captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> woodruff: good evening, i'm judy woodruff. on the newshour tonight, digging in their heels: the standoff deens between president biden and senate republicans over raising the debt ceiling. then, a major oil spill off the coast of california threatens wildlife as crews race to contain the damage. and, back in session. the supreme court takes on abortion, gun rights and more divisive issues in the new term that starts today. all that and more on tonight's pbs newshour.

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antesena unfolding in washington over the country's debt limit. it comes just two weeks before the united states is set to default on its debt, which could trigger damaging economic consequences for the entire country. today, president biden called congressional republicans' position "dangerous." for more, i'm joined by yamiche alcindor. so yamiche, we shedder today from the president and the senate majority leader mitch mcconnell, wre does everything stand? >> well both sides are dug in as debt ceiling, it is unclear which side will blink. president biden took to the white houspodium today and he delivered pointed remarks. he accused republicans of playing quote russian roulette with the u.s. economy. he said that the debt seang is not about new spending. he said this is about whether or not the u.s. will be able to pay its bills. here is some of what the

president had to say. >> not only are republicans ksh-- their job, they are threatening to use their power to prevent us from doing our job, saving the economy from a catastrophic event. i think quite frankly it is hypocritical, dangerous and disgraceful. >> now president biden also said that it is wrong for republicans to link the debt ceiling limit and raising the debt limiwith his infrastructure plan though the gop has said if democrats can pass the infrastructure plan, that 3.5 trillion plan with only democratic support they should also be able to raise the ket ceiling, the president has pushed back on that, pushed back on the idea it should be done through reconciliation. he also said republicans were in the wrong here because this has been a bipartisan endeavor to raise the debt ceiling but senate minority leader mitch mcconnell took to the senate floor after the president spoke. here is what mcconnell had to say. >> the majority doesn't need ou

votes. they just want a partisan-- they just want a bipartisan short cut around procedural hurdles that can actually clear on their own. and they want that short cut so they can pivot right back to partisan spending as fast as possible. >> now president biden said that republicans do not need to give their votes, he said all they todo tneo i filibuster but there is senate minority leader mitch mcconnell saying he is essentially going to stand in the way of democrats trying to raise the debt ceiling, also mitch mcconnell wrote a letter to president biden today saying that this is really the democrats problem to fix >> woodruff: and just in a word, the last time we looked there was also disagreement among democrats over two huge pieces of legislation, reconciliation, and social spending, any movement in-- movement on that. >> the president trying to get his party on the same page.

the president blamed essential leigh senator manchin and sinema saying they were the two dem kralts he couldn't get to back his plan as of yet but the president did have a meeting with progressives today saying they need to come down on the 3.5 trillion price tag for the bipartisan infrastructure bill, i should say for the democrat backed infrastructure bill. so we will have to see where the numbers end up, i'm hearing around $2 trillion but senate majority leader chuck schumer says he wants to get it done by the end of october. so we will have to stee where this ends but they are already eyeing the end of the month as trying to get this done. >> woodruff: all rht, yamiche alcindor following these two major stories, thank you, yamiche. >> woodruff: in the day's other news, crews in southern california worked to clean up an oil spill that fouled parts of the coastline over the weekend. huntington beach was hit hard after an offshore pipeline

leaked 126,000 gallons, closing beaches and killing wildlife. investigators are looking at whether a ship's anchor ruptured the pipeline. we'll return to this, later in the program. today was the deadline for teachers and staff to get covid vaccinations in new york city's chicpusyoo s, stl emthe mayor bill de blasio says 95% of school employees have now had at least one dose. thousands rushed to get inoculated in the past week to avoid being put on unpaid leave. refugee admissions to the u.s. hit a record low in the federal fiscal year that just ended. the associated press reports just under 11,500 refugees were admitted. that does not include thousands of afghans who came in recent weeks. president biden had pledged to reverse the sharp cuts of the trump years. u.n. humanitarian officials condemned libya today for a violent crackdown on migrants trying to sail to europe.

they say security forces rounded up me than 5,100 people and killed at least one since friday. an estimated 215 children and more than 540 women were among those detained. other refugee advocates said ib lit >> we're hearing from migrants that we're in touch with that they're scared to leave their homes, we know that their libyan neighbors have told them don't leave your homes because it's just not safe. so people are quite horrified. >> woodruff: the u.n.'s human rights council also accused libya's government today of possible crimes agnst humanity. it cited violence against migrants and civilians caught up in warfare between rival regimes and militias. back in this country, the biden administration reversed a trump- era ban on abortion referrals by family planning clinics that receive federal funding.

the ban had prompted a mass exodus from the program by providers linked with planned parenthood. the policy now reverts to what it was in the obama years. two americans are the winners of this year's nobel prize for medicine, for work that could lead, eventually, to new, non- opioid painkillers. david julius and ardem patapoutian made separate breakthroughs years ago. their work shows how receptors in the skin respond to heat and pressure. on wall street today, the broader market fell as tech stocks dropped. the dow jones industrial average lost 323 points, one percent, to close back near 34,000. the nasdaq fell 311 points, two percent. the s&p 500 slid 56, more than one percent. and, oil prices closed near $78 dollars a barrel, the highest

since 2014. and, "star trek's" captain kirk is finally heading to space for real. william shatner, who's now 90 years old, will be a passenger next week on a "blue origin" capsule. the space travel company invited him on a flight that will last 10 minutes before returning to earth. two other passengers will be paying customers. still come on the newshour: a look at the cases on the supreme court docket this term. tamara keith and amy walter break down the latest political news. a pakistani musician embraces tradition while charting a new path. and much more. >> woodruff: today the biden

administration unveiled its long awaited approach to trade relations with china. u.s. trade representative katherine tai said she would restart trade tas with beijing, but maintain most trump-era tariffs on china. nick schifrin is here to explain. so nick, hello, tell us what exactly did the u.s. trade representative announce. >> that biden will not move away from trump era tariffs, will not launch a full scale negotiation with china and will instead enforce president trump's trade deal with china. that trade deal is known as phase one in which beijing promised to buy about $200 billion of american goods. but the peterson institute says china has only bought 62 cents for every $1 it promised. ambassador tai said she would hold china accountable to its commitments but it was very restrained criticism and took pains not to say that she

supported a trade war. >> our analysis indicates that while commitments in certain areas have been met, that certain business interests have seen benefits, there have also been short falls in others. our objective is not to enflame trade tensions with china. durable coexistence requires accountability and respect for the enormous consequences of our actions. >> ambassador tai said she would allow u.s. companies to appeal to remove tariffs. the u.s. will try to work more with allies to confront china's trade practices and will try to be more resilient in the u.s. to build back better but ultimately today was about continue outity. maintaining trump era tariffs as a tool for economic strategies. >> so many businesses watching closely. what has been the response so far. >> she has been criticized by multiple sides. some china experts i have spoken to say this is not a strategy,

it's a holding pattern borne out of fear that any major steps on china is perilous domestically, politically for the biden administration, some of the more hawkish experts i talked to say this doesn't go far enough. that there is no promised punishment for china, nor is there a road map to try and get china to make those fundamental changes, but on the other side businesses have been pushing the administration to say tariffs don't work. so take a listen to anna ashton of the u.s. china business council who told us she was disa piented. >>-- appointed. >> to see the focus on the value of tariffs. i don't think that there has been a case made by the biden administration either today during ambassador tai's speech or prior to today that the tariffs have been beneficial in any specific way. and at the same time we have all of this evidence that has mounted over the course of the last few years that the tariffs have been detrimental to u.s. businesses. >> it seems ambassador tai

didn't please very many people but she kept her cards close to the vest, held back her criticism and that may be for room in those upcoming talks. >> and what about beijing, have they said anything. >> they have not to her but they have responded in the last few days in a very different way. more chinese planes have flown into tie want, self-declared air defense identification zone just outside of tie want ease airspace than ever before. this is three straight days of record military harassment of tie want. tie want's foreign minister said he was concerned beijing would launch a war but did not think war was imminent. bottomline beijing is flexing its muscles militarily, warning the u.s. and its allies over support for tie want. we will soon see whether beijing will also flex its muscle in trade. >> woodruff: connection between the economy and the military. nick schifrin, thank you. >> thank you.

>> woodruff: federal and state investigators are focusing on a 41-year-old pipeline as the cause of a massive oil spill off the coast of california. the spill is threatening wildlife and prompting a robust cleanup effort in the pacific. but as stephanie sy reports, the scale and scope of the damage remains unclear. >> sy: a calm day on the water betrays an unfolding catastrophe. some of the first victims, the california coast's ever-present seals, slicked in oil. booms and skimmers have been deployed to contain and clean up the some 126,000 gallons of oil spilled from an underwater pipeline into the pacific ocean on saturday. today, officials said oil can be seen overhead from orange county's huntington beach, all the way down to dana point.

local officials warned some beaches would be closed for weeks, or even mons. orange county supervisor katrina foley described the scene to reporters on sunday. >> i was there for a few hours today, and even during that time, i stard to feel a little bit my throat hurt and in and you can feel the vapor in the air. >> sy: orange county's health care agency has asked residents to “refrain from participating in recreational activities on the coastline such as swimming, surfing, biking, walking, exercising (and) gathering.” the area known as “surf city” is closed and mostly empty, but for volunteers picking utar balls. >> i'm picking this up and then i'm taking it to a disposal center, as much as i can carry right now. >> sy: amplify energy says they are still trying to locate where on their pipeline the suspected leak occurred. the pipeline began leaking roughly four miles off the shore and was shut down on saturday night. martyn willsher is the c.e.o. of amplify energy: >> we will do everything in our power to ensure that this is

recovered as quickly as possible and we won't be done until this is concluded. >> sy: for californians, the spill is just the latest environmental punch. >> we are in the midst of a potential ecological disaster. >> sy: kim carr is the mayor of huntington beach, where by today, the oil had already infiltrated talbert marsh, a large ecological reserve. >> we are in the midst of a potential ecological disaster. our wetlands are being degraded and portions of our coastline are now covered in oil. >> sy: oil spills kill wildlife. heavy oil can smother animals. and when seabirds get oil in their feathers, the birds can't stay warm. they die of hypothermia. it's one of the worst spills southern california has seen in recent history. thlast major spill was in 2015, near santa barbara wn a ruptured pipeline dumped 2,400 barrels onshore and into the

ocean. as the cause of this oil spill is investigated, people who live and work near huntington beach reported smelling oil as early as friday, leaving many to ask whether officials responded quickly engh to contain the spill. for the pbs newshour, i'm stephanie sy. >> woodruff: a worldwide consortium of journalists has published what it calls "the pandora papers," revealing a parallel financial universe in which world leaders and the mega-rich can hide billions of dollars in secretive offshore accounts. investigators say the accounts drain money from government treasuries and can undermine national security and democracy. nick schifrin is back with that story. >> schifrin: the inrnational consortium of investigative

journalists shared 12 million financial records with 150 news organizations to provide an unprecedented window into how billions are hidden from auorities, investigators, jordan's king abdullah's advisers created dozens of shell companies to buy homes wor 106 million dollars, despite high poverty levels in jordan and a corruption crackdown that targets citizens who use shell companies. today jordan's palace said the king's properties were "not unusual nor improper-- these properties are not publicized out of secity and privacy concerns." in russia, president vladimir putin's alleged girlfriend became the owner of a monaco apartment through an offshore compy.ha passed secrecy laws that allow tens of millions to be sheltered from view. joining me to discuss this is drew sullivan, co-founder and editor of the organized crime and corruption reporting project, or o.c.c.r.p. welcome to the newshour, your organization teamed up with the international

consortium investigator journalists to publish these stories, why do you think secretive offshore accounts are a threat to national security and democracy? ey i ws opaque power. and what these offshore companies really are is they're a device to move money around the world and to keep it secret. and the problem with that is you know, it can be am unthat is stolen and it can be money that you are trying to move for some business somewhere. but a lot of time tses is really money people are trying to hide, trying to launder. and once that money gets into your countries you don't flow what it is going to do, it could do something like create a real estate bubble which is annoying but not harmful. but it do also fund things like terrorist groups, extremists, political parties, you know, bad acur country, terrorists, so yoyon torsu knows just, in this day and age we should be able to control the

monday tization of money in our countries and we really can't because of the offshore industry. >> one of the more interesting parts of this investigation is that it st not only offshore, is it it, it is inside the united states. >> it's all over the world and the united states they're proliferating too. places like south dakota, wyoming, nevada, and a lot of other states considering passing laws. lots of organized crime gangs that we follow and track are more often using the united states than they are some place like dubai or something like that. and it is because the united states, a u.s. address seems to give an indication that that is a legitimate company. and the u.s. companies are respected for the transparency. but in effected you are not getting the transparency, it's being hidden. >> as i mentioned before, offshore companies link to king abdullah of jordan, have purchased one of the hundred million dollars of homes in the u.s. and u.k what is his story say to you.

>> that is really a classic case of a ruler really not wanting their people to know what properties they have. because it will raise questions as to whether it is appropriate to have a $33 million mansion overlooking malibu. that that is really the image for the king of jordan. and so it basically helps them avoid the kind of scrutiny and the kind of questions as to whether they're really acting in the interest of their country. more importantly, you know, increasingly a lot of rulers and i'm sanot king abdullah but a lot of this money and a lot of other rulers and potentially the king, it's stolen money. it is money that has been paid in bribes, it's money that is paid in getting part of a business deal. and those types of things. and so they also want to keep those kind of interests and those kind of assets that they're purchasing outside of the public and regulators

purview. >> also mentioned vladimir putin, what does that story say and how the russian authorities have responded to the journalists who is exposed. >> putin is probably stolen somewhere around $200 billion and he is one of, you know, the most repay shus rulers in the world in terms of we studied how he gets kickbacks and steals money for years. and you know, his system is simply he is going to take what he wants and anybody who causes problems or raises these issues are crushed. and in fact just in the last four months or so, most of the large respected investigative reporting organizations in russia had to stop publishing in russia. >> this is all out there. st being dismissed and denied by the various people in these stories. what is the real world affect if any? >> there will be some. there will be people who ask for sanctions. there will be people who will

ask for filings which will basically allow the properties to be taken away. there is a large civil society world out there that is really trying to-- using sanctions and seizures of properties to get the money back to the citizens of those countries. and you will see that especially in the most egregious cases likizer buy john, 700 million dollars of property in london, that is obscene. and i think you will see a lot of people going after those public interest law firms trying to get these assets taken away. >> drew sullivan, thank you very much. >> great to be here, nick, thanks. >> woodruff: the supreme court returned to the courtroom this morning to hear its first oral arguments of what looks to be an unusually consequential new term. john yang has more. >> yang: judy, the supreme court term began this morning with

familiar words from chief justice john roberts. >> i have the honor to announce, on behalf of the court, that the october 2020 term of the supreme court of the united states is now closed. and the october 2021 term is now convened. >> yang: but even though the justices, most of them, at least, were back in-person, not much else seemed the same as when they were lt in thecooo m 2 and the cases set for argument this term could make it one of the most contentious in many years. marcia coyle, chief washington correspondent for the "national law journal," was one of the two dozen of so reporters in the courtroom this morning. she is back in the studio now. >> yes. marcia, what was it like this morning? >> you know, john, it was normal and it was abnormal. was normal in the fact that there are were justices actually on the bench and they were hearing oral arguments. but it was abnormal, first days

at the supreme court you usually have a court building that's full of tourists on the lower level, lines of people who are waiting to get seats in the court room, lines of lawyers in suits waiting to be sworn into the bar. and the whole floor seems to be humming with talk. but today silence. a few supreme court police officers, staff people going in and out of offices, everybody masked. you go into the court room and you see the press, those of us who attended, we were in the public seats cannot in the usual press section but in public seats so that we could be spread out. and we wear masks. and also the lauers-- laiers who were going to argue, they were limited to having only one other lawyer with them, before you could have that table full m t aeaed. in the guest section for the justices, there really was hardly anybody there but justice

kennedy, retired justice kennedy showed up in mask. justin breyer's wife was there in a mask and just is barrett's husband showed up masks and they were appropriately distanced. so it was strange and during the argument as you mentioned, they were all on the bench except for justice kavanaugh who last week was positive for covid and is staying out of the arguments this week. but he was participate be remotely so you had this disembodied voice echoing in the court room when he did ask questions. the only justice who wore a mask was justice so the mayor. and-- sotomayor, and so you know, it was strange and then it wasn't strange. >> and it is a big term for this court. i mean there is hardly a hold button ise that they are not considering this term including the most divisive of all, ortion. >> that's right, john.

and who knows, there may be two abortion cases getting to the court. there is still action in the lower courts on the texas ban at six weeks opregnancy. so it is not only abortion, it's guns, they've taken up a case that could result in the expansion of gun rights under the second amendment. they've also tak two religion related cases. one that deals with separation of church and state, one involving a death row inmate who wants to have his minister present in the death chamber but praying and laying on hands. so yes, you are absolutely right. and they could add to that easily pending the big affirmative action case involving harvard. the court continues to accept cases until about mid january, and then usually they have about 70 for arguments and right now i think the number is about 39. so the term could grow yet. >> and in this first week on

wednesday, there is a cae involving state secrets. >> that's right, john. in fact, it is one of two state secret cases which is real unusual. the court hasn't looked at the stitt secrets doctrine for a long time. the first case that is on wednesday involves somebody who is now at guantanamo bay but he is rying to get evidence, what we call discovery of evidence were former federal contractors who were involved in his interrogation when he was at a cia site in poland. the detainee was seriously intergated. in fact they say he was suffered brain damage and the loss of one eye. the government is saying you can't have that evidence because it will expose national security to danger. the court has got to take a look at that. and there is another case that involves three muslim men from california, i believe, who feel that they were ksh-- that the

fbi was sur vailing them because of their religion. and again they want information and the government has pleaded the state secrets doctrine. so yes, and then there is also a very important death penalty. the boston marathon bomber, his sentence was invalidated by a federal appealate court because of errors at trial and the justices have agreed to look the a those trial errors and see if the lower court was correct in what it did. so yeah, it is a huge term. >> in recent weeks we have had a number of justices give public remarks, all sort of defending the court against a lot of criticism from the public. what is going on here? >> john, i think it's a reaction to the court's more recent ruling on emergency applications that come to it. it is generally known as the court's shadow dock et. and those rulings have come in very troarvetion areas such as the feks as-- text task abortion

ban, the biden administration's effort to extend the ban on eviction as well as the remain inico immigration policy of the tru mmpe administration. and so i think the some of the justices are voicing concerns about the impact of this criticism of the court and maybe also have an eye on the fact that this is a very controversial term. the public is going to be watching and so they're worried what the public is going to reaction to the decisions that may be coming fooshed. >> marcia coyle of the national law journal who will be helping us keep an eye on the term ahead. thank you very much. >> my pleasure, john. >> woodruff: facebook and its group of apps and social media channels went down for most of this day. william brangham looks at the latest, all of it coming on the eve of another difficult congressional hearing for the social media giant.

>> brangham: judy, facebook's app, along with instagram and whatsapp, went dark for several hours today, and at this moment, appears to be slowly coming back up. the cause of the outages still has not been explained. but for the hundreds of millions of people in the united states and a number of other countries who use these apps, the outages are a disruption to communications, connections and business. sheera frenkel of the "new york times" reports on facebook extensively and has been following this all day. she's the co-author of "an ugly truth: inside facebook's battle for domination." great to you have back on the newshour. can you help us understand what is it that happened today? >> the starting at about 9:00 a.m. pa sifng out here in california facebook and its family of apps went down, including instagram, whatsapp, these have 3.5 billion people

and for several hours no one including the security engineers at facebook knew what was going on. this was amplified by the fact that facebook's own internal communications were down so it wasn't just that we couldn't access facebook.com, facebook engineers couldn't get into their own emails and couldn't even access their own buildings in many cases. >> is there any evidence, this is what we always think of wn these kind of things happen now adays, that this was a hack of some kind? >> at this point in time we don't see evidence that this was a hack. we spoke to nearly a dozen of engineers that are working within facebook many directly to fix it. they say it is extremely unlikely that a hack would is be able to have this kind of impact. that it twoo take down all of these facebook apps at the same time. what is more likely and what seems to have happened is w as an internal update ruled out by facebook that just went very imadly and which it took them many, many hours to try and fix. >> okay. for the keptics out there who

say why are we even paying attention to this, can you just remind us of the takes here, that billions of people use these apps and they are not just teenagers sharing pictures and videos of their friends. >> absolutely. well, we hope they are not just teefn agers sharing pictures of they and themselves giving all the reporting they did on the affects of teenagers. facebook is used by businesses all over the world. in countries ranging from sri lanka to myanmar, indonesia, facebook is the way people do business and whatsapp is the way people do bhis. we spoke to shop owners all over the world who says their businesses were effectively uspt to teifebok pge ash bdown because they could not use whats whatsapp to message people, we spoke to people and couldn't reach family members, he wouldly family members because whatsapp was down, this is something people use, it is practically utility in many parts of the world and many people's lives.

>> an as you say, facebook in many places is in some places a stand-in for the internet, the vehicle by which people get on to the internet. this comes for people who have been paying attention to this, at an incredibly inopportune moment for facebook, we saw last night on "60 minutes," a whistle-blower came forward who you referenced who has been arguing that facebook has not been doing enough to tamp down on some of the what it knows to be damaging impact that its website has on teenagers. it it also comes after a year of scrutiny about their behior and whether they crack down on hate and misinformation that you reported in your book. and then hearing coming tomorrow on capitol hill. i mean this is, they are in the cross hairs as much as possible on the very day that their website goes down. >> you couldn't really think of worse timing as far as face book is concerned, for people to be going to google and twitter and put mg there what is wrong with facebook or what is the problem with facebook because they're going to come back with hundreds

of articles written in the last week pointing to really see systemic problems within facebook, you just touched on many of those in your question. the ways in which in sta gram is bad for teenagers. the way in which facebook as a platform has supported hate speech and misinformation. these are things that journalists have been writing about for years, and which we covered in our book which came out this summer. but we have a whistle-blower who has come forward with internal documents showing facebook was sitting on research showk just how bad the platform was, just how many harms the platform was causing and despite that research they continued to make decisions which amplified hate speech, which increased the amount of misinformation people saw and marketed their products towards teenagers which we know are incredibly sensitive to the harms of instagram. >> i know that this is not air-traffic control, this is not missile device, this is not a hospital but as you said, there are plenty of examples in which facebook is a vital ability for

people to get on to the internet. but it is a little bit alarming i think it's fair to say that something as simple as this blitz you are describing that could be what happened here, could take down such a central part of the internet. >> absolutely. and i think it shows us the danger of face boork having such a large roe to play in the infrastructure of the internet. one thing i hadn't said before which people should also consider is that many people use facebook to log into other apps, they use it to log into their smart home systems like smart tv's or smart thermostats so when facebook went down people couldn't access basic things around their house. this is a mega internet company that touches on so many different aspects of your lives and in some way takes facebook going down in this really catastrophic and immense way for people to understand just how many parts of their lives this company touches on. >> indeed. always good to see you from "the new york times," be thank you so

much for being here. >> thank you so much for having me. >> woodruff: stare downs in washington on the debt ceiling and the biden agenda have left president biden working to keep the country from possible economic collapse and uniting his divided party. here to talk about it all, our politics monday team. amy walter of the "cook political report wh amy walter." and tamara keith of npr. within hello to both of you on this monday. good to see you, so let's just dive right in. tam, it was our lead story tonight. the standoff between president biden and the senate minority leader mitch mcconnell pointing fingers at each other over something we know has to be raised. the debt ceiling, it can't sit

where it is, it has to go up, so what is this all about? >> every time there is a debt ceiling fight there are fingers pointed everywhere. and it is all about spending that has already happened. this isn't about spending that is coming in the future. this is allowing us to pay our bills as a country. but president biden and mitch mcconnell has exchanged letters and words and they are not seemingly looking for a path out of this, they are both dug in, the question is does the public care. maybe not right now, if the u.s. defaults on its debt, the public will suddenly care a lot. and then they will start wondering whose fault it was and right now they're pointing in opposite dreks trying to make sure the other one gets the blame. >> some are looking at this like but there are real consequences for the stare down if both of them refuse to blink. but this has been going on for so long that even the markets

have now, although today i think there was a little blip but even they have sort of assumed that this is just gamesmanship and eventually this will get worked out. this is just a polit kalt process but there are real consequences. and the real challenge is that the president himself and his party, they are the ones in charge. so when it comes to the bla game democrats and it is correct, they will say to republicans this is pretty hypocritical, you guys not allowing a vote on this considering the fact that you voted on it when donald trump was president and also we're paying for a lot of the programs you voted for. that is what we are doing. but republicans will say you know what, and this is what they are saying, we don't like the 3.5 trillion package you are putting together. and if we give you a vote on the debt ceiling it is basically saying we're okay with this amount of spending which we're not. and guess what, democrats, you have the votes, you go ahead and do it, you don't want to do it

because you don't want to take the tough vote and by the way, just one more quick thing, it drags out this process for the president's agenda and democrats are so eager to be done with this. >> but we remember it wasn't that many decades ago that joe biden and mitch mcconnell were actually able to work together on a few things. >> it wasn't even decades ago, they even worked together to settle a previous debt ceiling dispute and it's possible they will figure it out this time. but mcconnell is taking this hard line, essentially saying that republicans are going to filibuster a clean debt ceiling increase. he wants democrats to have to completely own it it to do this procedural thing called reconciliation which we've been talking about a lot for president biden's build back better agenda. but they want them to use this thing that will draw more attention to the debt ceiling being raised, will take time, will take floor time in the

senate, the white house is saying oh, it's risky to do that because what if it takes too long. but having it take too long i think is part of the goal for mitch mcconnell to really make democrats own this and not just vote on it quickly, late at night. >> that's right. >> can we amy does it get badly burned by this or does it just pass and there they go again. >> there they go again. i do think the public is definitely frustrated and seeing both sides. nobody has a clean bill of health on the lip hypocrisy scale, i micked a lot of metaphors, but i think you know where i am going. but the party in power gets all the blame and so the president himself we have been talking a lothese past few weeks about the fact that he has been struggling politically. he needs a big win. people don't understand what this is all about. the president will take the blame when things go poorly. >> and ocourse this isn't the only headache the president is

dealing with right now. >> we spent so many hours thinking about, talking about last week, the di vings among democrats over infrastructure and over this bigger, bigger social spending. >> any what happens, if this drs on. >> this is going to just drag on. they're talking about halloween, president biden has previously talked about christmas as sort of the informal deadline in his mind. this was sort of a self-imposed deadline on thursday that they missed to vote on the bipartisan infrastructure plan. the reality which has been sort of clear but was crystallized by last week is that democrats have to figure out how to agree monk themselves on the whole thing. the big build back better and the bipartisan infrastructure plan. they have to agree on all of it and they don't yet. but there have been big bills that look like they just weren't going to happen. the republican tax cut under

president trump, the affordable care act under president obama and roundabout christmas time things that seemed impossible suddenly were like oh, why did we think that wouldn't happen. >> it's a mouthful. but could it really, amy, go on that long? >> yes, and if probably will. i think the end of october is way too optimistic. so it is probably the end of the year. just to appreciate what nancy pelosi and chuck schumer are dealing with here, going back to some of those votes or i about all the way back to the '90s with bill clinton. clinton lost about 40 democrats in the house on his big reconciliation bill. trump lost 13 republicans on that axe bill that tam was referring to. nancy pelosi can afford three de fekses. obama lost 40 something voteds on health care on obama care. so she has literally no room for error which is where this started in the very beginning. we've known alalong, a 50-50

senate, three seat margin in the house. thiscannot just-- you can't sort of likjust muscle this threw. this is precision legislating. >> democrats hold all the control, all the levers of power but they barely have a grasp on any of them. >> that's right. >> a very quickly, i really want to ask about what john yang was talking to marcia coyle about, and that is the supreme court term starting today. they have a number of high profile cases coming up including mississippi abortion law, that would allow, essentially tightens the restrictions around abortions. and then we have just seen the supreme court uphold texas law that permits regular people to sue abortion provide ires. we looked-- providers. we looked at a poll. this is the maris poll that the newshour does with npr. both of them are not liked by a

majority of americans. look at this. 74 percent of americans say they don't agree with the legal action that private citizens, 58 percent don't like the so called cardiac activity law. this is, in other words, tam, my question is, it is not just something that the courts have to worry about, the public is invested in this politically. >> and yet there is no political mechanism in america to have a referendum to have the will of the people. and there is no such thing as settled law there is precedence, superprecedence but those things can change over time and that is what is potentially happening here. >> yeah. and the question too is does that translate into voting behavior. in other words, how sal yent is that issue for voters who may disapprove of many of these things but they say you know what, the covid issue is my number one priority. the economy is my number one priority. this is important to me but not as important as those other things, are you not going to

really understand where it is until first we see the rulings but then also understand where we are. >> which voters to get motivated. >> that's right. >> amy walter, tamara keith, thank you both. >> you're welcome. >> >> woodruff: the south asian art form known as sufi music has a centuries old tradition built on poetry and mticism coupled with specific instruments, meters and retition. one brooklyn-based pakistani musician is steeped in that tradition, yet also going her own wa refusing to let others define her work. special correspondent tom casciato has our story as part of our arts and culture series, canvas. >> reporter: arooj aftab

recently debuted work from her latest album at a concert at brooklyn's pioneer works. her compositions are personal, her performance intimate. but it was far from a solo effort. >> the way that i like to, kind of, produce this music is leaving space for the band. we're all involved in telling a story from this moment the song starts until the very end. >> reporter: still, the band is executing a vision of which she is in command. >> to even actually conceptualize a band like that is a creative work. especially as a singer composer who doesn't actively play an instrument, there is this sentiment in the industry of, like, kind of discrediting women for the work that they do. you have to kind of overstate that you're not just a singer. you are also the composer. you're also the producer. you're also the arranger.

>> reporter: she's also unwilling to let others define her. she sings mostly in urdu, her lyrics drawn from poetry often centuries old. her music draws from seemingly everywhere. for example, she'll bring non- traditional instruments like synthesizer and lever harp, to a traditional south asian poetic form like the ghazal. she's even given her style its own name: neo-sufi. >> it's not south asian classical music with, like, fused with jazz. it's-- it's like, it's living in its own world of, like, a marriage of many roots and heritages. so i was kind of like, i need to, like, name this right now, you know. >> reporter: take a hold of it. >> reporter: writing of her recent album, "vulture prince," the music site pitchfork said she has “as much a claim to the western traditions of jazz and experimental electronica as to the folk and classical music of her homeland.” the album is dedicated to her younger brother, maher, who passed away in 2018. >> when it's a younger sibling,

it's almost like you're kind of -- if they're young enough -- you know, you kind of raised them too. so it's like such a weird -- such a weird sort of loss. >> reporter: her loss and her art converge in a composition called “diya hai,” its lyrics derived from a poem by the popular 19th century indian poet mirza ghalib. ♪ ♪ ♪ >> and i loved the-- the poem itself, but it took me a really long time to actually, like, make it mine. when i was workshopping it and trying to figure it out, like, i was in pakistan and i was hanging out with maher. and so it's the last thing that i really sang to him and so that kind of felt important to me that i should really just, like, figure it out and put it in the record. >> reporter: there was a time as a teenager in lahore, pakistan, when it looked like she would never make a record. were your parents okay with you

wanting to be a musician? >> i think they were like, that's not going twork out for you, you know, like that you're not going to make any money. what are you saying? you want to be famous? >> reporter: still, she had the self-assuranceo take on a poet of more recent vintage: leonard cohen and his celebrated composition “hallelujah.” >> i think no one believed in me at the time. and i really wanted to -- i wanted to -- i wanted people to believe that i'm good at music, ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ >> reporter: she was more than good, aftab's version of“ hallelujah” went viral in pakistan. it also helped fuel an ambition she reveed to her parents. >> and i was like, well, there's this college it's called berklee. and i will get a bachelor's degree and i will study audio engineering and jazz. and they were like, oh, okay. so somebody has organized th for us. fine. you know, let's do it. >> reporter: accepted to boston's prestigious berklee college of music, aftab moved to

the states in 2005. she kept at her goal of becoming a professional musician, but got her degree in music production and engineering. >> i felt that i needed some sort of, like, concrete industry skill. i came out of berklee in like 2008 or '09, moved to new york, super recession times, all the music studios were kind of closing. people were making all these products that you could record at home. so it was just like, oh great. no, we don't -- they don't need audio engineers anymore. >> reporter: audio engineering's loss was composing's gain. where else would we get a song like “last night,” with lyrics adapted from 13th century sufi mystic and poet rumi put to a beat like this one? ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ >> i really liked the idea of juxtaposing rumi with a reggae groove, t also kind of jazz, upright bass vibes, and then, like, adding this sort of urdu meter in the middle-- >> reporter: there's just a

whole world of things you just talked about in half a sentence. let's just go back for a minute. >> i was reading a lot of rumi. you know, i was also listening to a lot of reggae. in a jam, like, those two things kind of came together. >> reporter: i'm not sure they've ever come together before. it's not like, you know, those rumi/reggae tunes that everyone does. >> right. >> reporter: aftab says for her next album, she'd like to explore the writings of a medieval indian ruler and warrior called chand bibi. >> she was one of the only, and first female, feminist warrior politician bad-ass who, like, released an anthologof poems. i liked the fact that her work has never been put to song. >> reporter: and do you relate to feminist, badass warriors? >> i think so. i think that, you know, we all probably came from her. >> reporter: maybe that's where arooj aftab came from. where she's taking her audience is somewhere new. i'm tom casciato for the pbs newshour in brooklyn, new york.

>> woodruff: on the newshour online right now, a family-owned louisiana grocery store open for 107 years has weathered numerous storms. but damage from hurricane ida has the community wondering whether this local staple can bounce back. that's on our website, pbs.org/newshour. and that's the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. join us online and again here tomorrow eveng. for all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you, please stay safe, and we'll see you soon. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> the landscape h changed, and not for the last time. the rules of business are being reinvented, with a more flexible workforce, by embracing innovation, by looking not only at current opportunities, but ahead to future ones. resilience is the ability to

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hello westbound everyone and well to amanpour and company. here's what's coming up. let me tell you about negotiating. at the end, that's when you really have to weigh in. >> build back bust, frantic talks to save president biden's sweeping agenda go down to the wire. how will the standoff end and what does it mean for everyday americans then. >> there are no words that can fully express the fury and overwhelming sadness. >> a british woman's horrific murder reignites focused on violence against women worldwide. why is advice from uk police sparking outrage and. growing up with