to learn more, visit safetyactioncenter.pge.com captioning sponsored by wnet >> hill: on this edition for saturday, september 18: supporters for some arrested in the january 6 capitol riot, rally in washington, d.c. a changed supreme court on the anniversary of the death of justice ruth bader ginsburg. and exploring unconscious bias. next on “pbs newshour weekend.” >> pbs newshour weekend is made 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 provide wireless serce that helps people communicate and connect. we offer a variety of no-contract plans, and our u.s.-based customer service team can help find one that fits you. to learn more, visit www.consumercellar.tv. additional support has been provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the american people.

and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> hill: good evening and thank you for joining us. i'm michael hill, in for hari sreenivasan. a rally in front of the u.s. capitol in washington, d.c., drew only a few hundred protesters today. the event was called justice for j6, a reference to the hdreds of people arrested in the january 6 attack on congress. police in riot gear lined the area and a temporary fence was re-installed to prevent access to the capitol. the rally organizer-- who worked as a staff member on former president donald trump's failed re-election campaign-- tri to separate his group from those charged with violent assaults during the deadly rioting. >> this is about the many people who were there that day who have not been charged with violence, not being accused of assaulting a police officer, destroying property and disparate treatment they've received. this is about equal treatment under the law. >> hill: the event lasted less

than an hour and a half an there were no major incidents reported. newshour corresponnt lisa desjardins was in the capitol on january 6 and she is there today covering the rally, law enforcement and security. >> desjardins: the focus of this rally was to be on those people who have been arrested from january 6 with nonviolent crimes who are still being detained. those behind the rally say that indefinite detenti, bridges those people's constitutional rights and they are very careful to say they're separating out those with nonviolent offenses,s largely trespassing in the u.s. capitol with those with violent offenses. we know of the some 600 people arrested for january 6 crimes, about 200 or so have those more violent crimes charged against them. there are more than trespassing and lesser crimes charged. when you talk to the counter-protesters, they say that's a dangerous message. they say the justice system

locks up people for small crimes, including small drug crimes for indefinite periods often and they think this is a crowd that doesn't understand this. the bigger question, of course, what we were waiting to see and came prepared for a variety of responseto was wh security would look like here, how big was the crowd? was there any violence? and there was no violence. this was a peaceful crowd. it was not a large crowd. i would say in the hundreds, perhaps 500 or , maybe a little more, give or take. it was hard to make out how large the crowd was, though, michael, because the truth is there were probably as many members of the media here covering this event as there were supports behind the cause of the rally. >> hill: lisa, it didn't seem to last very long, either. >> desjardins: you know, the rally was intended to lt about an hour or two, and it did seem to come in around that time. many of the folks who came either for or against the rally stayed. there also were a large number of honestly, something i'm calling january 6 tourists around the capitol. as fences go up, you often see

people taking pictures of the fences. there were a few flashpoint i witnessed. largely those were centered around a single individual. of course with these things, you draw people with passionate opinions, and there were occasions-- i saw one or two-- where police gathered around someone like that who was shouting, seemed to be acting out, and thethose people were taken away in the different incidents. we were also watching very careful iffully for that moment wh those who supported the cause and supported president trump walked by and those who did not. whether that would be a flashpoint and by and large it was not. the crowd was told to try and stay peaceful. and it did. michael, when you talk to people here you really understood the divide in america is still so sharp. this was a small crowd, but they did feel strongly, as did the counter-protesters here. and those views have not hanged since a year from-- a year ago before the election, or since january 6. >> hill: lisa, with all the

numbers of the media there, no doubt, some are looking out to see if any members of congress would show up to support this rally. >> desjardins: no members of congress were here today. in fact, i did not see any elected lawmakers of any sort. it's possible i missed some, state or local representatives. but republicans made a decision that they did not want members of congress to be here. and right now, you hear some of the larger trucks that have been serving as barricades moving away from this area as sort of you can see now, the phasing out of the security plan is happening. that's good news for people in washington. it is a question of whether there will be any kind of political repercussions or sort of lasting effects othis rally. will the cause of the people put in jail for january 6 remain? i don't know. i know that the organization behind us says that they will keep at i >> hill: lisa, who were the people speaking there? and what did they say? >> desjardins: the speakers were a variety, including the man behind this rally, who say

former trump campaign staffer, high-ranking staffer. but they also included the relatives of some of the people jailed currently for january 6. i will say that this crowd contained a full sperum of ideas about january 6. i spoke to people here who believed that all of the footage, all of the reporting wee done, what i personally saw on january 6, was not true. they believe the whole thing was a setup. they believe that no one should be in prison foranuary 6. those people were here at this rally. there also were people who disregard that, know that those are falsehoods and who say we're still concerned about those who are in jail for lower level misdemeanor crimes. and, by want way, those people tell me, we are not happy with the republan party. we're not happy with president biden. who are they happy with? president trump. >> hill: lisa, thank you. >> desjardins: you're welcome. >> hill: the u.s. will deport thousands of haian migrants in del rio, texas, along the

u.s./mexico border in the next few days, according to the department of homeland security. the move comes after thousands of haitian asylum seekers assembled around a bridge in del rio earlier this week. today's d.h.s. statement, said 2,000 migrants were moved out of the border area to other locations for possible removal from the u.s. the department also said it will send more than 400 agents to the del rio border region. after the devastating 2010 earthquake in haiti, large numbers of asylum seekers reportedly migrated to camps near the u.s. mexico border, many near tijuana. the u.s. has deported many using expulsion flights that send the migrants back to an impoverished country wracked with political instability and still recovering from a recent earthquake and other disasters. france's ambassador to australia left the country's capital of canberra today, as trade deal tensions between the two countries continue to escalate. france recalled its ambassadors from australia and the united

states after australia suddenly cancelled a major contract for french-designed submarines in favor of a deal with the u.s. as he departed his residence, the french ambassador said he was looking forward to coming back, after some reassessment. >> i'm still confident in the french-australian, australian- french cooperations. i think this has been a huge mistake. a very, very bad handling of the partnership because it was not a contract, it was a partnership. >> hill: former algerian president, abdelaziz bouteflika, who presided over the rth african country for two decades, has ed. born in 1937, bouteflika went on to successfully fight for his country's independence from france in the 1950s and '60s. in 1999 he became president, and soon after negotiated a peace deal with islamic insurgents that ushered in a period of stability for the oil-rich nation. but during his time in office

corruption flourished. in 2019, under pressure from mass protests for seeking a fifth term in office, bouteflika stepped down. abdelaziz bouteflika was 84 years old. robert durst, the multi- millionaire real estate heir suspected of killing three peoplever the past four decades, was found guilty of homicide yesterday in california. durst was only on trial for killing his best friend, susan berman, in 2000. but los angeles county prosecutors argued durst murdered berman and two others-- his wife who disappeared in 1982, and a neighbor in texas who discovered his identity dung the time he was hiding from police. durst was not in the courtroom for the verdict. he was in isolation in jail after being exposed to someone with the coronavirus. the 78-year-old faces life in prison without the possibility of parole.

for the latest national and international news visit pbs.org/newshour. >> hill: when freelance journalist jessica nordell was first starting out, shsent editors a lot of pitches, but had a hard time getting them accepted. she then began pitching under a gender neutral name, “j.d. nordell,” and immediately had more success. the experience set her on a path of researching and writing about unconscious bias for more than a decade, and eventually publishing a book.“ the end of bias: a beginning” comes out on tuesday. nordell recently spoke wh newshour weekend special correspondent megan thompson >> i don't think it's a stretch to say that bias affects all of us every day, because any time a person is interacting with another person, there's the opportunity for stereotypes and associations to infect the interaction. these reactions can often happen

so quickly and automatically that we don't actually know we're necessarily doing them. these are reactions that conflict with our values. >> reporter: so, someone might think, "i'm not racist, i'm not sexist," but then if they do have an unconscious bias, they may behave in a way that goes against what they believe. >> exactly. so, unconscious bias is a term that a lot of people are familiar with, but we might also call it unintended bias or unexamin bias. we know that it's extremely pervasive. we see it in education where black students a penalized more for the same infractions. we see it in the workplace where women and women of color in particular are often passed over for desirable assignments. we see it in policing wher black men are more likely to be on the receiving end of force, even when completely compliant with an officer's orders and even when no arrests are made. i mean, we see it all over the

place. >> reporter: nordell says, while there's plenty of research out there on specific instances of bias, she couldn't find any studies on the cumulative impacts of bias over time. >> because we knowhat bias doesn't just happen once or twice. it happens continually over a day, over months, over an entire career. so, what i did in order to try to answer this question was team up with a comper scientist a develop a computer simulation of a workace. >> reporter: nordell's workplace was called, “normcorp” and it started out with equal numbers of men and women. opportunity for advancement was based on a promotability score. nordell then inserted into her fake compa bias that research shows exists in the real world, like devaluation of a woman's performance. if a female employee succeeded on a project, she received 3% less of a score boost than a man. also, losing credit. so, if a woman worked with a man

on a successful project, she received 3% less of a reward. the consequence of this: more men were promoted than women. nordell ran the simulationver 20 promotion cycles. >> so, what we found was that when we introduced only a 3% difference in the way that men and women were treated in this simulation, it resulted in a leadership tier of our corporation that was 87% men. so, we found that it doesn't actually take ry much bias to create the kind of disparities that we see in the real world. >> reporter: nordell says in her research, she found pretty straightforward ways organizations can interrupt bias, like standardizing criteria for hiring and promotions. in the field of medicine, where bias can have deadly consequences, doctors can use a simp checklist for care to ensure eryone is treated the same. so, if a bias is uncscious, how can we as individuals

recognize them and addre them? >> one really important step is to develop awareness, awareness >> once we start to develop the habit of noticing in our own minds and seeing these reactions in real time, it's extremely powerful. another thing we can there's something called the marley hypothesis, which was named after bob marley, who said, "if you don't know your history, you don't know where you're coming from." and the research shows that as people's knowledge of the past increases, their ability to see present day discrimination also increases. >> reporter: we're doing this interview in minneapolis, which is where you live and where you wrote your book. and while you were writing the book, the george floyd murder and its aftermath unfolded practically in your backyard. >> when george floyd was murdered, i was just finishing this manuscript. and what i was looking for were examples of behavior change. one that i can share with you is

a program that was developed in south los angeles about ten years ago. police were told that instead of having their goal be arrests, their goal was to create relationships with the community that they served. and in fact, what they were told is that what they should do is treat the community as though they were members of their own family. over time, what happened was community members reported that police were starting to treat them with more dignity, with more respect. something else that happened was arrests went down. but additionally, violent crime went down. there's a close connection between police legitimacy, how legitimacy on one hand, and law-abiding behavior on the other. >> reporter: is thera silver bullet here? >> there's no silv bullet. i mean, this is a problem that's huge. it's complicated. it's going to take a lot of

different approaches and it's going to take really all of our collective efforts to solve. but the good news is, i mean, it's a human invention. this is a human problem. and i think that if we a really dedicated to it and we use evidence based approaches, we can really make an impact and make a dent in the problem. >> hill: today marks the first anniversary of the death of supreme court justice ruthader ginsburg. former president trump appointed amy coney barrett to replace the late justice after previously appointing neil gorsuch and brett kavanaugh to the high court. on monday october 4, the juices will ben their next term-- in person for the first time since the covid-19 pandemic required them to hear cases remotely. for more on how the court has changed and what's ahead, i spoke with amy howe, co-founder

of scotusblog, a website covering the u.s. supreme court. amy, thank you so much for joining us. please give us an idea of how much this court has changed since the passing of ruth bader ginsburg just a year ago. >> theost immediate impact that we've seen of the death of justice ginsburg and the replacement by justice barrett has been on what's known as the shadow docket that request the emergency requests for the court to step in and block an execution to put a lower court ruling on hold. recently, one of the most recent examples has been the request by abortion providers in texas to put the texas law barring almost all abortions after six weeks of pregnancy on hold. and so, in that case, you had the chief justice, john roberts, joining the court's now three liberal justices to say we should intervene and put this law on hold while we figure it out. but there were only four votes. you need five votes to put the

law on hold. so, i have no doubt that had justice ginsburg been on the court, the law would not be in effect in texas right now. >> hill: what's to come now as we talk about the cases that we already know about and what impact we have seen so far, what's to come? what should anticipate going forward? >> there are two big cases coming up in the upcoming term, which starts on the first monday in october on issues that are really near and dear to conservatives, abortion and gun rights. and in both of those cases, i think these are scenarios in which there were four conservative votes that may not have been quite certain where the chief justice might have stood or whether or not he would be willing to go ahead and issue kind of a broad sweeping ruling on abortion rights and on gun rits. but now that they have justice barrett, they're likely more confident that they've got a fifth vote.

and so, the question is, is the court going to overrule roe vs. wade that there's a case it's likely going to be argued in december called dobs vs. jackson women's health organization. and it's a challenge to a mississippi law that bans most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. and the state in that case has asked the court to overrule roe vs. wade and planned parenthood vs. casey, which are the cases establishing a woman's right to an abortion. and then in november, the supreme court's going to hear oral argument in a case called new york state rifle and pistol association vs. bruin involving the right to carry a gun outside of your home. the supreme court said about ten years ago that there is a basic right to have a handgun in your home, but didn't really say much more than that. and the conventional wisdom, obviously, we don't know whas going on inside the supreme court, but the conventional wisdom is that there were four votes to say more about what the second amendment means outside

the home, but that they weren't sure about the chief justice. but amy coney barrett, as a judge on the u.s. court of appeals for the seventh circuit, had written a dissent in a gun rights case and suggested she might be more open to a ruling on gun rights. so, those are two cases that we're watching very closely where it seems like the death of justice ginsburg and the nomination and confirmation of justice barrett could really make a difference. >> hill: is it me or is it reality that a lot of the justices have been speaking lately? we're talking about barrett. we're talking about justice stephen breyer. we're talking about clarence thomas of the university of notre dame. >> certainly justice brer has a new book to promote. so, that explains a lot of his appearances, certainly. but we've heard from justice barrett and from justice thomas. and i think one possibility is that the justices may be kind of sensitive to the criticism of their ruling in the texas

abortion case, their ruling in the federal eviction moratorium case. and so, they are speaking out because they are worried abo the perceptions of the court and they want to push back against the idea that the court is divided or partisan, particularly as they get ready to start a new term in which they're going to be hearing these high profile cases on issues on which the court is likely to be divided again. and then, of cours justice breyer has been promoting his book, but he has been getting a lot of questions about retirement. and so, we will be on justice breyer retirement watch all year long. it's hard for me to see him not retiring after this term. but one thing that i've learned is that when i make predictions about the supreme court, i'm often wrong. so, we'll certainly see and find out probably sometime in late june, early july. >> hill: amy howis the co- founder of scotusblog.

amy, thank you for joining us. >> thanks so much for inviting me. >> this is pbs newshour weekend, saturday. >> hill: finally tonight, it is world clean up day, and in more than 180 countries people picked up trash-- to make a statement and make a difference. it's the 11th year of the event, and in every location, plastic products make up a big part of the environmental problem. newshour weekend's christopher booker has the story of what may be one small solution. >> reporter: on one of spain's canary islands, off the coast of northwest africa, plastic waste washes on shore relentlessly-- much of it in the form of tiny beads that mingle the black and white sand. >> ( translated ): this is only the residue that floats, imagine what is in the ocean. if it's difficult to collect what's on the beach, imagine what it's like to collect the stuff in the ocean. the amount of plastic is brutal.

>> reporter: humbeo less left his job in barcelona last year determined to do something about the flood of plastic. >> ( translated ): there are thousands and thousands of these pebbles on the coasts of gran canaria. >> reporter: with no way to stop the incoming plastic, he decided to use his design skills to turn plastic waste into plastic furniture. >> ( translated ): why make furniture? because it is a way of giving it a lifespan that is similar to plastic. if plastic lasts years, why make something that will last months or weeks? i'll create a product that lasts years like plastic does. >> reporter: from beach to manufacturing-use takes several steps. >> ( translated ): this is the material. once it habeen cleaned, crushed and dried, it's useful to test our products and to determine whether they are suitable for manufacturing. >> reporter: first to market ll be these round clothes hangers. a small plastic footstool is in the works. the designer admits some of the beach plastic can't be re-used, but picking it up is part of his contribution to cleaning up plastic pollution. >> ( translated ): i recommend that people join a beach clean-

up or one in a natural spot to gain awareness about how much damage humans do. >> hill: that's all for this edition of “pbs newshour weekend.” for the latest news updates visit pbs.org/newshour. i'm michael hill. thanks for watching. stay healthy and have a good night. captioning sponsored by wnet captioned by media accessroup at wgbh access.wgbh.org >> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: sue and edgar wachenheim iii. 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 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. 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 station from viewers like you. thank you. you're watching pbs.

levar: hi everybody, i'm levar burton and this is open a book, open the world, the library of congress national book festival. you know, a good book can take you on a journey. and after the last year, we are all ready to plot a new course and books can be an amazing compass. join me as some of our nation's leading literary voices bring us a sense of renewal, discuss their newest work, and open up a whole new world of possibilities. the national book festival is coming up next. ♪