GEOFF BENNETT: Good evening.
I'm Geoff Bennett.
AMNA NAWAZ: And I'm Amna Nawaz.
On the "NewsHour" tonight: Police forcefully break up the UCLA encampment, as arrests and protests against the war in Gaza spread to more college campuses.
GEOFF BENNETT: We hear from the niece of an Israeli-American hostage nearly eight months after he was taken captive by Hamas.
AMNA NAWAZ: And a closer look at this consequential Supreme Court term, the cases heard and the ideological divide on display.
MARCIA COYLE: This appears, especially this term, to be a very confident court willing to step into some of the most divisive issues.
(BREAK) AMNA NAWAZ: Welcome to the "NewsHour."
Police in riot gear broke up an encampment at UCLA overnight and arrested protesters after another day of high tensions on campus.
That followed earlier violence from counterprotesters.
GEOFF BENNETT: So far, more than 2,000 people have been arrested in the last two weeks.
While many protests have been peaceful and many of the arrested are not students, the past week has seen a series of escalating confrontations, occupations, and shutdowns.
That led President Joe Biden to condemn violence and disorder today following the latest developments in Los Angeles.
Overnight, hundreds of pro-Palestinian protesters at UCLA defied warnings to leave their encampment.
And just before dawn, police tore down the tents.
Over the course of the day, they arrested more than 200 people.
The police response was still under way when President Biden spoke at the White House and drew a line between dissent and disorder.
JOE BIDEN, President of the United States: So, let me be clear.
Peaceful protest in America -- violent protest is not protected.
Peaceful protest is.
It's against the law when violence occurs.
Destroying property is not a peaceful protest.
It's against the law.
Vandalism, trespassing, breaking windows, shutting down campuses, forcing the cancellation of classes and graduations, none of this is a peaceful protest.
GEOFF BENNETT: The president, when asked by a reporter, said the National Guard should not be deployed to respond to the protests.
And when asked if the protests have made him reconsider his policies in the region, the president said no.
Back in Los Angeles, police faced growing criticism for a delayed response to Tuesday night's assault on the protesters' campsite at UCLA.
The city's mayor and California's governor have complained, and students today were still angry.
TAYLOR GEE, UCLA School of Law Student: I think it's especially galling for a lot of protesters, because, less than 24 hours ago, the protesters in this encampment were attacked by more than 200 unidentified counterprotesters who showed up in the middle of the night and assaulted the encampment for seven hours.
And the police didn't show up for the first three or four.
And then, when they did, they sat around and they watched for another hour-and-a-half.
PROTESTERS: There's no riot here!
Why are you in riot gear?
GEOFF BENNETT: Elsewhere, police also broke up a protester encampment at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire last night and arrested 90 people.
Today, the school's president defended the action.
In a statement, President Sian Beilock said - - quote -- "Last night, people felt so strongly about their beliefs that they were willing to face disciplinary action and arrest.
While there is bravery in that, part of choosing to engage in this way is not just acknowledging, but accepting that actions have consequences."
In Oregon, protesters occupying a Portland State University library were cleared out of the building by police.
Once outside, protesters dismantled police barricades.
But while some protests are intensifying, others are coming to an end.
Officials at the University of Minnesota reached a deal with pro-Palestinian demonstrators to disband their encampment today.
As part of the agreement, organizations involved in the protest will get to meet with the university's Board of Regents next week to discuss how the school should divest from companies with ties to the Israeli military.
New York police also released bodycam video from Tuesday, when officers swept into Hamilton Hall at Columbia University.
They cut through chains and faced barricades of furniture before arresting protesters.
More than 100 people were arrested.
Given the video of these clashes and the rising number of police called to campuses, it's easy to lose track of where protests have been generally peaceful.
But Wesleyan University in Connecticut has largely had a peaceful encampment so far.
There has been some vandalism and significant tensions on campus, but not at the level we have seen at some other schools.
Michael S. Roth is the president of Wesleyan University and he joins us now.
Thank you for being with us.
So let's start there.
Why hasn't Wesleyan seen the level of disruption, certainly not the level of violence that we have seen on other campuses?
What accounts for that?
How are you approaching this?
MICHAEL S. ROTH, President, Wesleyan University: It makes me nervous to hear you say that, because it just takes a few bozos to turn a peaceful protest into something else.
And at many of these other schools, it has been non-students and people who are looking for a fight or for confrontation who turn things towards mayhem and disorder, or, in the case of UCLA, counterprotests that were violent themselves.
We have been fortunate at Wesleyan that the students who are protesting who are bearing witness to a disaster in Gaza want to engage in discussions with their fellow students, with their faculty members, with staff members, sometimes even with me, although they want me to do stuff that I don't agree with.
They want the university to divest from companies that do business with Israel.
I don't think that's a sensible idea.
But I do think having more conversations about what we can do to bring peace to the Middle East makes a lot of sense.
And I'm proud the students aren't just worried about their finals.
They're worried about a very important issue in world affairs.
GEOFF BENNETT: What's your reaction to what we have seen transpire at UCLA over the last 48 hours and at Columbia University, with the NYPD clearing a campus building?
MICHAEL S. ROTH: Well, I think, when people break into a building and start destroying property, one has to get law enforcement to help.
I mean, I think that's really unfortunate.
But I do think that, as the president of Dartmouth said, actions have consequences, and those actions demanded a response.
UCLA seems quite more complicated because of the role that counterprotesters played when they attacked the encampment.
What we have tried to do at Wesleyan is to keep people talking to each other, even when they disagree.
And, sometimes, they disagree vehemently, but we want them to talk to each other, because, after all, you only learn from talking to people who don't share your point of view.
You're not going to learn a lot from talking to somebody who agrees with you.
GEOFF BENNETT: Well, tell me more about that.
How do you balance freedom of expression with student safety in a situation like this?
MICHAEL S. ROTH: Well, I'm pragmatist.
I wrote a book called "Safe Enough Spaces," which is about how you make these judgments.
You don't want the place to be too safe, because then you never encounter anything really disturbing, but you don't want the place to be so unsafe that you're too afraid to really learn.
You want to find a middle ground where people can listen to ideas, even offensive ideas, and find out why someone else holds those ideas and maybe in the end learn from them.
So we have tried to do that by cultivating a culture of conversation across difference.
And in these days in America, that's hard, because people do retreat to their silos.
They retreat to their own in-groups.
But our faculty and our staff and our students have worked very hard to keep lines of communication open, because students at Wesleyan, they don't stay in their own lane.
They're likely to be people in athletics who do theater, who do science, and they talk to each other.
And I think that habit of talking across difference makes it easier to prevent the outgrowth of violence.
GEOFF BENNETT: What do you make of this argument that we have heard from professors in some cases that institutions of higher learning are not so tolerant of demonstrations these days, and that universities are so afraid of the political blowback from lawmakers that they're being overly aggressive in how they're responding to all of this?
MICHAEL S. ROTH: I think each case is a little different.
As you pointed out when we looked at the video just now, I mean, there are a lot of campuses where there is -- there's peace.
They don't make it on the news.
It's not as exciting to watch a peaceful demonstration.
But I do think, in some cases, the pressure by lawmakers to do something, to show that they're doing something, or, in some cases, perhaps, donors to show that you're tough, this is counterproductive.
We don't need to show we're tough.
We need to show that we're educational.
And Congress is not the institution to give lessons on how to talk across difference or how to be educational.
Professors and presidents have to have the courage to stand up to politicians and donors who want to force us to do things that are countereducational.
We need to create safe enough spaces, peaceful campuses where people can agree and disagree across lots of differences.
GEOFF BENNETT: Wesleyan University President Michael S. Roth, thanks for your time and for your insights this evening.
MICHAEL S. ROTH: Thank you.
AMNA NAWAZ: In the day's other headlines: Hamas announced it's sending a delegation back to Egypt, a possible sign of progress in talks on a Gaza cease-fire with Israel.
The group said its goal is to work toward an agreement.
In the meantime, a U.N. report said it will take until at least 2040 to rebuild all of the destroyed homes in Gaza.
The report estimated that nearly 80,000 housing units have been flattened in the war.
U.S. intelligence officials say Iran's allies have paused attacks on American troops, at least for now.
Groups linked to Tehran carried out a series of strikes on U.S. forces in the Middle East after the war in Gaza began.
But at a Senate hearing today, the director of national intelligence, Avril Haines, said the situation has calmed.
AVRIL HAINES, U.S. Director of National Intelligence: Iranian-aligned militia groups in the region continue to plan attacks against our forces, but have broadly paused conducting such attacks, though it is not clear how long that pause will last.
AMNA NAWAZ: Haines said there's no assessment yet on when militia attacks might resume.
Former President Trump has stepped up his threats to reject November's presidential election results if he does not win.
On Wednesday, he was asked specifically about Wisconsin.
He told The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel -- quote - - "If everything's honest, I'd gladly accept the results.
If it's not, you have to fight for the right of the country."
The former president made similar statements in 2016 and in 2020.
President Biden stopped in Charlotte, North Carolina today to speak with relatives of four law enforcement officers killed this week.
They were shot while trying to serve a warrant.
Today, the president met with the local police chief and others at the Charlotte Airport before seeing the families in private.
The European Union will send more than a billion dollars in aid to Lebanon to curtail the flow of migrants to Cyprus and Italy.
Lebanon hosts more than 785,000 Syrian refugees, plus hundreds of thousands of others.
In Beirut today, European Union Commission President Ursula von der Leyen appeared with Lebanese prime minister and the president of Cyprus on the aid deal.
URSULA VON DER LEYEN, President, European Commission: We are committed to maintain legal pathways open to Europe and resettle refugees from Lebanon to the European Union.
At the same time, we count on your good cooperation to prevent illegal migration and to combat migrant smuggling.
AMNA NAWAZ: The E.U.
has arranged similar funding deals with Egypt, Tunisia and Mauritania in a bid to tighten border controls and human smuggling.
In Southeastern China, the death toll from a collapsed mountainside highway has risen to 48.
On Wednesday, state TV showed cranes lifting vehicles crushed after tumbling through the section of road that gave way in Guangdong province.
It followed a month of heavy rains.
State officials in Maryland announced today that rebuilding the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore will take four years and nearly $2 billion.
The span collapsed in late March when a container ship rammed into a support column.
Six members of a road crew were killed.
On Wednesday, a fifth body was recovered.
The sixth worker has not yet been found.
Part of Interstate 95 in Connecticut will be closed for days after a gasoline tanker truck crashed today on a bridge over the highway.
The wreck shut down the main north-south highway linking New England with New York.
Traffic was backed up for dozens of miles.
The governor said the bridge will have to be replaced.
And on Wall Street, stocks made up some lost ground after strong corporate earnings reports.
The Dow Jones industrial average gained 322 points to close at 38225.
The Nasdaq rose 235 points, or 1.5 percent, and the S&P 500 added 45.
And a European court has sided with Italy against the Getty Museum in California in a fight over an ancient Greek statue.
The Victorious Youth sculpture dates back from 300 to 100 B.C.
It was pulled from the sea bottom by Italian fishermen in 1964.
Italy argues it was illegally sold to the museum in 1977.
Getty officials say they're considering a further appeal.
Still to come on the "NewsHour": after a second gag order hearing, the prosecution in former President Trump's hush money trial continues its case; young voters in Michigan weigh in on President Biden and the upcoming election; author Eddie Glaude Jr. discusses his new book on how ordinary Americans can be the heroes of our democracy; plus much more.
More than 100 hostages are still being held captive by Hamas, among them, eight Americans, including the bodies of three Americans confirmed dead and five believed to still be alive.
Israeli-American Keith Siegel was kidnapped from his home in Southern Israel during the Hamas attack on October 7.
I spoke with his niece, Hanna Siegel, earlier today about the status of hostage negotiations and her family's relentless work to bring her uncle home.
Hanna, welcome to the "NewsHour."
Thank you for being here.
HANNA SIEGEL, Niece of Hamas Hostage: Thank you so much for having me.
AMNA NAWAZ: So your uncle, Keith Siegel, was one of the hostages in a video that Hamas released last week.
You're wearing the number 208 to represent the number of days that he has now been held.
HANNA SIEGEL: That's right.
AMNA NAWAZ: As a policy, we don't show those videos, but I just wanted to ask what you thought when you saw him and when you heard his message.
HANNA SIEGEL: Yes, it was surreal.
I mean, it's the first time that we have seen him or heard his voice in over 208 days.
My aunt Aviva, who is a hostage survivor and was held and released in November in the cease-fire deal, they were held together.
And so when she came out, she was able to tell us a little bit about how he's doing.
But since then, we didn't know if he was alive or how he was.
I think there was an immense sense of relief just to hear his voice and see his face.
And it's devastating.
I don't know how to describe what it's like to look at a family member in that situation.
He talks.
The first thing he says is "I love you and I hope you're OK" to our family.
And he talks about Passover.
And he also talks about hearing bombs nearby.
There are so many facets to this and so many ways in which we're worried about him.
AMNA NAWAZ: There is a moment in the video where he does break down.
I can't imagine how difficult this must be for you and your family to watch that.
But how did he seem to you after all this time in captivity?
HANNA SIEGEL: I mean, his voice, it's him.
It's him.
And that was one thing that gave me a lot of comfort.
But he's gaunt.
He looks weak.
He looks older.
I -- he's being held underground.
I worry every single day.
I remember when Aviva was released, she told me that they were starting to starve.
And that was a long time ago.
So I think about that a lot.
AMNA NAWAZ: You know that a deal to release him remains stalled right now.
And you said earlier this week something that stuck with me.
You said you're don't -- you're not sure, rather, that it's actually in Prime Minister Netanyahu's political interest to make a deal.
What did you mean by that?
HANNA SIEGEL: You know, there have been deals on the table in the past.
There's a lot that happens in these negotiations.
It's hard to keep track.
I'm obviously not on the inside.
But from what I do know, and from what I have seen, he hasn't made those deals.
It hasn't always been clear that he's ready to lean in and prioritize the hostages over anything else.
And so I guess what I would say is, I hope that Prime Minister Netanyahu prioritizes his own citizens, the hostages, before any political considerations and gets this deal done.
I think one thing that we have seen over the last six months and, frankly, throughout history with Hamas is that the deals don't get better.
AMNA NAWAZ: Mm-hmm.
HANNA SIEGEL: Weeks ago, we were talking about 40 hostages potentially in this next round.
That number has gone down.
Every single day that goes by is another day that a hostage could die in captivity or another day where our family members aren't coming home.
So, to me, this is the moment.
This is our chance.
AMNA NAWAZ: And U.S. officials have said that Israel has made significant concessions in this latest round of talks.
But Hamas wants, in the second phase of a deal, a commitment to end the war in Gaza, which Netanyahu says he will not agree to.
Do you want him to make that deal?
HANNA SIEGEL: I want him to bring my uncle home and everybody home.
And I do think that bringing the hostages home is the first step to ending this devastation overall.
And that's really important.
The political calculations, the back-and-forth, what he's saying, what U.S. officials are saying, I have sort of learned not to ride the roller coaster of that, if I can, until we know exactly what's happening.
But I want the hostages back.
And so do millions of people all over the world.
I know we have really felt that support.
AMNA NAWAZ: You have talked about how support of the Biden administration has been, how you feel their support and that they are fighting for you and your family.
Your uncle is an American citizen, one of a handful of Americans held hostage right now.
If you don't trust that Netanyahu will take the steps necessary to prioritize bringing home your uncle and the others, do you want President Biden to start to negotiate for the release of the Americans, at least?
HANNA SIEGEL: I think we need to see what happens with this deal.
I think getting all of the hostages home is and should be the top priority.
The Biden administration has made it very clear to me and my family from the beginning that they will do what it takes to bring the Americans home, including Keith.
And so I have ultimate faith and trust in President Biden and Jake Sullivan and Secretary Blinken and their whole team, who's looking to bring these people home by any means necessary.
AMNA NAWAZ: Do you think there's more that they could be doing to apply pressure on the Netanyahu government to make a deal?
HANNA SIEGEL: Everything that I can see shows that they're doing absolutely everything that they can.
AMNA NAWAZ: You mentioned that your aunt, Keith's wife, was freed back during that hostage deal that was made last November.
Our audience may remember we spoke to her soon after her release.
I just want to ask you, how is she doing today?
HANNA SIEGEL: Thank you for asking.
Aviva's incredible.
I mean, she went through something that is unimaginable, and she came out and she decided she was going to spend every minute of every day fighting to get her husband, my uncle, and all of the other hostages out.
She is so committed to this and fighting every day.
She is a hero.
Her strength is incomparable.
AMNA NAWAZ: We're glad she's home with you.
We hope that your uncle Keith is home with you soon.
Hanna Siegel, thank you so much for being with us today.
HANNA SIEGEL: Thank you, Amna.
GEOFF BENNETT: On the stand today in Donald Trump's hush money trial was Los Angeles lawyer Keith Davidson.
He negotiated both the Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal hush money agreements at the center of the case against the former president.
William Brangham was in court today and joins us now to break down the latest developments.
So, William, this was the continuation of Mr. Davidson's testimony about how he actually negotiated these payments.
What else did we learn in court today?
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: That's right, Geoff.
Prosecutors teased out more information about this negotiation that he had to get his then-client Stormy Daniels, as you mentioned, to pay -- to be paid $130,000 so that she wouldn't go public with this story of an alleged relationship she had with Trump right before the 2016 election.
And at one point during his testimony, Davidson acknowledged that he knew that this payment to Daniels and the other one to the Playboy Playmate Karen McDougal were intended to somehow help Donald Trump's campaign.
And this is central, because prosecutors here want the jury to see these payments as election interference.
And then Davidson later in his testimony told a story about how, after the election, he got this hour-long phone call from Michael Cohen, who he described as being despairing and despondent because he hadn't been given a job in the fledgling Trump administration.
He actually -- Davidson said he worried that Cohen might actually try to kill himself.
And in that conversation, Cohen also mentioned that he was really upset because Trump had still not repaid him the $130,000 that Cohen used of his own money to pay Daniels.
Again, this is central too, because it is that eventual repayment and how those repayments were accounted for that are the center of the 34 allegations of falsifying business records that Trump stands accused of.
GEOFF BENNETT: So, how did Mr. Trump's attorneys try to undermine Keith Davidson's testimony when they cross-examined him?
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: They tried to put as much daylight between Davidson and Donald Trump, acknowledging that he never met with him, never spoke to him, never had any phone calls, never has been in a room with him before.
They also tried to portray Davidson as a guy who gets salacious information about celebrities and then tries to extort celebrities with that information.
And they mentioned all of these different cases that he had been involved with, about - - with Charlie Sheen, and Hulk Hogan, and Lindsay Lohan.
And they want the jury basically to see Davidson as this sort of serial blackmailer, extorter of rich people for money.
GEOFF BENNETT: And the day actually started, William, as you well know, with a separate hearing today over allegations that Donald Trump has again violated the gag order that the judge in this case has placed on him.
Bring us up to speed.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: That's right, Geoff.
The morning started with this hearing where prosecutors have alleged that Donald Trump has committed four more violations of this gag order.
You will remember earlier this week the judge found that Donald Trump was guilty of nine violations of that gag order and fined him $9,000.
Prosecutors say he has continued to do that four different times, talking about witnesses, talking about the jury, and they're arguing that this makes impossible to have a fair trial, that jurors might be nervous, that witnesses might not give full testimony.
And so they're arguing that he needs to be sanctioned again.They don't want him to go to jail yet, but that still hangs over this as well.
Trump's defense team argues, look, the man is running for president.
He's just repeating things that a lot of his supporters are saying out in public, and that he needs to have the right to say these things.
The judge seemed somewhat skeptical of that.
We don't know when he's going to rule on that yet, though, Geoff.
GEOFF BENNETT: William Brangham reporting tonight from Manhattan.
William, thanks so much.
WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Thanks, Geoff.
AMNA NAWAZ: The Supreme Court wrapped up oral arguments last week and has now turned to rolling out decisions.
As John Yang explains, they could be some of the most consequential cases of the year - - John.
JOHN YANG: Amna, some of those decisions will shape policies nationwide on such divisive issues like homelessness and reproductive rights, and some of them could even affect the presidential election.
The passions surrounding these issues were reflected in protests outside the court on oral argument days.
Now, inside the court, the justices are spending the next two months or so searching for agreement among at least five of them in the 43 cases that remain undecided.
Watching all of this are two Supreme Court analysts, the "NewsHour"'s Marcia Coyle and Joan Biskupic of CNN, author of "Nine Black Robes."
Joan, Marcia, thanks for being here.
Marcia, 61 oral arguments this session.
Was there any common theme or thread running through them?
MARCIA COYLE: Well, John, I think there were a number of themes, but I'd step back for a moment and take a look at the court a little bit and say that this appears, especially this term, to be a very confident court willing to step into some of the most divisive issues, maybe even eager by some of them to take on these questions.
And we see it in the arguments that we listened to, everything from EPA's good neighbor plan for the Clean Air Act, to abortion, to, of course, what may very well define the term, Trump's litigation.
JOHN YANG: Talk about those.
There were -- there were, what, four cases involving the former president?
JOAN BISKUPIC, Supreme Court Analyst: Four total, and three that most people will know about.
Donald Trump has loomed over the Supreme Court from the start.
When he was president, he was constantly saying, just wait until my cases get to the Supreme Court.
And, of course, he named three of these nine justices, and he's felt like he had a little bit of ownership there.
And we have already seen one of the Trump cases come down.
The justices ruled unanimously that an anti-insurrectionist provision of the 14th Amendment could not be used to keep him off the ballot.
That was the Colorado case.
But now we just had two more recent ones that could be very consequential for him.
Most strikingly will be the test of whether he can be immune from criminal prosecution in the four charges brought by special counsel Jack Smith.
JOHN YANG: And, also, Donald Trump did a lot to shape the Supreme Court.
This is that fourth year you have the supermajority of six conservative justices.
Is there any sense -- as the oral arguments went on this year, does there any sense that they're still sort of evolving, coalescing, trying to figure out how to dance together?
JOAN BISKUPIC: Definitely.
You have got the three liberals and the six conservatives, but they're not all created equal on both sides.
For example, on the conservative side with the six, you have a great difference in terms of personality and also kind of urgency on the part of Sam Alito, who's 74, and really wants the court to be moving pretty fast to the right.
But then you have Amy Coney Barrett, who's only 52.
She was the third appointee of Donald Trump, who takes a little bit more pragmatic, slower approach.
They're both conservatives, but they're signaling in a different way about how far they want to go.
Same on the left side.
You have got someone who's very strategic in Justice Elena Kagan, one of President Obama appointees, and our newest justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson, the only appointee of President Joe Biden at this point, who's more independent and consistently liberal, as opposed to Justice Kagan, who, as I say, is a little bit more transactional.
JOHN YANG: Marcia, I want to talk a little bit more about Justice Barrett... MARCIA COYLE: Yes.
JOHN YANG: ... because as eager to go as Samuel Alito is, she... MARCIA COYLE: Yes.
JOHN YANG: This term, there were a number of times, she said, well, let's wait.
Let's not move so fast.
Let's just decide what's in front of us.
MARCIA COYLE: Yes, I think this term in particular.
I mean, she did indicate in some earlier cases, for example, a case involving a Catholic foster child agency, not willing to immediately overturn a religion precedent that some of the -- her more conservative colleagues and the religious right would love to see, but she would not do that.
She also was very cautious in an Indian child welfare challenge not to go down the road of race.
And then, this term, as Joan has pointed out, her questions, for example, in the Trump immunity case, she was more focused on acts that could actually be tried and not on a rule for the ages, as Justice Gorsuch wanted.
And there have been other cases where she has shown more caution.
But I'd caution everybody too that it's very early and we have to see how she writes, not only how she votes,but what she writes.
And it gets very difficult labeling some of these conservatives as maybe a moderate.
She's being called now a moderate conservative like John Roberts.
And yet you have to remember that she was shortly put on the bench in the Supreme Court, when she overturned Roe v. Wade.
JOHN YANG: This term, Marcia, there have been 18 decisions that have been handed down.
All but three of them were unanimous and the other three were lopsided.
Are they getting the easy ones out, the things they can agree on out now and fight about the rest?
MARCIA COYLE: Yes, John, of course.
(LAUGHTER) MARCIA COYLE: And that has sort of been their pattern for many, many terms.
And it's a very human kind of pattern.
Get out what you can quickly so that you have more time to focus on the really complicated ones, although, over the course of the Roberts court, there has been generally a good degree of unanimity.
You say 61 cases, but there's really only a handful of cases that we tend to focus on that are going to end up being very divisive.
JOHN YANG: Joan, this is the -- almost the 20th year of John Roberts, the Roberts court.
JOAN BISKUPIC: Yes.
JOHN YANG: Describe the Roberts court as it is now.
JOAN BISKUPIC: Oh, I think it's still very divided.
It's the cases that we care about most that come down to 6-3 or 5-4.
And they're the ones that John Roberts is constantly trying to bring greater, if not unanimity, a bit of a more lopsided ruling.
And let's just take, for example, on the Trump immunity case.
You know, he has struggled in the past on Trump cases.
For example, in 2020, when he handled the documents cases, worked very hard behind the scenes to take 5-4 initial votes and make him 7-2.
And I could see him doing that here with the Trump immunity one, because, as much as he himself is very conservative -- remember, John, he cut his teeth in the Reagan administration.
He's been pretty consistently conservative.
He's also aware of the standing in the public eye of this court and how much its stature has been diminished in recent years.
So I think what he's going to want to show in some of these more divisive cases, on Trump claims, on some regulatory matters, and maybe even on some of the abortion ones that they have heard, is to try to bring both sides to a -- more of a compromise.
You're always going to have someone like Justice Clarence Thomas, probably Samuel Alito, Marcia... MARCIA COYLE: Yes.
JOAN BISKUPIC: .... over further to his right.
But I think he's going to try to win greater compromise, because that's the stamp he's trying to put on this court.
MARCIA COYLE: I think, John, we have to remember, too, that this is still, on Supreme Court time, a relatively young court.
JOAN BISKUPIC: Yes.
MARCIA COYLE: And I remember one justice telling me that, when you get a new justice on the bench, it's a lot like a marriage and a new marriage, or it's like getting a new family member.
You have to get used to how that person wants to operate.
And that takes time.
Is it going to be someone like retired Justice Breyer, who liked to sit down in other chambers and chat about cases?
Or is it somebody who just wants to use drafts?
JOHN YANG: Joan Biskupic, Marcia Coyle, thank you both very much.
JOAN BISKUPIC: Sure.
MARCIA COYLE: Pleasure, John.
JOAN BISKUPIC: Thanks, John.
GEOFF BENNETT: Young people between the ages of 18 and 29 make up roughly 20 percent of eligible voters in the U.S. A majority of them voted for President Joe Biden back in 2020.
And they're typically a reliable vote for Democrats.
Laura Barron-Lopez is here with a look at where things stand this election year -- Laura.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Thanks, Geoff.
In the battleground state of Michigan, "NewsHour" sat down with four young voters at a Detroit coffee shop to talk about the 2024 election.
Most of them plan to vote in November, but they aren't enthusiastic about their options.
How does this election cycle make you feel, in one word?
MAX RECKNAGEL, Michigan Voter: Nervous.
MELINDA BILLINGSLEY, Michigan Voter: Kind of tired.
ALEC HUGHES, Michigan Voter: Overwhelmed.
SABA SAED, Michigan Voter: Hopeless.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Do you think that a lot of your friends are -- feel the same way or feel disillusioned?
MELINDA BILLINGSLEY: Actually, I think all of the words is exactly how all of my friends would be.
It's like, yes, nervous and also hopeless and, yes, all of those things.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: What are the top issues for you?
Max Recknagel, 19, attends Oakland University just outside of Detroit.
He voted for Nikki Haley in Michigan's primary.
MAX RECKNAGEL: Economy.
Border, because I think it's a humanitarian crisis.
And then, yes, also guns.
I think the Second Amendment is extremely important.
And I do not like the language behind any sort of banning on weapons at all.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Twenty-eight-year-old Melinda Billingsley from the East Side of Detroit works at a voting rights nonprofit and is open to third-party candidates.
MELINDA BILLINGSLEY: LGBTQ issues, those are impacted a lot by rhetoric, not even actual things changing.
Just if you talk about them and you demonize or you invoked fear and things like that, like, people will get hurt.
There are consequences to that, especially in the right or wrong hands.
It makes a big difference.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Alec Hughes, 20, is a junior at University of Michigan and a co-chair of his school's College Democrats.
ALEC HUGHES: The biggest thing for me is just simply democracy.
I mean, we saw January 6.
We saw Trump just gradually eroding things away over the course of his term.
And now he's admitting it flat out, I'm going to be a dictator on day one.
I don't think that's just rhetoric.
I think that's an admission.
I think that's almost a boast.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: And 22-year-old Saba was born in the West Bank and moved to the United States 12 years ago.
She's a senior at Michigan State University.
SABA SAED: I worry a lot about like the economy.
Quality of life has -- for the average person in the U.S. has kind of not been so well.
Everything is more priced.
I don't think that housing is going to be affordable for a lot of people, and inflation is crazy.
People are being overworked, but, like, not getting paid enough.
MAX RECKNAGEL: I work at a Kroger on the pickup department.
So, like, I bring people's groceries out to them that they order online on the parking lot.
I will be checking somebody out for $80 worth of groceries, and it looks like $30.
Like, just prices have gone through the roof on a lot of things.
And, I mean, like, yes, yes, wages are up, but, like, some people still haven't been able to adjust with that.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: So how many of you are planning to vote in the November election?
OK, so at least three out of four.
So who's planning on voting for Joe Biden in November?
Who is planning on voting for Donald Trump?
And who's undecided?
SABA SAED: Uncommitted, one might say.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Uncommitted.
MELINDA BILLINGSLEY: Good answer.
(LAUGHTER) LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Could President Biden still earn your vote between now and November?
SABA SAED: No.
And I think that many people say, well, you would rather Trump with the Muslim ban, whatever, whatever.
Trump was president.
I'm Muslim.
As bad as he is in many ways, I still had the privilege of being very safe in here.
So I think, out of the respect to like 35,000 who were killed in Gaza and lost their homes and have been displaced, I cannot justify voting for the guy that authorized those checks.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: You're the Joe Biden voter.
Why are you voting for Joe Biden?
ALEC HUGHES: Yes, looking back retrospectively, he made a lot of promises back in his run in 2020 that I think ultimately he's lived up to very well.
Is there space for improvement?
Absolutely.
But we have seen the Inflation Reduction Act pass.
We have seen the bipartisan infrastructure law pass.
Both of them make, like, trillion-dollar investments in the infrastructure and green energy.
I think he's worked extraordinarily within the bounds that are defined for him.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: How about you?
Why are you undecided?
MELINDA BILLINGSLEY: Even though I'm committed to voting, I would personally, like, say that Joe Biden is very moderate for me, and I am not.
I am, like, so far to the left, where Joe Biden's like, we're going to make a reasonable transition to, like, electric vehicles.
I'm like, no, let us get rid of all gas powered cars.
We're going to go straight to electric and trains and mass public transit.
And we're just going to go hard into that.
I want to vote for what I want, not, like you said, the lesser of two evils.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Why are you voting for Donald Trump?
MAX RECKNAGEL: It really just boils down to policy.
I'm a conservative guy.
He's the conservative candidate.
Like, even if I don't love his rhetoric, he wins me over with policy.
And I... LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: What specific policy?
MAX RECKNAGEL: Immigration.
We have a massive crisis at the border right now, and I would attribute a lot of that to Biden opening the border up.
I would say, diplomacy-wise, he was one of the best presidents to do it, I think, personally.
I don't think that we'd have the situation in Ukraine that we have right now if Trump was president.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Another issue that was top of mind, the Israel-Hamas war.
ALEC HUGHES: The first thing I think of when I think of the conflict is really the power that we have as students in shaping U.S. policy towards it.
At our respective schools, U-of-M and MSU, over the last week, we have had encampments popping up.
It's -- it really is incredible students exercising their voices in such a disruptive, civilly disobedient way because I think that's a very effective tool of getting your voice across.
The issue that I have, though, with some demonstrations is that, when people are automatically voluntarily disqualifying themselves, saying, no matter what, I'm not going to vote for President Biden, Democrats need young voters.
They need young voters to win.
But if you're saying right from the outset nothing you can do can make me vote for you, then why do they have any incentive to listen to you?
SABA SAED: Just a quick question.
So how much has he moved to earn those votes that said they're not going to vote for him?
Because I want to know like, in case I miss something, because I feel like, for a while, we have been calling for a cease-fire and that didn't happen.
I don't always have to vote Democratic, because you can change as a person, and I don't think it should -- I should compromise my morals because I'm going with a certain direction in, like, a specific party.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Did you vote for Joe Biden in 2020?
SABA SAED: Yes, and then I changed my mind.
ALEC HUGHES: President Biden has been working over the months to push towards an immediate cease-fire, but, unfortunately, it's not solely his decision to make, because it is Israel that's ultimately -- ultimately pushing the war.
MAX RECKNAGEL: I was going to say, like, I'm kind of a pessimist on this, because, even though the United States can call for a cease-fire - - and I understand.
There's other measures that the United States could do.
It's like, what's actually going to stop Israel at the end of the day?
SABA SAED: Our money.
MAX RECKNAGEL: I mean, it could.
It could.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: There was little agreement on President Biden's ability to quickly negotiate an end to the war.
But there was one issue most thought could tip the election in his favor.
MAX RECKNAGEL: Because I have -- I have met several young women who are like, I can't stand Joe Biden, but abortion.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: How big of an issue do you think abortion is going to be for young voters?
MAX RECKNAGEL: Massive.
Massive, because I think it -- this is -- this is the issue that conservatives lose on, right?
Conservatives are all about small government and your rights.
Well, now it's about creating restrictions.
I think that Joe Biden could muscle out a lot of votes by just standing on that Donald Trump's going to take away abortion.
MELINDA BILLINGSLEY: A lot of people, abortion is something that is very, like -- I don't want to say, like, at the -- but something that is front of mind.
Like, when they're thinking of policies that affect them every day, that's one that's going to come into play a lot more.
LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: In a battleground like Michigan, voters like Saba, Alec, Melinda and Max could ultimately swing the state.
We asked them to sum up one thing they want national politicians to know about young voters.
MAX RECKNAGEL: Regardless of what party you are part of or aren't a part of or if you're an independent, we don't like political division.
There's a lot of solutions out there, but I don't think that we can reach them with all the tension in the country.
MELINDA BILLINGSLEY: Party I.D.
is not their go-to label.
Like, they're more likely to have their Taylor Swift bumper sticker than a Democrat one.
We are not going to just fall in line with a political party forever and ever.
They can't count on that.
SABA SAED: For the sake of their careers, they need to listen to what we're saying now, because we're going to be the ones getting a majority of their votes at some point.
It may not happen now, but in five to 10 years - - so, beware.
That's what I'd say to them.
MELINDA BILLINGSLEY: A strong threat.
We all mean that.
(LAUGHTER) AMNA NAWAZ: On our Bookshelf tonight, a call to action for everyday Americans to reclaim their political destinies from the heroes of our past and present.
Princeton University Professor Eddie Glaude Jr. argues that is what's needed to secure a just and democratic future for America.
It's a case he makes in his new book, "We Are the Leaders We Have Been Looking For."
And he joins us now.
Eddie, welcome back to the "NewsHour."
Always good to see you.
EDDIE GLAUDE JR., Author, "We Are the Leaders We Have Been Looking For": It's always good to see you.
It's a delight.
AMNA NAWAZ: So this is -- it's a beautiful book, let me say.
It tackles some very big ideas.
But in reading it, it's also fair to say, I think there's an urgency to your writing in this book.
Tell me about that.
What's driving that?
EDDIE GLAUDE JR.: Well, I think we have outsourced our responsibility for democracy too long, for too long.
We have outsourced it to politicians.
We have outsourced it to so-called community leaders, to so-called prophets and heroes, when, in fact, we need to take responsibility for it.
And if we don't take responsibility for democracy in this moment -- and we heard a lot of that in the last segment.
If we don't do it in this moment, we may very well lose it.
So I'm saying that, instead of thinking -- looking to an election, looking to politicians, we need to look to ourselves.
And in order to do that, we're going to have to really examine who we take ourselves to be.
AMNA NAWAZ: We are the leaders we have been looking for, you write in the book.
We are the prophets we have been looking for.
This is an absolute call to action.
So what is it that you want to see everyday Americans do differently?
EDDIE GLAUDE JR.: You know, I think there's a through line in the book, throughout the book.
And it might sound a bit cliche, you know?
And that is to say, if we're going to be the leaders that we have been looking for, we're going to have to be better people.
And if we're going to be better people, we need to help make a more just and better world, because that world, the world as it's currently organized, values selfishness, it values greed, it gives license to hatred and grievance and fears, right?
So part of what we have to do is to do the hard work of becoming better people.
And, Amna, I get this from James Baldwin.
Baldwin said -- and I'm paraphrasing him here - - that the messiness of the world is in part a reflection of the messiness of our interior lives.
We have to deal with our own wounds, so that we can open ourselves up to the beauty and brilliance of other people, so that we can be committed to justice.
So I'm making a claim that reaching for higher forms of excellence in pursuit of a more just world is a radical politics.
AMNA NAWAZ: You write about what you call the heroes, the prophets, the leaders of, in particular, Black democratic, with a small-D, life, people like Baldwin, people like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. And I guess I want to ask, isn't it sort of human nature to turn people into heroes and heroines, to aspire to some kind of ideal?
Is there something that undermines our democratic life with that?
EDDIE GLAUDE JR.: You know, I think it's absolutely - - it's ordinary.
It makes sense that people will find in the lives and witness of other folk examples, heroes, people that they look up to.
But the thing I'm worried about, and I think democracy should always be concerned about, is when prophets who are authorized by voices or authority outside of our form of life or heroes who become larger than life, we end up giving ourselves over to them.
And the moment we start following people, giving ourselves over to them, we stop working on ourselves.
We stop doing the hard work of becoming better people.
Of course, they're heroes.
But you know what heroes are, are examples.
Ralph Waldo Emerson says, great people come to us for even greater people to follow.
We look to great people, so that they can demonstrate the characteristics that we could if we choose, if we choose to, demonstrate in our own lives.
AMNA NAWAZ: You write about Ella Baker, in particular, and sometimes referred to as the mother of the civil rights movement.
And you also refer to what you call her -- quote - - "democratic perfectionism."
What does that mean?
Why is she an important person to highlight here?
EDDIE GLAUDE JR.: She's such an important figure.
Without her, the 20th century Black freedom movement wouldn't make sense.
In the 1940s, she was a field secretary for the NAACP.
She helped -- she was the first executive director for the SCLC, King's organization, Southern Christian Leadership Conference.
And there's a reason why those students who participated in the student sit-ins in the 1960s, in 1960, organized themselves at Shaw University.
That was Ms. Baker's alma mater.
She had this fundamental orientation, Amna, that she wanted to expand who mattered in the demos.
So those Black sharecroppers, those folks who fall in the cracks and crevices of our democracy, she wanted to lift them up, but she also wanted to create a politics where they could understand their own power.
She says, a strong people do not need strong leaders.
And so the objective is to create indigenous leadership.
Those of us who are working close to the ground in our communities must understand our own power.
And that's what organizing is all about, not to helicopter in, but to actually engage in the hard work on the ground of creating the conditions of building community with others.
AMNA NAWAZ: Eddie, you reexamine some of your own views in this and some of your past essays and speeches as well.
So I have to ask, where does the election of America's first Black president, the election of Barack Obama, fit into all of this?
EDDIE GLAUDE JR.: You know, I cannot deny the symbolic significance of President Obama's election.
My son was raised, grew up with a Black family in the White House.
And I can't begin to give an account of how meaningful that was for him and for me.
But I was annoyed that Obama's presidency was seen and often interpreted as the eventuation, the outcome of the civil rights movement, that this was what the Black freedom struggle aspired to do.
And that is to put a Black man in the White House.
The quest for justice goes beyond elections.
It goes beyond just mere representation.
So I look back with some trepidation that how did Obama's presidency narrow what is considered legitimate forms of Black dissent?
How did it constrain Black politics?
I'm trying to open that up in my own individual way in this book.
AMNA NAWAZ: You talk about the search and the effort to become a better person.
You turn that lens on yourself as well.
EDDIE GLAUDE JR.: Yes.
AMNA NAWAZ: And there are some intensely personal parts of this book,one in which you write about what you call your own primordial wound, one caused by your father.
That moment really stuck with me.
And I just wonder why you felt compelled to include that in the book.
EDDIE GLAUDE JR.: You know, oftentimes, we hide our vulnerabilities.
The idea of being a leader is that you don't show that you're broken.
King -- Dr. King wouldn't smoke in public.
You know, we don't know the biographies of Reverend Jesse Jackson or we know only glimpses of Sharpton, right, of Reverend Sharpton.
What I wanted to do is to kind of deal with my own wounds, to understand how brokenness shapes me, shapes my own voice.
And my father sits at the heart of that.
I love my father.
We have a wonderful relationship today, but that's a journey.
He's scared to living daylights out of me as a kid.
He could just look at me, and I would cry at times.
And so, by virtue of my fear, the fear that he deposited in my gut, I thought I was a coward.
And so I reached for my heroes.
I reached for Malcolm X. I needed a form of masculinity in the face of what felt like being emasculated daily in some ways.
But you understand the beauty in brokenness.
We're not reaching for wholeness.
We have to understand the goal that fills the cracks.
And that's what I'm trying to do in that chapter, yes.
AMNA NAWAZ: There's a message of hope.
And you say that yours "is an abiding faith in the capacity of everyday, ordinary people to be otherwise and in our ability, no matter the evils that threaten to overwhelm, to fight for a more just world."
In the minute or so I have left, Eddie, where do you derive that faith?
EDDIE GLAUDE JR.: In human beings, in us.
I come out of a tradition where it didn't seem possible for us to imagine ourselves in the grandest of terms.
We were nothing but slaves, according to some.
But, oh, my God, did we make life swing, Duke Ellington-style.
We gave the world the blues.
We gave space and time our rhythm in so many ways.
So the -- human beings can be disastrous and cruel.
But you know what?
We can also be miracles.
And, my God, do we need miracles today.
AMNA NAWAZ: That's Professor Eddie Glaude, Jr., author of the new book "We Are the Leaders We Have Been Looking For."
Eddie, always a pleasure.
Thank you.
EDDIE GLAUDE JR.: Thank you so much.
I appreciate you.
AMNA NAWAZ: Remember, there's a lot more online, including a look at why U.S. elections seem to stretch on longer than other countries.
That is at PBS.org/NewsHour.
GEOFF BENNETT: And join us again here tomorrow night for a look at the terrorist threat posed by a resurgent ISIS in Syria.
And that is the "NewsHour" for tonight.
I'm Geoff Bennett.
AMNA NAWAZ: And I'm Amna Nawaz.
On behalf of the entire "NewsHour" team, thank you for joining us.
