JUDY WOODRUFF: Good evening.
I'm Judy Woodruff.
On the "NewsHour" tonight: a tense alliance.
I sit down with Turkey's foreign minister, amid heightened flash points with the U.S.
Then: a historic election in Chicago: We talk with Lori Lightfoot, the first black woman
and the first openly gay person to serve as mayor of the city.
Plus: Warnings From Antarctica.
We kick off our series of reports from the bottom of the world with a look at what penguins
can teach us about climate change.
RON NAVEEN, Oceanites: Penguins are us, you might say.
They breathe the same air.
They have to have food, a good home, a good environment.
If one of those falls out of synch, it's troubling.
JUDY WOODRUFF: All that and more on tonight's "PBS NewsHour."
(BREAK)
JUDY WOODRUFF: Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives are turning up the heat
over special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia report.
The Judiciary Committee today authorized subpoenas to require that the report and any related
material be turned over to them.
Democrats rejected Attorney General William Barr's promise of a redacted version by mid-April.
Republicans, in turn, called that reckless, as the two sides argued before voting.
REP.
JERROLD NADLER (D), New York: The committee has a job to do.
The Constitution charges Congress with holding the president accountable for alleged official
misconduct.
That job requires us to evaluate the evidence for ourselves, not the attorney general's
summary, not a substantially redacted synopsis, but the full report and the underlying evidence.
REP.
DOUG COLLINS (R), Georgia: If we can't get what we want, we will try and try again.
Maybe that's the new theme with this committee, the little train that kept looking for something
that says, I will try, and I will try, and I will try.
But at the end of the day, the president's still the president, the economy's still moving
forward, the regulations that we put in place are there, and, at this point in time, the
attorney general, although he has been smeared repeatedly, is doing exactly what the regulation
says.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Attorney General Barr has said that Mueller found no conspiracy or coordination
between Russia and President Trump's 2016 campaign.
Barr also decided against charging the president with obstructing justice, after Mueller reached
no conclusion on that question.
The U.S. Senate voted today to dramatically curb debate on most presidential nominees
to government posts.
Majority Republicans cut the time to two hours from 30.
The change will not apply to Cabinet slots, the Supreme Court and appeals courts.
Democrats used the two-hour rule during President Obama's second term, but it later lapsed.
The mayor-elect of Chicago is claiming a mandate for change after Tuesday's runoff election.
Lori Lightfoot swept all 50 of the city's wards.
She will be the first black woman to serve as mayor of Chicago, and the first who is
openly gay.
We will talk with her although later in the program.
The drama over Brexit has taken a new turn.
British Prime Minister Theresa May met today with the leader of the opposition Labor Party,
searching for a compromise that might pass Parliament.
She also wants a further delay in leaving the European Union.
But, in Brussels, the head of the European commission said no.
JEAN-CLAUDE JUNCKER, President, European Commission (through translator): April 12 is, however,
the ultimate possible deadline for approval of the withdrawal agreement.
If the House of Commons doesn't express itself by this date, no further short extension will
be possible.
JUDY WOODRUFF: As things stand now, Britain faces the prospect of crashing out of the
E.U. with no divorce agreement.
New, Islamic laws took effect in Brunei today, punishing gay sex and adultery by stoning
to death.
The Southeast Asian country is about two-thirds Muslim, but the new laws also apply to non-Muslims.
The measures have sparked calls for boycotts of hotels around the world that are connected
to Brunei's ruling sultan.
In Mozambique, thousands of people lined up to get a cholera vaccine in Beira.
That is the port city ravaged by a tropical cyclone last month.
More than 1,400 cholera cases have been reported there in the last week.
Health workers have launched a campaign to inoculate some 900,000 storm survivors over
the next six days.
Venezuela's opposition leader, Juan Guaido, has vowed defiance after being stripped of
his legal immunity.
President Nicolas Maduro's loyalists took that action last night in a legislative superbody
that bypasses the country's national assembly.
Afterward, Guaido warned those backing Maduro against trying to arrest or even kidnap him.
JUAN GUAIDO, President, Venezuelan National Assembly (through translator): We know that
all they have left is brute force.
We know that.
But we have audacity, intelligence, soul, strength, heart, hope, trust in this country,
in ourselves.
So, armed forces, you have a decision to make.
You have a decision to make now.
There are all the elements on the table.
Allowing this would be to turn against the republic.
JUDY WOODRUFF: The U.S. and some 50 other countries recognize Guaido as the rightful
leader of Venezuela.
Back in this country, three former fraternity members of Penn State University face jail
time for the hazing death of Timothy Piazza, who had been accepted for membership and Beta
Theta Pi.
The 19-year-old drank heavily and was fatally heard in a series of falls during a pledge
ritual in 2017.
The case drew national attention.
The three sentenced today will serve from 30 days to nine months.
A fourth fraternity member was given 10 months of house arrest.
Parents involved in a nationwide college admissions bribery case were in federal court today in
Boston.
They included actresses Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin.
The pair were not asked to enter pleas, and remained free on bail.
In all, 33 parents are charged in a multimillion-dollar scheme to get their children into top schools.
And on Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average gained 39 points to close at 26218.
The Nasdaq rose 47 points, and the S&P 500 added six.
Still to come on the "NewsHour": my conversation with the Turkish foreign minister; the incoming
mayor of Chicago, Lori Lightfoot; allegations against Joe Biden raise questions about respecting
boundaries; and much more.
Foreign ministers from NATO countries are gathered this week in Washington, and one
of the allies, Turkey, has come under sharp criticism for its dealing with the alliance's
principal adversary, Russia.
In a moment, you will see my interview with Turkey's foreign minister, but first some
background on an increasingly tense showdown between Turkey and the United States.
It was all smiles last week, as Turkey's Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu hosted his Russian
counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, to reaffirm a major arms deal.
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU, Turkish Foreign Minister (through translator): We have made this deal
with the Russian Federation, and we will honor it.
We bought it out of necessity.
Turkey is in need of an air defense system.
JUDY WOODRUFF: But Turkey's decision to buy Russia's top-of-the-line S-400 surface-to-air
missile system has angered Washington, because of a big arms deal of its own.
The U.S. is selling F-35 fighter jets to Turkey, a NATO ally, and fears Russia would gain technical
access or insight into the state-of-the art planes.
This week, the Pentagon cut off planned F-35 deliveries to Ankara, while offering the Turks
an American alternative to the Russian missile.
PATRICK SHANAHAN, Acting U.S. Defense Secretary: I am very confident in the Patriot proposal
that we have delivered to Turkey.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Acting U.S. Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan says, if Turkey instead buys
the U.S.-made Patriot air defense system, then problem solved.
PATRICK SHANAHAN: I really think we will resolve the situation, as we are strategic partners.
I expect we will solve the problem, so that they have the right defense equipment, both
in terms of Patriots and F-35s
JUDY WOODRUFF: But, in Washington today, at a NATO 70th anniversary event, Cavusoglu gave
no ground and said the deal with Moscow would proceed.
Vice President Mike Pence fired back in a speech to the NATO gathering.
MIKE PENCE, Vice President of the United States: Turkey must choose.
Does it want to remain a critical partner in the most successful military alliance in
the history of the world?
Or does it want to risk the security of that partnership by making reckless decisions that
undermine our alliance?
JUDY WOODRUFF: The verbal war over war machines is adding increased pressure to a relationship
already rife with tension.
Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has long condemned U.S. support for Syrian Kurdish
forces in the fight against ISIS, arguing they are allied with Kurdish separatists inside
Turkey.
The foreign minister followed up today, again accusing the U.S. of supporting a direct threat
to Turkey.
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: We have been asking the United States to actually disengage, disengage
with terrorist organization.
But it seems that they still support this terrorist organization.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Meanwhile, local elections in Turkey this week showcased a different
challenge to Erdogan.
The opposition won control of Ankara and led in Istanbul's mayor's race.
We explored most of this with Foreign Minister Cavusoglu earlier today.
Minister Cavusoglu, very good to talk to you.
Thank you for speaking with us.
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Thank you for the invitation.
JUDY WOODRUFF: The United States, Turkey, longtime lies, but right now seem to be at
an impasse.
Your government has committed, it says, to buying the Russian air defense system, the
S-400.
However, the defense secretary says he doesn't think this is going to happen, that, instead,
you're going to buy an American defense system, the Patriot.
Which is it?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Well, we really value our relations.
We are not only NATO allies, but our partnership has been actually very successful in many
areas in our region, in Afghanistan and in Europe as well.
And now we have some outstanding issues, but now S-400 is another issue.
We wish we could have both Patriots -- I mean, the Patriots from the United States, or other
systems, defense systems from other allies.
In last 10 years, we have tried, but we could not buy it from the United States.
And now there is a proposal, but still there is no guarantee that the U.S. will be able
to sell them to Turkey.
We are negotiating the conditions and the terms.
That's fine.
But even President Trump cannot assure us that he will get the green light from the
Congress.
JUDY WOODRUFF: But do you understand why the U.S. opposes Turkey having the S-400, worried
about the Russian defense authorities having access to American defense technology?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Well, this system -- will not see F-35s or other NATO systems as an
enemy.
And we will make sure that it will not happen.
And we propose the United States to form a technical working group and to examine this.
This is our proposal.
So we had to buy S-400s.
And it was an urgent need.
It was another choice for us, but we had to buy it.
JUDY WOODRUFF: They're already purchased?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Yes.
And it's a done deal.
JUDY WOODRUFF: But are you saying, regardless of what happens with the Patriot American
system, Turkey is committed to deploy the S-400, the Russian system?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: This is a done deal.
We already bought -- purchased...
JUDY WOODRUFF: Committed to deploy?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: We have purchased this, and it has to become...
JUDY WOODRUFF: It has to be...
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: It has to...
(CROSSTALK)
JUDY WOODRUFF: Deployed?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: That is the reason that we bought -- we spent a lot of money for this.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Even at the risk of a serious split with the United States over this?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Well, why we should have serious split?
And Turkey is a NATO ally, and secretary-general of NATO made it very clear that any ally can
purchase any system from other countries than allies.
And there are some other NATO allies which have S-300s and also Russian systems.
So why is that big a problem that Turkey had to buy this S-400, because she couldn't buy
them from its allies, particularly mainly from the United States?
So you don't want to sell it to Turkey, or you cannot sell them to Turkey, and then you
insist Turkey not to buy from anybody else either.
So this is actually unacceptable for us.
JUDY WOODRUFF: The U.S. sees this as a direct threat to U.S. national security.
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Well, it is not a direct threat, neither to Turkey, nor to any other
ally's national security.
JUDY WOODRUFF: How can you be sure?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: This will be fully under control of Turkey, this system.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So the U.S. should trust?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Right.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So much to ask you about.
You mentioned Syria.
It was not very long ago that your President Erdogan said keeping Mr. Assad in power in
Syria was unacceptable.
Now it looks as if Mr. Assad is staying in power.
Is Turkey prepared to accept this?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Well, we still believe that he cannot unite the country.
This is the problem.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Meanwhile, the U.S., as you know, President Trump saying the U.S. is pulling
troops out, except for a very small group.
Do you understand what the U.S.' overall strategy is now in Syria?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Well, it seems that there is no clear strategy yet.
There are some decisions, decisions of Trump, to withdraw, and different statement -- statements
are coming from different institutions.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Where are the different statements coming from?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: From the president himself, from different departments, from military,
from CENTCOM, military on the ground.
This is what we see from Turkey, actually.
Probably, you see better here in the United States.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So how do you who know what's going on?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Oh, that's why we have now a task force.
We brought military and intelligence and minister of foreign affairs of both sides to coordinate
it.
JUDY WOODRUFF: It's well-known what Turkey's government believes about the YPG operating
in Northern Syria.
Is your government at this point planning to attack?
Is your posture that they cannot stay there, that they should be attacked and removed at
some point?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Well, we are prepared for that option as well.
But since Trump told Erdogan, President Erdogan, that U.S. is withdrawing from Syria, we actually
started working together, coordinating the things together.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Just a few other things I want to ask you about quickly.
Number one is the journalist Jamal Khashoggi, murdered at the Saudi consul in Istanbul.
Why does your government not and do you plan to release the audio recording which you have
of the murder and any other information you have about that?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Well, any information is no longer a secret.
And we have shared all this informations with everybody, including CIA.
It is up to, of course, now the chief prosecutor to make it public or not.
But at this stage, I think...
JUDY WOODRUFF: In Saudi Arabia, but why does not...
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: No, in Turkey, I mean.
It's up to our chief prosecutor in Istanbul actually to give such decisions.
And there are still unanswered questions, and including whereabouts of Khashoggi's body
and local collaborators, as well as masterminds.
And we share also all the findings on our side with Saudi chief prosecutor, but, in
return, we couldn't get anything from them.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So, you are saying the Saudis are holding this up?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Right.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Question about the Trump administration's proposal for Israeli-Palestinian peace, a
Middle East peace plan.
Do you have a view of this?
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Well, we don't have a view, because, until today, there is no peace plan.
This is for sure.
And we are not sure whether there will be a peace plan or not.
Everybody is quite skeptical because of the decisions that the United States has taken
so far.
And decision to move the embassy to Jerusalem actually was a kind of turning point.
So, the U.S. -- everybody believes that the U.S. is no longer a balanced country, or objective.
And to initiate a peace plan, first, you have to be an honest broker.
And the last decision, for instance, of Trump, again, to recognize the Golan Heights as the
territory of Israel is another, actually, decision that everybody has been very much
concerned.
So, U.S. first has to be an honest broker to initiate a peace plan on this issue.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Minister Cavusoglu, thank you very much for talking with us.
MEVLUT CAVUSOGLU: Thank you.
JUDY WOODRUFF: And, as you just heard, the foreign minister said Turkey was prepared
to take action against the Kurds in Northeastern Syria, the YPG.
Late today, the State Department said Secretary of State Pompeo warned Cavusoglu this afternoon
in Washington that any unilateral Turkish military action in Syria would hold -- quote
-- "potentially devastating consequences."
The city of broad shoulders and tough politics turns a new page.
For the first time in 30 years, Chicago has elected a new mayor whose name isn't Daley
or Emanuel.
Lisa Desjardins reports.
LISA DESJARDINS: It was a landslide, history-making victory, and Chicago's new mayor-elect, Democrat
Lori Lightfoot, said Chicagoans made clear who and what they wanted:
LORI LIGHTFOOT (D), Chicago Mayor-Elect: You did more than make history.
You created a movement for change.
(APPLAUSE)
LORI LIGHTFOOT: We can and will finally put the interests of our people, all of our people,
ahead of the interests of a powerful few.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
LISA DESJARDINS: Lightfoot, who is openly gay, will be the first black woman to lead
the city.
She's an attorney, and she's a relative outsider to Chicago's political scene.
She'd distanced herself from the current mayor, Rahm Emanuel, even though he'd previously
named her to oversight posts.
Starting with the primary in February, Lightfoot bested 13 other candidates, including former
White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley of the powerful Daley family.
And in yesterday's runoff, she easily defeated Toni Preckwinkle, a longtime fixture in local
politics.
Lightfoot appeared with fellow Democrat Preckwinkle today, and Preckwinkle pledged to work with
her former foe:
TONI PRECKWINKLE, Former Chicago Mayoral Candidate: We have some real challenges ahead of us in
our county and in our city.
And I look forward to working with mayor-elect Lightfoot to address those challenges.
LISA DESJARDINS: Lightfoot herself comes from a working-class background, and her resume
includes stints as a federal prosecutor and president of the Chicago Police Board.
She inherits a city still struggling with gun violence and a deep sense of the haves
and have-nots, in the role of police and in the city's much scrutinized school system.
Those are themes for Lightfoot, and she is pragmatic and direct in approach.
It's something she displayed when asked today why it took so long for a black woman to be
elected mayor.
LORI LIGHTFOOT: I can't look into the crystal ball.
All I can do is the here and now.
Here I am, and now we move forward.
MAN: That's right!
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
LISA DESJARDINS: I spoke to mayor-elect Lori Lightfoot earlier today, and began by asking
what she thinks her win means.
LORI LIGHTFOOT: Well, I think the way in which we won, which is getting support from literally
every ward in the city, is a historic mandate for change.
Chicago's been under the grip of the corrupt and broken political machine for as long as
everybody's memory.
And I think people realize that something was problematic, that we needed to have change,
but weren't confident that it was possible.
I think the way in which I won in February really gave people optimism and hope that
we could go in a completely different direction.
And I think this broad mandate that I got last night is a real prescription for change.
LISA DESJARDINS: Your city has been in the headlines too often in the past few years
for violence.
It's something you have talked about.
And, specifically, in your campaign, you say you want to address the illegal flow of guns
into Chicago.
But how do you do that as mayor of the city?
LORI LIGHTFOOT: Well, first of all, you have got to make sure that our federal partners
in the U.S. attorney's office, ATF, FBI, DEA, not only here in Chicago, but all the states
that are the sources of illegal guns, they have got to be focused on a coordinated and
proactive strategy to go after the gun dealers, the traffickers, felons in possession, and
the straw purchasers.
So, if we focus on those individuals in a coordinated way, then I think we're going
to see significant drops in the number of guns that are coming to our city, and then,
as a consequence, the number of gun-related shootings and homicides.
LISA DESJARDINS: So, do you see this as an enforcement issue primarily, or are there
are new gun laws you think the city needs to put in place?
LORI LIGHTFOOT: Well, look, I think it's got two major pillars.
The violence that we're seeing is really an epidemic.
It's a public health crisis.
And what we haven't done is look enough at, what's the root causes?
A lot of what we're seeing are crimes of poverty.
And that means people don't feel a connection to the legitimate economy.
And that makes sense, when you think about the fact that we have 25 percent unemployment
or higher in the crime-plagued neighborhoods.
We have -- a vast majority of people that live in those neighborhoods are on some form
of government assistance.
Forty percent of African-American children in the city are living in poverty.
What that cries out for, to me, is a need to invest in our people, neighborhoods, small
business, rebuild our neighborhood schools.
And if we focus on those things, we're going to absolutely drive down violence and create
an environment and an infrastructure for positive change.
LISA DESJARDINS: On the subject of policing, you are a former prosecutor, but you have
also come out during this campaign saying that you think sometimes police are reaching
too far, perhaps in the use of the gang database there in Chicago, and you think maybe some
people are getting tagged in the justice system inappropriately.
Obviously, there's a trust issue in Chicago with the police.
Can you talk about the balance with law enforcement and police?
Should something be done there?
LORI LIGHTFOOT: Well, look, the police can't be effective if they are not viewed as a legitimate
force for good.
So we have to continue the hard, but necessary work of bridging that divide.
And having multiple databases, which is what we have right now, that have people who got
in it 30 years ago, there's no transparency around it.
You don't know how to get in.
You don't know how to get off.
So what I have said is, that database has to be decertified.
And only when we have a process that is transparent, that demonstrates to people what the onboarding
process is and a transparent way to get out of a database can we stand up a new one.
I'm meeting with the superintendent of police.
And that will be one of the primary issues that we talk about.
LISA DESJARDINS: You have talked about forgotten Chicago and making sure you bring development
and resources to the part of Chicago that is outside of the gleaming downtown, especially
the south and west.
But we have heard this from politicians of Chicago for years.
How do you make that happen?
LORI LIGHTFOOT: Well, number one, you have got to deal with the violence, because nobody's
going to invest in neighborhoods where they don't feel safe, where their employees are
not going to be safe or their property is not going to be safe.
That's kind of the overarching issue that really affects every other thing that we want
to do to uplift the quality of life in neighborhoods.
And then the city itself has to come up with a comprehensive plan for economic development,
which we do not have, which means we have got to go into those economically distressed
neighborhoods, listen to the people there, engage in a conversation about the assets
and opportunities, and then use that information to develop a comprehensive plan in which we
can drive progress.
LISA DESJARDINS: Of course, one of the national headlines coming out of Chicago recently involves
actor Jussie Smollett.
I know you have been getting a lot of questions about this.
(LAUGHTER)
LORI LIGHTFOOT: I do.
LISA DESJARDINS: To remind our viewers, Smollett was charged, and police say he was guilty,
of filing a false police report.
But the charges were dropped with almost no explanation.
As a former federal prosecutor yourself, what do you think about the role of privilege?
Is there too much role for privilege in the law enforcement system in Chicago?
LORI LIGHTFOOT: Well, look, privilege should never change the outcome.
No matter your financial status, no matter your celebrity, everybody should face the
same level of justice.
And that's the concern that we have in this case.
And, first, let me say, we need to make sure that we understand hate crimes do happen.
People are targeted as a result of what they look like, how they -- the God that they worship,
or who they love.
So I don't want to dismiss that.
But in this particular circumstance, within five weeks' time of when the charges were
laid out, and it seemed like there was an overwhelming case against this individual,
suddenly, the state attorney's office dismisses all charges, with no acceptance of responsibility
on the part of Mr. Smollett.
I think that begs for an explanation.
And I have been saying now for a week, since the issue came up, that the state attorney's
office has to give a much more fulsome explanation, so that you eliminate the perception that,
if you're rich, or you're a celebrity, or both, that you get better treatment than the
vast majority people who are making their way through a torturous criminal justice system.
LISA DESJARDINS: Finally, I have got a bit of a personal question for you.
I read it you grew up in a working-class family, both parents working multiple jobs, and that
you particularly the credit your mom, who came from the segregated South, with being
a driving force in your life.
I'm curious, what does she think about this historic win?
LORI LIGHTFOOT: My mother is a fascinating person.
What she says to me is, this is how I raised you.
I wanted you to be able to take advantage of the opportunities that are out there, to
be strong and fearless and feel like you had the confidence to be anything that you wanted
to be and take on any challenge.
So, I know she's very proud.
And I'm grateful for her being my mother, but also being a constant presence in my life.
LISA DESJARDINS: Mayor-elect Lori Lightfoot of Chicago, thank you for joining us.
LORI LIGHTFOOT: Thank you very much.
I appreciate it.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Stay with us.
Coming up on the "NewsHour," we kick off our series from the bottom of the world, the effect
of climate change on the penguins of Antarctica.
Some of former Vice President Joe Biden's past personal behavior is sparking conversations
about boundaries when it comes to physical contact and consent.
They go beyond himself to questions about social norms that were once tolerated by many
women, but may no longer be acceptable.
To be clear, none of the public accusations about Biden's actions approach sexual assault
or serious misconduct.
What the four women who've spoken out recently, including Lucy Flores, a former Nevada state
legislator, have said is that they were uncomfortable when Biden either hugged them, kissed them
or touched them inappropriately.
Biden addressed the matter on Twitter today.
JOSEPH BIDEN, Former Vice President of the United States: In my career, I have always
tried to make a human connection.
That's my responsibility, I think.
I shake hands.
I hug people.
I grab men and women by the shoulders and say, you can do this.
And whether they're women, men, young, old, it's the way I have always been.
And it's way I have tried to show I care about them and I'm listening.
And, over the years, knowing what I have been through, the things that I have faced, I have
found that scores, if not hundreds of people have come up to me and reached out for solace
and comfort.
Social norms have begun to change.
They have shifted.
And the boundaries of protecting personal space have been reset.
And I get it.
I get it.
I hear what they're saying.
I understand it.
And I will be much more mindful.
That's my responsibility, my responsibility.
And I will meet it.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So, that was on Twitter today.
And now let's look at some of the issues surrounding all of this.
Rebecca Traister is a writer for "New York Magazine" and for The Cut.
She's author of "Good and Mad: The Revolutionary Power of Women's Anger."
Karen Tumulty is a columnist covering national politics for The Washington Post.
And Frank Dobbin is a sociologist at Harvard University who studies sexual harassment and
diversity training.
And we welcome all three of you to the "NewsHour."
Let me first get your reaction, just your take on what the vice president had to say
today.
Karen Tumulty, you first.
KAREN TUMULTY, The Washington Post: Well, I think that this shows, among other things,
sort of how rusty he is at this.
His initial response to this was essentially to say -- to the women who were accusing him
of making them uncomfortable, was to say, I'm sorry that your feelings got hurt.
This is a very different kind of statement.
This is him sort of acknowledging that the fault lies in his own actions and promising
to change those actions.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Professor Dobbin, how did you?
How did you read what the vice president said?
FRANK DOBBIN, Harvard University: Well, I think it's a little surprising that he didn't
follow the issue over the last nearly 40 years, since he was in the Clarence Thomas hearings
in 1991.
But I think it's an indication of kind of a generational shift.
There's a generation of people that just hasn't really been aware of what kinds of changes
in social norms there are.
And, in this case, he at least acknowledges that he was out of synch with what was going
on.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Rebecca Traister, how did you hear him?
REBECCA TRAISTER, "New York Magazine": Well, I do think that especially the final part
about acknowledging that norms are changing and that he's engaged in this conversation
is what he needed to say, but he did need to say it five days ago, and really 20 years
ago, 10 years ago, two years ago.
He's billed himself of late as somebody who's very interested in these issues.
He's involved with It's On Us, talking about issues around changing norms around gender
and power.
And yet he was very slow to respond with what he needed to say.
And what he doesn't address in this statement is the degree to which norms are also changing
around the role -- the paternalism of that kind of touching is also reflected in his
policy record.
He's been in power for 40 years in the Senate -- or 30 years in the Senate and then as vice
president.
And he has also had a sort of paternalistic role in his positions on abortion, reproductive
health, his role as the head of the Judiciary in the Anita Hill hearings.
He's had -- he needs to address a lot about what has shifted in our politics and norms
and our ideas about gender and power.
JUDY WOODRUFF: I do want to broaden this to talk about what is going on if terms of our
entire country, our entire society at this point.
Karen Tumulty, have norms changed?
KAREN TUMULTY: Yes, I think that the MeToo movement is sort of evolving from a movement
into a norm.
And by that, I mean part of all of this is all of us understanding that, when women come
forward with these accounts, that we both give them the benefit of the doubt in their
version of events, but also the benefit in the doubt of the validity of their feelings
about it.
But at the same time, I think we do have to recognize that not every offense has -- carries
the same degree of severity, and that, you know, a lot of these just come from, you know,
behavior that is just clueless.
And if the person who is, you know, alleged to have committed these sort of understands
the degree to which this behavior makes people uncomfortable and is sensitive to that, I
do think that there really ought to be a path to redemption for lesser offenders, as it
were.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Well, I want to explore that, but I want to come back, too, to what you
said, Professor Dobbin.
You said -- you talked about a generational shift.
You know, what did you mean by that?
FRANK DOBBIN: Well, there has been a change in norms since 1991 and the Clarence Thomas
hearings.
What we generally recognize explicitly as OK and as not OK has changed pretty dramatically,
things like trying to date someone at work.
But this kind of behavior is, he would call it just emotional behavior.
He would just call it part of the way he does his job.
One of the things that I find disturbing is that we have undergone a pretty massive social
experiment since the early 1990s.
In 1991, at the time of the Clarence Thomas hearing, about 25 percent of medium and large
companies had some kind of harassment training.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Right.
FRANK DOBBIN: By the end of the 1990s, about 75 percent had some kind of harassment training.
But if you look at reports of harassment and surveys of workplace harassment, harassment
hasn't really declined very much in that time.
So I think, at the extreme ends of the continuum, when you think about what's OK and what's
not OK, you know, we know that sexual assault at work is widely viewed as not OK, and that
trying to date an underling, and persistently trying to date an underling is considered
to be not OK.
But a lot of stuff in the middle, people haven't gotten the message about.
And that's one of the reasons we still see high rates of harassment.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Rebecca, how clear is it what is OK and isn't OK right now in a workplace,
in a public setting?
REBECCA TRAISTER: Well, I think the question of clarity is a tough one, because, when you're
changing norms, you are -- you're literally changing the rules in the middle of the game.
But there's no other real way to do it, right?
So, and that's -- I think when Professor Dobbin talked about the generational shift, you have
people who were born in an era in which certain kinds of behavior were normalized, before
the term sexual harassment was even coined, which wasn't until 1975, which, by the way,
is after Joe Biden was already elected to the Senate, which happened in 1972.
So, we are changing the ideas about what is permissible and also the interrogation of
what kind of power, the sort of access to women's bodies.
What does it mean to be a powerful man who feels he can -- what he sees as emotional
connection, but winds up being uncomfortable physical touch with a woman who is his junior,
but in his field, a peer?
These women are working with him or other politicians.
The game is changing.
And that means that there isn't always a clear answer.
But the key thing is, you have to listen to the people who are telling you, this feels
like it's conveying something that is uncomfortable to me or that conveys you don't think of me
as an equal, it feels diminishing.
We have to listen to the conversation about it before we can just say, OK, this is OK,
this is not OK.
It is an ongoing and evolving process of trying to change the way we approach power and gender.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Karen, is it easier now to hold people accountable for their actions?
I think we're all trying to figure out, is there a way to sort through this now that
brings us to some conclusion that more of us can agree with?
KAREN TUMULTY: Oh, I think it is absolutely easier to have these conversations, and especially
over the last year-and-a-half, since we have seen so many brave women come forward in the
MeToo movement and tell their stories and be believed.
But, you know, at the same time, you have had -- I mean, the obvious comparison, is,
you know, Donald Trump sits in the White House right now having boasted about, you know,
grabbing women by their genitals and being accused of actual sexual assault by a number
of women.
So it isn't like I think we have very, very clear standards at this point.
But it is true that the conversation is happening, and that's a very welcome development.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Professor Dobbin, where should people turn if they're looking for guidance
on what's right?
I mean, where do they turn?
What do they -- who do they look to?
FRANK DOBBIN: Well, the problem is, the law isn't very clear about that.
What court cases say is unwanted sexual contact or unwanted physical contact.
But who's to say who wants it?
I mean, obviously, in this case, Biden thought that he was being friendly in these cases,
and so he -- I assume he thought that the women who have come forward wanted that contact.
But I think there's a bigger issue, which is, we have been trying to prevent harassment
with sexual harassment training, and it doesn't work.
It doesn't change the incidents of harassment in the workplace.
It can make things worse by exacerbating the behavior of the worst kinds of harassers to
begin with.
It tends to be preaching to the choir.
And then our solution, when people experience harassment, is a grievance process in most
companies that doesn't work, that backfires, and that women don't use because they know
they won't get any kind of resolution.
So, when you asked earlier, is it easier now than it was, it's easier, I think, to report
a high-profile man, a senator or a CEO of a company or Jeffrey Weinstein.
But, you know, for the person whose manager is harassing them at a McDonald's at 11:00
at night, they don't really have anybody to go to, because their only real remedy is to
talk to their manager, who's probably the person who's harassing them, or to use a grievance
process that they know won't produce positive results, because they never do.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Yes.
FRANK DOBBIN: So, I think we're in a kind of conundrum here.
We don't know how to resolve the problem.
I think the -- it's great news that the MeToo movement is making some public progress in
what the norms are, but I just don't see much changing in the workplace.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Finally, Rebecca Traister, what do you say to people, women or men, who
are looking around saying, what's my guidance here?
How do I know where the boundaries are today?
REBECCA TRAISTER: Well, again, I would emphasize, listen to the people who are telling you.
They're describing the experiences of feeling like their boundaries are being violated.
But also look to the power imbalances, because so much of what enables behavior is not just
harassment and not -- this is obviously -- when we're talking about Biden, we're not talking
about any kind of violent assault -- but what enables sexism, the sort of diminishment,
you know, in another category, racism.
It's unequal power distribution.
And when you look at politics, when you look at businesses, what you see is a lot of power
that's been in the hands of men, and for a long time in the hands of white men.
And part of the criticism here isn't just about saying individual people did something
bad.
It's actually a critique of the way that the system has distributed power unequally, and
that some people have been in a position to have access to women's bodies or to make the
rules, to make the norms around their preferences and their ideas.
And as some of the people who have had less power are gaining a voice and saying, actually,
that hasn't -- that makes me uncomfortable, I feel like I have been denied an equal share
of this power, I have been being denied respect and a hearing, I think that's a bigger critique
that we're talking about, is saying, let's change some of the structural dynamics that
have put so much power into the hands of certain kinds of people for so long in so many realms.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Sobering thought and a subject I know we're going to come back to again and
again, because it is an important one.
Rebecca Traister, Karen Tumulty, Professor Frank Dobbin, thank you, all three.
KAREN TUMULTY: Thanks, Judy.
FRANK DOBBIN: Thank you, Judy.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Tonight, we have the first in a series about the remarkable continent
of Antarctica.
William Brangham and producers Mike Fritz and Emily Carpeaux spent two weeks there.
And for the rest of April, they will be reporting on climate change, tourism, and the history
of the vast ice-covered continent at the bottom of the world.
But they begin with a story about a man dedicated to studying the penguins who live on the Antarctic
peninsula, and how they're adapting to a warming environment.
It's part of our weekly series on the Leading Edge of science.
RON NAVEEN, Oceanites: Hi, buddy.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: For more than 35 years, Ron Naveen has been coming every year to Antarctica
to do something he still can't believe he gets paid for: research and count penguins.
RON NAVEEN: I can't believe it.
I have the best job on the planet.
(CROSSTALK)
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Is that right?
RON NAVEEN: Well, I'm a penguin counter, for God's sake.
Can't beat that, can you?
(LAUGHTER)
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: No, I don't think you can.
Naveen is a former lawyer for the Environmental Protection Agency, but he left government
work back in the 1980s to start Oceanites, a nonprofit that tracks the health of three
penguin species that breed on the Antarctic Peninsula.
It's home to millions of these charming, occasionally awkward, flightless birds.
RON NAVEEN: They're really funny.
They're like little human beings.
And they don't have knees, so they're waddling around all the time.
They look kind of silly and stupid and late for dinner, and all that stuff.
But they're just cute as hell, and I love spending time watching their behaviors.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: The Antarctic Peninsula is the 800-mile-long stretch of land that
branches off from the northwest corner of the continent.
This region has been warming faster than almost anywhere else in the world.
And Naveen says that warming is having a dramatic impact on penguins.
RON NAVEEN: Because I have been coming here for so long, I have seen these changes.
I have seen the penguin populations of certain colonies thin out pretty dramatically.
One colony that we studied at Deception Island has gone from an estimated 90,000 breeding
pairs to 50 or fewer.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Wow.
RON NAVEEN: Fifty thousand or fewer.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Ninety thousand down to 50?
RON NAVEEN: Yes.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: That's a huge drop-off.
RON NAVEEN: Right.
But these penguins can teach us something about life on the planet.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: We first met Naveen and his colleague, seabird biologist Grant Humphries,
in the southern Argentinean city of Ushuaia.
They were preparing for their annual trip south.
There, they met with Dr. Heather Lynch, an evolutionary biologist from Stony Brook University,
who was just returning from a similar expedition.
She and Naveen have long partnered in this penguin research.
DR.
HEATHER LYNCH, Stony Brook University: Some species are going to be major climate change
winners, and there are going to be others species that are no longer able to thrive
on the Antarctic Peninsula.
And the changes that we have seen have been so rapid, that it's really important that
we're down here every year to monitor them.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: The research teams hitch rides on the various tourist ships willing
to give them a lift to the bottom of the world.
And for more than two weeks, we followed Naveen and Humphries on this remarkable continent,
as they trudged through snow, hiked up rocky peaks, and went into areas few humans are
allowed to see.
The three different species they have been tracking here are Adelies, with the distinct
white circle round their eyes, chinstraps, named for that thin marking across their faces,
and gentoos, with the orange beaks.
GRANT HUMPHRIES, Seabird Biologist: Antarctic penguins are just unbelievable animals.
They have been around for 60 million years.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Grant Humphries says these birds have long survived and thrived in some
of the most inhospitable terrain on the planet.
GRANT HUMPHRIES: They look like rugby balls, you know?
(LAUGHTER)
GRANT HUMPHRIES: They just don't look like they're made for anything, and here we are
on top of this hill here.
They have come up from the water and hiked up through deep snow, up over the rocks and
all that to get up here.
And it's not like they have hands.
I mean, it is spectacular how hardy these animals are.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: The sound that we hear them making, when they put their head up, and make
that cry, what are they doing there?
RON NAVEEN: They're displaying one to another, hee-haw, hee-haw, the donkey call of the penguin.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: But are they communicating something with that?
RON NAVEEN: This is my nest.
You're my mate.
This is my territory.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: In the summer, when it's a balmy 20 to 30 degrees out, the birds seek
out some clear ground, where they build these piles of rocks for nests.
After their chicks hatch, the penguins head back to sea for the winter.
Penguins are generally monogamous.
Roughly 80 to 90 percent stick together for life.
That doesn't mean, though, that when they come back to nest each summer, it's all marital
bliss.
RON NAVEEN: The male will come back, claim his rocks, and start displaying.
And, hopefully...
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: That's the come hither, ladies, sound?
RON NAVEEN: Come back to me, my lady from last year.
And she hopefully will show up within 10 or 14 days.
And, if she doesn't, he's going to take and get it on with whatever available female comes
by.
I mean, he's ready to go.
And, of course, you see these fights, which are presumably between the two females when
wife number one shows up late, finds somebody else in the house, and they have a battle
royal.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Because she wants to be back with her mate from before?
RON NAVEEN: Well, she doesn't understand who this other bird is that is sitting in the
nest, and he's got a lot of explaining to do.
(LAUGHTER)
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Life here for the birds has never been easy.
There are predators everywhere, from the sea, like this leopard seal, and from the sky,
like these skuas flying overhead, constantly raiding penguin nests.
But now they're facing a host of new threats.
Krill, the tiny shrimp-like creatures which are the penguins' main food source, are declining.
They're being heavily fished to supply the booming fish-supplement industry, and everything
down here eats krill, including the resurgent population of whales.
But climate change is also believed to be harming them.
That's forcing penguins to dive deeper and travel further in hopes of finding food.
The warming on the peninsula is also causing another, seemingly contradictory effect, more
snowfall, which makes it harder for the birds to breed.
That seems counterintuitive, that a warming environment brings more cold snow.
GRANT HUMPHRIES: Yes.
The interaction between that warmer air and the cold sea surface temperature means that
you're actually getting sort of more evaporation.
You're getting rain.
You're getting snow, things that wouldn't normally happen on the peninsula over the
course of a whole season.
And that heavy snowfall prevents these birds from being able to breed, because it packs
down on top of them.
The nests fail.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: It's all led to a rapid decline for the birds on the peninsula.
Adelie populations have dropped by nearly 75 percent since 1990.
Chinstraps have in some locations dropped by half.
GRANT HUMPHRIES: We're quite concerned about Adelies and chinstraps.
We're seeing colonies that are getting close to blinking out, and it could very well be
likely that, in our lifetime, we will see Adelie and chinstrap penguin completely disappear
from the Antarctic Peninsula.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: But, remarkably, the gentoos are actually thriving.
Their numbers have grown six-fold over the same period.
Researchers believe it's because they have adapted and are now eating more fish, instead
of krill.
And, as the breeding season gets harder, they're re-laying their eggs a second time.
DR.
HEATHER LYNCH: There's a real lesson for us, that, as people, as communities, as cities,
we're all going to have to figure out what's going to work in the future.
And it may look very different than what's worked in the past.
RON NAVEEN: Penguins are us, you might say.
They breathe the same air.
They have to have food, a good home, a good environment.
If one of those falls out of synch, it's troubling.
So, my question, you might say, in a very general, euphemistic way, are we going to
be gentoos in the future, or are we going to have a sinking population, like some of
the chinstrap and Adelie populations?
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Meaning, are we going to figure out either how to stop this warming
or how to adapt to it?
RON NAVEEN: I don't know if we're going to be able to stop it.
What I have been focusing a lot upon is whether we're going to be able to adapt.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: At 73, Ron Naveen is also learning to adapt.
New technologies like drones and satellites are now used to count penguin colonies from
above.
But he says old-fashioned manual counters like him will always be needed to verify what's
happening on the ground.
And even after all these years, he admits that saying goodbye to this magical place
is never easy.
RON NAVEEN: I get very wistful and teary-eyed, to be honest.
It's my last day in the Antarctic for this season.
I do want to come back.
I'm intending to come back.
I have been doing this forever.
I want -- I'm not ready to hang up the penguin clicker.
But I will have a few moments later this afternoon with my favorite guys, sitting down there
communing with them.
And I will go back to the ship and have a big fat smile on my face.
I'm the luckiest guy on the planet.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm William Brangham in Antarctica.
JUDY WOODRUFF: And a news update before we go.
Late today, the chairman of the U.S. House Ways and Means Committee, Representative Richard
Neal of Minnesota, requested six years of President Trump's personal and business tax
returns.
Unlike other recent requests by congressional Democrats, Representative Neal is using a
little-known provision of tax law dating back a century to the Teapot Dome scandal of the
Harding administration.
It grants the chairman power to request tax information on any filer.
Mr. Trump says tonight he is not inclined to adhere to the request.
On the "NewsHour" online: We see how an academy in Uganda is training youth to start their
own businesses to spark social change.
That's on our Web site, PBS.org/NewsHour.
And that's the "NewsHour" for tonight.
I'm Judy Woodruff.
Join us online and again here tomorrow evening.
For all of us at the "PBS NewsHour," thank you, and we'll see you soon.