conducted on a bipartisan basis. >> trump made no mention of his impeachment in a video message on twitter released soon after the proceedings, but in a change of tone he condemned last week's violence and said those involved will face justice. >> i want to be very clear. i unequivocally condemn the violence that we saw last week. violence and vandalism have absolutely no place in our country, and no place in our movement. making america great again has always been about defending the rule of law, supporting the men and women of law enforcement, and upholding our nation's most sacred traditions and values. mob violence goes against

everything i believe in, and everything our movement stands for. no true supporter of mine could ever endorse political violence. no true supporter of mine could ever disrespect law enforcement or our great american flag. no true supporter of mine could ever threaten or harass their fellow americans. if you do any of these things, you are not supporting our movement. you are attacking it. and you are attacking our country. we cannot tolerate it. >> google will pause political advertising on all of its platforms starting on thursday. the company says it is the result of the violence at the u.s. capitol last week. the policy will be in place until at least january 21, the day after joe biden's inauguration. airbnb announced it will cancel all bookings in washington, d.c. during inoculation week erie of

the company says it is in response to local and federal officials asking people not to washington. those of the headlines. the news continues on al jazeera in about half an hour after the bottom line. goodbye. >> talked to al jazeera. we asked -- >> how can you deal with institutionalized corruption in this country? >> we listen. >> if this breaks into conflict between pakistan and india, this has implications for the world. >> we meet with global newsmakers and talk about the stories that matter on al jazeera. >> i'm steve clemons and i have a question. do americans believe their country is in the middle of a cold civil war? let's get to the bottom line. for years, more and more americans have been losing trust in their journalists and politicians. january 6 will go down and -- as one of the days when mistrust

spilled over into mayhem. citizens following donald trump's dark vision of american carnage ackley -- actually attacked the american capital. people died. americans wonder how fragile their democracy is. add covid to the equation, joblessness, economic anxiety, inequality, structural racism, now all sides are angry and out each other, don't political leaders in the media and their social institutions. trust has been supplanted by conspiracy theories trying to make sense of it all. these tensions erupting in a divided america are just happening here. you can see trust eroding inside many other countries around the world. today we are talking to richard, local public relations publisher

of surveys called the trust barometer. the latest poll has been released. great to see you and thank you for joining us. >> thank you. >> i have to start with the deeply divided america and the assault on the capital. i can't think of a better time than now to look at the question of trust in this country. your report is one of my favorites to look at. what are the highlights of your report and what do they say about this unusual and awful moment we are in? >> we have a real info-demic. the fact that people don't believe leaders anymore, 60% of our respondents said they think leaders intentionally lied to them and they don't believe the platforms come either. trust in mainstream media has gone down by 12 points, trust in social media is at an all-time low, around 30%. they are operating with an absence of facts and they go on hopes or illusions, and i think that is really the basis on which those hooligans invaded the capital last week. the false hope that they could

overturn the electoral college, which was not going to happen and was a violation of the american democracy. >> i got a press release from senator chris coons and the headline is that we have two pandemics. we have a health pandemic in covid. an early copy of the report, is he reflecting these times? >> we have an inextricable link between the pandemic and disinformation. think about the reality that only two thirds of americans are prepared to get vaccinated. that is really on the basis of misinformation. a sort of history may be of bad treatment of african-americans in particular at teske geek -- tuskegee, but the sad fact that people are going on rumor and not on fact and that is a tragedy in a democracy.

we have to get good information in front of people so they can make legitimate decisions. >> you mentioned two thirds of the public would be willing to take the vaccine, but actually i looked at your numbers and it says 33% are willing to take it in the near term and 31 more percent may be within the first year, which gets you to two thirds but doesn't sound like an enthusiastic population to get vaccinated. >> we also find people with poor information hygiene, those who get information from social and share it and go on a single source, are substantially less willing to get vaccinated. as the senator said, it is like a dna strand with the pandemic and info-demic linked. >> i talked to you six months ago when you did a midterm version of this report and it was shocking, because in that report, you saw trust in government institutions, trust

in scientists, trust in intellectual authorities, if you will, really go through the roof and it looked like a time when there was this health pandemic hitting americans and creating fear, the study said trust in institutions >> trust has cratered for government, and businesses stay quite stable so business is the most trusted institution. there are all sorts of new expectations on the private sector. for example, it is up to tech companies to take certain people off their platforms. it is up to the private sector

also to somehow fix the food supply or any of these things. so government is 50 points less confident than business in this study. that is a stunning condemnation of government handling of the pandemic in particular. >> are we in a good situation? are businesses in a good situation, with so many people looking to large corporations to bail them out? i can tell you, to put a date tag on this, america has throttled twitter for banning donald trump. amazon web services is kicking parler off. we are at a line where trust and responsibility should be with a social contract companies have with americans or they have with citizens around the world and that is in debate right now.

as they look at companies for responsible action, are companies prepared to really be responsible? >> i look at this on the spectrum of action. in the obvious, you have to speak up to your employees about diversity and inclusion. you have to condemn systemic racism, you have to be sure to say that the murder of george floyd was an unforgivable act. that is because it is relevant to your employees and to your business. now, the decisions to remove your political donations to certain parties or certain people, that is further on the spectrum. that is a more ambitious, aggressive, and by the way, i agree with it, edelman will not make donations to ted cruz or anybody who voted to overturn the electoral college procedure. now, further on the spectrum is the decision to take off center

-- certain individuals, politicians from sort -- certain platforms. taking parler off of apple or any other store. i think over time, businesses will be in a better place if it works cooperatively with government on these types of decisions. there are those that in -- are in the wheelhouse and those that are on the edge and if it is a playing field issue, where i think business, if it is a player and a referee, is going to have trouble. you have to leave it to business to be the actor and government to be the referee. >> one thing that fascinated me about your reports and always does, the global dimension of them. you were in a lot of countries, i think 27 countries if i am not mistaken, and you did a poll of public attitudes and look at their trust levels across the board. you found a higher degree of trust in places like china and india by far than in the united

states. the united states, while never rock-bottom, was pretty close to the bottom in many measures. you had some surprising countries like indonesia and india way on top. what are they getting right? what is china getting right that the united states is not? >> in general, this has been a progression over a decade. countries in asia have populations that have more trust in their institutions. they tend to be performing better economically, the rising tide lifts all ships, i do want to point out though that in the last six months, trust in china has gone down more, 18 points, then in any other country. particularly trust in business, down 25 points. it is a warning for american companies operating in china, be careful. i would also say that trust in china as a foreign government is at 30%. this is an all-time low. again, based on perhaps keeping the truth from the world about

covid. trust in the united states is only 40%, also an all-time low. we are not exactly seen as helping on sustainability or being a good partner with a lot of these countries. so we have a lot of work to do for america in terms of international relations. >> one of the other elements that i gravitated towards in your report where the very different attitudes that republicans and democrats have regarding trusting media. democrats around 57%, republicans around 18% if i am not mistaken. in that, you talk about i think information hygiene and the way people interact with their news sources. can you break that down for us? >> sure. what has happened since the election is that trust among trump voters have plummeted. it has gone down 15 points, most in media, somewhat in government

. not so much in business. i think the media is seen particularly by trump voters as biased, politicized, not telling the full truth, and so it is sort of written off. i think the media has a job to do. you are a top journalist. it is seen as moving towards following tweets and being a reporter on that which the legislators say as opposed to doing independent reporting. i think we have to get back to a time when media is seen as the bulwark of society. at the moment it is seen as seeking division. that is a core place for democracy to be. >> do you think there is a pathway back? as i look at the many different platforms, and i just joined parler the other day on the day they unplugged it because i really didn't know much about it, didn't know about twitter, i

do know a lot about tiktok and instagram and other places, but very different arena of news. 10 years ago we were talking about blogging. we have gone a long way in different directions in fragmenting that media. the question i have is, how can we make all of these platforms at least aspire to more responsible engagement with the truth? how do we get people to reward and punish those media outlets for engaging with the truth? >> steve, i think the media is always going to be the core of people's knowledge base. but the surroundsound can be provided by ngos, business and government, when they have comparable advantage in a specific issue area. i found it amazing that in our study, employer media is actually more credible than mainstream media. that tells me that trust is actually local. trust is in my employer, my ceo.

all the employees of that company come all of the people who are in the community where the company is headquartered, have the ability to be informed at least on the basis of what the company's view is. i think that is a helpful addition to overall knowledge. we have to be sure that social media doesn't continue to be ac were. it has to just not be free speech. free speech, all of her wendell holmes was direct about this, fire in a crowded theater, not ok. there is a will -- a limit to speech. we have reached that limit. companies and ngos have to intervene by putting up quality material in their social feed so people can get educated. >> one interesting point of convergence you spoke to is the ceo employer, that person being interviewed, has a high level of

trust. the high level of trust, whether one is a republican or democrat, it is really the only space in your report that i can see both trump supporters and biden supporters kind of roughly in the same spot in terms of trusting their employer. i guess my question is, what is the playbook for that employer? what is the playbook for that company that actually has an opportunity to talk to both sides of the equation? what do they need to do to be transformative? and what do they need to do to guide government and ngos? you are not just about businesses and government, there are other players out there is trust has plummeted. what can those ceos do to create a healthier ecosystem? they may be the only ones that these people are listening to. >> let's use massachusetts as an example. there is a group of 20 companies that have come together called the massachusetts competitive alliance and they are dealing

with education, infrastructure, health, etc. and they are inviting firms like bain capital, they are inviting the big employers in the area. they are speaking to government and acting on their own. so they are taking on job upscaling, we are getting more diverse senior management or diverse board or this, small business in the supply chain. they have specific agenda items. they are bringing this to the governor and the mayor of boston and saying, we are going to get this done. let's do it together. that is a productive way to proceed between business and government. >> one of the things that has been bothering me in the covid story of this is the communication plan. i was asking myself, is anthony fauci calling richard edelman? is donald trump calling richard edelman on what the communications plan is for a vaccine rollout? when i talk to communities around the country, which i do,

there is incredible confusion about vaccines. people don't know what order they should be in. there is fear about folks that have gotten sick potentially from having been vaccinated. you have lots of communities, communities of color and others, that have been hit hard without ambassadors that they might trust going out to them. are you as appalled as i am? i have been asking government officials and they say don't worry, we have a plan, but are you appalled that there seem to be no communications plans with the vaccination strategy for covid? >> we are working with the city of chicago on a plan. it can't just come from the top down, from the director of public health or whatever. that is important but not sufficient. we have such a lot of suspicion, rumor, etc. we have to bring

church leaders and community activists and others with quality information such that they can talk to the congregants and give them reassurance about the way in which the clinical trials were carried out, who was in the trials, what the side effects might be, like anaphylactic response or something, and what a small percentage that is and it is recoupable. in fact, the speed at which these vaccines were developed is not miraculous. it was on the basis of these companies working together and sharing knowledge. we have to do our basic part of communicating before somebody is going to agree to get vaccinated. it is the most important thing we have in the next three months, is to get this vaccination program accepted. >> i agree with you and i guess it does need to come from the bottom up at some level, but it seemed after we have been talking about this for a year, we have been talking about the native american population, which we see reports of so many elders diane, the black and

hispanic population taking the brunt, when we look at this, i live in rural maryland. even frontline police officers and fire responders, a little less than one third are getting vaccinated, even though they are at the front of the line. that fits with your data. maybe another third over the course of a year but it is very clear that that communication strategy is not there. i'm worried about it. >> i'm definitely worried about it. i am also worried business will overreach and do something like mandate a vaccine for employees. i think that is exactly the wrong message, because it means, well, they couldn't persuade me so they are having to force me. that is going to create a ripple effect of further mistrust. and we should at least do the best we can to put the data in front of people and try to get them to comply as opposed to the

stick. >> one of the things that we talked about companies and their behavior in the past, a lot of companies went through, check off the box, make sure you are sustainable, make sure you talk about equity and women, check off boxes. you said that is no longer good enough, that they had to get into the game, they had to help solve problems. do you stand by that? let me ask you, if you were advising politicians who are a big part of this study, and trust in politicians is simply plummeting to the dark caves of the earth, what do they need to do? would you give them the same advice, stop posturing and solve? >> i think it is all about action. people want results. politicians have to take the political hat off and put on the competence hat, and be very practical and be willing to partner with other institutions,

business, etc., and not look for immediate glory. it is not about the latest sort of standup press conference or whatever, it is just, get the hard work done. and the idea somehow that we have gone to our own corners in politics also opens up this whole avenue for business in a way to be the web of bringing us back together. again, business will get stuff done, and we will get back to work, for example a health safety passport is something i have been pushing for months. if steve clemons wants to fly to london to do his job, he should be able to do that and we should know that you have had the vaccine or you have had the disease or you have been tested at the following places for how long. everyone deserves that level of comfort, and you need to know also that the restaurants and the people on the airplanes, who

sit next to you, have done the same thing. we are in a community where the least common denominator can make you sick. so you have to guarantee against that. >> i have often talked to you about this report for many years now in the middle of some of the most powerful people in the world in davos, switzerland, at the economic forum, and geo-heads, social leaders in communities around the world, and business people in every part of the world. when i read the report this year, it is among the bleakest i have read when we talk about a cold civil war and the collapse and the deficit. it is not a pretty picture. give us your pathway, if you will, as if we were talking to those ngo leaders around the world. if we were talking about the problems in the world, what is the way to a less bleak and a more hopeful situation, if you can, than the realities you are describing in this year's trust barometer? >> i actually think we have hit

a trust bottom and the way forward is action, transparency, frequency of communication, fairness, we haven't talked about this enough, the biggest mask class divide in terms of opinion in 20 countries, 24 have double-digit trust divides between elites on the masses. dow jones down, record unemployment, and a lot of sickness among people who are frontline workers. we have to have four or five things that we are going to accomplish in the next 12 months, and if those are done, then we will see a significant rise in trust. it is almost like, you and i are desperately to get back on the road because we are road warriors. we want to be safe and we want to get back in the game. but imagine you are a restaurant worker and your place is closed because the boss can't make

enough money having seats outdoors. everybody wants to go out, go back to their old lives. we just need to make that easier. we need to hurry up and get it done. there needs to be fairness. that is the word. we can't have the wealthy being so rich and all of this. everybody thinks the game is rigged. that is what trump plays into, this idea of being rigged. that is not the america that i know. but if people are afraid, they are unable to function normally, and their fears are particularly around job loss and downward economic mobility. we have to be empathetic about that and we have to show we are going to invest money so you have a chance. if you work hard we will take care of you because you will be trained to compete. as opposed to, 25 percent of

retail jobs will disappear because 20 5000 stores are going to close and how many branch banks are going to say goodbye? women particularly are very vulnerable to job loss, clerical, etc., and they don't want to have a loss of income so they are mad. give them a path forward. show them community colleges will be improved. chill them the companies will pay for their scholarships to those schools. that is a big deal. that is being fair to people. >> richard, thank you for your candor in talking to us as you have so many times, about technology and the anxieties it creates as well as the opportunities and how people who are feeling left behind, or not part of the system, need to be brought into the system. i appreciate your candle at -- your candor and the publication of the edelman trust barometer. so what is the bottom line? social trust is what makes

communities work. without it, people can't agree on the rules and anarchy and fear takeover. we need to trust that people will stop at a red light, that medicines are safe and restaurants are clean. that our leaders don't lie. otherwise, society breaks down in fear takes over. in the united states, trust between supporters of the two opposing visions of america has reached a low point. it can be rebuilt, but can the democrats and republicans be less about winner takes all and more about, we are all in the same boat? so far, i'm sorry, it doesn't look promising. but january 6 might be the spark that starts the conversation, and that is the bottom line. ♪

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- hey, i'm darius rucker. coming up onreel south. - [darius] from mobile to birmingham, alabama's gay community is no longer silent. - [searcy] you know, my roots are definitely southern. - [darius] and the struggle to change state laws and attitudes has gained ground. - [patricia] for somebody like me who's a political junkie and an activist, this is the front lines. - [darius] but in many cases, families' lives have been upended. - [kinley] once again, our life is put on hold. - this is about the whole state. this is about every single gay person who's been denied rights - [darius] witness "alabama bound" onreel south. - [female narrator] support for this program is provided by south arts, sponsors of the southern circuit tour of independent filmmakers, with funding from the national endowment for the arts.