captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> nawaz: good evening. i'm amna nawaz. judy woodruff is away. on the newshour tonight: new covid guidance. as rising omicron cases keep many at home, we explain the new c.d.c. recommendations around shorter isolation times. then, crackdown in russia. the government bans the most prominent human rights group, as the world marks 30 years since the dissolution of the soviet union. and, rising costs. how the roller coaster price of lumber might have predicted inflation and could signal where the economy goes from here. >> no one has ever seen $700. that was pretty astonishing. but then it went to $800, $900, and $1,000. >> nawaz: all that and more, on night's pbs newshour.

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>> 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. >> nawaz: questions about quarantines and testing are growing tonight, as the omicron wave of covid-19 keeps building. in new york, the nation's largest public school system has announced beefed-up testing, in a bid to keep classrooms open. mayor bill de blasio says entire

classrooms won't have to stay home when a student is infected. instead, those who have no symptoms, and test negative, don't have to quarantine. >> this guarantees more consistency in their education. it guarantees fewer disruptions, which parents have rightfully said have been a tremendous challenge for them. >> nawaz: we'll focus on >> nawaz: the c.d.'s director said the agency is not considering any recommendation the vaccine mandate for domestic flights. we'll focus on the c.d.c.'s recall of shorter quarantines later. snr after the news summary. police in the denver area are investigating what sparked a mass shooting last night that left five people dead, including the gunman. the shooter killed three people in the central part of the city, then drove to nearby lakewood, where he killed another person. he died later, after a shootout with police. three other people were wounded, including a police officer. the family of a 14-year-old los angeles girl demanded justice today, after

police accidentally shot and killed her last week. valentina orellana-peralta was in a clothing store when a man began attacking customers. police shot and killed him, but also shot and killed the girl in her dressing room. today, the family, from chile, held a news conference. the teen's mother tearfully described her last moments. >> ( translated ): we heard some screams. we sat down and hugged, and started praying. when something impacted my daughter valentina, it threw us on the floor, and she died in my arms. and there was nothing i could do. there was nothing i could do. ( crying ) >> nawaz: police have released an edited version of body camera and other video. the family is demanding that more video be released. the congressional committee investigating the january assault on the u.s. capitol has struck a deal with the biden white house regarding trump-era documents. the white house counsel's office says lawmakers will defer a

request for some of the material. presidential aides had warned its release could compromise national security or executive privilege. former president trump is asking the u.s. supreme court to block release of any documents. the pacific northwest shivered through anotr day of frigid cold, as an arctic storm grips the region. officials have declared emergencies in portland and seattle, where the low was 17 degrees on monday-- the coldest on record. warming centers are now open for those who could be in danger. >> it's going to be, you know, four or five days before we get above freezing again. so, you ow, this is not a short event. this is going to take a while. and the longer it goes on, the harder it's going to be on people that they don't have a place to get out of this. >> nawaz: to the south, travel remains treacherous in parts of northern california and nevada, where snow has broken records for december. at least 38 people were killed in sudan today, when a gold mine

collapsed. it happened near a village that is 435 miles south of khartoum, the country's capital city. the mining company says the site was inactive, but local miners had returned to work it once security guards left the area. in russia, the national supreme court has ordered a leading human rights organization to shut down. the court ruled today that "memorial" acted as a foreign agent. prosecutors claimed the group falsely painted the soviet union as a terrorist state. also today, authorities detained allies of alexei navalny, the imprisoned opposition leader. we'll return to all of this, later in the program. prosecutors in hong kong have filed a new charge against jimmy lai, the jailed founder of a pro-democracy newspaper. the paper was shut down last june, and lai was accused today of sedition. he already faced other charges for violating a national security law imposed by mainland china. back in this country, the s. housing boom shows no sign of weakening. home prices in october jumped more than 18% from a

year earlier. that was down slightly from september's growth rate, and economists do expect price hikes to slow furthenext year. and on wall street, the dow jones industrial average gained 95 points to close at 36,398. the nasdaq fell 89 points. the s&p 500 slipped four points. still to come on the newshour: new crackdowns in russia, as the country marks 30 years since the fall of the u.s.s.r. looking at the roots and potential solutions to homelessness. an exclusive look inside an iraqi shia paramilitary group with ties to iran. and much more.

>> nawaz: the centers for disease control and prevention is now recommending a shorter isolation period for anyone testing positive for covid-19, from ten days to five, if asymptomatic; followed by five days of mask-wearing around others. the new guidance comes as the u.s. is averaging more than 230,000 new cases per day. dr. mati hlatshwayo davis is the director of health at the city of st. louis' department of health. and she joins me now. dr. davis, welcome to the "newshour". thanks for making the time. it's a big change in guidance. we want to make sure it's clear to people, should they say if you te positive and have no symptoms, isolate for five days, wear a mask for five days. what do you do if you test positive and have symptoms of some kind? >> excellent question. the guidance has been clear to differentiate between asymptomatic and symptomatic but you've seen guidance around vaccination status, and for that

population of people, what we believe is that the second five-day period does not guarantee your local health department will clear you from isolation because you are still symptomatic, right, so you are allowed to leave after day five asymptomatic with a mask. tat is not the case if you are still symptomatic. >> nawaz: they've also issued new guidelines from the c.d.c. for anyone just exposed to the virus, if you come into contact with someone who tested positive for covid 19. they are saying, if you are exposed, and you are unvaccinated, they recommend five days of isolation plus five days of masking. if you have been vaccinated earlier, which means more than six months have passed since the time you were fully vaccinated with pfizer or moderna or more than two months for the johnson & johnson, five days of isolation and five days of masking. if you were vaccinated recently, fewer than six months pfizer and

mannered and fewer than two months j&j, no isolation recommend, they say ten days of masking, and if you have been boosted, no isolation and ten days of masking. a lotto keep up with. a lot of people are confused. ho uh are you making sure people in your community things and how are you implementing it? >> my background before the director of health for the city of st. louis, i am an infectious disease specialist and public health expert. you understand in my field that infectious diseases-volve over time which means the guidance is going to change over time. so what needs to happen is the leadership needs to do a good job of helping people to make those transition when they occur, so the confusion is warranted. the job, now, is on the c.d.c., on the federal government and on local health officials to make sure that people understand the science and can make that transition.

now, what's also a challenge is that, while i completely agree with the science, as the director of health of a major city, the implementation may take time because we need to do it in a way that is safe and effective for our populations and not every county or city hs the same level of suport measures to make sure that this is successful as the next. for example, my counterparts in new york are able to ramp up testing to support this because part of these guidelines do make the recommendation for testing at day five for certain populations. but if you come from a city or a county where the funds and the capabilities just aren't there for that level of testing, this may not be something that you can implement right away. there within lies the challenge. >> nawaz: does that mean you are not following the c.d.c. guidelines in st. louis right now? >> for me the c.d.c. is always who we go to as the trusted resource, but for me right now i have to have conversations with local, state and national

leaders around what this looks like. i have to take the time to responsibly look at the data they used to support this and then i have to make sure that those wrap around services are available. so we are at that stage right now. we just got the c.d.c. guidelines yesterday. i'm having those conversations and making sure we have everything available to be able to implement. >> nawaz: what do you think you're missing now? we've seen a lot of testing across the country. do you have tests you need now to implement this safely? >> absolutely, amna. testing has been something that alof us who advocate at the public health level have been asking for. in order to be able to really maximize and keep our population safe, we should have tests for any american, any household that requires them and especially for this leveof transition of guidelines, that would be the goal, and we've heard this from our leaders, we've heard this from dr. fauci, we've heard this across the line. in an ideal world that is where we would be.

unfortunately, we don't have that. so, unfortunately, the buck stops at the local government level where we have to make decisions about what's safest until we no we have that at a reasonable capacity. >> nawaz: overall missouri vaccination rates ae row across the state, i think only 53% of the populaon is fully vaccinated, about 62% have one shot. how concerned are you about omicron? where are you seeing it show up in your community? >> right, so we are currently in the same position as most of the country now where we are in a very concerning surge. we have seen a doubling of our case possivity rates in two weeks and we expect that level of increase within the next week or less. that level of rate of increase we have not seen throughout our time in the city. so what we know in the city of st. louis is we have two highly transmissible variants in omicron and delta in circulation at the same time and, as a public health officials, it is

important that the public understand the best tool in your toolbox to defend against this is vaccinating, being sure to have the ful vaccination series available, but also what we know is the greatest way to prevent a serious illness from the omicron variant specifically is to be boosted. so that is my number one challenge, but, again, it's an all hands on deck approach, so it's education around masking, social distancing, hand washing, staying home if sick, limiting social gatherings, and if you're going to engage them in a limited capacity, testing if you are engaging with people outside your household. that is what i am focused on in the city of st. louis and the glibs, making sure we have available support for the state to ramp up testing for the city of st. louis. >> nawaz: dr. davis, something we hear often from people when there is new guidance or they don't understand or it's on

fusing and requires unpacking is the guidance continues to change, as you mentioned pandemics are hard, things evolve, they follow the science, yet we are at a point where cases are surging and officials are saying this is a worrying new increase, you have to take it seriously, but at the same time we're going tbe loosennenning restrictions, and that is very confusing for a lot of people. what would you say to focus who hear that and think those are two very different messages? >> i would say in my position of leadership, there is no suh thing as loosening. if anything, this is an all hands on deck approach. i think people grab headlines. they hear five days and run with it. absolute not. this is about appropriate isolation and quarantine. this is about masking to the extent that you can, and we have seen -- i mean, you have seen it online where you live, i know it's happening where you live here, i think people have been complacent about it and that's an active part of the guidelines and it's about mitigation strategies. so where i am living, the

message is clear -- we are currently in a surge, you need to be considering all mitigation strategies to keep yourself and the community safe. we are not nearly where we need to be. our new normal is going to be difficult to get to if we do not do the best we can around vaccinations, boosting and appropriate education and messaging around these types of transitions that we've had to overcome during this pandemic. >> nawaz: that is dr. mati hlatshwayo davis, the director of the health at the city of st. louis department of health. thank you so much for being here. >> thank you for having me, amna. >> , russia ordered the russian human rights organization

closed. as nick schifrin reports, the ruling comes almost exactly 30 years after the fall of the soviet union and is part of the kremlin's battle over history. >> reporter: inside russia's supreme court the verdict was swift. russian judge ordered three decades of historical and human rights work "liquidated." outside, supporters of "memorial" yelled "there is no law." police showed whose law runs today's russia. memorial came together as the soviet union was falling apart. the late '80s, andrew sack rav teamed up with then soviet president mikheil gorbachev. the goal, document the truth about soviet repression and collect the memories of millions of people who were marched to their death and forced to work in soviet gulags, a history that

memorial says today's russia is trying to erase. >> all the branches of memorial were very active opposing the te attempts of authorities to forget about the repressions of soviet. >> reporter: this documents today's political prisoners including alexei navalny labeled the equivalent of al quaida. >> russia is mott a safe place now. we have seen the list of former governs or political leaders who have been recently arrested and these numbers are growing. >> reporter: memorial human rights tracks the unprecedented crackdown on russian civil society and media and itself expects to be shut down by the same court tomorrow. >> it sends a very clear signal to the other human rights organizations that they should be somehow more careful with what they say or what kind of compains they are one running and, of course, yeah, a lot of people interpret it in a way that the memory about

repressions has been targeted. >> reporter: gorbachev was willing to acknowledge the memories of the soviet repressions. it fit philosophies of openness and restructuring as he tried to restructure the soviet union. his efforts failed 30 years ago this past weekend, but christmas day 1991, he ended his presidency and with it the soviet union as well. years of pressure, pro democracy protests across eastern europe, the fall of the berlin wall, calls for economic reformdriven by miners all over the soviet union and calls for democracy from within the communist arty. but in 1991, yeltsin confronted gorbachev and in december yeltsin and the leaders of belarus and ukraine created the commonwealth of the states. today putin calls the union the century's greatest geopolitical catastrophe and blames the west

for rubbing salt in the wound. >> not one inch to the east is what we were told in the 190s, and we were duped. we didn't come to the borders of the u.s. or the u.k., you came to us. now you're telling us that ukraine will also be in n.a.t.o. >> reporter: putin frames today's crisis ton borders of ukraine where the u.s. has 100,000 russian troops are ready to invade. he demands nato reverse its own historical promises, and reject ukrainian membership. but in kiev, president volodimyr zelenskiy is trying to write a new future, with the west. >> ( translated ): ukraine's membership in nato is a matter between ukraine and the alliance and definitely not the choice of any other country anywhere in the world. >> schifrin: and joining me now from moscow is vladislav zubok, professor of international history at the london school of economics, and author most recently of "collapse: the fall of the soviet union." welcome to the newshour.

let's start with today's news. why do you think memorial international, and presumably tomorrow memorial human rights, are being targeted? >> memorial stands for the clear language of denunciation of stalinist and terrorists past to have the soiet state. for instance, vladimir putin got interested in history himself put in a very specific and instrumental way. he was particularly passionate about the story of the outbreak of the second world war and the responsibility of the soviet union for that outbreak. if you read the documents that memorial collected, you built a sort of a line that links the terror and the rise of stalinism to the rise of totalitarianism in europe and the outbreak of the war. and this is the story that the thorities don't like, and putin does not agree with. >> reporter: vladimir putin talks about the war often.

why is that competition for the narrative over world war ii so imrtant. >> he gradually and purposefully began to resurrect the symbols of heroic past, particularly zeroering in on the victory in the second world war, which he always calls the great patriotic war, meeting that unpleasant ep seed sewed in 1939 to 1941 where the soviet union was an ally of nazi germany, and millions of russians somehow ambivalent between realization, thanks to memorial, that it was a very costly war and the regime was enormously repressive and millions lost their reel lives and the fact that somehow it was instrumentallized and justified by the complete victory of 1945, and i think the leadership realizes this is sort of the last in the most important peg of which you can hang the new

identity, post-soviet identity, linking it to the old one and, at the same time, not completely returning to it. >> reporter: what do you believe the lessons are that putin has taken from the collapse of the soviet union and implemented throh his policies today? >> well, fers lesson that he learned was a fiscal and financial lesson, always have the money because you always need the money when some kind of economic or political crisis or just instability sets in. the second lesson i think you learn from gorbachev and yeltsin, never project the image of indecisiveness and inability to use power, and this is the image that gorbachev left, remarkably, among the russians because he had all the power, he just didn't use the power and he didn't know what to do with it. and, of course, never allow the opposition to speculate on the past of stalinist crimes and so on and so forth or on the

existing problems and, above all, never allow the opposition to find their lives in the west. this is what happened in 1991, you found amazing coalitions wen russian democrats and yeltsin at the time and for instance the american republican right in the united states and nationalists, ukrainian nationalists, and those transnational coalitions were used to devastatingly effectiveness to unseat gorbachev and putin is aware of this. >> reporter: how does that inform or connect to the kind of crackdown that we've seen even today against memorial? >> for him, it's a strategic problem. it's a struggle for european security order and, in this struggle, the past is a very important weapon. if you accept memorial's version, the soviet union and

russia as a successor to the soviet union must adopt the same kind of policy as germany adopted, always repenting, always asking for for forgiveneo everyone they invaded, repressed, so on and so forth, and, at the same time, sort of accepting a marginal and repentant position in the new european order, and this is what innocences him, i believe. he finds the history of stalin as a weapon in the arms of his enemies. >> reporter: where does that leave the west today? what should the west understand about the lessons that putin has taken from the end of the cold war? >> if you move n.a.t.o., you know, and declare that this n.a.t.o. would be inland forever, you have a conflict. the only kind of tool he sees is moving troops along the russian border and trying to send this

powerful signal to the west. >> reporter: ukrainian officials, today's u.s. government, western european and n.a.t.o. officials would say that it is today's russia that it is more aggressive by amassing the troops on ukraine's border and that it is putin's misinterpretation of history and, frankly, n.a.t.o.'s intentions today that has increased tensions? >> yes, and this is why putin became so interested in the history, tries to interpret history in his own way. so we all are in the battle of over the past, but i would say as his attorneys, let's continus continue to fight over the past rather than to fight on the ground, is what churchill or someone would famously say. >> reporter: vladislav zubok, thank you very much. >> great pleasure, thank you.

>> nawaz: home prices and rents have gone up this year, and that is in part because of the increase in the cost of lumber. could the wild swings in the price of wood over the past two years be a sign of inflation continuing to go up? economics correspondent paul solman takes us for a ride. ( roller coaster ) >> reporter: a roller aster we featured in a story back in 1989. why use it in a story about lumber prices, decades later? hang tight for a few minutes. but first, what has been happening to lumber? >> volatility. it's the main word. volatility. >> reporter: stephen beckerle's family owns a small chain of lumber yards in rockland county, new york. brother larry is the jokester. what's your best lumber joke? >> if i told you, you'd get board. ( groaning and laughter ) >> reporter: oh, “board.” i finally got the pun. but the beckerles are dead serious about the business. they buy railroad cars full of

lumber, shipped from the pacific northwest. >> so, a carload of lumber in march of 2020 cost me, on average, let's say, $50,000. >> reporter: that was the usual price: $300 to $400 per 1,000 board feet. then suddenly, covid, and an economy on the brink of paralysis. >> and for one month, you know, new home sales and new home starts, everything, just plummeted. >> reporter: lumber trader stinson dean. >> so, producers just shut it down. they got rid of any inventory they owned, and they stopped producing anymore. >> reporter: retailer beckerle's thinking at the time was typical. >> we're going to minimize what we're-- we're stocking. >> reporter: but business didn't collapse completely, and-- with too little supply to meet even weak demand-- by summer 2020, lumber prices doubled. >> no one has ever seen $700 lumber. that was pretty astonishing. but then it went to $800. and $900. and $1,000. >> reporter: and retail prices took off accordingly, says contractor kevin o'dell. >> plywood and 2x4 lumber and

stuff, you know, three or four times higher than it was. >> reporter: and then, in the spring of this year? >> $1,100. $1,300. $1,700 by may. >> carload of lumber in may cost me over $200,000. >> i didn't believe it. >> reporter: pete beckerle, the family patriarch, has a motto. >> like we're sitting on a staple, two-by-four-eights. don't run out of two-by-four- eights. it's like the butcher running out of hamburger. but we didn't always make it. >> reporter: because demand kept growing. >> people didn't take vacations, they didn't travel. so people are investing back in their homes. they can work remotely, so they can live anywhere. so, people are moving out of the cities they're moving to suburbs, like right here in rockland county, new york. >> reporter: dominique ward's family, for instance, which moved from queens. so you bought lumber during covid? >> yes, i did. i built garden beds. i built the deck. i also built a fireplace. i built an ice skating rink for my kids in the winter last year. 20 feet by 20 feet ice skating rink in the middle of the yard.

>> reporter: and you were not price-sensitive. >> i was not price-sensitive. i wish i was! ( laughs ) but i wasn't-- i wasn't. >> reporter: it turns out even our cameraman, david zapatka, his job displaced by zoom, turned to home improvement. >> i was bored. we had just done a major project on our house, in the kitchen, and i looked out and looked at e deck and i said, man, that deck is just a mess. so, i bought $1,000-worth of tools and went to town. >> reporter: demand was back, convincingly. >> so now, how long does it take for the industry to believe that we're back? that took about six or seven months. >> reporter: then-- given labor shortages and ongoing supply problems due to climate calamities-- it took more time to ramp up. but once it did, price responded rapidly. >> as quickly as it went up, it went down twice as fast. it was about a six-month ride-up

to $1,700. and in three months, it was-- it was back down to really close to pre-covid levels. >> reporter: and yet today, the price is back above $1,000 per 1,000-board feet. that's mainly a function of sustained new home building, says hsing economist ali wolf. >> in the case of new construction, we see that year- -date activity is up 15% compared to 2019 levels. >> reporter: and with higher lumber prices? >> home prices are rising, as are rents. >> reporter: all of which is fueling inflation. so, you've probably figured out by now the roller coaster metaphor we began with-- which came courtesy of m.i.t. professor john sterman, who put capitalist market cycles in context here on the newshour back when soviet socialism was collapsing. >> so, what we've done is created the simulated beer company, which you will manage over the next hour and a half. >> reporter: a role-playing game in which each team represents a link in the beer supply chain. >> so, it's a balancing act. you want to have inventories as low as possible, but you don't want to run out. >> we don't have anything coming in, and we're going to get into demand in a hurry, and

we're going to stock out. >> reporter: oh, my god. we have nothing coming-- >> we have zero coming in. >> stock-outs lead to panic orders, and customers who can't get what they want start ordering more than what they really need, and they start hoarding inventory. and that, of course, makes everything worse, in a kind of vicious cycle, self-reinforcing process. >> reporter: sterman has actually come up with a new prop for today's supply chain disturbances. >> with a slinky. so, i actually have a slinky here... think of my hand here at the top as consumer demand, and think of the bottom as production. and in the real world, demand is always fluctuating little bit at random. >> reporter: and those rings in the slinky, those are the different elements of the supply chain? >> yeah, the different links in the chain. the time delays in the chain. how long it takes to build new capacity. and so forth. and it creates these cycles that we've seen forever.

but occasionally, a really big disturbance can hit. pandemic! and, well, you know, now, the system, it's going to really go nuts, and it will take quite a while for it to settle back down. >> reporter: but what we all care about these days is inflation. so, i asked housing analyst wolf: is lumber a good proxy for inflation, or-- or just a quirky one? >> i think lumber is a great proxy for inflation. we've seen how choppy lumber prices have been. i think that's what we expect to see in a lot of different items acrossthe economy as we go through next year and try to-- to sort through the supply chain challenges and the labor shortage. >> reporter: so that suggests a shorter-term rather than a longer-term phenomenon, right? >> yeah. so, our belief is that costs will stay high, but throughout 2022, we'll see the rate of growth start to come down. >> reporter: john sterman agrees about lumber, given today's high price. >> mill owners and the forestry industry are saying profits are fantastic.

let's build new mills and grow the capacity of existing mills. and so, those new mills will keep coming on stream, and now there will be excess capacity. and that's going to then push prices down. >> reporter: so are you suggesting that this inflation that we're experiencing in lumber, and pretty much everything else, is really a temporary phenomenon? >> well, some of it is, but there's other forces driving inflation now, and might get much worse. >> reporter: sterman is invoking the classic definition of inflation: too much money, or liquidity, chasing too little to buy, driving up prices, which drive up wages, and so on-- the so-called wage-price spiral. >> there's a big debate going on among economists. some people arguing it's transitory, because it's just the supply chain; and other people arguing, no, it's now going to be baked into this wage-price spiral, enabled by excess liquidity in the system. and the reality is, it's both, and nobody knows how that's

going to play out. >> reporter: nobody knows. which should surprise nobody familiar with economics. for the pbs newshour, and still in the game, paul solman. >> nawaz: homelessness, and is not a new issue, but it is one that often doesn't receive a lot of attention. the number of americans living without homes, in shelters, or on the streets, continues to rise at an alarming rate. judy woodruff has this report on why that is, and what more can be done to prevent it. >> woodruff: homelessness often gets extra attention during the holiday season, of course, but the problem has grown yearound, particularly in many cities. estimates show that as many as half a million people are homeless in the u.s. on any given night.

nan roman is the c.e.o. of the national alliance to end homelessness. and she joins me now. nan roman, thank you for joining us, and, full disclosure, i serve on the board of the alliance. but first, let me ask you, how serious is the homelessness problem in this country compared to a few years ago? >> well, the problem of homelessness has been getting worse in this country compared to a few years ago. from 2007 to 2016, it had been going down pretty steadily every year. stting in 2016, it has been creeping up everyear, including this year, as far as we know. >> woodruff: and do you understand why that is? >> i think it is largely due to the lack of affordable housing and housing getting more expeive, and also what people earn, are purchasing less housing. >> woodruff: and is at due to federal policies, state policy? what would you ascribe it to? >> it's due to the market, to some degree. i mean, we really don't have an

adequate supply of housingn the u.s. anymore. about five million units short of having an adequate supply of housing overall. and in the affordae housing category, it's even worse, where we are about seven million units short of enough affordable housing for all of the low- income households that need it. and that really is the driver around homelessness. >> woodruff: and do you have a sense-- we were just talking about this-- of how covid has affected people's ability to be in a home? >> you know, it's sort of a mixed bag. i think that, on the one hand, a lot of the benefits that have been coming to people, in terms of the child tax credit, the income tax credits, the boost in unemployment insurance and so forth, have given people resources-- and the eviction moratorium, i should also mention-- have given people resources or protected them so that they didn't become homeless. our data isn't so good because

some of the counts over the past two years have been stopped because of covid. but we also see in some populations that it looks like there's an increase. there appears to be an increase in unsheltered homelessness, for example, whereas family homelessness is down, we think. >> woodruff: and i saw that, i believe you were saying, that more than a third of those who are homeless are completely unsheltered. they don't have any place, or don't, you know, don't go anywhere, don't have a place to go. >> that's right. so, the homelessness system is not-- basically, just not large enough, where the problem today is to help people who are homeless. and 39% of people who are homeless don't even have a shelter bed, so they're living on the streets, in encampments, vehicles; places not meant for human habitation. >> woodruff: nan roman, you were also telling me that there was a good amount of money that was allocated to address housing the homeless in the legislation that was passed because of covid: the american rescue plan, the cares act, and you were

saying, not all that money has been spent. why not? can you give us a sense of what's happening there? >> i think there are a couple reasons. there was about $14 billion, between the cares act and the american rescue plan act, specifically targeted to peoe who are homeless. some of the issues around it being slow have to do with just the ability of the sector to absorb it. staffs being low, the hiring-- the same sorts of things you hear about businesses, that's also happening in government and non-profit sectors. and so, many resources flowing into communities have made it a little bit difficult for them to get the money out. and then, there's also the question of how strategically they're able to use it. >> woodruff: is that an argument that more federal money right now than many of these communities are just not equipped to handle it? >> i think the communities are equipped to handle it, but not probably quite as fast as we might hope they could handle it. still, these resources are so critical and, as i said, they

really are-- this is a once-in- a-lifetime injection of funds into solving this problem. we estimate how the current we estimate that the resources of build back better, should that prevail, could house 80,000 households. >> woodruff: i want to come back, finally, to why so many people are homeless in this country. i know, i hear many people saying, well, they think-- they'll say it's because of mental illness, or they think it's because of substance abuse. but as you suggested earlier, it is more complicated than that. >> it really is about affordable housing and wages. i will age myself, but i'll say, when i first started working in the late '70s, it really was on housing issues. there was not homeless people. very, very few people were homeless. and what's changed since then is that there was an adequate supply of affordable housing, and now, we're seven million units short. and that's the driver. if housing is affordable, if people can be housed, they won't

be living on the street. it's really that housing is not affordable if they're homeless. >> woodruff: and so, at this holiday season, what would you want americans to know about homelessness in this country? >> well, i want them not to blame homeless people for their homelessness. to understand that the solution is really not that complicated. and to have compassion for people. it seems to me that in a country as wealthy as ours and as wonderful as ours, we really should not have hundreds of thousands of people living on the street. >> woodruff: nan roman, who is the c.e.o. of the national alliance to end homelessness. thank you very much. >> thank you, judy. >> nawaz: the iraqi supreme court ratified yesterday the results of the parliamentary elections which took place last october.

this opens the path for the one of the groups that disputed the election results is kataib hezbollah, a paramilitary organization which, alongside other iran-backed groups, wants all u.s. military forces out of iraq by the end of the year. kataib hezbollah is believed to be responsible for previous rocket and drone attacks on american forces, and is threatening to once again step up those operations should their demands for full withdrawal not be met. newshour special correspondent simona foltyn gained exclusive access to kataib hezbollah's bases near iraq's border with syria. >> reporter: this is the united states' principal adversary in iraq: brigade 46 of iraq's popular mobilization forces. but it's better known as kataib hezbollah: a powerful, secretive armed group with close ties to iran. the newshour gained exclusive access to areas it controls near iraq's border with syria, just eighty miles from the ain al assad military base,

which houses american troops still operating here to help the iraqi government defeat isis remnants. but these fighters consider american forces here illegal and want them gone. >> ( translated ): the 31st of december will be the last day for american troops in iraq. if they don't leave voluntarily, they will leave by force. they will face the resistance factions and we will return to the year 2003. >> reporter: the resistance he's referring to is a secretive network of iran-backed insurgent groups that mobilized to fight the united states following its 2003 invasion of iraq. kataib hezbollah is part of the resistance, and in 2009, the u.s. designated it a terror organization for targeting american forces and its iraqi opponents. but after the war with isis broke out in 2014, kataib hezbollah was folded into the popular mobilization forces, or p.m.f., an amalgamation of mostly-shia paramilitaries

formed to fight isis. that means kataib hezbollah is now officially part of the iraqi state. still, these fighters see the united states as their enemy. >> ( translated ): the popular mobilization forces are against isis, and against america at the same time. america is an occupier in iraq and we don't want occupation in our country. >> reporter: until rently, the p.m.f. fought alongside the u.s. and other iraqi security forces in the grueling, four- year war against isis. this is where some of the final battles took place, near the iraqi border town of al qaim, and in baghuz, just across the border in syria. the border between iraq and syria remains closed for civilians, but al qaim has become a strategic waypoint along a corridor that connects iran with its allies in iraq and in syria. that has also made it a flashpoint in the geopolitical conflict between the u.s. and iran. the u.s. has accused kataib

hezbollah stands of targeting u.s. forces with rockets, and, more recently, weaponized drones. in response, the.s. has repeatedly struck its bases. this facility was hit by an american airstrike in december 2019, killing 26 fighters and a brigade commander. hassan ali, one of three soldiers we were allowed to interview on camera during our two-day visit, witnessed the attack. >> ( translated ): they targeted the headquarters, administration, medical unit and the rocket support unit. >> reporter: that december 2019 strike was part of a series of tit-for-tat attacks that culminated in the u.s. assassination of the powerful iranian general qassem suleimani, as well as his close iraqi associate, abu mahdi al mohandis; he founded kataib hezbollah and was second-in-charge of the p.m.f. the killings were labeled unlawful by a u.n. inquiry and sparked calls for revenge and a

political backlash. ( chanting ) >> reporter: chanting “baghdad is free; out with america,” iraq's parliament voted in january 2020 to oust all foreign troops. that led to bilateral talks to renegotiate the american military presence in iraq. earlier this year, the two sides agreed to withdraw all american combat forces. matthew tueller, the u.s. ambassador to iraq, says that the transition has been completed. >> what that really means is that we have now transferred to the iraqi forces the main role in conducting combat operations against isis and its remnants. what the u.s. and the coalition forces will do is provide an enabling mission, they will provide advice, they will provide intelligence, but they will be sitting alongside iraqis in the operation centers. >> reporter: 2,500 u.s. soldiers will remain in iraq for that purpose, but their continued presence remains contested by groups like kataib hezbollah.

is the biden administration prepared to strike these so-called resistance factions should there be a reaction from their side? for example, rocket or drone attacks against u.s. personnel and facilities? >> we are not here in order to fight against the so-called resistance factions or the armed militias. our presence here is to prevent isis from being able to resurge. so we look to the iraqi government primarily as having the task to defend those forces that it has invited to be here on their territory, but absolutely this administration, as any administration, reserves the right to respond, to defend itself if it's facing an attack. >> reporter: twice this year, the biden administration targeted kataib hezbollah and its affiliates. this base was hit in june. the u.s. military said the strike against this base was a matter of self-defense, arguing it was used to launch drone strikes against u.s. personnel and facilities in iraq.

but iraqi officials have condemned the attack as a violation of iraq's sovereignty. and its operations like these that have fueled growing resentment against u.s. military presence in iraq. for the men at this training camp, the reclassification to a non-combat mission is not enough. ( instructor giving orders ) they say they want every american soldier to leave by end-of-year, including advisors, and they're ready to use force. the recent airstrikes have hardened their stance against the u.s. and given them more reason to fight. >> ( translated ): we consider each american attack as a victory for us, and each drop of blood spilled by our martyrs is a jihadi march for us. this makes us stand. when america hits us, we consider them as an enemy, because they are targeting an iraqi force. >> reporter: but are they really an iraqi state force? or are they a resistance militia fighting the u.s.? the answer appears vital to

understanding and addressing this conflict. but kataib hezbollah is taking advantage of the vagueness of its status, which allows it to be both a state and a non-state actor. on the one hand, the fighters here claimed to report to iraq's prime minister... >> ( translated ): our responsibility is to control the iraqi territories and the iraqi borders, as assigned by the iraqi government, because we are operating under the iraqi flag. >> reporter: ...but there were scarce signs this was an official state force. the cars didn't carry license plates, and none of the bases we visited were visibly marked as official p.m.f. facilities. many fighters, including the commander, didn't want to show their faces on camera for fear of being targeted, and only few wore insignia. u.s. officials say kataib hezbollah merely uses the p.m.f. for legal cover and to access state resources, while acting outside of the chain command to attack american forces and to subvert the iraqi state. >> this is a post-conflict

state, and it's not unusual in a post-conflict state to see armed groups that exist within the state. and ultimately after a conflict, you try to go through a process of demobilizing armed groups, bringing them under the authority of the state, reintegrating them into society. what's been problematic for iraq is that they have a neighbor, iran, that seeks to foster, to strengthen, to enable those kinds of groups. >> reporter: u.s. military commanders frequently refer to kataib hezbollah as an iranian proxy. but, the group also enjoys some political and popular backing inside iraq, and is acting more and more independently of iran to pursue its goals. the soldiers we met denied that kataib hezbollah is loyal to iran. >> ( translated ): this is an iraqi mobilization force, not an iranian one. nobody denies that as a friendly neighbor, iran offered us suort at a time when other countries didn't. >> reporter: in addition to his job as a soldier, noor ahmed is studying economics in baghdad. he says he became a fighter to

earn a stable salary, but mainly, to protect his country from what he sees as external threats. >> ( translated ): because of the american occupation, the security situation in the region deteriorated. they are not willing to let iraq stabilize. >> reporter: iraqi officials say that the best approach to rein in these groups is through gradual integration into the state, something that might only be possible follong a prolonged period of stability and non-interference. but with the end-of-year deadline to withdraw u.s. troops approaching, there's fear that iraq could be cast into a fresh cycle of attacks. for the pbs newshour, i'm simona foltyn on iraq's borders with syria. >> nawaz: as 2021 comes to a close, we want to take a look

back at a year of immense challenge and loss, but also a year of hope. in recent days, we've reconnected with a number of you-- viewers and guests we've interviewed over the past year. we wanted to hear how you've handled the last 12 months, and your wishes for 2022. tonight, we get a view from a doctor in texas. >> this is joe chang. i am the chief medical officer here at parkland health an hospital system here in dallas. the last time i spoke to you was august of 2021. it's taken a sharp turn for the worse, really, over the last few days, even at the end of last week, we went from about 60o about 100 cases in total at the hospital. so, it's definitely not going in the-- in the right direction, and omicron is doing what we thought it would. i am a little bit surprised that we are still here talking about yet another variant. you know, back in january of 2021, the vaccine had just come out. ere was so much hope

surrounding what that might bring to us. what surprised me was that such a large part of our population chose not to avail themselves of that preventative treatment. still, well over 90% of our admissions are still unvaccinated. lks are-- are able to be as, sortf, brash as they want, you know, about vaccination, before they feel the effects of the disease itself. and then, once the disease takes hold, you know, everyone pretty much backs up on that belief and really wishes that they got vaccinated before this happened. but again, as i've said to everybody, it is too late at that point. we cannot go back in time and get you vaccinated, and once you've been infected, vaccination does nothing. and we have so much compassion for the individuals who come in and they get sick enough and get ready to be intubated and put on ventilators. the amount of regret and sorrow in their voices is something that's almost unbearable for us.

watching my frontline workers and the support staff, day after day, bring themselves back into the hospital to fight this disease that-- it seems like it's never going away. this year in particular, my family and i, my colleagues and my friends and i, have spent a lot of time talking about what has occurred. i mean, it's affected every aspect of our lives, right? i still go back to feeling that, you know, heroes emerge. people running towards danger, as opposed to away from it. the other thing that-- that we reflect on a lot is loss. i myself have lost friends and family to this disease. if we're able to come together as a community, then i think we'll see this sort of fade into the background, as flu has, as a lot of other diseases that used to claim millions of lives. as long as we come together as a society and control the situation, covid, just like other diseases, will sort of fade into the sort of the backdrop of community health. at some point, we will all

decide that this is something we have to do together, regardless of the politics around it, the rhetoric around it, the emotions around it, that we will come together and get that done. >> nawaz: thank you, dr. chang. >> nawaz: a fifth victim in the colorado shootings died bringing the total number dead to six including the gunman. two people remain wounded. that is the "newshour" for tonight. and that is the newshour for tonight. i'm amna nawaz. join us online, and again here tomorrow evening. for all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you, please stay safe, and we'l see you soon. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: >> fidelity wealth management. >> consumer cellular. >> johnson & johnson. >> financial services firm raymond james.

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