captioning sponsored by wnet >> sreenivasan: on this edition for sunday, september 12: the divide over vaine requirements continues. a look at afghanistan's taliban government. and a survivor's fight for healthcare in the wake of 9/11. next on “pbs newshour weekend.” >> pbs newshour weekend is ma possible by: sue and edgar wachenheim iii. bernard and denise schwartz. the cheryl and philip milstein family. the anderson family fund. the estate of worthington mayo- smith.

leonard and norma klorfine the rosalind p. walter foundation. koo and patricia yuen, committed to bridging cultural differences in our communities. barbara hope zuckerberg. we try to live in the moment, to not miss what's right in front of us. at mutual of america, we believe taking care of tomorrow can help you make the most of today. mutual of america financial group, retirement services and investments. >> for 25 years, consumer cellular has been offering no-contract wireless plans designed to help people do more of what they like. our u.s.-based customer service team can help find a plan that fits you. to learn more, visit www.consumercellular.tv. additional support has been provided by: and by the corporaon for public broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the american people. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you.

>> sreenivasan: good eveningnd thank you for joining us. president joe biden's push to mandate covid-19 vaccinations is triggering a new wave of political division as the number of shots given stalls in many parts of the country. one day after the countrmarked the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, vaccinations and possible legal challges to mandates have republican governors lining up against the democratic administration. >> this is something that every state has to make decisions on. i support businesses being able to require vaccination, but it's their own independent choice for their workplace. but to have the federal mandate will be counterproductive. it's going to increase resistance. >> sreenivasan: the u.s. surgeon general said the mandate is an“ appropriate legal measure” and called for unity ding the pandemic. >> but what we cannot allow, george, is for this pandemic to turn us on each other. our enemy is the virus. it is not one another. >> sreenivasan: the political

dividever vaccinations comes after former president george w. bush recalled the nation's unity after 9/11 yesterday-- and then warned of the dangers of domestic extremism-- in an aprent reference to the january 6 attack on the u.s. capitol. >> there is little cultural overlap between violent extremists abroad and violent extremists at home, but in their disdain for pluralism, in their disregard for human life, in their determination to defile national symbols, they are children of the same foul spirit. and it is our continuing duty to confront them. >> sreenivasan: there are protests planned next weekend in washington, d.c., and several other cities as part of what organizers are calling “justice for j-6,” meaning for those arrested on january 6. the f.b.i. released the first newly declassified document related to the september 11 2001 attacks late yesterday following president joe biden's executive order earlier this month.

the heavily-redacted 16-page report describes an f.b.i. interview in 2105 with a man who had contact with saudi arabian nationals who helped support two of the hijackers in the u.s. before the attacks. the document includes details of the unnamed man's work for the saudi consulate in los angeles. it does not provide any conclusive evidence that the saudi government played a role in the attacks. saudi arabia denies any role in the september 11 attacks. family members of victims, survivors and emergency medical workers have demanded the release of the classified documents for years. biden's executive order instructs the justice department and federal agencies to release the remaining documents over the next six months. iran announced today that it will allow the international atomic energy agency to reset nuclear monitoring devices. in a joint statement with the agency, the newly formed government in tehran said it would allow i.a.e.a. inspectors to service the monitoring

equipment, which includes cameras, and replace storage cards with new ones. this is considered a first step in the effort to resume talks between iran and the united states in order to restore the 2015 iran nuclear deal scrapped by former president donald trump. talks between washington and tehran have been slow to resume as both countries hope to alter or enhance the 2015 agreement, which put tough limits on iran's ability to enrich uranium in return for the lifting of economic sanctions. for the latest national and international news visit pbs.org/newshour. >> sreenivasan: as ceremonies worldwide marked the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attack on the united states, the taliban formally raised their flag over kabul, afghanistan yesterday. as the new government takes shape there, there are questions about how it will rule, the rights of women, and relations with pakistan. i spoke with npr international

correspondent jackie northam who was in islamabad. jackie, in this period now, what do we know about how the pakistani government and now the taliban government in afghanistan are going to get along, are getting along? >> well, you know, the taliban and the pakistani government or the pakistani military and pakistan intelligence services have had a very long history together. there is some debate here about how much influence pakistan still has on the taliban right now. i spoke to several people in this area who had just actually one had just come back from kabul, he's a journalist. and he said that the taliban, they're seen as proxies in afghanistan right now to be seen as proxies of pakistan and they don't like it. in fact there's something that was a little joke about how they have a made in pakistan tag on their back and they don't like it at all. they want to separate themselves from that.

but at the same time, they do have a close relationship. the head of the i.s.i., the intelligence service who was in afghanistan last week meeting with taliban leaders, and they have a long history, so you can't fracture it. but it'll be interesting to see just how much influence pakistan does have going forward. >> sreenivasan: we also have other groups that are, we should say, may be jostling for power. i mean, we just had a long video released by al-zawahi from al qaeda. we still have isis-k that isn't happy necessarily with the taliban government. what, what are you hearing on the ground? i know you recently took a trip to peshawar. >> yes, indeed. we're hearing a lot. i mean, the number one thing here is if the taliban wanted to project a more moderate we're not going to let any extremists in on our soil. so, they keep saying that, they said it again today, that there is no al qaeda operating here and we're not going to allow it.

it's hard to say if al qaeda is there or not it's a big country, there's great remote areas. and there is a lot of sympathizers for al qaeda. you know, the same could be said here in pakistan as well. isis-k is another story as well. it started off as sort of a sort of an offshoot, if you like, of the taliban by a couple of permutations. and it is anti pakistan right now, but it is also not the same camp as the taliban either. and it's seen as both a threat to the taliban as well as al- qaeda in a certain way. they're all sort of jostling for power right now. so the big thing is for the, the taliban is it has to put down isis-k because that really is its main challenger right now in afghanistan. >> sreenivasan: jackie, there's been a lot of concern in the west about how the taliban decides to create policy affecting women. what has the government done so far to address any of this?

>> well, just today, just today, obviously, the minister of higher education just came out with an edict that women will still be allowed to go to school, even higher education. but now the classes are going to be separated between men and women, either with physically separated, and also that women are going to have to use islamic dress. and they didn't expand on that. so, we don't know what that just means, a hijab, a headscarf or something, or if it's going to be the full bua. what's interesting is because the eyes of the world are on the taliban and watching, scrutinizing what they're doing it could be at t beginning that it could just be a headdress. but then, as the days go on, in the weeks in the media spotlight dies down in that it's hard to say what we're going to see. the other thing that they came up with, as ll as they've decided to recreate their version of the ministry for the propagation of virtue and prevention of vice. and i'm not sure if you recall from when they were in power

before this allowed the taliban to roam the streets. and if they felt that you weren't adhering to the purest form of islam, they would punish you. they would whip you. and adhering to the purest fm of islam would be not flying a kite, not playing music and that kind of thing. so, they've reinstated their version of that >> sreenivasan: finally, we had all these commemorations of the 20th anniversary of 9/11. what was it like in pakistan? >> very quiet, actually. very quiet. it wasn't, it wasn't really marked in any way. you know, the embassies, of course, mark of the day. what was interesting is the taliban decided that was the day that they were going to raise their flag over the presidential palace in kabul and so and really get its new government underway at that time. so, they chose september 11th to do that or take from that what you will. >> sreenivasan: npr's jackie northam joining us from islamabad. thanks so much.

>> sreenivasan: there has been no shorte of dramatic weather events around the globe this year. scientists and forecasters who study the connection between imate change and extreme weather say the rapid rates of sea level rise are accelerating the frequency and intensity of severe weather events. i recently spoke with claudia tebaldi, climate scientist with pacific northwest national laboratory, about her latest report on the global impacts of rising sea levels. >> just because of sea level rise, what used to be a 100 year event right now will become an annual event, and this happens, unfortunately, at many locations around the world, even with warming that is limited to one and a half degrees, which is, as you know, a very at this point aspirational goal.

unfortunately, the last i.p.c.c. report has said that we may hit one and a half degrees in the 2030s. >> sreenivasan: is this likely to be uniform around all of the coastal areas or are there particular sections of the planet that are going to get the sea level rise impacts worse? >> so, we know that there are areas that we see for the same amount of warming, much more sea level rise than other areas where sea level rise will be of lesser magnitude. and in particular, we see areas of the tropics and subtropics seeing this change much more, i would say easily than areas, for example, in the northern hemisphere, like northern europe of the northern pacific coast of the u.s. >> sreenivasan: when you look forward in your modeling, how do you actually say if the temperature goes up this much, we're going to see more likely increased sea levels in the caribbean?

>> one big part of this is looking at our climate models that that can simulate on the basis of different future scenarios of emissions, different degrees of warming and all that comes with them. and then there are effects that are a little more complicated than we base our understanding on physics, but also in these models, also on observations that in some areas of the world that long enough to show us trends and therefore we can somehow infer what's going to happen with more warming that is just more of the same of what we have done so far, unfortunately. >> sreenivasan: so, you're looking at these changes happening even at one degree celsius of temperature increase, one point five degrees. and right now, most of the scientists agree that we are not changing our behavior fast enough to try to keep it below

those numbers. >> if we don't immediately implement large scale, rapid decrease in our emissions of greenhouse gases, those targets, the one point five that the two degree target are going to be impossible to, to respect. >> sreenivasan: what gives you any hope that we can make the changes necessary? >> i feel as if we should communicate the fact that even if these targets are useful taets to have in mind, that exceeding them for, for a few decades and meanwhile, adapting to what these changes are bringing and developing technology that will help us reduce our footprint on the planet is going to, to be okay. and the hope is that both these adaptations and the technology will allow us to come back to a

temperature that is going to be more favorable to our way of living. it's also important to think of these as a problem with many complimentary solutions. and so, i think one big message of the report was every little bit counts and you can read these in a negative way. every little bit of warming would make things worse. but also every little bit of warming that we save will help us make the problem a little less daunting to face. >> sreenivasan: alright, claudia tebaldi, climate scientist with the pacific northwest national laboratory, thanks so much for joining us. >> my pleasure. thank you. >> sreenivasan: when two commercial airliners crashed into the world trade center on 9/11, approximately 3,300 students had settled into their desks at stuyvesant high school. it is located just blocks away, in the shadow of what were the

twin towers. lila nordstrom was a senior who was instructed to evacuate that day. today she is a public health advocate and executive director of stuy-health, focusing on young adults in the 9/11 survivor community. she's also the author of “some kids left behind: a survivor's fight for health care in the wake of 9/11." it seems that there was pre 9/11 and post 9/11 kind of bisecting your existence. >> thawas a transformational moment for everyone in america because our understanding of just how safe we were and what our life would be changed forever on 9/11. but i think specifically in my case, like, it also changed my relationship to political systems. it changed my relationship to political authority. it was really the first time that i had been failed by a government authority on that kind of massive scale. and it kind of reoriented my life. you know, i've always been interested in politics. it reoriented my life away from,

you know, thoughts like i might go into politics and i might want to run for office. and i, i kind of embraced being an advocate and an activist after that because i felt like that was really where i had the power to actually make some change and speak up about some things that, you know, were, were actually failures on the part of the government. and we're not something that had been actively done. >> sreenivasan: i mean, you were lobbying on the hill with jon stewart and others, but you weren't the first responder, right? you weren't the sort of archetype that we have for who suffered on 9/11. our kind of definition was a bit constrained. >> i think that we have this tendency, especially in the u.s., because of the way our healthcare system works. i think because of the way we conceive of what public benefits should be and who deserves them, we have this tendency to apply like wartime framings to domestic crises. and that was very explicitly what happened on 9/11. you know, we were just barely willing to accept that the heroes of 9/11 might be getting

sick. but i think a lot of people didn't feel that we had any responsibility to the community that was also misled that was also sent downtown without proper safety equipment that was, in many cases left to clean homes and businees without any guidance. and there was sort of a tendency to n view those as part of the same government failure that imperiled the health of first responders. but in reality, it was the same thing. >> sreenivasan: here we are 20 years later when you get together, if you do, with your high school classmates, that all kind of went through the shared experience together, do you find how did how did how did you all process this? i'm sure it was different for each of you, but are there still people, you know, grappling with what i guess would be p.t.s.d. or are they aware of that? >> a lot of people actually had it during the covid crisis for the first time. my organization got more inquiries about mental health services than we have ever gotten. and it was a little surprising because it's 20 years later. there are so many events that re-trigger you know memories of 9/11.

and a lot of the time it takes a certain amount of exposure to that kind of cris, a certain kind of exposure for people to make the connection. i think also a lot of us never spoke about this in the immediate aftermath of the attacks. >> sreenivasan: when do you think the work that you're doing now at stuyhealth, will be unnecessary? >> we have 9/11 survivors in every state. you know, there are 9/11 responders and survivors who are sick in almost every congressional district. it's a national problem, but certainly perceived as local. i think that i see a lot of connections between what i experienced and what a lot of other people in other disaster communities experience that would behat would benefit from similar kinds of broader policy. >> sreenivasan: when did stuyvesant high reopen get back to normal? >> stuyvesanwas returned to our building in lower manhattan on october 9, which was less than a month after the attacks. the context is that this neighborhood was not yet open to the public.

the cleanup effort was happening all around stuyvesant. so, it wasn't that stuyvesant was on one edge of the cleanup effort, but the barge that they were bringing the debris to was on the other side of stuyvesant. so, it meant that we were sandwiched between, you know, the pile at ground zero, which was still on fire. it was on fire 'til late january, so four months of a consistent chemical fire, basically. and then on the other side, you know, pulverized debris was being dumped right next to our schools air intake system. and we were going through five police checkpoints to get into this area so that i guess it would look like things were back to normal. but in no way was this area fit for people to be returning. and certainly it wasn't fit for children to return. >> sreenivasan: finally tonight, one of the many searing images from 9/11 is of first reonders carrying the lifeless body of father mychal judge from the rubble of the fallen twin towers.

father judgeaplain for the new york city fire department, had remained in the lobby to pray for the victims and first responders who were entering the burning buildings. in remembrance of fatherudge, this animated segment from our partners at storycorps is told through father michael duffy, who recalls delivering the homily for his close friend. we franciscans are a little odd, and one of our oddities is there's a form we fill out and it's called ”on my death.” it says where you want your funeral mass to be, who you want to do the homily and et cetera like that. so, 9/11 happened on a tuesday. well, the next day the phone rang and it was our provincial in new york and he said, "mychal wanted you to do the homily." and i said, "well, yes, but this is different. it should be someone with a little more import. so, i think you should do it." and there was a long pause. and he said, "but mychal wanted you." so, i mean, what are you going to say to that? family and friends of mychal judge. good morning everyone.

i said to myself, when i see mychal i'm going to kill him. ( laughter ) i stand in front of you and honestly feel that the homilist at mother teresa's funeral had it easier than i do. there were 3,000 people at his funeral. the church wasn't big enough to hold them. they were outside. bill clinton was there, hillary clinton, all new york. and the moment arrived, i stood up and i reached in to get my glasses and couldn't get to the pocket because my vestment was covering them. thank goodness i'd practiced it cause i couldn't read it! he loved to bless people. and i mean physically. en if they didn't ask. a little old lady would come up to him and he would put his big thick irish hands and press the head 'til i think the poor woman would be crushed. everyone thought mychal judge was their best friend. he'd remember significant things in their life and he would write a little note-— just one or two lines. of course, they'd write him back. so, he had a big black satchel

filled with letters to answer. he would say to me once and a while, "michael duffy," he always called me by my full name, "michael duffy, you know what i need?" and i would get excited because it was hard to buy him a present or anything. i said, "no, what?" "you know what i really need?" "no, what mike?" "absolutely nothing. i don't need a thing in the world. i am the happiest man on the face of the earth. why am i so blessed? i don't deserve it.” mychal judge's body was the first one released from ground zero. his death certificate has the number one on the top. of the thousands of people who perished in that terrible holocaust, why was mychal judge number one? and i think i know the reason. mychal's goal and purpose in life was to bring the firemen to the point of death so they would be ready to meet their maker.

mychal judge could not have ministered to them all. it was physically impossible-— in this life. in the next few weeks we're going to have name after names of people who are being brought out of that rubble. and mychal judge is going to be on the oth side of death to greet them, instead of sending them there. and so, this morning we come to bury mike judge's body, but not his spirit. we come to bury his voice, but not his message. we come to bury his hands, but not his good works. we come to bury his heart, but not his love. never his love.

>> sreenivasan: that's all for this edition of “pbs newshour weekend.” for the latest news updates visit pbs.org/newshour. i'm hari sreenivasan. thanks for watching. stay healthy and have a good night. captioning sponsored by wnet captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org >> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: sue and edgar wachenheim iii. the anderson family fund. bernard and denise schwartz. the cheryl and philip milstein family. the anderson family fund. leonard and norma klorfine. the rosalind p. walter foundation.

koo and patricia yuen, committed to bridging cultural differences in our communities. barbara hope zuckeerg. we try to live in the moment, to not miss what's right in front of us. at mutual of america, we believe taking care of tomorrow can help you make the most of today. mutual of america financial group, retirement services and investments. additional support has been provided by: consumer cellular. and by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the american people. and by contributions to your pbs ation from viewers like you. thank you. you're watching pbs.

(gentle music) - there's something about contrasts that seem to be sharper, more clear when you travel. a drive on interstate 15 through las vegas, nevada at rush hour is starkly different than a drive here just an hour away. and as this drive leads further from the energy of sin city, another kind of vibrancy is discovered. (air puffing) a place where ancient sandstone emerges from the surrounding desert floor and paints a frame alive with color. we come up over the trail and there's this combination of colors all in onframe that you can grab. there's purple, there's yellow, there's the sandstone kind of blondish color.