♪ anchor: good evening. tonight, much of the country languishes under extreme summer heat as the effects of climate change become more apparent. >> a federal court assesses the controversial river barriers at the u.s. southern border.

>> the lawsuit broht by survivors of the racist mass shooting in buffalo again social media companies. gun manufacturers in the gunman's parents. >> a lot of times, we are considered to be persons who are not injured by the situation. but the trauma that we are experiencing in our everyday life is an injury. ♪ >> major funding for the pbs newshour been provided by -- the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions and friends of the newshour including kathy and paul anderson and camilla and george smith. ♪ >> pediatric surgeon, volunteer, topiary artist, a raymondjames

financial advisor helps you live your life. life well planned. ♪ >> john s foundation, fostering engaged communities. ♪ >> and with the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions. ♪ this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you.

>> here are the latest headlines. tropical storm harold barreled through south texas today. the states first tropical storm of the hurricane season to make landfall, bringing much-needed rain to drought stricken areas. some of those areas could see as much is six inches of rain along with wind gusts up to 50 miles per hour. thousands of homes and businesses in corpus christi are without electricity. in california, crews in mountain and desert towns are digging themselves out of mud and debris left behind from tropical storm hilary. more than 800 people on maui are unaccounted for two weeks after the deadly wildfires first erected. teams have searched all of the single-story residences. they are now focusing on multi-story properties including commercial buildings. the confirmed death toll stands at 115 people.

in greece, authorities have recovered 18 bodies from a major blaze burning in the country's northeast. they were believed to have been migrants who cross the border with turkey. hundreds of firefighters are battling infernos across greece fueled by strong wind. one hospital had to evacuate patients by ferry to a makeshift clinic as flames approach. >> i've been working for 27 years and i've never seen anything like this. it's like war conditions. stretchers everywhere. it was like a bomb had exploded. >> in spain, canary islands, police say a wildfire was ignited deliberately but they haven't made any arrest. that blaze has been raging for a week and has burned about 50 square miles, much of it now under control. john eastman, indicted with former president trump, surrender today in georgia on charges he plotted to overturn the 2020 election results.

eastman turned himself in at the fulton county jail. he was a close advisor to mr. trump leading up to january 6. two other codefendants, jeffrey clark and david schaefer, filed paperwork to transfer the case to federal court. donald trump says he will surrender thursday. in pakistan, eight people were rescued from a cable car dangling hundreds of feet above a remote river canyon. army commandos used helicopters and a makeshift chairlift to rescue six children into adults who were headed to school. pakistan's prime minister has ordered safety inspections at the countries cable cars and chairlifts. a new u.n. report paints a grim picture of the situation in afghanistan since the taliban took over. more than 200 former officials and security forces have been killed by the taliban in the

last two years. the u.n. documented over 800 cases of serious human rights associations. the fukushima nuclear power plant will start releasing treated radioactive waste water into the pacific as early as thursday. the japanese government says it's essential for cleanup efforts. the water has been accumulating since the 2011 earthquake and tsunami caused nuclear meltdowns at the plant. an executive said safety is their highest priority. >> staying on our guard, we will promptly proceed with the preparations for the release. we've decided to start by discharging small amounts in a careful manner while checking the impact of the relief on the surrounding environment. >> the decision sparked protests in south korea where some fear the wastewater poses a threat to the environment and safety of

seafood. the un's nuclear watchdog has approved the plan. there are new concerns today about the toll that conflict in sudan has taken on children. the group save the children estimates that 500 children in the east african country have died from hunger since fighting started in april. that includes two dozen babies in a government run orphanage. at least 31,000 children there lacked treatment for malnutrition. the charity was forced to close 57 of its nutrition centers. still to come on the newshour, which gop contenders might break through in tomorrow night's debate. the impact on troop readiness from one republican senator holding up a raft of military promotions. a new exhibit chronicling how a massachusetts town helped shape the artist edward hopper. ♪ >> this is the pbs newshour,

from w eta studios in washington and in the west from the walter cronkite school of journalism at arizona state university. >> i heatwave is baking much of the country right now, leading to record highs and triple digit temperatures in the midwest and south. the latest in a series of extreme weather events that have led to damage, destruction, and death. that includes the wildfires in maui, a month of broiling temperatures and parts of the southwest, and flooding in vermont. michael man is a presidential professor and director of the penn center for science at the university of pennsylvania and author of the forthcoming book, our fragile moment. welcome back and thanks for joining us. these seem like very different events but what's the connection between all of these that we need to understand behind why they are so extreme? >> it's great to be with you. at some level, this is pretty basic.

you make the planet hotter, you are going to have more frequent heat waves. we are seeing that. you warm up the ground in the summer, you will get worse drought. the atmosphere is warmer so when you get a storm, there's going to be more rainfall. so we see greater extremes at both ends of the scale. there is something else going on which is a little more subtle and it's in effect that is in perfectly captured in the models that we use to predict future climate change and to attribute events to climate change. that's an important caveat. something that the models are doing very well, capturing the way that the pattern of warming, it's warming more in the arctic than it is down here. that changes the difference in temperature as a function of the latitude. it turns out that's what drives the jet stream. you slow down the jet stream and you get this very slow wavy jet stream where the high-end and

low pressure centers stay fixed in place for days after days. that's when you get those heat domes like that record he dumb we are seeing right now in the central u.s.. that's when you get excessive flooding like we are seeing in new england, like we saw in association with that hurricane. so what that means is that yes, there are some uncertainties in the science. there are some surprises. they are not pleasant surprises. in many respects, we are seeing that the impacts are worse than we predicted. >> you did mention climate change. is it fair to say climate change is fueling more extreme storms and with greater frequency? >> climate change is showing us it's weapons. these last couple weeks, it is showing us everything it has to offer. its full arsenal. that's what we are seeing. climate change is no longer some subtle, far off possible thing. it's here and now.

it's impacting us here and now. the dangerous impacts are occurring now. it's a question of how bad we are willing to let it get. >> this is all over the world. we saw deadly landslides in india after torrential rains. new heat records in morocco and japan. another heatwave in europe. i just read recently, one estimate put the deaths at over 60,000 people. we talk about damage and destruction. what about the death component of this? should we look at this as something to be endured, something we will struggle to survive? >> let's make no mistake about this. climate change is deadly. we are seeing human deaths that can be attributed to climate change. that are caused by events that wouldn't have been as intense or as catastrophic as they were if not for the warming of the planet. i fear that we are probably going to see a total many thousand people from those

wildfires in maui when all is said and done. there were various attributes about that event. we can get into the complexities. basically, climate change contributed to that event in various ways. as deadly as the pandemic was, as many lives that were lost due to the pandemic, far more lives will be lost due to climate change if we fail to act while we still can. >> the last nine years have been the hottest nine years ever recorded on planet earth. the science has shown us to change that trend, we need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions globally. how would you say we are doing on that front? >> not well enough. we are making some progress. it's important to recognize that. carbon emissions seem to have plateaued. they are not following that ever upward trajectory that they were on just a decade ago. the bad news is, they have to come down dramatically. it's not enough to be at the

summit. you have to come down quickly. 50% within the next 10 years and all the way to zero within a couple decades. we are not doing that yet. what we need to see later this year when we get cop 28, the next round of international climate negotiations, we need to see the countries of the world commit to a substantial move away from fossil fuels, and a fossil fuel infrastructure, putting in place policies that will dramatically move us away from fossil fuels towards renewable energy. we need to do it now. it can't be five or 10 years from now. it has to happen now. >> i have to ask you. folks will ask. look at the summer. temperatures are usually hotter. is it a chance that these are vent -- events or just an out leader? >> no. they are even worse than the new normal. the new normal liens, we have to cope with what we have now. it will get worse if we continue to warm the planet. the good news is, the science

tells us that it will stop getting warmer if we stop polluting. there's an immediate and direct impact of our efforts to decarbonizing our world. that's what we have to do when we have to do it quickly. >> thank you for so much -- thank you so much for joining us tonight. >> the battle over floating barriers on the rio grande reached the courtroom today. a federal judge in austin heard arguments from the state of texas and the u.s. justice department over republican governor greg abbott's use of giant buoys to deter migrants crossing the river. the justice department sued the state, saying the barrier violates federal law and must be removed. following the latest is our own laura lopez. what arguments did the judge in the courtroom here today? >> the central argument was that this violates federal law that

governs the rio grande. specifically the rivers and harbors act of 1899. i spoke to a local reporter from austins mpr station. she was in the courtroom today and she said that governor greg abbott deployed a number of justifications to the judge for why they implemented these barriers. >> the defense team said that they were acting out of secured concerns and they would repeatedly cite human bungling, illegal immigration along the border. the judge repeatedly struck that down and said, we are here to talk about water and how it relates to the u.s. mexico border. >> the judge overseeing the case , greg abbott's team didn't actually cite specific statutes when they were making this defense. they simply said that they had the right to defend their border. the judge said, this is about international water law and the territory and the fact that this

potentially infringed on mexican sovereignty. the judge asked the justice department and texas defense to submit their closing arguments and he plans to make a determination shortly after those closing arguments which are expected on friday. >> the justice department contracted -- confronted governor abbott. break down the case for us. >> the justice department said today that abbott did not have permit approval from the army corps of engineers which oversees this, that he never got approval to place these floating buoys in the rio grande which stretches about 1000 feet or so next to eagle pass which is not border community. also, they said in court today, that this action by abbott is harming u.s.-mexico relations. they also said in court briefings prior to the hearing today that this language used around invasion is not accurate,

it is something he doesn't have the right to determine, whether or not there's an invasion occurring, that that's a federal right. ahead of the hearing today, local advocates as far as residence came to speak out against operation lone star tactics that the governor has deployed. the border organization of del rio texas took issue with exactly what abbott is doing. >> dehydrated individuals denied water in extreme heat, small children being pushed back into the river, razor wire along the real ground injuring and forcing immigrants into deeper water, increasing the risk of drownings. worst of all, pregnant women stuck in wire, having a miscarriage. >> captured what a number of residents have been saying, which is that while they may have supported governor abbott's operation lone star at first when it was deployed about two years ago, they aren't

supportive of it any longer. >> the governor is undeterred. he makes the point that he has the responsibility to return -- protect the border and he's not moving away from this program. what's his argument? >> he has doubled down in defending this entire operation. recently, another part is the busing of migrants to democratic led cities. he did that recently to los angeles and california as hillary was approaching los angeles. over the weekend, he was joined by four other republican governors from non-border states and defended his actions. >> the border between the united states and mexico is turning into a deadly welcome mat for the migrants who are coming here. as an example, just last year, there was an outside number of people who died crossing the border. joe biden is responsible for that deadly border.

>> according to the department of homeland security, in 2022, there were a record number of migrant deaths when they crossed the border. those were attributed to drownings. they were also attributed to extreme heat which migrants suffer from. when governor abbott first deployed operation lone star, he was asked if it would include resources that would potentially help migrants deal with those conditions. he said that he was concerned with texans. >> the number of illegal border crossings is down across the board anyway. >> it is overall down. compared to last year at the same time. june had a record drop in border crossings and apprehensions. they were at their lowest in the last two years. just this last month in july, homeland security released new numbers. they increased by about 30%, border apprehensions. within that, we should note that

there were more migrants process because they are seeking asylum through the biden ministrations new parole app which they are trying to make possible where migrants can seek asylum while they are in their country of origin. overall compared to last year, border crossings are down. >> thank you for that reporting. ♪ >> the first gop presidential debate will play out in prime time tomorrow. even as the leading contender for the nomination plans to be a no-show. lisa desjardins brings us the latest on what to expect from this historic debate. >> how do you debate a front runner who doesn't show up? that's the question for the eight candidates appearing tomorrow in milwaukee. here they are in their stage positions. the debate is a major moment as well is a test for the republican party and for the

impact of debates themselves. a gop strategist and presidential campaign veteran. she previously worked for candidate ramaswamy. she's been in the room for the republican debate prep in the past. what are the stakes for this debate and for whom? >> i think the stakes are high for everybody. in particular, the highest for governor ron desantis. he's restarted his campaign a couple of times. he's done some shakeups. i think everybody will take pot shots at him just as they have been throughout these last several weeks. i think the stakes are highest for him but he also has a really great opportunity to throw some punches back if he chooses to. really, what he should be doing is driving his message as to why he would be better, more electable than president trump. >> you mentioned pot shots and punches. those are things that former president trump excelled that generally.

few others could land punches on him. one who did was carly fiorina in 2015. asked about his criticism of her face. she brought up the access hollywood tape and the former president's own words to billy bush about how he felt he could sexually grope women. here's what she said. mr. trump -- >> mr. trump said that he heard mr. bush clearly. i think women all over the country heard very clearly what he said. >> i ask you, what does work in this environment in terms of landing a criticism or a punch on someone who is opposing you? >> i remember that debate. that was the cleanest punch that everybody and he landed on -- ever landed on president trump. bobby lindell was not on the stage with president trump but we were on the campaign trail. everybody, all the campaigns were trying to figure out how to land something.

when you do these silly attacks or insults, he's just going to punch right back. if you are going to punch a trump, you better landed. nobody did that better than carly figure ina. >> trump won't be there tomorrow night. that's an issue. candidates will be asked about him. here's ted cruz in a debate that president trump boycotted. here's how he tried to handle that. >> let me say, i'm a maniac. everyone on the stage is stupid, fat, ugly. then you are a terrible surgeon. now that we've gotten the donald trump portion out of the way. [laughter] [applause] >> how do you think these candidates will handle the elephant not in the room? >> that's what the debate prep is about now. there are a couple candidates that are probably going to go straight at trump, namely chris christie because it's not in his dna to do anything but go

straight at trump. we've seen that on the campaign trail. but i think the other person that has the opportunity to take him on very specifically on accomplishments is governor desantis. what he could do tomorrow night is say that he handled the pandemic better when he was governor, during his time as governor of florida. he can say, donald trump, you were shutting down the country. i was opening up florida. he is really the only person on the stage with the kind of executive experience where he's able to say, i did it better. >> who else are you watching? a lot of folks will be watching --. this is a moment not just about this election cycle but future ones. who are you watching? >> i think so. i like tim scott. his message is so different from anybody else on the stage. he has a message of positivity, optimism because that's who he is. he is built for this. he has the resources to go the

distance, not just the cycle but next cycle. he's also got this life story to tell that republican voters are yearning for. we haven't heard it in so long. this optimistic message has gotten him far in the iowa polls, so far at least. >> thank you so much. we will all be watching tomorrow night. >> thank you. have a great night. ♪ >> last may, a white gunman killed 10 people in a racist mass shooting out a grocery store in a predominantly black area of buffalo. the gunmen now serving a life sentence. he drove 200 miles to target that community. last week, 16 witnesses of the tragedy filed a lawsuit over the trauma they endured. they named youtube and read it, websites where the shooter was

radicalized, as well as the retailer who sold his gun and the manufacturer of his body armor. the suit names the gunman's parents who the plaintiffs say new about their son's violent tendencies and failed to act. one of those plaintiffs is -- who was working that day and -- the executive director of every town law, representing the survivors in this case. thank you both for being with us. i read where you said that you initially thought that a month or two after the shooting, that you would be ok. that the passage of time would bring healing. but that ultimately, that wasn't the case. what has the last year been like for you, living with the aftermath of this tragedy? >> it's been horrible. i didn't think it would traumatize me to the degree that i would still be feeling the effects. not be able to work and do regular, normal things to remember things.

i didn't expect that. migraine headaches. lots of pain. >> this is a fairly novel approach, filing suit on behalf of witnesses, not those who were injured who might have lost of -- lost a loved one. why do you believe you have standing in this case? >> it is unusual to sue after a shooting, even a mass shooting, on behalf of those who were not shot. in this case, fragrance and 15 other individuals who we sued on behalf of, these are folks who were working and shopping at the tops market last may 14, going about their daily business. suddenly they found themselves literally in the midst of a mass shooting. not knowing if they would live or die, running and hiding for their lives. we think it's important to establish a clear precedent to new york.

these individuals, folks who lived through the unthinkable, what nobody should have to live through, a mass shooting. they are entitled to their taken court and to have their case heard by a jury and their injuries should be recognized, particularly with respect to various companies and individuals who contributed to the harm that they suffered. >> can you share what you experienced that day? what do you hope comes from this lawsuit? >> i can say that i saw things that are unimaginable. my brain sometimes doesn't want to accept that i actually saw, that i can't forget these things. it keeps me up at night. i wake up crying for days and days in a row. even my daughter just having regular conversations, because she also worked there that day with me, we struggle to even have regular everyday

conversations. i like the fact that eric distinguished that these are injuries. a lot of times, we are considered to be persons who are not injured by this situation. but the trauma that we are experiencing in our everyday lives is an injury. it feels like your brain doesn't work like it used to. you can't control these thoughts that just keep coming back to you. it can be anything that pushes you right back into those memories. at some point, something will cause me to be right back there. i remember it clearly as if it happened yesterday but i can't remember yesterday. [laughter] so it's very different. >> the lawsuit names youtube and reddit for their role in allegedly radicalizing the shooter. we reached out to both companies. we got statements from both. the one from youtube reads this

way. youtube has invested in technology, teams, and policies to identify and remove extremist content. we work with law enforcement to share intelligence and best practices. part of the reddit statement reads, our policies prohibit content that promotes hate based on identity or vulnerability. we are constantly evaluating ways to remove this content. these companies are saying, it's hard to pin this tragedy on online radicalization. what you say to that argument? >> it's one thing to say, as these companies regularly do, that they remove this content. what we've alleged here and what we intend to prove is that youtube and reddit were unreasonably dangerous in the way they were designed. they are defective products essentially. through their algorithms and

other mechanisms, they drove content to the shooter. as you say, he was radicalized, implicated in his gracious beliefs. this content provided him with knowledge and information that he used to acquire and learn how to use military grade armaments and learn how to carry out this mess -- massacre. we believe under the facts of this case that these companies do bear legal responsibility. >> on that point, what does this case say about the ways in which every town and other advocacy groups are going after and trying to hold to account online sites, gun manufacturers, and the shooter's parents? >> we take a holistic approach. the log recognizes that when people are injured, when people are harmed, there can be one or more contribute in fact her. in this case, there's no question that multiple companies

and the shooter's parents, their actions combined contributed to the shooting. >> what's it like in buffalo now on the city's eastside? how are folks grappling with this violence, this tragedy that was visited upon them? >> people are still trying to find a feeling of safety here. trying to redesign the area so that it doesn't appear the same. much like the store. it looks different. the city has sponsored an organization that has put on a series of community events in the area, to try to change the thought process when people walk by or go by the area. i personally don't attend because i try to stay away from that particular area of the city. but for the majority of

citizens, there is a push to try to find some comfort in that area. so i think that's a positive thing. i think there's a lot more that needs to be done. but that's for another conversation. >> we thank you both for your time this evening. >> thank you. ♪ >> the constitution assigns to the senate the power to approve the president's nomination of officers of the united states. that includes general and flag officers of the defense department. this year, one senator has held up all the promotions including to some of the highest jobs in the military. nick schifrin has the story.

>> near an entrance to the pentagon, voters of the joint chiefs grace the wall. at least those whose positions are full. the black boxes represent the officers meant to lead the army, navy, marines. none have been confirmed by the senate. the pentagon says 301 officers are waiting to be confirmed. among them, the commanders of the united states space command, northern command, and cyber command. most of the senior commanders in the pacific who deal with china. the indo pacific commander and commanders of the pacific fleet, pacific submarine forces, and pacific special operations. alabama republican senator tommy tuberville has imposed a nomination block. he opposes the new department of defense followed -- policy that pays for the transportation of service members. >> this is really about a taxpayers having to pay for something to do with abortion.

national security is not a problem here. you don't change a position just because somebody isn't promoted. somebody stays there until the promotion is done. >> lloyd austin says it does threaten national security. >> the sweeping hold is undermining america's military readiness. it's hindering our ability to retain our very best officers. and it's upending the lives of far too many american military families. >> so what impact is the hold on nominations having on the military and their ability to do their jobs for that, we retire -- go to admiral mullen. thank you so much. what difference does it make if a military commander is confirmed by the senate as opposed to the job being filled by an acting officer who isn't confirmed? >> i think confirmation really is the gold standard for

legitimizing individuals in these leadership positions. it's been that way for over a hundred years. so that's a really important part of this. if i were to put this into something that the senator would understand, five was an acting head football coach, nobody would know how long i was going to be there. would somebody follow me? how could i recruit? would my players stay? over time, would it impact my ability to win? a lot of that is the same thing with respect to our leadership. we depend on leaders in our military in everything that we do. having somebody that's a permanent leader confirmed by the senate is very much a part of our background and what we need out in the field right now. >> senator to prevail argues this. there are no vacancies. each job is filled, even with an

acting officer. and acting officers and acting chief naval officer said the navy was on disrupted and unabated despite the fact that she's in an acting position. what do you say to that? >> that would be the position that she would take. as a leader, she would want to say that. in fact, she is one of three, soon to be for joint chiefs who will be acting without certainty about when they will be confirmed. when you are an acting leader, can you lay out a new strategy? can you lay out a new plan? i would argue that you can't. historically, that term of acting is one that is of concern. people are not really sure if you are going to be there. you aren't sure until you go through this confirmation process which has been proven time and time again.

>> what is the practical impact? in the pacific, where many of the senior leaders are not confirmed, in terms of planning for a possible conflict with china? or if that conflict were to actually start. >> i think the senator is doing this at one of the most critical times in our history. we are at a real inflection point with respect to the pacific and china and taiwan and the south china sea. also war in europe. impacting our readiness, impacting our leadership at this particular time is, from my perspective, irresponsible. the longer this takes, the longer we wait, the more it will impact. these leaders won't be in place. in every case, there won't be someone who will easily stay. in addition to the incredible disruption in families, with kids going to school, with spouses trying to figure out how

to continue to work at a new location, getting settled in a new home, it significantly impacts the people who sacrifice a lot. they are very patriotic. they are privileged to do it. it's a hard life. this just makes it a lot harder. >> the personal impact is something that we've all heard about as well. you talked to folks in the military all the time. they have to be respectful of civilian leadership. what is their perception at this point of these holds? >> one of the concerns is that the senator's fillers are -- further politicizing the military at a time when the military as a trusted institution is degrading in that trust with respect to the american people come in great part because of the politics that are going on in washington. the senator can make his point about abortion and have that debate.

i think that's really important. that said, keep us out of it. we need to be a political and stay out of political fights. when he says on the one hand, it would be very bad to politicize the military, that's exactly what he's doing. >> in the 30 seconds or so i have left, what is the military's plan on how to deal with this whole -- hold as it continues? >> we will plow through it. we will do the best we can. i just think it will diminish readiness. oftentimes, readiness gets reflected in the face of a crisis or a really tragic accident and people wonder, who is accountable for this? in fact, will anybody at any time hold senator tupper phil accountable for any bad outcomes with respect to the holds that he's actually generated? >> thank you very much. >> thanks.

♪ >> edward hopper stands as an almost mythical figure in american art. as a new exhibition at the k band museum reveals, the artist known for rendering the haunting isolation of urban life mastered his craft spending summers by the sea. jared bowen of gbh boston reports for our arts and culture series canvas. >> this eagles sale and squawk over gloucester. a coastal city on the north shore of massachusetts. like the goals, artists have long flocked here. including 100 years ago, edward hopper. >> think about edward hopper and his goal to paint some light on the side of the house.

he found that opportunity in this series of home. >> the director of the cape and museum which just opened its largest ever exhibition. a show that documents house by house, landscape by landscape, how edward hopper found himself as a painter. >> this exhibition is about place but it's also about an artists process. learning a new medium and seeing the impact of that. >> hopper had been there before. in 1923, he took root. spending the first of five consecutive summers here painting the place. he was single, 40, and had only ever sold one painting. so his career was stagnant and best. he was far removed from the fame that would come from borrowing into the american psyche with his scenes of urban loneliness. most pointedly, rendered in his painting nighthawks. >> he was really struggling to make a living. >> the shows curator says hopper

was drawn to the sea and drew it himself starting as a young boy growing up in nyack. >> he lived right on the waterfront. from his second-story bedroom window, he could see vessels sailing along the hudson. in the show, we have an early drawing that he made in pencil. his mother was an artist which is another interesting aspect of him. >> another woman ultimately change the course of his career. in the summer of 23, he met josephine everson, an artist with whom he had crossed paths before. >> she had a lot to be proud of. her work was being shown in the daniel gallery. she also had her painting selected for an important traveling exhibition in 1924 which would be shown in both paris and london. >> the pair found both artistic and romantic connections. also an art teacher, she pushed hopper, moving him out of his comfort zone where he meticulously planned his illustrations and etchings and

into watercolors. >> watercolor is harder to control. pigment suspended in water. it helps him get out of his own way and to let himself be a little more spontaneous and perhaps tap into more of that subconscious. it's maybe for athletes, the way you think of that moment of flow . >> she becomes his biggest champion. do we have an understanding of why she started to step away from her own career and identify him as the person who should move forward? >> i think she was a pragmatist. she understood that one of them had to succeed. she saw what it took for him to become edward hopper. >> a year later, the pair was married. together, they toured k band -- cape and. edward was especially drawn to fishing scenes, the immigrant community in the city's italian neighborhood, and to the signals of modern times like utility poles.

he also dwelled on dwellings. many of his homes still stand, like anderson's house and hodgkins house. >> what you think it is about this particular house that speaks to that hopper loneliness, ministry? >> the painting in the show is his first house portrait. almost a split personality between the light facade and the start facade on the front which is much more somber. >> a metaphor now for the light and dark in his artistic life. after that first summer in gloucester, his career began to crop open. he sold his first work in more than debt -- a decade. this watercolor. he had a new artistic eye and furniture -- fervor and it transformed him in ways that can be traced through the rest of his career. >> i love motifs that show up

here in gloucester. in tony's house, we have the fire hydrant on a mound and watercolor. the most famous fire hydrant anyone painted in american art. the sole object on the sidewalk casting that long shouter. hopper loves intersections. he loves this shape at the corner of portuguese hill. corner buildings became the subject of his nocturnal drugstore seen of 1927. >> it all happened here at this intersection. for the pbs newshour, gloucester, massachusetts. ♪ >> a new memoir reveals how a picture-perfect life hid the turmoil and trauma roiling behind closed doors.

the author unpacks how the model minority myth and pressure to succeed impacted her indian american family in her debut work, they called us exceptional and other lies that raised us. we spoke recently here in our studios. welcome to the newshour. thank you for joining us. >> thanks for having me. >> for anyone looking at your family from the outside, you were the picture of success. the american dream fulfilled. successful immigrant parents. high achieving children. the story that you detail about life behind closed doors is starkly different. why did you decide to share all of those details, often painful ones, with the world? >> i decided to share them because we need to hear the stories. we need to hear and really understand what the pressure of success and achievement does to

a person's psyche, to our relationships, to our families. we live in this hyper capitalist culture that really only values us for what we can produce in the world. as immigrants coming in to this country, my grandparents came to canada. they came here in search of better opportunity and really had to pining into the american dream. the same pressures exist in canada. in order to belong, assimilate, fit in. but when they spent all of this energy to focus on making sure these kids have these opportunities, there's also a hidden cost to that. a lot of pressure that comes with having to fit that mold. america and canada really only accepts immigrants if they look a certain way, if they behave a certain way. i wanted to write an honest

story about what that pressure can do to a person's psyche, to their relationships. my story doesn't speak for everybody. there is so much pressure to hide these things. to not talk about them. again, because of the image that we are expected as asian americans to portray. i think we need to be honest about the harm that this myth causes on our bodies, our lives, within our families. >> you document your father's emotional and sometimes physical abuse. one story really stuck with me. a family driving to a prestigious school that you and your brother hope to one day attend and your father becomes angry with your mother and her rates her when she can't get the directions and read the map correctly, ends up kicking her out of the car. the family goes onto the school. you and your brother have to pretend nothing happened. folks will wonder, how can that disconnect between what you lived and what people saw be so

vast? >> i felt like i was living a double life. i think that's a common experience, not just with abuse but with my life as the child of immigrants. for all of us, there's this public face and image that we have to portray. and then there's your private life or your home life. the pressure to maintain a certain appearance, i think any sort of person of color can really to that experience in a country where whiteness is idolized and is the standard and his default. there was a lot of shame and what was happening but i also didn't know if it was normal or not for people who look like me because we just didn't talk about it. >> you also talk about your family's own struggles with mental health pigot to even acknowledge that there are any issues and your family in the first place.

even today, asian americans remain one of the least likely groups to seek any kind of mental health support. i wonder why you think that is. >> there are so many complex reasons for that. there are so many barriers to accessing adequate mental health care in this country. our mental health institution comes from a very eurocentric perspective so it's not designed to acknowledge or address a lot of the issues that people of color are facing. another reason is that therapy, for a lot of us, has been a form of control and domination. the british empire actually ran lunatic asylums in south asia and used them as a way to assert control. they rounded up people of south asian origin who didn't adhere to victorian social norms and said that they were giving them therapy. really, they turned into

for-profit labor camps where they extracted productivity from them. that has had announced -- outstanding impact generally really -- generationally on creating stigma, skepticism about what is mental health care. i think there's also a culture of struggling with not talking about feelings. i know that my grandparents deftly struggled with that as well. for me personally, therapy really only started becoming effective when i sought out a therapist who treated all these conflicts, not as brokenness, not as contradictions, but is normal. this was part of my normal experience. >> you write so openly and so intimately about some incredibly painful moments throughout your entire life. i wonder, what has the reaction from your family been to the book? >> there are a lot of varying reactions.

i think that the one that really kept me going throughout the writing process was that of my grandfather. he died earlier this year at the beginning of the year. >> i'm so sorry for your loss. >> thank you. we were very close. he is somebody who really inspired me. he grew up in colonial india and made the very difficult decision to leave india and move to canada and raise his family there for better opportunity. he was in many ways a very conservative, patriarchal father and husband. in his later years, he began to identify as a feminist. he said that it was seeing his granddaughters that really changed him. seeing -- he didn't css future mothers or as partners. he saw us as full people and he wanted us to be apple -- able to have the rights that he had.

when i told him about this book and why i needed to write it, even knowing that i would be critical or interrogating some of the decisions that he had made, unearthing things that we had tried to bury or forget in our family, talking critically about my own family system, he said he understood and he supported me and he was proud of me. he said, i understand. you need to tell the story. you need the full story or it won't have any teeth. >> you tell the story beautifully in this book. thank you for joining us. >> thank you so much for having me. ♪ >> as always, there is much more online including a visit to a

farm outside of detroit were formerly incarcerated people earn an income, growing and selling kale strawberries and other crops when they get a new start in life. >> join us again here tomorrow night when we will have an inside look at the planned release of treated radioactive water from the fukushima nash -- nuclear plant into the ocean. that's the newshour for tonight. >> thanks for spending part of your evening with us. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by. >> consumer cellular, this is sam. how may i help you? >> this is a pocket dial. with consumer cellular, you get nationwide coverage with no contract. that's our thing. have a nice day. ♪ >> carnegie corporation of new york, supporting innovations in education, democratic engagement

, and the advancement of international peace and security. carnegie.org. and with the ongoing support of these institutions. this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy.] >> the pbs newshour continuing nearly 50 years of unbiased reporting. >> the foundation for democrats as they push for voting rights. >> the protesters haven't been moved. having the run of the place. >> covering a broad range of stories. >> less rain now. >> they are running out of water. >> what's it like on this stage? >> join us every weeknight on the pbs newshour. ♪ >> this is pbs newshour west

from w eta studios in washington and from our bureau at the walter cronkite school of journalism at arizona state university. ♪ >>

wow, you get to watch all your favorite stuff. it's to die for. now you won't miss a thing. this is the way. the xfinity 10g network. made for streaming. - [narrator] explore new worlds and new ideas through programs like this, made available for everyone through contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. - hello i'm paula kerger, president of pbs. our goal in public television is to bring you