

recoveries in the global economy which is a headwind on u.s. growth so it is an important risk to ok out for but most importantly is get vaccinated and we can get through this. judy: mary daley, president of the federal reserve bank of san francisco, tha you very much. >> thank you. judy: the grim first anniversary of the port explosion in beirut comes amid the ongoing collapse of lebanon's economy. by some measures, one of the three worst globally since the 1850's. shortages of food, medicine, fuel and a near worthless currency have been exacerbated by inept and corrupt government. the result, widespread suffering and sense of national doom. from beirut, special

correspondent reports. >> dawn breaks over beirut. with it, the first light many will see today. for months, much of lebanon has been without power overnight but day brings only little respite. in the suburbs, she's preparing for another day of organizing life around her chores. >> don't have electricity. the electricity we have is from private generators. it's not enough. >> how much government electricity are you getting? >> one or two hours. >> this summer, the usual few hours of outages per day have soared to more than 20. the only other option for those who can afford it is pricey private generators. >> we have been asked three million liras. that is more than i get paid per month. >> even those are failing thanks to a dire diesel shortage leaving people without any power

up to 12 hours a day as temperatures soar. on the highway nearby, her husband is facing another exhausting lebanese right ritual, hunting for gas. >> basedn availability of the fuel. look at this station for filling fuel. line about 30 cars. >> for weeks, lebanon's fuel pumps have been running on almost empty. the country doesn't have an official public transport system and the unofficial system is made up of minivans and cars which need petrol, too. if you want to live daily life, your only option is to sit in the heat and wait. the government has scrapped fuel subsidies making scarce fuel increasingly unaffordable. fights are breaking out as gas stations across the country and many have closed altogether. waiting for petrol four hours.

because they work in different areas, they can't share a car so she has to endure the same process and when she gets to work, she's stepping from a personal crisis into a public one. she's the head pharmacist at lebanon's public hospital. as well as struggling to keep the hospitalnd life saving equipment running with little power, they're constantly short of vital medications. what are you missing at the moment? >> i am missing a lot, most of the time, antibiotics. >> the cub boards are bare. now the srtages aren't just threatening lives, they're taking them. her brother-in-law recently died needlessly. >> he didn't find medication for two, three days. he thought it was ok, just hypertension. he thought he can manage for a few days without it but what actually happened is that he had a brain hemorrhage and later on

he died. medication that costs 15,000. >> less than a dollar? >> yes. that's not supposed to happen. >> it's the same situation across the country. pharmacies are closing doors and social media is flooded with desperate messages searching for life saving drugs. >> how long can the medical system here survive like this? >> it's falling day by day. i can only imagine how many people have gone through that, how many people, they don't have voices to be heard. nobody can tell their story and they just die. >> private businesses aren't faring much better including her father's fabric company. ismail has worked all his life to support his four children, put them through university and give them a comfortable life. he hoped to retire and spend his remaining days relaxing with grandchildren. now the crisis has taken that away. even his savings are gone.

>> i feel that my money has been stolen. >> do you feel let down by your country? >> yes. i feel that my country has betrayed me. i have no peace. no peace of mind. no peace of life. i feel like a person, like a prisoner who is sentenced to death and he is waiting death. >> ismail isn't the only one who feels hisoney and future have en stolen. lebanon's currency has lost more than 90% of its value. one u.s. dollar used to be 1,500 lira. it's now around 20,000. people's life savings have been wiped out and for those lucky enough to have a job, the minimum wage is worth less than $35 a month. after another fearful, draining shift at work, it's time to fight more fires at home. on the way she has to tackle the

grocery store. as always these days, she has no idea what she'll be able to feed our family with the cash in her wallet. the average price of goods and services has quadrupled since june 2019 and basic essentials cost seven times what they once did. this costs you two hours of work to buy one can of corn? >> yes. it's usual for someone to be at the cashier paying and then he will return this one and return this one and return this one. >> finally she finds something affordable, a jar of mayonnaise. it's time to make dinner. she does everything she can to still give 7-year-old ahmed the food he likes. some rice and some meat, that's all. i don't want to be a vegetarian. the meat is more tasty. >> between them, they have nearly two decades of higher

education and multiple degrees. they used to earn well. now their combined monthly salary is worth just $250. in 18 months, their family have gone from working hard to live a comfortable life to struggling each day to make ends meet. >> not in my scariest dreams ever that everything is going to fall apart at once. >> they are one of thousands of families who took to the streets in october 2019 to call for a better future for lebanon. instead, they've been plunged into the abyss. >> we were there and we were -- i really for a while we believed we were going to make a change and then all our dreams were crushed. >> those days of hope are long

gone. almost every day sporadic demonstrations break out as angry lebanese light tires and dumpsters on fire a block roads to protest the dire conditions they facen every element of daily life. few believe things will improve. now they're simply trying to survive. they don'tnow how long they can. >> people are walking around like zombies. their eyes are so desperate. for the first time in my life, i can understand why would someone go through a boat and throw himself and his children into the sea, because he can -- he can -- he can hear his child crying of hunger. we have reached a hopeless end and it's so hard for me to say hopeless but it is hopeless.

>> for the "pbs newshour," in beirut. judy: on many immigration related issues, president biden has taken a different approach than that of president trump, ear in some cases, even reversed course. that is not the case for several key issues at the southern border. earlier this week, the biden administration extended a trump era order that expels migrants seeking asylum during the pandemic. amna nawaz looks at the issues in play. amna: the policy in question is known as title 42 and has been used by two admistrations to expel undocumented migrants. the biden administration had planned to phase it out. the centers for disease control says it's extended title 42 to prevent the spread of covid at

holding facilities. some families are exempt, as are all children. this comes as the government reports a record number of migrants trying to cross the border. more than 900,000 migrants have been expelled sin the policy first took effect. advocacy groups say the policy is inhumane and the aclu will resume a lawsuit gates government. the lead attorney for the ucla on this issue joins me now. thks for joining us. you brought the lawsuit against the trump administration, the biden administration inherited that policy and kt it in place. you've been negotiating with them. why are you returning to court? >> we're returning to court because there's no end in sight. we were hoping that the biden administration would eventually say enough's enough and end it. but now it's clear that it's not ending it and c.d.c. has now issued a new order doubling down on the policy. when the biden administration approached us in the beginning

of taking office and said, look, trump administration depleted the asylum system. we need more time to build capacity, will you give us a little time and negotiate, and what we said is, ok, but we want desperate families to vey pipeline to get in, in the meantime. that's happened, we're grateful for that. thousands of lives have been saved through that humanitarian pipeline and we said ultimately you have to end this policy so we negotiated month after month and it was clear they weren't going to end the policy. i think what's critical about the c.d.c. order is that the government's hiding behind c.d.c. but c.d.c. repeatedly deflects back to d.h.s. and the white house. the c.d.c. order does not say this is a problem that can't be solved, we have to send families back to danger without a hearing. it simply says, d.h.s. needs to take the pror mitigating steps and protocols. it repeatedly says that and

what's that we're upset about. d.h.s. had seven months to take those steps and didn't take those steps. amna: the white house will say we're following the public health experts, the scientists. c.d.c. did extend this policy and d.h.s. said they will enforce it as c.d.c. tells them to but they're arguing it's a public health emergencies with covid cases ring and you're saying they could fix it if they wanted to but they don't want to? >> absolutely. i think that's what's so important to look at what c.d.c. is actually saying. c.d.c.'s medical professionals are not saying, this is a problem we can't solve, you need to send families back to danger. they're simply saying you need to take the mitigating steps. they haven't taken those steps. we don't know what we can do to push them other than going back to court. it seems like something other than plic health joivingses are at play and that's what

public health professionals have said. what i think is really happening is that the border is out of sight, out of mind, and it's an abstract issue. i am down here at the border talking to people and what they tell you is, the united states government is literally pushing families back across the border, cartels are waiting for the families the minute they cross. they're being kidnapped. every possible thing is happening to these families. horrendous, horrific abuse. the country is in a much better place than it was when we brought this suit, vaccines are readily available. testing is readily available. at first, back in the trump days and early biden, the government was saying our personnel will be at danger. they've long had the opportunity to be vaccinated. so i think everything is going by the wayside and the biden administration is now just coming up with one excuse after another not to ■end title 42 no one's being cavalier about covid but there are steps they can take. we can't keep sending families with little children back to

danger. amna: even when you look at the number, setting aside covid concerns, they are seeing recor encounters. recidism is very high with people repeatedly trying to come again and again, the vast majority, single adults, expelled immediately but there's a growing number of unaccompanied children coming across the border. most families who are allowed to enter into the united states can our system handle if as you say title 42 goes away, could the system even handle that? >> absolutely. we have more than enough resource to do it if we wanted. this is -- if there's a will, there's a way. first of all, it's just back up. the law requires us to give asylum. there is no question that the united states government has the capacity to do this. and it's just not as many people as the government is suggesting because the same people are trying over and over. if we just process them once, then it's not nearly the numbers that the government is putting

out. amna: we know you've been working with the federal government and their task force set up to reunite separated families under the trump administration. hundreds of families -- hundreds of parents still haven't been located when that task force was set up months ago. where are those efforts today? >> we are still looking for approximately 300 families, we haven't found. we also need to reconnect with with hundreds of families we did connect with during the trump administration but couldn't offer them anything. i think the biden administration is negotiating with the aclu in good faith and constructively but there are more than a thousand families we think still need to come back, need to be found and brought back. we are hoping to have a system in place in early fall that will allow all those families to come back. each day that goes by where a child doesn't s their parent is a day too much. amna: we'll be following that story, as well. lee georgia -- gaularrant of the

aclu joining us. judy: prison can, of course, be brutal. it can also be the scene of remarkable change. jorge euro renaud spent 27 years behind bars where he discovered the power of poetry. he's now the national criminal justice director at latin justice where he advocates for reform in texas and beyond. tonight he gives a brief but spectacular take on reimagining incarceration as part of our arts and culture series, canvas. >> i don't describe myself as a poet. you let other people do that. but i love poetry andill always be a piece of me. this time i will not scream. sleep folds its flames around me, ashes fill my cheeks.

this time i welcome the jailer's keys. they soothe with a well known exactness, the sound of my surrender. i first went to prison when i was 20 years old and i'd been drinking and i was stopped and as i am want to do, i got mouthy with the police officer. and they arrested me. they put me in the county jail and they put me in a tank of men who had been convicted of crimes and were awaiting transfer. and i was drunk and i was young and i was strong and i was a boxer and none of that matted. i was attacked and i was beaten and i was raped. i didn't know where i was. i was lost. i was in this sse of shock. just -- and i ended up two weeks

later i took my father's gun and walked into church's fried chicken there and robbed it and i received a five-year sentence fo that. doesn't get any easier to talk about getting raped. i don't think it does for anybody. never really addressed. never really talked to anybody about what it happened. i was a young, strong chickano. i'm a man. i was weak. and i ended up getting into drugs and went back in september of 1980 with a 28-year sentence for aggravated robbery. i adjusted to prison life by immediately asserting my well willingness to commit violence. yet i was one of the few going to college. i have often said that we are where we are in our criminal justice system because we have

failed to imagine anything other than what has been presented to us throughout our history and that has been punishment. by having conversations with individuals about the concept of rehabilitation and what that means, you say what would happen if the program that you think are so necessary for someone to come out of prison rehabilitated were offered to that person before that person went to prison, wouldn't the value of those programs adhere to that individual, if at that point they say yes, what's the point of prison? the demonstrable harm that happens to people until cages, we know what that is. we have become enamored of the idea that there are certain individuals who are crime prone and you marry that to the idea that the only recoursis to, one, call the cops, two, have them arrested, three, have them convicted, fou have them incarcerated, you get to where we are now. this time i will not quarrel

with chains. i have nooom for scars and i will fit my bones to their bracelets. my name is jorge antonio renaud and this is my brief but spectacular take on reimagining incarceration. judy: very powerful. and you can watch all of our brief but spectacular episodes at pbs.org/newshour/brief. the olympics offer a chance for the people of the world to gather, watching athletes compete at the highest level. but some athletes are also using the olympics as a chance to give human rights and social jtice a spotlight on the world stage. explore how they are speaking upa our website. that's the "newshour" for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. for all of us, thank you, please stay safe and we'll see you

soon. >> consumer cellular's goal is to provide wireless service to help people communicate and connect. to learn more, visit consumer cellular dot tv. >> johnson & johnson, bnsf railway. financial services firm raymond james. the ford foundation working with visionaries on the front lines of social change worldwide. and with the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions.

this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. this is "pbs newshour" west from weta studios in washington and from our bureau at the walter cronkite school of journalism at arizona state university.

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