captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> woodruff: good evening. i'm judy woodruff. on the newshour tonight: election day. voters head to the polls in crucial off-year contests that may hold clues for next year's nationwide congressional and senate races. then, getting the vaccine. a c.d.c. advisory committee votes to recommend pfizer shots for children as young as five, but many american parents remain skeptical. and, the tipping point. world leaders convene to address the increasingly urgent threat of climate change-- but china's absence looms large. >> we cannot achieve these global climate goals unless china is able to reverse its emissions trends. >> woodruff: all that and more, on tonight's pbs newshour.

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>> the john s. and james l. knight foundation. fostering informed and engaged communities. more at kf.org. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions: and individuals. >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> woodruff: voters went to the polls today to cast ballots in a number of contests across the country. two are races for governor, in new jersey and virginia,

and the latter has especially captured national attention because of its closeness in a state that president biden won by ten points. to walk us through what to look for tonight, i'm joined by jessica taylor, senate and governors editor for the cook political report. jessica, very good to have you with us on this election day as the results are coming in and, in fact, we do have early exit numbers to look at but, before we do that, what has made this virginia contest as watchable as it's been and apparently as close as it is? >> well, this has been traditionally about what happens the year after a presidential election. going back to the '70s, typically, the opposite party that just won the white house typically wins this governor's race, except for in 2013 when terry mcauliffe broke that streak. he's trying to do that again. we have really seen a reflection of how things have soured for democrats in the biden administration. this is a state that biden won by ten points just a year ago.

his approval rating is now in the low 40s, and you have glenn youngkin, who is a businessman, he's helped self-fund his campaign. he's able to spend almost dollar for dollawhat democrats have in this race, and that hasn't happened since 2009, and this was the last time that a republican was elected statewide in virginia. and he's made this a referendum on education, on the economy, on, you know, when people are seeing high prices at the pump, when they go to the grocery store, they're seeing inflation, and that's really contributed to a sense of frustration. >> woodruff: as we mentioned, we are getting early exit polls again. the polls weren't closed yet. they weren't closed till 7:00, but let's look. here is a -- people were asked, what is your top issue? and we've got numbers here to show, economy 33%, education 24%

has not been an issue in virginia races, a top issue, anyway, taxes 16 and coronavirus 13%. what does this tell you. >> the coronavirus is the one that's most surprising to me because even a few months ago when we were talking about the delta surge, this is really what mcauliffe thought would set him apart. he's for mask mandates, vaccine mandates and they've tried to hammer that home. we've seen this dropping as an issue. we saw coronavirus really drop as an issue and education really spike. >> woodruff: speaking of education, there was one other exit question we want to share with our viewers in that the question to voters was how much say should parents have in the school curriculum. 53% said a lot. >> right. this was a turning point, i believe, in the race, when you'd ha, in the funeral debate between the two of them, mcauliffe was asked about a law in virginia that he vetoed that

would allow parents to opt out of sexually suggestive material that their children were reading, this was in response to ap history, english book beloved by toni morrison, and he responded by saying i don't think parents should be telling schools what to teach. that was a gift for youngkin, a sound byte they put up immediately, and democrats i talked to, mcauliffe took a while to respond to this. he finally went direct to camera to respond. we saw again like we're sealing in the polling and exit polling, education is sky rocketing asen issue. parents matter rallies has been his rallying cry. he's getting my crowds of them. >> woodruff: the republican campaign made a huge issue. let me ask you, jessica taylor, about new jersey, phil murphy, the democrat running for reelection has been a democratic state. what are we looking for there?

>> well, if he wins reelection, he would be the first democrat to win a second term since 1977. so a little history could be made, too. this one hasn't gotten as much in virginia. the polls have shown a high single digit or low double ticket lead over republican jack who has not been able to erase his name in state. murphy has good marks because of coronavirus, that's driving the race. >> reporter: in this year where former president trump has gotten so much of attention, how much a factor is he turning out to be? >> mcauliffe is hoping he is a factor and one that will motive democrats to come off the bench. this has been another key thing in the virginia race is that republicans are more engaged, they're more energized and, so, he has tried to paint youngkin as a trump acolyte. now trump endorsed him, said he accepts the endorsement and would back him if he is the nominee in 2024. it's hard to paint him as trump,

like,. he's a suburban dad that wears felicia, he doesn't tweet. mcauliffe hopes this energizes democrats the way it did in california in the recall but we'll see if that works. >> woodruff: embraces the ideas but tacking in another direction. you will be joining us with updates. >> yes. >> woodruff: thank you so much for the political report. we appreciate it. >> woodruff: in the day's other news, pfizer's covid vaccine for young children won approval from a c.d.c. advisory panel. the group endorsed a low-dose version for kids five to 11 years old. that sent the issue to c.d.c. director rochelle walensky for final approval. we will return to this, later in the program. world leaders at the u.n. climate summit pledged today to cut methane emissions and to conserve forests.

president biden wound up his two days at the glasgow gathering, focusing on america's role in the new initiatives. william brangham reports. >> it's one of the most potent greenhouse gases there is. it amounts to about half-- half the warming we're experiencing today. >> brangham: president biden, hoping to solidify america's role as a leader in the fight against climate change, joined the european union today to announce a proposed 30% reduction in methane emissions, worldwide, by 2030. methane which can come from agricultural production, doesn't last in the atmosphere as long as carbon dioxide, but it traps far more heat than co-2. controlling its release is considered one of the quickest ways to slow the pace of climate change. the president also formally announced a plan to cut back on u.s. methane emissions by targeting the oil and gas industries, which are a major source.

his proposal includes two new rules to be enforced by the environmental protection agency and the department of transportation. another new global commitment made today was on deforestation. these forests, sometimes described as “the lungs of the planet,” serve as enormous reservoi for carbon. over 100 countries, including the u.s., china, and russia pledged to stop cutting them down by 2030. promises like this have been made before, but often not kept. this initiative covers about 85% of the world's forests, and would provide financial support for conservation and restoration, as well as aid for indigenous peoples who rely on them. meanwhile, amidst the pledges and promises from world leaders, legendary documentary filmmaker sir david attenborough hoped that the current impacts of a warming world would stir even greater action. >> perhaps the fact that the people most affected by climate change are no longer some imagined future generation,

but young people alive today... perhaps that will give us the impetus we need to rewrite our story. >> brangham: for the pbs newshour, i'm william brangham. >> woodruff: and in ethiopia today, the government declared a six-month state of emergency. rebels from tigray province have captured key towns and are now threatening addis ababa, the country's capital. the u.s. is warning the rebels not to besiege the city. facebook has announced that it's shutting down its facial recognition system over growing privacy concerns. the system automatically identifies users in photos and videos. the company says it will delete the faceprints of more than one billion people, by december. yahoo is the latest tech company to leave china, citing growing restrictions. government censors had already blocked many of yahoo's services. the professional networking site linkedin shut down its operations in china last month. lawyers in kenosha, wisconsin,

began making their cases today in the trial of kyle rittenhouse. he is charged with killing two men and wounding a third amid protests and violence after police shot a black man in 2020. prosecution and defense depicted rittenhouse as either acting to protect himself, or looking for trouble, as they made opening statements. >> the evidence will show that hundreds of people were out on the street experiencing chaos and violence, and the only person who killed anyone was the defendant, kyle rittenhouse. >> it isn't a "who done it?", "when did it happen?", or anything like that. it is, "was kyle rittenhouse's actions privileged, under the law of self-defense?" >> woodruff: rittenhouse is now 18. if convicted, he could face life in prison. the u.s. justice department sued today to block a giant merger in book publishing. penguin random house, the

nation's largest publisher, wants to buy simon and schuster for $2.2 billion. the suit says the new company would have too much power, hurting authors and readers. and on wall street, the dow jones industrial average gained 138 points to close above 36,000 for the first time. the nasdaq rose 53 points. the s&p 500 added 17. still to come on the newshour: election workers from across the country share the threats they face for doing their job. why some parents remain resistant to getting their children the covid vaccine. the pandemic's effect on the mental health of millions of college students. plus, much more.

>> woodruff: democrats in congress have spent the past several days working towards passing the build back better and infrastructure packages. lisa desjardins joins me now, for an update on negotiations. so, hello again, lisa. >> reporter: hey. >> woodruff: back at it again. >> reporter: yes. >> woodruff: give us what the latest is. does it look as if there's going to be action this week? >> reporter: this is an important day. i'm going to say something i haven't been able to say in these many months of covering these two bills, i think it is possible and maybe likely that we'll see a final bill of this week and a build back better draft this week. the build back better bill, as we have been describing it, includes universals pre-k, childcare, housing, also includes major climate legislation, health provisions. the infrastructure bill, that's the bipartisan bill, has money for roads, bridges and replacing

lead pipes around the country and broadband. so why now? this has been hung up for so long, there has been a shift in particular among house progresses who wanted to wait for the senate to take a full vote on build back better before passing the infrastructure bill. let me try and tick off what's happened here a little bit more clearly. house progressives now say they are on board the current framework, not a full bill yet, but the framework, as a minimum starting point for this bill, they think anything the senate adds, will expand it. previously they wanted a guarantee that senators sinema and manchin, the conservative democrats would get on board. there's not that guarantee. they say they're trusting pesident biden to get the votes. turning point last week, a meeting between kyrsten sinema of arizona and the progressive leader of the housing pramila jayapal. it's now lo -- now moving ahead.

>> woodruff: we're all sitting back watching. >> reporter: yes. >> woodruff: one piece of this with an interesting set of developments, prescription drug prices. >> reporter: i want to report on a deal that emerged today on prescription drug prices. first, they have agreed, democrats amongst themselves, a $35 a month cap on insulin, very significant. also, future drug prices for everyone would be capped to inflation. medicare would be able to start negotiating just on tn drugs to start, but that would include some to have the most expensive ones. a lot of fine print in this deal, other issues open -- immigration, climate, we will be talking about this more -- but things are starting to happen. >> woodruff: maybe this is a turning point. >> reporter: we'll see. >> woodruff: lisa desjardins, thank you. >> reporter: you're welcome.

>> woodruff: the ripple effects from president trump's accusations of voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election are still being felt today. our pbs newshour/npr/marist poll this week found that more than four in five american adults believe that the future of american democracy is under serious threat. and, several local and state workers who administer elections throughout the country continue to receive threats. stephanie sy will have our look at what consequences may result from that. but first, we hear from election officials who shared with us what they have been experiencing. i am jess kirk, election supervisor in barker county georgia. >> i'm natalie adona, assistant county clerk recorder for the county of nevada, california. >> i'm claire, the executive director to have the city of milwaukee election commission. >> my name is michelle caru, the outgoing elections administrator

for hood county, texas. i have been working in elections for 14-plus years. while attending the election commission meeting back in july, it was a two-hour-long meeting. the public was allowed to come in and speak and talk about things that they felt like i was not doing correctly as an elections adinistrator. they questioned my integrity as an elections administrator. >> there is no election integrity because she hasn't done her due diligence to make sue she has a good working relationship with the republican party. >> i had a phone call after the 2020 presidential election before the january runoff from someone from a different state who called to inform me how horrible of a person i was, how, you know, i was letting the country down because she wasn't happy with the results of the election in a county that her candidate won by a large margin. >> in the course of several days, i ended up receiving over 150 threats, many of which were death threats, many of which called me some pretty heinous

words, and also had voice mails telling me i deserved to go before a firing squad. >> i also had, you know, some voters on the phone who were not so kind, one that sort stands out in my mind in particular had been upset because california's identification law does not require us to ask voters for photo i.d. all of the time. he was upset that i followed the law and when i told him that, you know, my job is to follow the laws and, you know, here are all the safeguards that are in place for us to identify any voter fraud, he lost his temper with me, he told me that, you know, the nazis also followed the laws blindly and how could i live with myself. that was really hard to hear. >> so i had a lot of people ask

me, michele, why are you leaving? why now? my is answer is i just don't want to do this anymore. i don't want to be a part of these unfounded truths, these constant lies, the constant scrutiny. >> i'm a mother of two small children. it definitely scared my husband, it scares my parents, but i truly love my job, and i have to push forward because it is a field that i love. a part of me thinks the intention of these threats is to get election officials to leave their jobs. >> staff the january election, i was having panic attacks in e morning. you know, maybe not for months, but they were definitely for a couple of months because i had been under such pressure for such a long time, that coming out the other side of it almost didn't feel real and then going back to this election site, i was nervous. >> we want to be able to give voters the information that they

need and, also, to give our staff maybe a little bit more assurae that we are doing everything that we can to help protect them. >> we've improved security in our office so that all our staff feel safe coming to work, myself included. >> for the first time i'm including poll worker safety in training sessions or reaching out in a different way to local law enforcement to make sure that we have the resources we need and protection we need if we need it. >> we don't want any type of applause. we are not looking for that. we just want people to know, your vote counted, it was counted fairly, your vote was cast and you were represented well. >> those are just a >> sy: those are just a few of the election officials around the country facing verbal attacks and death threats from americans unhappy with election results.

joining me now to discuss this more is tammy patrick, senior advisor the democracy fund's elections program. she is also a former official in the elections department of maricopa, county, arizona. ms. patrick, thanks for joining the newshour. ms. patrick, thank you so much, as always, for joining the "newshour". you heard it, voice mails, text messages where people are threatening election officials lives, even their children's lives. it seems beyond the pale. is this something you ever experienced as an election official? >> happy election day. thankfully it wasn't something that i experienced in my more than a decade of being a local election official, but i will tell you that this is something i have been hearing more and more frequently in the last six, seven, eight, nine months, and far too often we're getting targeted of the election officials that conducted that election freely and fairly, and this is absolutely exemplary of what i'm hearing from all across

the country, in places where the former president won, in places where the current president won. >> you're hearing about election officials of all levels either quitting or retiring out of just these threats worrying them and their families. what do you worry will be the consequence of that? >> so vacancies in and of themselves are pretty common. however, we're seeing a systemic rise in the number of vacancies because people are retiring early, they are leaving the job that they love because of the pressure and the mental toll that it's taking on them. this can cause a problem because of a loss of both institutional knowledge for professionals, and then we also have the double problem in this moment of election professionals being replaced bipartisan actors. so individuals that will be filling those vacancies with ulterior motives in mind. >> reporter: in the subtext of what you're saying there, tammy,

is those partisan actors may actually have integrity issues. so what are the solutions? there have been attempts by democratic lawmakers in particular to pass legislation that would increase protections for election workers. the department of justice has formed a task force. is any of that going to work to stop these threats? >> it's going to take all of us. it's going to take accountability all throughout the system, so whether it's the federal government having task forces to hold people accountable in this moment or bar associations holding lawyers accountable or voters holding their own elected representatives accountable at the ballot box, it's going to take all of us to make sure that we get our democracy back on track. as we go into today's election, we know many local races are up for grabs today. as we move into 2022, there are even more local elections that will be held.

so secretaries of state that are running on platforms that the 2020 election was illegitimate or stolen need to be held accountable. >> reporter: well, also election day, tammy, as you mentioned, and there's this close governor race in virginia where the republican candidate there has brought up election integrity, so to speak. do you see today in that race a test or harbinger of what may be coming in the midterms next year or even the presidential election after that in 2024? >> all the elections we've seen so far this year including the california recall election are all giving us an indication of what to suspect in the future. so we've seen candidates both in california and in virginia calling into question the legitimacy of an election if they were to lose. that is not only playing out at the the state level statewide, but we're seeing that narrative also be used by candidates in local races. so calling into question the

ability for anyone to fairly lose an election. >> reporter: tammy patrick with the democracy fund, thank you so much. >> thank you for having me. >> woodruff: with the c.d.c. approval of a children's covid vaccine expected shortly, parents will be able to get first doses for their children in the next few days. but, a kaiser family foundation survey found only 27% of parents say they are eager to get the shot. one third say they will wait for now, and another 30% say they definitely will not get it for their children. we wanted to hear more about how parents see this, and what they need to know. william brangham gets the perspective of a top pediatrician. but first, here's what parents told us. >> for us, the whole time, vaccines have been the key to being able to get back to some

sense of normalcy. and especially with her being an only child, it's been really hard to not be around other people. we're at that point where it's like, okay, as soon as she can get vaccinated, we're going. like, she's going to be the first in line. >> i just don't think it's a choice i would make. i just don't think it's within their self-interest. i think that we have gone a bit too far, as a society, because of the pandemic and setting precedents to take away personal liberties. >> put aside all of these issues of concern about liberty and personal liberties, and realize we have a common enemy, and that enemy is the virus. >> it is the atmosphere that people areoming from, that liberties are not as important, when it's one of our unalienable rights per the declaration of independence. >> there's a lot that's unknown with long covid. and i know even some kids have been affected by it. obviously, i don't want that

for my child, so i want to get her vaccinated as quickly as possible. >> i would say i'm a vaccine- hesitant parent. i'm concerned about myocarditis in young children, especially having a boy, and i also think the risk to children is low if they do get covid. so i'm just very cautious, and it's not something i'm going to jump into. >> i'm still on the fence. i probably will end up doing it, but i'm worried about the small group of kids, the kids in the trial. and they're kind of just guessing based on what happened with the older group, with the myocarditis and whatnot. my husband's family has heart issues. so, worried that's going to pass on to my kids. but then again, you know, if they got covid, there's a, you know, a really big chance that they could also have heart issues. so, it's-- i don't know. >> we plan to vaccinate our

>> i actually can't wait for them to get vaccinated. i tried to get them in trials to get vaccinated, and we already are on the waitlist at the pediatrician's office. the kids play covid. they're playing a covid testing clinic, which they do every week in school now, and i know that with the shot or with getting the covid vaccination, they won't get as sick if they get covid or one of the variants, and they are much less likely to die. >> so, we plan to vaccinate our seven-year-old, because he has several life-threatening food allergies, which means that he is more likely to have to visit the emergency department whenever he has the anaphylaxis reaction. having him vaccinated, means that when he does have to go to the hospital, that's taking one of two major concerns off the table for us. what was his probable exposure to covid? he could potentially react to the vaccine as an allergic reaction. i guess the other potential concern that i think about is, we really don't know the long-term effects or side effects of this vaccine, because

we don't have that longitudinal data quite yet. >> i think i'm going to postpone just for a little bit, and not do it right away, just so i know what numbers are coming in and what's happening in the now. for me and my husband, had no hesitation about getting vaccinated. but for them, i mean, like, of course i want to protect them. i need to know more. >> because my daughter has a complex medical history, she's very small, and she's also at high risk. and so, one of our concerns is whether her small size, being more like the size of a three-year-old, would impact in any way the safety or her eligibility, even to get the vaccine. >> brangham: so these kind of concerns and questions are what pediatricians and other medical professionals will likely hear about in the days ahead. we are going to try to answer some of them now. dr. yvonne maldonado is chair of the american academy of pediatrics' committee on infectious diseases. and she has been a principal investigator in the pfizer vaccine trials.

she gets no payments from pfizer. dr. maldonado, very good to have you on the "newshour". i loved hearing from all the different parents and i want to dive right into some of their questions. a combination of questions here. one parent expressed a concern that there were too few kids in the trials and that then when you start vaccinating potentially tens of millions of kids that new problems could crop up. another parent expressed the concern that, well, we haven't been vaccinating for that long so what happens if a year from now,two years from now could a problem come up, what about those concerns? >> well, thank you for those questions, and it's natural for a brand-new virus and a new vaccine that people will have questions, and i think the first thing i would likto say is that the american academy of pediatrics which represents 67,000 pediatricians around the country has been really keeping up to date around the facts about covid, about covid vaccines, and pediatricians around the country are waiting

anxiously to answer questions for parents. so i think, for vaccine hesitant families, it's really important to contact your providers. if you don't have a private provider, your public health provider will be happy to answer questions for you. so this is a natural fear of a new disease that we're seeing. but regarding the clinical trials, the number of people enrolled, the number of children enrolled is about the same and sometimes a little higher than other vaccines for children. and in context of the other age groups that have been studied, we've already seen hundreds of millions of doses given to older children and adults. so we have a very good sense of how these vaccines work, what the safety is like and what the effectiveness is and, in particular now, what this particular set of studies did is really put a fine point on what happens specifically with this age group, and what we saw was that the side effects, the

effectiveness, all of that is very similar if not better in some cases than what we saw in older children and adults. and, so, regarding the vaccine itself, the platform itself has been around for decades, so we know that this vaccine itself will disintegrate as soon as the immune response is elicited, it is gone, eliminated from the body, and there really is no risk at this point that we can see for side effects long term. however, we will need to study this vaccine like we studied any other vaccine for long-term impacts. and to date, with all of our safety systems in the u.s., we have not seen long-term impacts from vaccines that we've used in children before. >> reporter: so that's certainly good news for parents listening to this. what about the issue of myocarditis, the inflammation of the muscle of the heart? we've seen it in some rare instances with younger males who had been vaccinated. any data that that's a problem

for this younger group of kids? >> well, we really don't have that data because, as you probably know, the risk is highest in boys and in young adult men, and the risk is really highest in about 16 to 17-year-old boys, at the rate of about 70 per million doses given in that age group. it's much lower in all other age groups. so even in that age groups, it's about one in 10,000 boys in that group. in other age groups, the risk is exceedingly low, and we couldn't obviously see any signals in the children who were studied here because this was well under a million children who have been studied. but the risk seems to mirror what we see for natural myocarditis, which is caused by viruses and bacteria and parasites in all age groups with, and it mirrors the same incidence -- the same curve that we see in natural myocarditis.

and this age group, at least for background myocarditis from other causes is actually quite low. >> reporter: what about the concern that some parents have expressed that, one, i don't want my children to get long covid. what do we know about that? on the flip side of that, though, you also do hear parents say, well, it sounds like kids don't generally get that sick from covid, so why do i need to vaccinate them? what would you say to parents who expressed that? >> let me start with that first because we have, since last year, we heard a lot of misinformation spread nationally that, a, kids didn't get infected, b, they didn't spread disease and, c, they didn't get sick if they did get infected. that's absolutely false. in our children's hospital and children's hospital around the country, children have been admitted to the hospital, put on ventilators, they have died, it is not something that you want to happen, especially if you have a safe and preventable approach to this disease. now, so far, we've seen almost

2 million children infected in this alien group of five to eleven with thousands, 8,300 hospitalizations in this age group, and very severe cases in at least 2,500 with 94 deaths. >> reporter: all right, dr. yvonne maldonado -- >> it has been qite a severe disease, and i would say that the risks of immediate impact are much more important, and that was expressed today at the meeting. every single person who spoke said, a, that they would vaccinate or have vaccinated their own kids and, b, that the risks of this disease -- and we've all seen it -- far outweigh any potential short-term problems. the long-term issues we will continue to follow for long covid, but it looks like the risk of long covid is subtle and we won't really know for some time. >> reporter: dr. yvonne maldonado, thank you so much for being here. >> it's a pleasure. thank you.

>> woodruff: despite world leaders from more than 100 countries being in attendance at the u.n. climate conference, one significant figure is absent: china's xi jinping, president of the globe's largest polluter. without china, efforts to fight climate change will likely be in vain. and, reducing china's reliance on coal is key. we've now got two looks. in a moment, we'll hear from special correspondent patrick fox in northern china. but first, here's nick schifrin. >> schifrin: in china, it is the best of times... and it is the worst of times. beijing produces more solar power, more wind power, and more electric cars than any country in the world. but china also produces more greenhouse gases than the rest of the industrialized world combined. >> there's schizophrenia there-- that there is both an investment in the future, in exactly the kind of technologies that are going to be needed to build a sustainable economic engine for

their country; at the same time, clinging to some of the vestiges of the past. >> schifrin: pete ogden is the vice president for energy and climate for the u.n. foundation. he was president obama's climate director when obama and chinese president xi jinping, representing the world's two largest emitters, agreed to climate collaboration. that produced the 2015 paris climate accords' pledge to reduce emissions enough to limit global warming to 2 degrees celsius. ( cheers and applause ) climate experts say beijing has met its paris promises. beijing's poured billions into electric cars, and the world's largest network of electric buses. by 2060, it hopes renewable energy provides 80% of the country's power. beijing wanted to clean up notorious air pollution. but that wasn't the only motivation. >> i think clean energy is not just about the environment. clean energy is an economic strategy for the country, and we really see the government prioritizing clean energy

industries as strategic to china's economy, to its overall economic transition. >> schifrin: joanna lewis directs georgetown's science, technology and international affairs program, and has studied china's climate policies for decades. she says beijing believed green technology could help achieve long-term growth. and xi jinping wanted to be seen as a green leader. china pledges to achieve carbon neutrality by 20, and peak all emissions before 2030. but u.s. special envoy for climate john kerry said this summer, 2030 is too late. >> if china sticks with its current plan and does not peak its emissions until 2030, then the entire rest of the world would have to go to zero-- zero!-- by 2040 or even 2035. it knocks at least a decade off the timeline for the rest of the world to decarbonize. and that, my friends, sets a goal that currently is impossible to achieve.

>> schifrin: this week in glasgow, xi jinping is a no-show, as are any new chinese pledges, or details on how it will achieve previous pledges, says ogden. >> the chinese announcement, however, failed to include much that was really new. we just really need to see much more information about-- about-- about what they're going to take, how those steps are going to be taken in the near term. >> schifrin: back at home, beijing is taking backward steps by increasing-- not decreasing-- its reliance on coal. greenpeace says this year, provincial governments approved at least two dozen new coal plants. coal still provides more than half the country's power. >> the reason why we do see china sticking with coal and just having a difficult time moving away from coal is because it is such a fundamental part of the-- the economy. these are obviously powerful it's a huge bor source for the country. these are obviously powerful companies, in terms of setting

policy. >> schifrin: climate activists hailed xi jinping's september pledge not to fund new overseas coal plants, and chinese domestic reliance on coal has dropped from a peak of 72%. but ijing still requires coal to fuel its short-term growth. and that means beijing's emissions could get worse before they get better. >> we cannot achieve these global climate goals unless china is able to reverse its emissions trends. >> schifrin: chinese officials say their transition from coal will not be rushed. as one put it, “you cannot ask a person to go on a climate diet while he is still starving.” and chinese coal has a legacy, that goes back centuries-- even in the places going green. >> reporter: this is patrick fok, 150 miles west of beijing in northern china. as you approach by train, wind turbines stretch along the dry terrain for asar as the eye can see. but this is datong, also known as china's coal capital. coal mining here dates back around 1,500 years.

and as the country's economy opened up in the late 1970s, industrial mining took off, fuelling china's boom. >> ( translated ): conditions for workers today are much more comfortable than before. the work is not so tiring, after mechanization. the underground environment is not so bad. >> reporter: wang hongwei is a retired mine worker in his 60s, and part of veral generations from datong that have lived off the coal produced here. his son's followed in his footsteps. shanxi province, where datong is, has a total of around 950 mines, and according to 2018 figures from the world bank, employed close 900,000 people. as part of efforts to tackle climate change, china has ramped taking off-line some of its dirtiest coal-powered plants, and sending workers to newer, renewable energy efforts. >> ( translated ): the mountains and fields are covered with solar power. it will definitely be better in the near future than it is now. the state will surely send its employees to other projects or

factories. for those of us who are retired, it doesn't matter. we'll just stay at home and get a state pension. >> reporter: still, those working the mines today aren't exactly fretting. as china struggles to shake off its coal addiction, there's no sign of the jobs drying up, just yet. all over datong, you can see china's massive efforts to switch to renewable energy. there are solar farms and wind turbines dotted all over the landscape here, and yet at the same time, it is furiously ramping up coal production. in 2020 alone, the country brought 38.4 gigawatts of new coal-fired capacity into operation. that's more than three times the amount built in the rest of the world over the same period, and enough to power about a fifth of the whole country. environmentalists like li shuo, who's a carbon emissions and energy specialist for greenpeace, say china's insatiable demand for non- renewable energy will make it difficult for it to meet its goal of net zero emissions by 2060.

>> reporter: last month, authorities also called on mines to boost coal production by nearly 100 million tons, as it battles a power crunch that's threatened to derail china's recovery from the coronavirus pandemic. president xi jinping pledged earlier this year that coal consumption would peak by 2025. but drastic reliance on the fuel source to meet energy demands has raised questions over whether he can stick to that promise.

>> reporter: and for the people of datong, there's another discussion to be had, about their livelihoods, when the coal industry does one day crumble. but for now, that day is nowhere near, as china's coal reliance continues. for the pbs newshour, i'm patrick fok, in datong. >> schifrin: and i'm nick schifrin. >> woodruff: college is a time of major transition and stress. add in the pandemic, and colleges are left struggling to cope with ever-increasing levels of mental distress among students. john yang looks at the problem, and what can done on and off campus, for our series, "rethinking college." >> yang: judy, a study this year by the american college health

association found that 48% of college students reported moderate or severe psychological stress. 53% reported being lonely, and one in four had considered suicide. many college campuses are scrambling to expand and rethink the ways they help students cope with mental health concerns. riana elyse anderson is an assistant professor of health behavior and health education at the university of michigan. thanks for being with us. this year i think really got a lot of attention nationally when the university of north carolina had sort of a mental health break for students after there were two apparent suicides. but you study this issue, you teach young people on a college campus. what do you see -- talk about your personal experience to sort of give our viewers a sense of this issue. >> sure. we know over the past year we've watched stress, anxiety and depression go up about four-fold for everyone and that absolutely includes our young folks.

so whether these are pediatric populations or the collegiate population, we're watching this number just balloon, and that's on top of what we saw even as a pattern even before covid. so we're watching college students really get impacted by the comparison that they're seeing in their classmates, online and social media that they're using comparison and feeling particularly anxious about it for themselves. >> reporter: what were the factors before the pandemic? >> social media is one thing that has really ballooned in this past decade where children and adolescents are now college students who have been utilizing those strategies for the past several years now are starting to see, oh, that person got into college, this person scored this on this exam, whereas before you could only look as far as the cafeteria, right, you didn't know what was happening nationwide. but now you have this greater comparison and it's really impacting one's well being. >> reporter: is there a sense of generational difference that young people now are perhaps

more concerned about mental health issues? >> a wonderful article just came out looking at even the generation like myself which is just one above the millennials who really started thinking about mental health a bit differently than our generation before us. we're starting to see now that generational divide in the gen-zers who are staking a claim and saying i have to see a counselor rather than go to class or work and that's something our generation or above never thought to do, never thought possible. so, on the one hand, what a wonderful thing to do and have the autonomy to say. it's another thing to say when collegiate professors like myself are saying what do we do? how do we contend with teaching, meeting, doing the things we need to do for school to continue and meeting the needs of our students, so it's challenging for us to contend with that. >> reporter: are there differences along racial,

ethnic, socioeconomic lines, thinking particularly first generation college students whose families may not be prepared to help them through this? >> certainly covid has impacted that, so we're seeing this dual impact of not only the resources that have been impacted by covid but the socioeconomic and racial disparity. so you're watching folks who perhaps didn't have the access, the tablets, the technology to do the work from home or perhaps they didn't want to show their screens so that's lessening the amount of time on screen, they're feeling less connected to folks, and now that they're back into a college setting, the, the year impacted them. they are finding out how to find community and are exposed to some things they weren't exposed to last year like discrimination or ejection so they're contending with lots of things that are unique to them relatie to their classmates. >> reporter: how can colleges

help students deal with this. and you talk about students being more willing to seek help, are they willing being a little overwhelmed or finding greater demand than they have the supply for? >> absolutely, so you said it well, and the ways we can combat that are prevention and intervention strategies. so with respect to what you just said, the cap services or counseling and psych services most universities have, if we know what these numbers are, we can plan accordingly and make sure that we have referrals in the community, we can expand the number of people on staff, so intervention strategies, once we know that mental health problems are bubbling over, can be something that we can do. but we can also engage in prevention strategies, that is can we reduce the amount of assignments that we're giving, can we take more days like unc did as a community so that no one's e-mailing. it's not just you saying i'm going to take an individual day. your proffers, your administration, no one is emailing or expecting anything from you so we can prevent some of the problems we're seeing in

the first place. >>eporter: riana elyse anderson from the university of michigan, thank you very much. >> thank you. >> woodruff: now we hear from brandon dennison, a sixth- generation west virginian who is on a mission to revitalize appalachia. his community-based non-profit, coalfield development, has trained over 1,200 people facing barriers to employment, helping with education and personal development. dennison gives his "brief but spectacular" take on rebuilding the appalachian economy, and making it sustainable in the process. >> i think appalachia holds a special place in, sort of, the hearts and minds of many americans. we're in touch with our landscape. we live modestly. we live within our means. and, we try to take care of one another. a lot of times, maybe, folks think of appalachia culture as backwards, but in many ways, i think we have a lot of the skills and assets and attributes

that are going to be needed to thrive in a complex modern, climate change-challenged world. >> i grew up in oana, west virginia. it's not-- not technically incorporated as a town, but it is a place on a map. the burden of-- of poverty and struggling to survive, it's a lot to overcome. and that's the kind of poverty we have to overcome here in appalachia. coal just dominates in southern west virginia. it's more than economically. it's politically, and it's culturally. it's our sense of identity. we're proud to have powered this country's development for generations. but on the other hand, i think it holds us back, to be told, time and time again, that you're just this one thing. being so dependent on one industry is just not a good strategy. it made me realize that we-- we basically had to reinvent our economy here in southern west virginia to be diversified. it's not enough to just provide

services for people who are in poverty. we really have to create and cultivate opportunities that can change the trajectory of a life. i started coalfield development. my best friend from high school joined me. we were completely happy to be in one county, with one construction crew, helping to break down barriers that hold people in generational poverty. we've trained over 1,200 people now; we've helped start more than 50 new businesses. and it makes me realize that i think appalachia is hungry for a newer, better, more fair economy. a job is the main hook. we pay 33 hours a week of paid work. it's a real job. but six hours a week, our folks are in the community college classroom working towards an associate's degree, and three hours a week, we do what's called personal development. when we think out transitioning our economy from dirty fossil fuels to clean renewable fuels, a lot of times

coal country is thought of as collateral damage in that transition. actually, i think appalachian people have the hands-on skills that are going to be needed to retool our economy to be truly sustainable. we like to make stuff and fix stuff and grow stuff, and those are the hands-on skills that are going to be needed to retrofit buildings, to be energy- efficient. so, i think appalachia has a lot to offer, and we can actually lead the way in building a new and more fair and more just economy, rather than my name is brandon dennison, and this is my "brief but spectacular" take on rebuilding the appalachian economy from the ground up. >> woodruff: such a great program. and you can watch all our "brief but spectacular" episodes at www.pbs.org/newshour/brief. and that is the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. join us online, and again here tomorrow evening. for all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you, please stay safe, and we'll see you soon.

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♪ hello and welcome to "amanpour & company." here's what's coming up. >> this is a moment of truth and we really have to step up, my interview with the european commission president ursula von der leyen who tells me why the cop26 climate summit is make or break for planet earth. >> it's hard to exaggerate the scale of the crisis. >> a looming climate catastrophe. i speak to scottish leader nicola sturgeon about the troubling gap between rhetoric and real action. then. >> we want to exist 100 years from now. >> on the front line of climate change in the caribbean. barbados prime minister mia mottley fear are for her nation as the temperature rises. >> in the '70s