PBS News Hour - Full Show - December 23, 2025 - PBS News Hour full episode

Episode Date: December 24, 2025

Tuesday on the News Hour, the latest release of files related to Jeffrey Epstein includes many mentions of President Trump. The White House recalls dozens of career diplomats in the latest effort to reshape U.S. diplomacy and foreign policy. Plus, an inside look at Ukraine's rapidly developing drone capabilities. PBS News is supported by - https://www.pbs.org/newshour/about/funders. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy

Good evening. I'm William Brangham. Jeff Bennett and Omna Nawaz are away. On the news hour tonight, the latest release of thousands more files related to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, files that include many mentions of President Trump. The White House recalls dozens of career diplomats in the latest effort to reshape U.S. diplomacy and foreign policy. and an inside look at Ukraine's rapidly expanding use of drone warfare. We're targeting Russian fuel bases, logistics hubs, command headquarters, and this forces them to move all of this away from the front line. Welcome to the NewsHour. The Justice Department released nearly 33,

more pages of documents related to the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, including many that reference President Donald Trump. The new batch comes as the DOJ is being criticized for not releasing all of the documents by the deadlines set by Congress and heavily redacting many of those they have put out. Our White House correspondent Liz Landers has been going through the recent batch, and she joins us now. Hi, Liz. What is in this latest release? This is 30,000 more pages that were put up last night, taken down, and then reposted by the Justice Department. This includes photos, video surveillance, a lot of legal correspondence between different prosecuting areas that were prosecuting the Epstein and Galane Maxwell case.

There are a few pages of this that are fully redacted, no explanation why. There's also an email that mentions 10 co-conspirators that the FBI was discussing in 2019. That is some news that people have picked up on. and there's also a few mentions of President Trump. Let's talk about some of those mentions of him. We should say the president has not been accused of any wrongdoing in relation to Epstein, but there are some troubling references in here.

There is a reference in one FBI file that includes a rape allegation. This was apparently made during the height of the 2020 campaign. There's also a court document that talks about a 14-year-old girl who was taken to Mar-a-Lago in 1994. She said that she was there with Jeffrey, Epstein, who introduced her to its owner, Donald Trump. Epstein apparently elbowed Trump

playfully asking him referring to Jane Doe. This is a good one, right? Trump smiled and nodded in agreement. They both chuckled and Doe felt uncomfortable, but at the time was too young to understand why. There was another Department of Justice internal email sent from a U.S. attorney to an unknown person again redacted. This was sent in January of 2020 talking about Trump being on Epstein's plane. It says, quote, for your situational awareness, we wanted to let you know that the flight records we received yesterday reflect that Donald Trump traveled on Epstein's private jet many more times than we previously had reported or that we were aware of. And it said that he is listed as a passenger on at least eight flights between 1993 and 1996. Now, the Department

of Justice put out a statement this morning on social media saying that some of these documents contain untrue and sensationalist claims made against President Trump that were submitted to the FBI right before the 2020 election. To be clear, the claims are unfounded and false. And if they had a shred of credibility, they certainly would have been weaponized against President Trump already. But we don't know which of those documents they're referring to. No, there's not a clear indication in there.

So what is President Trump saying about all this? So President Trump was asked yesterday at his club in Palm Beach about some of the release that had come out, and in particular about former President Bill Clinton being in some of those images that we saw last week. Here's what he said. A lot of people are very angry that pictures are being released of other people that really had nothing to do with Epstein, but they're in a picture with him because he was at a party and you ruin a reputation of somebody.

So a lot of people are very angry that this continues. The president has repeatedly expressed his frustration that the Epstein Files story continues to dominate the news while he said it's overshadowing some of the accomplishments of his administration. This is not how this was all supposed to roll out, right? Congress passed a law. Legislators are upset about this, as are some of the survivors. What are they saying? To put it bluntly, the way that this has been released by the Department of Justice has not been in compliance with the original intent of the law. The Epstein Transparency Act directed the Department of Justice to publish all of the files and materials related to Epstein and Galane Maxwell.

Flight logs, records, any grand jury testimony, all of that was supposed to be released, redactions to protect. victims' names, but that was it and anything related to ongoing investigations. That was supposed to be redacted. What we have seen is that not everything has been released all at once. Instead, we're seeing this kind of trickle out over the course of several days now. We've also seen names that have been redacted in some of these emails with no apparent reason why between attorneys, it looks like. That's not supposed to be covered up in some of these redactions. And also, we've seen that these files have been posted and then, taken down in two instances now without explanation from the Department of Justice.

Liz Landers, thanks for staying on top of all this for us. Of course. while a legal challenge moves forward. It leaves in place a lower court ruling that barred the deployment and marks a rare setback for President Trump. The court's conservative majority has frequently sided with the administration

on previous tests of presidential power. Trump has utilized the guard in Chicago and in other Democrat-led cities to protect ICE agents and federal buildings over the objections of state and local officials. The U.S. military struck another boat that it said was smuggling drugs, killing one person on board. The latest strike, which occurred yesterday in the eastern Pacific,

is now the 29th known boat strike carried out since the fall. At least 105 people have been killed. As with previous strikes, the Pentagon provided no evidence that the vessel was carrying drugs. The Trump administration has said these strikes are part of a push to pressure Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. That pressure campaign has also included the seizure, by U.S. forces of several oil tankers in the Caribbean Sea.

Turning to Ukraine, officials there say more than 600 Russian drones and dozens of missiles bombarded the country, killing at least three people, including a child. The strikes also hit the power grids of more than a dozen regions, triggering widespread outages amid freezing winter temperatures. Ukrainian president Volodemir Zelensky took to social media saying this barrage in the middle of peace negotiations was a, quote, clear signal of Russian priorities. He added, Putin still cannot accept that he must stop killing, and that means the world is not putting enough pressure on Russia. Now is the time to respond.

The U.S. economy grew this summer at its fastest pace in two years. new GDP data, which got delayed due to the government shutdown, showed that a rise in consumer spending helped to drive 4.3% economic growth from July to September. That's an acceleration from the previous quarter. Some economists expect GDP growth to slow in the fourth quarter because of that record government shutdown. Meantime, those solid GDP figures led to moderate gains on Wall Street.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average added just under 80 points the NASDAQ gained more than half a percent, and the S&P 500 rose enough to reach a new all-time high. Former Nebraska Senator Ben Sass revealed today that he has terminal stage four pancreatic cancer. In a social media post, Sass said the diagnosis came just last week. He wrote, quote, advanced pancreatic cancer is nasty stuff. It's a death sentence. SAS was first elected to the Senate in 2014 and stood out among Republicans for his his vocal criticism of President Trump.

He resigned in 2023. SAS, who is 53, ended his announcement today on a determined note, writing, quote, The process of dying is still something to be lived. And Vince Zampella, the video game developer behind the mega-successful series Call of Duty has died.

The iconic first-person shooter game debuted in 2003, originally as a World War II simulator, before delving into more modern warfare. That franchise has gone on to sell more than half a billion copies worldwide. Zampella was also behind other widely popular shooter games, including Battlefield and Medal of Honor. Multiple reports say he was killed in a car crash in California this weekend.

Vince Sempella was 55 years old. Still to come on the news hour, A historical look at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts that's been renamed after President Trump. Who the so-called Trump savings accounts, which are meant for children, will benefit most. And the murders of Rob and Michelle Reiner highlight the mental health struggles that families face often privately. This is the PBS News Hour from the David M. Rubenstein studio at WETA in Washington, headquarters of PBS News. In an unusual move, the Trump administration is recalling the ambassadors from nearly 30 countries around the world.

According to the Associated Press, nations in Africa are losing the most diplomats, followed by Asia, then Europe, the Middle East, and here in the Western Hemisphere. The State Department told the news hour in a statement that, quote, this is a standard process in any administration. An ambassador is a personal representative of the president, and it is the president's right to ensure that he has individuals in these countries who advance the America First Agenda.

So for one perspective on this move, we turn to John Dinkleman. He is the president of the American Foreign Service Association. He had a nearly four-decade diplomatic career with the U.S. State Department. John, thank you so much for being here. Thank you for having me. How unusual is this to recall nearly

30 ambassadors one year into an administration. Is this standard practice? This is not standard practice. This is unprecedented. This is unheard of. This is a sabotage of the American diplomatic machine. This is an affront to the professional foreign service that we have spent decades a century

in building in our country. And I don't know what it foretills. Sabotage. Definitely. when individuals have spent their lives devoted to a profession to representing our country overseas, and on mass, you tell those who have qualified to represent our country, to carry out our policies, to execute any administration, any president's goals in any given country, when you tell them all summarily that for some reason they don't qualify, something is definitely

wrong. I mean, you heard the State Department's position on this. They're arguing this happens with every administration. Many of these people were appointed by the Biden administration, and president wants his own people in there. What do you make of that argument? It is entirely incorrect and a misrepresentation of the reality. Every American ambassador submits their resignation to the incoming president who either chooses to accept or reject those resignations at that time. And all these ambassadors did that? All of these ambassadors did that about one year ago right now. And the Trump administration not only refused those resignations, but actually encouraged the individuals to remain. Even within the past few weeks, senior level cabinet individuals have visited with these

various ambassadors on trips, reaffirming the desire of the administration that they stay in their only to find them getting a phone call and surreptitiously being told they have until January to get out. We know that the U.S. already had about 80 vacant ambassadorships before this event. Then this comes. What is your sense of what the impact is going to be on our ability to project American power in ways, soft and hard, all over the world? Simply put, we're taking our star players off the field before we can even enter the game. game. These individuals will not be able to exercise the personal and professional

bona fides and relationships that they've established over decades and what will be very interesting is to see who replaces them. If it's a member of the professional Foreign Service, I have to worry as the president of the Foreign Service Association what kind of loyalty oath are they going to be required to take that demonstrates their fidelity to the administration in addition to the fidelity that they should have sworn to the Constitution in the first place. Have you seen any evidence that there is such a loyalty oath being passed around to potential candidates?

I have not yet seen that, and I am looking for it closely. Have you been hearing, I imagine your phone must be ringing off the hook? Incessantly, yes. And what are they saying to you? They're hurt. They're concerned. Many of them are afraid. There is a wonder as to what in the world they could have done that would have caused the ire of our leaders. They've done everything they could to carry out the policies of the president as they would for any elected leader of our country, because that's what the Foreign

Service does. But in this case, they are left stumped, as am I, as to what would have caused this on mass dismissal of our leaders in our foreign service. Is it possible, just playing devil's advocate, that to take the State Department's stated position, that some of these people were not enacting what President Trump's believes is in America First Agenda in their positions. I find it inconceivable. Individuals like myself who have spent decades trained to make sure that they are advocating on behalf of our leaders, on behalf of the elected leaders of the United States, it is

incomprehensible to me that individuals would do this, much less 30 or 40. of them en masse all at once. It simply cannot happen. At the beginning, I put the list up of all those nations that were, where the ambassadors have now been pulled. Are there particular nations, when you look at that list, that concern you specifically? There's various that concern me,

but I'm particularly interested in what's going on in Guatemala, where not only our ambassador, but our deputy chief of mission, both senior foreign service officers, with decades of experience each, have been summarily told that they are to leave the post. Given the immigration crisis that the administration says we are in and the key role that Guatemala plays in that crisis, how we could determine that the individuals in charge of our mission there

on the other side of that problem, working with the other side of the equation, are no longer going to be there, and who will fill that gap is beyond me. You mentioned earlier to one of my colleagues the concern that you have that if every new administration comes in and basically guts the core civil service, what that does to America's ability to enact its foreign policy.

What did you mean by that? It will politicize us as a profession. We come into the service sworn, loyal to the Constitution, and nothing else. And when presidents change, I myself have been through six different presidents and have served willingly under each one of them. I know that the thousands of men and women in the Foreign Service will continue to do so, because that's what they were sworn to do. If, on the other hand, we start to move our people in and out with every administration, it's going to deplete our ability as diplomats to get the job done. It will hurt our credibility, and it will hurt our nation in general.

John Dinkleman, thank you so much for being here. Thank you. Tonight, we give you an inside look into one of Ukraine's most rapidly evolving tools in its war with Russia, drones. These small unmanned machines have come to dominate. the battlefield, from the front line in the east to long-range strikes against power facilities to the waters of the Black and Mediterranean seas. Special correspondent Volodomir Solihub gained rare access to a military unit that is responsible for some of Ukraine's highest-profile drone strikes. And a note, we allowed them to review some of our footage before it aired for security

reasons. On a river outside of Kiev, Ukraine's defense intelligence is taking us to one of their most prized weapons. They've helped push Russia's fleet away from occupied Crimea, disrupted supply lines and change the balance of power at sea. Naval drones operated by a unit known as Group 13. Magua 5, a kamikaze boat. Maghra 7 outfitted with American missiles. Inventing new weapons out of necessity, Ukraine doesn't have its own navy. When Russia and its Crimea in 2014, Ukraine lost almost all of its navy. So when the new invasion in 2022 started, Ukraine had to rely on unmaned naval drones like these to fight a more powerful and much better equipped enemy.

They're fast, effective, difficult to detect, and has caused Russia a lot of trouble. Just last week in a highly produced video, Ukraine showed off how its naval drone struck a Russian submarine. That helps keep the Western Black Sea open to Ukraine experts, and forces Russia's ships to dock in Novorosk in their own territory, well east of the occupied Crimean peninsula. Group 13's commander, who we promised to keep anonymous, explains his unit's core mission.

Little by little, we pushed the most active and most dangerous part of Russia's Black Sea fleet off the western part of the Black Sea. Right now, Russians do not keep anything that is valuable or important in Crimea. Everything is in Novorosk. But even in Novorosk, Russia's fleet is not safe. From summer of 2023 to the spring of 2024, Ukrainian naval drones pummeled Russian ships, hundreds of miles from Ukraine-controlled territory, including the patrol ship Sergei Kotov, which Ukraine said was worth $65 million. It's an example of Ukraine using relatively cheap weapons

to take down expensive Russian hardware. In our missions, we work in flocks, if we're talking about an open sea. For example, during the mission on Kotov, we were working in flocks and we're hunting it. The ship was trying to hide between the commercial vessels and escape near the Crimea bridge. Group 13 even uses drones to strike Russian helicopters. But recently, Ukraine's tactics have shifted. The drones are now striking Russia's so-called shadow fleet.

The oil tankers Russia uses to evade sanctions and finance the war. And Ukraine's drones' targets aren't only military. Kiev believes that one way to pressure Putin is to bring. bring the war home to everyday Russians. Ukrainians build an army of long-range drones that have also targeted Russia's economic lifeblood, energy facilities, some as far as 600 miles away. At one point this year, long-range Ukrainian drones

took down more than 10% of Russia's refinery capacity. Just last week, long-range aerial drones struck a Russian tanker in the Mediterranean Sea, 1,200 miles from Ukraine's border. Inside a landmark hangar, the beaver is a 200-pound kamikaze drone capable of traveling up to 600 miles. This commander also asked us to keep him anonymous. With our deep strikes, we're targeting Russian fuel bases, logistics hubs, command headquarters, and this forces them to move all of this away from the front line,

and thus their logistics take more time. But Russia is way ahead of Ukraine with its own deep strikes. Over the last week alone, Moscow launched an average of 726 drones, mostly at energy and infrastructure targets. And Russia's ability to manufacture drones exceeds Ukraine. At this factory shown on Russian TV earlier this year, workers claimed they manufactured more than 400 per day. But at sea, Ukrainians are still.

on the offensive. We're fighting for our survival. We have no choice but to fight. As the war continues, unmanned systems are reshaping the battlefield. And as both sides, praise for what comes next, Ukraine's unmanned army is now an increasingly central part of the fight. For the PBS News Hour, I'm Vladimir Sadov in Kyiv, Ukraine. Since returning to the White House earlier this year, President Trump has made quick work reshaping Washington, D.C. in his image, in some cases, literally. That will be on full display during what he's calling the Trump Kennedy Center Honors, which is being broadcast on TV tonight.

The president hosted the event from the recently and controversially renamed building. one that has roots tracing back to the Eisenhower administration more than 60 years ago. Stephanie Syne takes a closer look at its history and evolution. When the building opened to the public in 1971, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts stood as a living memorial to the late president. That legacy stood untouched until last week when the Kennedy Center board, most of whom were appointed by President Trump, followed through on the president's wishes and voted to rename it the Trump Kennedy Center. While it takes an act of Congress to make that official, construction teams wasted no time.

Within 24 hours, President Trump's name was emblazoned alongside Kenned's in the marble facade. For more on this change and how it's part of a larger effort by the president, I'm joined by presidential historian, Mark Uptogrove. Mark, it's a pleasure to have you on the show. comment on this move. Is there any precedent for a sitting president to have major cultural buildings named after him, especially ones in which they themselves control the board? No, not at all. I mean, it would be unthinkable. I think for a president to even entertain being the chairman of the Kennedy Center board. That was unprecedented. The president is presiding over the nation. He has some big problems to resolve. And I think the American people would

agree that that is not the function of a president. We don't want to see our president acting as the chairman of the board for the Kennedy Center. We want him addressing the challenges and the problems that come across his desk as being not only the president of our nation, but for all practical purposes, the leader of the free world. So this is unprecedented on so many levels. From a historian's perspective, why do you think it matters that the name of this building is being changed. We shouldn't have our presidents, I think, thinking about things that should be named in their honor. President Trump is barely a quarter into his second term in office at a time when most Americans are worried about affordability. We saw that as almost the off-year

elections as a referendum on the Trump presidency and his failure to deliver on the promise of resurrecting our economy, bringing down inflation, boosting our employment numbers. He hasn't accomplished that, but what he has done is renamed institutions in his honor, not something that we see from a president. I think of humility as an American value and part of the American brand, but of course, narcissism is really part of the Trump brand. This shouldn't surprise us, but it should alarm us. Tell me more about this bill. and how it originally came to be named after President Kennedy. The Kennedy Center was not something that President Kennedy had imagined.

Rather, it was the thinking of Lyndon Johnson, President Lyndon Johnson, who succeeded President Kennedy after his assassination. President Johnson wanted to do something to reflect the best of the arts in America and named the Kennedy Center for President Kennedy, to get it through Congress, but partly to honor the accomplishments of our 35th president, John F. Kennedy. This is not the first time in recent months that the president has shown what critics say is disregard for historical and cultural sites, the demolition of the White House, East Wing, for instance. As a historian, how would you frame all of these changes taken

as a whole? I think it's very concerning, deeply concerning, to see this president, I think, overreach. Fifty years ago, we call the Nixon presidency, the imperialistic presidency. But it really pales in comparison to what we have seen from Donald Trump. The demolition of the east wing of the White House is another example of President Trump just deciding to do something and doing it without consulting anyone, without looking at the rules, without looking at the precedence. And I think that in itself is dangerous. Mark, but of course Trump was elected. He was elected twice, and he has millions of supporters. We also know that as a real estate magnet, he was long known to put his name on his properties. Of course, we're talking about

government buildings now, including the Institute of Peace Building, which bears his name. His picture is now, by the way, in front of many buildings, like at the Department of Agriculture. But as much as Trump critics say, this is something that looks like we'd see in authoritarian regimes, Haven't we seen a lot of renamings of monuments in the last several years, for example, to more align with what is viewed as politically correct today? I mean, do you see parallels or contrasts there? No, I don't see any parallels. I think there are renamings of institutions. And a couple of examples are the JFK Airport, which was named for President Kennedy, like the Kennedy Center after his assassination.

It was posthumously named for President Kennedy. The national airport in Washington, D.C. was renamed Reagan National. Ronald Reagan was diagnosed with Alzheimer's early in the 1990s and was renamed for President Reagan in 1998 when President Clinton was in office. So President Reagan was still very much alive, although ailing from Alzheimer's. We don't generally see these things until a president has left office. and has rendered a legacy in President Trump's case. He is only one quarter through his second term in office. We have yet to see the legacy he will render as president. I think he would do well to think that not about being remembered for his name being on a building,

but what he does in the office of the presidency of the United States to better the American people in our nation and around the world. That is Mark Upton Grove, the president of the LBJ, Mark, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you very much. You may have heard in the last couple of weeks about these new savings and investment accounts for kids known as Trump accounts. They recently got a big boost from a philanthropic donation that's among the largest ever delivered directly to Americans.

The accounts are first expected to open next May. And the question is, can they deliver the benefits over the long haul that are being promoted? Our economics correspondent, Paul Solman, dug into that question. Trump accounts will be the first, I guess you could say, real trust funds for every American child. To which tech billionaire Michael Dell added, we believe the smartest investment that we can make

is an investment in children. So what exactly are these so-called Trump accounts? Part of this year's one big, beautiful bill act, their tax-advanted savings accounts available for every American child up to the age of 18, and parents can put in up to $5,000 annually. For kids born between 2025 and 2028, Uncle Sam salts away $1,000,

no matter what parents do. And all parents have to do is opt-in through a tax form. Moreover, other philanthropists, employers, and states are invited to add to the accounts as well. Susan and husband Michael Dell are the first philanthropic contributors of many Brad Gersner thinks. Moms and dads adding five, ten bucks a week. You know, kids saving a little money in the summertime, philanthropists like the Dell's states, like the state of Texas, that said they're going to add $1,000 to these accounts. Silicon Valley entrepreneur Brad Gersner helped make the idea a reality.

The objective here is to get the 70% Americans who feel left out and left behind by capitalism into the game to make everybody a capitalist from birth, sharing in the great upside of the American economy. U.S. savings bonds. Now, watch how they grow. Now, putting money away for a kid was pretty common back when folks like me and Teresa Gilarducci were babes in the woods. I used my own example of what happened when my grandmother gave me a little baby bond. She eventually became a prominent economist, a left-wing one, who's long promoted something like government trust funds from birth. She even wrote a proposal for them.

Along with Kevin Hassett, who's on the other side of me on the political spectrum. Kevin Hassett, President Trump's top economic advisor. Given her politics, how could she pair up with him? We came together as an economist, and we know that wealth gives people security and power. She and Hassett, despite their different politics, have now been meeting with Brad Gersner. That comes as no surprise to early wealth building expert Ray Bischarra. I've been working on this idea for 20 years, and it's been bipartisan over those 20 years. It's important to remember that the bottom half of the population owns only 2.5% of the nation's wealth

and only 1% of stocks and bonds. We have a long way to go to build wealth for the bottom half of the population. Trump accounts, designed properly, can do that. Designed properly. But that's only the first problem, says policy expert Amy Matsui. We already have extremely significant wealth gaps by income, by race, by gender. And the way that this policy is structured, it's not going to narrow them. It has the potential to widen them.

How so? Because the practical aspects of these accounts will mean that the families that are very well off will benefit much more than anybody in the bottom 90%. Most families will not be able to contribute the $5,000 for the tax advantage. A family who's been able to steadily contribute the maximum would have almost $200,000 in assets. And in contrast, a family that has the $1,000 and has the 6% rate of return may have something more along the lines of $2,000 or $3,000. But Teresa Gilarducci remains hopeful. The Trump accounts surely can be restructured.

But here's a real question. Will they be? The technocrats around populist policies would absolutely endorse a tweak of these accounts so they don't just serve the top 1% or top 10%. Her tweak of choice eliminate tax advantage for families earning over 250,000. per year to make the program more progressive. She expects Brad Gersoner will be sympathetic. And to listen to him, he may be. I started this when my oldest child was 13 years old, coming out of COVID, 2021, and I showed them the custodial accounts that I had opened

at birth and added to over the years. And they had compounded into a fair bit of money. And my oldest son Lincoln said to me, Dad, this is incredible. But what about all the other kids who don't have these. And that really was the conversation around our dinner table that led to the birth of Invest America. And now here's another problem, a teenager and money. What happens when he or she turns 18 and suddenly there's a windfall? I used to be a Boy Scout counselor for the personal finance merit batch. And I talked to many teenage boys, you know, over the years about their finances. I bet that 90% of the teenagers that you talk to will say that they would buy a car or somehow fix their car. What did she do with the grandma bond?

The bond that my grandmother gave me was cashed in to pay our back rent. As a father of a 17-year-old and a 14-year-old, I think about that all the time. And so the new law tries to address the problem, he says. At 18, kids can use up to 25% of this. to buy a home, start a business, go to college. If they don't use the money for that purpose, it automatically rolls into an IRA and is subject to the IRA rules.

So yes, you can't take it out, but it will be subject to a stiff penalty if you take it out at that point in time. But college? That isn't for most Americans, right? Two-thirds of people don't go to college. And so if they take the money out to buy a car, they have to pay a penalty.

So you're actually penalizing people who don't go right from high school to college. And so that has to be changed. They can use this money to go to a trade school. They can use this money to study a profession that isn't a typical for your education, community college, to start a small business. Okay, but what about this potential final snack? Trust in government agencies is pretty low.

And for families who don't have a lot of financial literacy or a portfolio of their own, they may be unwilling or reluctant to take the steps to open accounts for their children. even if they could receive that $1,000 of seed money from the government. Brad Gersner says he's keenly aware of the problem. Failure for me would be if we had a bunch of accounts that were not claimed by the bottom third of the economic ladder. We have to make sure that we make it seamless for these people to know about the accounts, to get excited about the accounts, and to claim the accounts. So what's the bottom line right now?

Pitfalls galore. But these accounts are, says longtime proponent Ray Bouchara, the down payment on a big idea that can and should be improved over time. And it's important to look at history here. The Social Security, one of our most successful social policies, started out largely excluding women and minorities. But today, it's one of the most inclusive, successful programs that we have. These Trump accounts, since they are completely wide open for an 18-year-old to spend, will not achieve. the goals that right now, President Trump and Michael and Susan Dell say they want it to

achieve. It needs reform. But better than nothing. Better than nothing? And if reforms do happen in myriad ways, and if money pours in from myriad sources, potentially much better. The PBS News hour, Paul Salman. The murders of filmmaker Rob Reiner and his wife, Michelle Singer-Riner, allegedly by their son Nick, have renewed difficult conversations across the country for other families who are struggling with mental illness and addiction. Nick Reiner had many well-publicized struggles over the years. Serious health crises, repeated treatments for substance use, and recent reports suggested he was being treated for schizophrenia. We still don't know what happened with the Reiner's, but we do know mental illness and addiction can be profoundly difficult challenges, even for families with means.

So we turn to someone who has traveled that difficult path within his own family. Virginia State Senator Creed's in 2013, his 24-year-old son, Gus, who'd struggled with bipolar disorder for years, attacked his father before taking his own life. Senator, thank you so much for being here and talking with us about this very, very difficult topic. We should say at the outset, I know you know this, that people struggling with mental illness are not inherently violent. They're much more likely to be the victims of violence than the perpetrators of it. But still, when you first heard what's alleged to have happened with the Reiner family, what was your reaction? Well, just heartbreak for the family, heartbreak that these beautiful people were lost and heartbreak that they couldn't get the help they needed it for their son. I mean, mental health is so misunderstood, and we've built up this wall of stigma around it for years and really prevented put up roadblocks in the way of people trying to get help.

And I also thought about the struggle of trying to care for an adult child. You know, even just because a child turns 18 doesn't make them less of a child. But there's a huge challenge to try to get services. You can lead a horse to water. You can't make them drink. As an old saying, I guess, and the same thing is true when you're trying to get services for somebody you care about. I want to ask you a little bit more about that. Again, we don't know the full extent of what happened with Nick Ryan.

but we also know that mental illness and substance abuse often go hand in hand. Can you just tell us a little bit more about the struggles that you had trying to get care for your son, Gus? Well, you know, that was a long time ago now, but the reality is that a lot of people don't understand that they are ill or they won't accept the fact that they are ill and they don't want, there are things they don't want to do. And as an adult child, you have to either get them to be treated, I guess to volunteer at some point, even when it's involuntary, to try to get them to treatment or to get them to sign something that will give you the authority to help

them make decisions, or you're going to have to go to court and file suit. It's just, it's, there's one difficulty after another one. And with my son, we just, we struggled to get him to acknowledge the problems and acknowledged that he needed care. And in the end, he was just ill and delusional, and he would not accept care. He would not, you know. So it's not a laughing matter at all. It's very tough.

And you're saying that once a person turns 18, legally, for all sorts of medical privacy and autonomy reasons, you as a parent don't have autonomy over them anymore. That's absolutely true. I mean, in fact, lots of cases under federal law and state law, once they turn 14, they have a certain amount of independence. They don't have to be treated after receiving the treatment. You prescribe for them.

You think they need. I think that they need. I want my son to receive care. I did the best I could to get him to place where he could receive that care, and he refused. And that's often the case. After your family's tragedy, you were part of a commission in Virginia. to look at the gaps in mental health care. That was over a decade ago.

What has happened in your state? What has happened nationally? Are we doing a better job now than we were then? We're doing a better job, but the reality is we had, we for so long neglected the issue that we still have so much work to do. You know, when I was in the hospital for several days after my son's situation, after he attacked me and then he died. I was in the hospital, and I was just scheming up.

I was in the fortunate position of being in the general assembly. So I was going to be able to make some change or I hope to make change. I have lots of questions, but I had quite more questions and answers. We created this commission to study mental health. And out of that grew, that met for about eight or nine years. Out of that grew the Virginia Behavioral Health Commission, which is a permanent staffed commission that staff is doing research

on figuring out ways to address mental illness. What we've done in Virginia is we've added several hundred million dollars a year to our public mental health system because we've had to build out services. We've taken the list of mandated services from public health providers, public mental health providers,

our community service boards in Virginia, from two to nine. We are focused on, on keeping people out of crisis. We've done some things. Yes, and I'm proud of that work. But we've still got a lot to do. The Reiner family was very public about their struggles.

They even made a film that dramatized some of Nick's experience. You, as you said, were in the legislature when this happened. You couldn't avoid talking about what had happened. But a lot of families, as you mentioned, feel an intense stigma and shame and blame and struggle to talk openly about what they are dealing with, let alone get help. How much of an issue is that still today? It's a huge issue.

Here's the thing. There are tragedies every day, and nearly every family suffers a tragedy of some kind. They're not all on the front page of the newspaper. In fact, few of them are. So you have to have empathy for what people are going through, and I think that you have to show kindness all the time. But the reality is that historically, we've had wall of stigma up around mental health. We've made people feel discouraged, feel embarrassed about mental health,

feel discouraged from seeking treatment, feeling discouraged from acknowledging that a problem exists. And the stigma is still out there. We are slowly tearing down the walls. Several years ago, we put in Virginia in the health curriculum of our public schools some mental health awareness, particularly in eighth and ninth grades. It's true that about 70% of those people that have serious mental illness first experience a crisis sometime between the ages of 14 or 24. So you want to build up the knowledge of mental health and the knowledge of warning

signs for people when they're in that age group. In Virginia, what we've done is incorporate mental health awareness into our health curriculum in the public schools for 8th and 9th graders. so that young people at the age when they might begin experiencing a mental health crisis can have some knowledge of what's going on. You know, here's the problem. The brain is part of the body. Mental health care is health care. People have to acknowledge that.

They have to acknowledge that it's all right to feel bad. It's all right to have these mental illness. It's just, you know, the frustrating thing is that we have fundraisers. we focus on things like breast cancer or a whole bunch of other illnesses. But for mental health, we use words like crazy. And, you know, it begins by thinking about the way we talk. Thinking about the way we talk, we can tear down the walls of stigma ourselves. We just have to focus on trying to make sure that people can get the treatment they need.

and can get well in their communities. That is, Virginia State Senator Cree-Deeds. Senator, thank you so much for taking the time. Really appreciate your insights. Thank you so much. Yeah. Bye-bye. Watching the classic Christmas movie,

it's a wonderful life, is a beloved tradition for millions. Its director, Frank Capra, always said his film was, in part, about the beauty of life in small town America. One little town in Rhode Island believes it was the inspiration for this holiday favorite. Pamela Watts of Ocean State Media has that story. It's part of our arts and culture series, Canvas. Yay!

Hello, Bedford Falk! Merry Christmas! The Christmas classic, It's a Wonderful Life, starring Jimmy Stewart, was filmed on a Hollywood set. Seneca Falls, New York boasts it's the model for the beloved movie's small town. Hey, George, don't take any plug nickels. But hold the popcorn. Could Little Compton have also played a big role? Town historian and native Marjorie O'Toole says clues of the connection are sprinkled.

throughout the film. Is it kind of a given that people in Little Compton do believe that they are really a part of It's a Wonderful Life, the movie? Oh, we're 100% in on that. That certainty began here. Hollywood husband and wife script writing team of Francis Goodrich and Albert Hackett, who created the screenplay, often vacationed at the Goodrich family cottage. Francis and Albert summered on Bailey's ledge in Little Compton, on the Bailey family farm. And so I think the fact that they named their incredibly sympathetic main character, George Bailey, is an absolute tie to this summer home, summer community that they loved. Need more proof? In the church cemetery on Little Compton's town common, here lies George Bailey and nearby Mary Bailey.

Hey, Mary. Yes, highways lumber and down the street, down the street, down the street, down the street. Goodrich and Hackett borrowed other area names, too. The folks in Seneca Falls may argue this, but Little Compton sits in between two cities, New Bedford and Fall River. And so I think the fact that the town in the movie is called Bedford Falls is a direct combination of the names of those two cities. That may all seem a coincidence until this scene in the movie.

You had me worried. One of the oldest trees in Pottersville. Pottersville. There's actually a Pottersville neighborhood in Little Compton. Today it's a perfectly beautiful little neighborhood in Little Compton. But a hundred years ago, Pottersville was one of the poorer neighborhoods in Little Compton, where working class people would have lived and worked. Senior digital producer Dan Medeiros of the Herald News in South Coast Massachusetts has traced another local tie to the movie. I found that someone from It's a Wonderful Life was born in Fall River,

and I thought, well, who could that be? I know I've seen the movie a million times. Don't blink. The photo of the pharmacist's deceased son is the headshot of actor Glenn Vernon. Medeiros discovered Vernon wasn't even critical. in the movie, but he got paid. That actor from Fall River was a part of it, a very, very small part, but it was a part, nonetheless.

At first, Vernon didn't mention he was in It's a Wonderful Life, which flopped at the box office, winning only one Oscar for special effects. All the snow in the movie was made of soap flakes, sugar, water, and fire extinguisher foam. As for Vernon... Was he ever like, I'm the guy from It's a Wonderful Life? Well, kind of, yeah.

Kind of, yeah. He would add that to his credit. He would become like a background actor or just like bit parts. He was in Lassie. He was in an episode of Columbo. He's in the movie Breakfast at Tiffany's. Meantime, Goodrich and Hackett would go on to write other screenplays, including the Thin Man Detective movies.

The characters Nick and Nora based on their own witty and close marriage. Eventually, the couple won a Pulitzer Prize and a Tony Award for their stage play, The Diary of Anne Frank. And back in Little Compton... Every time a bell rains, an angel gets his wing! Even if you're skeptical about Little Compton being this prototype for the story, is it a wonderful life in Little Compton? Oh, it's always a wonderful life in Little Compton.

To my big brother George, the richest man in town. Every time I watch the movie, I keep my eyes open for additional connection. For old and time For the PBS News Hour, I'm Pamela Watts and Little Compton, Rhode Island. And that is the NewsHour for tonight. I'm William Brangham. On behalf of the entire NewsHour team, thank you so much for joining us.