PBS News Hour - Full Show - September 19, 2025 – PBS News Hour full episode

Episode Date: September 19, 2025

Friday on the News Hour, the future of TikTok hangs in the balance after President Trump and Chinese President Xi negotiate a deal to keep the app in the U.S. The Senate rejects stopgap measures to avoid a looming government shutdown. Plus, a leading historian joins the ongoing debate over how to interpret the U.S. Constitution. 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 future of TikTok hangs in the balance after President Trump and Chinese President Xi negotiate a deal to keep the app in the U.S. The Senate rejects stopgap measures to avoid a looming government shutdown. And a leading historian joins the ongoing debate over how to interpret the U.S. Constitution. We really have abandoned that very idea of amendment, the idea that it is our constitution, and that we are the authors of it. And by not changing it, we submit to possible abuses. Welcome to the news hour. After a call with Chinese President Xi Jinping today, President Trump said a deal to spin off an American version of the wildly popular social media app, TikTok, is, quote, well on its way.

A Chinese company developed and owns the app, which raised concerns in the U.S. over national security and data privacy. Nick Schifrin begins our coverage. From communicative cappuccinos. To presidential pop, TikTok is a social. social media juggernaut. As a piece of cake. With nearly 2 billion global users, including 170 million Americans.

And thanks to President Trump, it turns out that TikTok has nine lives. The young people of this country want it badly. The parents of those young people want it badly. Despite a law requiring TikTok to be banned in the U.S. If it doesn't sever ties with its Chinese parent company, President Trump now says he says he has President Trump now says he made a deal today with Chinese President Xi Jinping to save TikTok. We're going to have very good control.

We have American. These are American investors. An official familiar with the deal tells PBS NewsHour, TikTok U.S. will be controlled by a consortium, including Oracle, Silver Lake, and Andresen Horowitz. They would control about 80%. Chinese shareholders would control about 20%. There would be a new app. Oracle would keep all American user data inside the U.S.

and be able to monitor and stop suspicious activity. TikTok U.S. would have a majority American board with one member designated by the U.S. government, and the app's algorithm would be licensed from Chinese parent company BiteDance. That has led critics concerned that TikTok is built with an internal sleight of hand. How are you doing that?

That the Chinese algorithm could allow Beijing to steal Americans' data and manipulate TikTok's content. This week, the Republican chairman of the House of Senate, elect committee on the Chinese Communist Party, Michigan Republican John Mulanar, wrote, quote, I'm concerned the reported licensing deal may involve ongoing reliance by the new TikTok on a bite-dance algorithm and application that could allow continued CCP control or influence. But it's not clear if there's even a final deal. Today, Xi Jinping released a statement that said, quote, the Chinese government respects the

wishes of the company and would be happy to see productive commercial negotiations. The details are really going to matter to understand whether this addresses the national security concerns that U.S. policymakers have been so vocal about. Sam Sachs is a senior fellow at Yale Law School and New America focused on Chinese technology. So just having the data housed in the U.S. by a U.S. company or consortium of companies doesn't exactly answer who has access to the data under what conditions does it flow out of the U.S. same for the content. there are a lot of questions about who will be overseeing the recommendation algorithm, right?

A license in and of itself doesn't tell us about how certain content will be promoted. She says the Chinese government's stance on TikTok has become more flexible because Beijing sees a TikTok deal as a step toward making a larger deal with the U.S. on computer chips, trade, or even about Taiwan. I don't think Beijing cares about TikTok. But I think they've realized that they have a real opportunity here because Trump does. And they have bigger fish to fry. They may be using this as an opening to extract larger concessions. President Trump also announced today that he would meet Xi Jinping at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit at the end of October

and travel to China early next year, while she would reciprocate, William, with his own trip to the U.S. Nick, thank you. We've also got our White House correspondent, Liz Landers, here joining us. Nick, a question for you, though, there has been this bipartisan consensus that there really is a national security problem with TikTok. Has there been any evidence that the Chinese government has manipulated TikTok in some way? So bite dance is a Chinese company and has to respond to any Chinese government request for data from bite dance. And the Department of Justice alleged that the company actually accessed the devices of American journalists via their TikTok apps in the past. As for the overall concern, William, as our story suggests, there are a few buckets. One is the concern that China could steal the data of Americans. And the deal, according to the people defending the deal, tell me that that's designed to be mitigated by the fact. that the data of Americans is kept inside the U.S. firewalled off.

The second concern is that the app could somehow deliver malicious software. And the critics of the deal who I talked to today say that, yes, that still could happen because this company, this algorithm, will still be Chinese. And that even if you had some kind of review of the algorithm, it's simply too long and too complicated to know that an American company like Oracle can actually find anything nefarious inside the code. And as an aside, William, all the experts I spoke to today told me that the legislation requires a complete divestiture from bite dance, and this deal does not do that.

Liz, President Trump's position on TikTok is, I think the technical term is evolved, we might say. How and why has that happened? Evolved, and it's been a 180, really. Since he came back into office, he has totally changed his position on this. Back in August of 2020, he signed an agreement. executive order that would have effectively banned TikTok, and there was a ton of pushback to this. That was put at bay by some court orders. Congress took up the mantle on this issue in April of last year of 2024. They passed bipartisan legislation that would ban TikTok here

in the U.S. unless there was this divestiture. One of the very first things that President Trump did when he came into office on inauguration day on January 20th was to sign this executive order to postpone the shutdown of TikTok. And he has attributed his change, his 180, and his position to how he saw TikTok help him in the election. He actually just said yesterday that Charlie Kirk urged him to get on the app. Listen to what he said.

I like TikTok. It helped get me elected. In fact, Charlie said, sir, you ought to get on TikTok. You'd be great. I said, really? Tell me about TikTok. And we, as you know, we did unbelievably well with youth, like at a level that no Republican has ever even dreamt of.

And William, just in the last few months that he has been in office now, he has delayed this TikTok ban over and over again. He signed the most recent executive order delaying this just a few days ago. That is now extended and in effect until December 16th. Secondly, there's this consortium that Nick was reporting about that if the deal goes forward, a consortium of American businesses would take this ownership of part of TikTok. Who are they, and how did they get put together?

So this group that could potentially be the buyer to have the majority American stake includes several people that President Trump is both close friends with and are donors to him and to the Republican Party. In particular, Larry Ellison, he's one of the co-founders of Oracle, and also Mark Andreessen, who's a venture capitalist.

For example, Mark Andreessen donated $2.5 million to President Trump's Super PAC last year in 2024. So both of these men have close personal ties to President Trump. And they would also stand to gain a lot financially if this deal goes through. And beyond the national security questions, there's also real political implications if this deal goes forward. Well, there are more than 170 million Americans who use TikTok, and that cuts across all kinds of ideologies and demographics, including young people. And so the president really believes that this helped him win the younger demographic. I think that Republicans want to continue to get young people involved in politics as well.

So he has now joined TikTok himself. He has more than 15 million followers on TikTok since he joined. So this would be a big deal if he was able to push through this deal with Xi and with China. Liz Landers, Nick Schifrin, thank you both so much. Thank you. The day's other headlines begin in Atlanta, where HHS secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s Overhauled panel of vaccine advisors declined to recommend COVID-19 shots for the fall. Instead, the advisors recommended that individuals decide for themselves whether to get the vaccine.

And they urge the CDC to adopt stronger language around the supposed risks of vaccination. The panel narrowly voted against recommending a prescription for the COVID vaccine. Previously, the vaccine was routinely recommended and provided to almost anyone who wanted one. Turning overseas, Estonia says three Russian fighter jets violated its airspace today. It marks the third attempt by Moscow to test NATO's eastern flank this month alone. The Russian MIG-31 jets breached Estonian airspace near a small island in the Gulf of Finland, staying there for about 12 minutes. NATO jets from Italy scrambled to respond. Estonia's foreign minister called today's incursion unprecedentedly brazen.

This all comes just one week after NATO planes shot down Russian drones over Poland. The UN is set to reimpose tough sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program, after the Security Council today opted not to give Iran any relief. The draft resolution has not been adopted, having failed, to obtain the required number of votes. The vote paved the way for so-called snapback sanctions to take effect at the end of the month. That's a return to sanctions that were lifted under the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. Iran called today's action pressure and intimidation, but said it was still open to diplomacy. Tehran still has eight days to try and reach a deal to delay those sanctions.

Just in time for the UN General Assembly next week, the Senate confirmed former national security advisor Michael Waltz to be the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Waltz was quietly dismissed from his previous job in May for mistakenly adding a journalist to a private signal chat where sensitive military plans were being discussed. Waltz now fills the last vacancy in President Trump's cabinet after the prior nominee, Representative Elise Daphonic, was withdrawn from consideration

so that she could help preserve a slim Republican majority in the House. President Trump signed two proclamations today related to foreign visas. One of them restricts entry under the H-1B visa program for skilled foreign workers unless the applicant pays a $100,000 fee. In the Oval Office this afternoon, the president also signed an executive order allowing expedited visa treatment via a new gold card program that will cost entrance up to $2 million. A federal judge has for now tossed out President Trump's $15 billion defamation lawsuit

against the New York Times. In a scathing ruling, Judge Stephen Mary Day wrote, A complaint is not a public forum for vituperation and invective, or a protected platform to rage against an adversary. He noted the lawsuit didn't even get to the first defamation count against the Times until page 80. The president's team has been given a month to refile its suit. Separately, the Trump administration has asked the Supreme Court to halt a judge's order that let transgender and non-binary people pick their preferred gender on their own passports. It's been the Trump administration's policy to require stating a person's sex at birth on passports.

And on Wall Street, stocks ended the week hitting new all-time highs after the Federal Reserve moved to cut interest rates. The Dow Jones Industrial Average reached a new record for the second straight day. So too did the NASDAQ, which climbed 0.7%. And the S&P 500 closed out its sixth positive week in less than two months. Still to come on the news hour, an FCC commissioner weighs in on the suspension of late-night host Jimmy Kimmel. David Brooks and Jonathan Capehart give their analysis on the week's political headlines, and the Utah Festival focuses on mental health in the music industry. This is the PBS News Hour from the David M. Rubenstein studio at WETA in Washington,

and in the west from the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University. The A's are 217. The Navy. are 212. The bill is passed. That was House Republicans today, passing their plan to avoid a government shutdown with a temporary seven-week funding bill. But within hours, that was blocked by the Democrats in the Senate. Their own plan for extending funding also fell short. So what does this mean? Congressional correspondent Lisa Desjardin is here again with the latest as we approach the looming September 30th deadline. So, Lisa, where do things stand?

Well, tonight, the votes today mean that we are, in fact, on track and more quickly moving toward a government shutdown. As I've said before, this particular shutdown threat, while we have these now commonly, this one is unique because of the timing. So let's take a look at the calendar because it's closer than you think.

So this is today. Now, let's look at the deadline that's September 30th for funding government. Here's the situation. Next week, Congress is on recess. In fact, Congress has already left for that recent. says, so you think maybe they could come back Monday? No, Speaker Johnson and his team decided late today that they will not be in session in the House, the 29th or 30th. So, William,

what this means is, as you and I sit here, really, unless the Senate passes the House bill passed today, then there will be a government shutdown. And right now, Democrats don't have that appetite. They say this is their time to stand up to Donald Trump. They say they want more money for health care specifically. It is really a back and forth. And here is how easy. side put it today. We do not want to shut down. Our position has never changed. We need bipartisan legislation to keep the government open and meet the needs of the American people, especially on costs, specifically health care costs. But until Republicans break free from Donald Trump's grip, they're dragging this country straight into another

shutdown. They're not being reasonable at all. A short-term CR is not a partisan exercise. We could have loaded this up with partisan provisions, but we're not doing that because we're governing in a responsible manner. I hope Chuck Schumer and the Democrats in the Senate will do the same. This is a test for everyone, but especially Leader Schumer. He's really never done this before making demands that could lead to a shutdown. So the leaders are talking shutdown. Where do rank-and-file members sit?

Well, if you talk to Republicans, they believe that Democrats will be blamed. Democrats are less sure. They think that if they put this message out that Trump needs to be stood up to, that this is their one time to draw some lines with him, that that will help them. Now, both parties are more than a year away from an election. But when you talk to Democrats, you really also get this sense, William, that they don't have an off-ramp plan. They don't know how a shutdown would end. And that really puts us in a potentially precarious situation as we go down into it, potentially as soon as a week, a little bit more than a week from now.

So what are the odds? You know, I don't like to speculate about these things. Of course, I always have my own opinion. But I will say they're very high that we will have a shutdown. I would say as high as 80% or more, the only possibility out of one is that the Senate returns next week and Chuck Schumer changes his mind. That's not likely. Well, Lisa Desjardin, thank you so much. You're welcome. The debate continues over Disney's sudden decision to pull the ABC show.

show Jimmy Kimmel live off the air indefinitely after a conservative backlash to his comments about Charlie Kirk's murder. The chairman of the FCC, Brendan Carr, first suggested that ABC affiliates should pull Kimmel's show or face action from his agency. But Carr rejected accusations that he was punishing free speech. Our goal and our obligation here is to make sure that broadcasters are serving the public interest. And if there's local TV stations that don't think that running that programming does it, then they have every right under the law in their contracts to preempt it. We again asked Chairman Carr to come on the news hour, but his office did not respond. But there is also pushback coming from within the FCC itself. Commissioner Anna Gomez

has been very critical of Kimmel's suspension, and she joins us now. Commissioner Gomez, thank you so much for being here. What is your principal issue with how this all went down? What concerns me is how this administration is using every lever of power in order to bring broadcasters to heal, which is contrary to the First Amendment. These threats are leading to these corporate parents capitulating to this administration's desire to control both how the media portrays this administration and now apparently how comedians make jokes about them, no matter whether you find them distasteful or not. Just to remind our audience about the chronology here, Kimmel made his comments on Monday, Chairman Carr made his comments, then two large owners of ABC stations, Neckstar and Sinclair, both said they would pull Kimmel's show. Both of those companies also have major regulatory matters before the FCC. How much of a role do you think that plays in all of this?

their desire to get the FCC's approval and thus maybe doing what the FCC wants. So this is all a part of this administration's campaign of censorship and control. And it has really been very aggressive in going after broadcasters for, like I said, how they report on this administration. And they want them to change and count out to this administration's ideology. So corporate parents are seeing what it is that this administration wants. And as you know, These broadcasters own a very large number of local broadcast stations throughout the country, and they are seeing what it is that this administration wants.

And so this capitulation is basically self-censorship in advance of their desire to get their transactions granted once they come before the FCC. And also, by the way, to have the FCC lift a lot of the regulations that would stop them from merging and consolidating our broadcasters even more than they already are. The defenders of Kimmel's suspension say this was not about government censorship. This was about private companies choosing to say, look, we don't like what we heard on our airwaves and we're taking it off. And so that is their right. Doesn't some of the responsibility here fall on these companies, fall on Disney and its CEO, Bob Iger?

It is absolutely true that private companies have, the right to decide what programming they want to to air and the FCC does not have the authority to tell them whether or not what they are showing is something that they like as long as it's not unlawful however this pressure campaign is what's leading these companies to capitulate and what we need is for companies to stop capitulating and to show some courage because every time you see themselves censor, it is fraying our democracy and the underpinnings of our democracy, which includes the freedom of speech and the freedom of the press. It is a dangerous precedent for this country. Your colleague, Chairman Carr, has also said that Jimmy Kimmel was in fact lying about the motives of this shooter and his political affiliations, and when he was trying to mislead the country, he called it some of the sickest conduct.

Others, including some on Capitol Hill, have also argued that Kimmel's comments were equivalent to hate speech as opposed to protected speech. What do you make of that argument? Once again, there is no exception to the First Amendment for broadcasters simply because they are licensed by the FCC. We do not take action against broadcasters because we find a joke distasteful. Our First Amendment, jurisprudence actually has protected throughout decades and centuries, really, the most abhorrent speech imaginable. And also, satire has been such an important way that we push back against people in power. When we censor whether broadcasts of the news or comedians, what we are doing is losing part of our civic discourse that the public should be the one determines

is what they want to hear, not the government. President Trump has suggested that the FCC should consider revoking the licenses of broadcasters that put on material that is critical of him. What is your response to that suggestion? Does he have the power to do that? could the FCC, in fact, do that? So the FCC does not have the authority, the constitutional right, or the ability to revoke licenses simply because this administration does not want to be criticized.

That is contrary to the First Amendment. And it's also contrary to the law. Our Communications Act, which is what governs what the FCC can and cannot do, prohibits us from censoring broadcasters. And that would be exactly what we were doing if we were revoking licenses simply because the broadcasters are criticizing this administration. All right. That is FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez. Commissioner Gomez, thank you so much for being here. Thank you.

Last night, we took an evening. in-depth look at what's known as the originalist interpretation of the U.S. Constitution. Tonight, Jeff Bennett has a conversation with a historian who has a different view of America's most important governing document. It's part of our On Democracy series about the range of perspectives about how our government should function, what led to this moment, and where the country goes next. Originalism is often countered by the idea that the Constitution is a living, breathing, document meant to be interpreted and changed along with the times.

Jillipur is a historian at Harvard University and author of the new book, We the People, A History of the U.S. Constitution, and she joins us now. Thanks for being with us. Oh, thanks so much for having me. Many conservatives, as you well know, they argue that the Constitution should be read exactly as it was written, or at least as the framers understood it in the late 18th century. Why do you see that approach as flawed or even dangerous? well their approach is I think a good faith attempt to interpret the constitution

originalism is a judicial philosophy I happen to disagree with it as a judicial philosophy but more importantly I disagree with it as a matter of history in the sense that one of the fundamental claims of originalists is that originalism is original and the historical record suggested it very much is not you could still defend it you could still say this is how I think we should interpret the Constitution. But I don't think you can successfully argue the claim that it is how the Constitution was originally intended to be interpreted. What do you say to those who argue that originalism

provides stability and protects against judicial activism? Well, I think it's important to historicize originalism. By that name, it doesn't emerge until 1980. It really dates to 1971, when Robert Ork, who becomes the Solicitor General and then later, of course, is nominated to the Supreme Court by Ronald Reagan, publishes a law review article in which he argues the principal positions of what become known in the 1980s as originalism. So you have to ask yourself as a historian, right? Like, originalism isn't original. The framers didn't talk about constitutional interpretation in that way. The documents that originalists say you must consult in order to interpret the Constitution correctly, were not widely available until the 20th century.

I think most historians, including originalists, would suggest that originalists are responding to a very liberal Supreme Court that's very active, the Warren Court, beginning with Brown v. Board of Education in 1954, which rules that segregated schooling is unconstitutional through the privacy rulings we associate Grizzle v. Connecticut in 65, declaring that state laws banning contraception and constitutional through Roe v. Wade in 73, that this act is a lot of other things that the Warren Court did. But social and fiscal conservatives were out of power in those years in the sense that they didn't have spots on the Supreme Court. And there were a few different ways to gain power over the way the Constitution was interpreted. You could amend it, and they

tried to do that. You could instead, though, try to take over the federal judiciary, which Reagan made an unprecedented number of judicial appointments, of course, entirely within his powers in the 1980s. And he applied a litmus test to those judges that they must subscribe to this new judicial philosophy that Bork had first described, that they were seeking only to restore the original meaning, understanding, and intent of the Constitution. They were, you know, it is a judicial revolution. And from that era forward, we've lived in an era where the court has had so much exclusive authority over constitutional change because we've stopped amending the Constitution. There are people who argue that the Constitution has lasted, has been enduring in large part because it is hard to change.

Do you see its rigidity as a strength or as an existential liability? I certainly don't think it's an existential liability. I just, this is not a language that I would use to describe most things, right? Certainly not the Constitution, but sure. Certainly not, certainly not the Constitution. You know, I think the Constitution with its 27 amendments tells the story of American history. One of the reasons I wrote the book is I think the philosophy of amendment

is a very beautiful idea. The idea that we are fallible, you know, of course, the famous speech that Benjamin Franklin gave. I consent to this Constitution, sir, because I don't think it's the best, but I do not think we could do any better. And because I know that we're fallible. And there's going to be something wrong.

in it, but I also know that we can change it. I think what troubles me, though, is that we really have abandoned that very idea of amendment, the idea that it is our Constitution and that we are the authors of it. And by not changing it, we submit to possible abuses of constitutionalism. And we submit to a political system in which the legitimacy of the Constitution is pretty easily questioned. If a fundamental mechanism that was built into the Constitution that has never been written out of it, is it the people have the capacity to amend it doesn't work. Is the Constitution still working? There is this American reverence for the Constitution. People almost hold it up as a sacred text. Does that shape our collective unwillingness to change it, do you think?

Yeah, but I think I think we kind of naturalize that and assume that it was ever thus. That wasn't really the case. Constitutional worship or kind of bringing the trappings of religious fundamentalism in particular to the Constitution. People, you know, obviously, well, what would the founders do? Well, they weren't called the founders until the progressive era in the rise of constitutional conservatism when, you know, they were deemed the founding fathers as a way to fight against progressive social reform. So you're absolutely right that it is a feature of how Americans view the Constitution, but it is also a historical artifact of a moment in time.

The Constitution's history does not lie in the archives of the Supreme Court. The Constitution's history lies in the hearts and minds of the American people. And that has been a long history of contestation and argument and division and union. And it's a very rich tapestry. And it's very hard to see if we focus only on those moments across the chronology, the long 250 years since the first American Constitution in 1776, first state constitutions, if we focus only on the moments where this particular political passion that takes the form of worshipping the Constitution as sacred emerges. Jill Lepore, author of We the People, A History of the U.S. Constitution.

Quite enjoyed speaking with you. Thanks for being with us. Thank you. To some, the suspension of Jimmy Kimmel's show by the Disney Corporation was a much-needed corrective to what they argue is a never-ending tide of liberal politics on the airwaves. To others, this was the government taking another dangerous step into censorship and authorities. On that and more, we turn to the analysis of Brooks and Capehart. That is New York Times columnist David Brooks and MSNBC's Jonathan Capehart.

Gentlemen, so nice to see you both. I want to talk about Jimmy Kimmel. Before we get to the seriousness of it, several of his late-night comedic colleagues responded to his suspension this week. Let's listen to a little bit of that. We have another fun, hilarious. administration-compliant show. That is blatant censorship, and it always starts small.

Remember, like, in week one of his presidency, Gulf of America. Call it Gulf of America. Sure, it seems harmless, but with an autocrat, you cannot give an inch. We must all stand up for the principles of free expression. There's a reason free speech is in the very First Amendment. It stands above all others.

You might even say it's... The ultimate. This has been a closer life. So you guys, we've talked about this all week long about this tide, this current, this, the chronology of what went down here. I'm just curious, David, what is your reaction to this? Let's go through the chronology. The shooting happened. And I thought most the political establishment and the media establishment reacted well.

You had beautiful statements from every former president. Most of the media coverage was responsible, sympathetic. You know, they played who Charlie Kirk was. And it was all going great, reasonably well. But then the conflict entrepreneurs get in the game. And on the right, online, you literally had conservative MAGA people saying, this is our Reichstag fire. This is our pretext to crack down the left.

The left has been trying to kill us. This shows they're trying to kill us. We need to get back at them. And my advice to the MAGA folks, when you're comparing yourselves to the Nazis, that's probably a bad move. And then on the left, you had people. like Heather Cox Richardson and Jimmy Kimmel saying, no, that was a MAGA guy with no evidence at all. And then the other reaction on the left was look at his views on the Second Amendment and he

deserved it. And so everything began to deteriorate. And then Donald Trump comes in and uses, or the FCC at least, and uses the power of the federal government to crack down on Kimmel. And now that takes it to a whole other level. And there, it really is censorship. It really is authoritarianism when you get a government trying to use federal power to police. speech. Is it that clear cut to you as well? Yes. Yeah, I mean, how could it not be? And especially when, and I want to use Brendan Carr tweet from February of 2019, he wrote, should the government censor speech it doesn't like? Of course not. The FCC does not have a roving mandate to police speech in the name of the public interest. What did we just see? Or take a look at Stephen Miller.

And he's deputy chief of staff now, a tweet from April of 2022. If the idea of free speech enrages you, the cornerstone of democratic self-government, then I regret to inform you that you are a fascist. And I could read other tweets. There's always a tweet for something. Sure, the president's executive order said, defended the First Amendment when he first came into office. Right. How did we get, though, from there to here?

Well, I think we got there from there to here because we have to understand what he meant. I think, by the free press. And really, what it, to my mind, it's, it is okay for us to do this to them. It was bad. It's really bad if liberals or Democrats say nasty things about, about me, about our movement, about what we're trying to do, and that censorship. But now that we're in power, and they're still, you know, leveling these criticisms and critiques, well, That's really bad, and we have to crack down. And what's really problematic in all of this is it's not just the president. He is surrounded by enablers who are not willing to tell him you can't do this

or who are true believers and are more than happy to do his bidding. I mean, Kimmel suffered the consequences for his comments, but he's not the only one, certainly. There's a USA Today has got a ticker up. I think it's over 100 people already who have. have been censured or fired for their comments. Some of which those comments were grotesque and horrendous, and others were kind of grounded in fact and not inappropriate. Do you think we have just lost this balance

between what is truly dangerous speech and what is protected critique? Yeah, we've lost the boundary. I mean, you're not allowed to say famously shout fire in a crowd theater. You can't urge people to go kill somebody. Like if it leads to violence, that should be prohibited. speech, and especially if you're a private company and you care about the integrity of your

institution. But that boundary has been blurred. Let me try to describe what it feels like for a lot of the folks on the right. So in their view, I would say to my Democratic friends, imagine you woke up in every media organization you saw preached Christian nationalism. You sent your kids to school and they were being taught Christian nationalism. You turned on late night comedy, and it's all Christian nationalism. For conservatives, that's how it feels.

To live in our current world. Look in our current culture. And that one of the things that's happened over the last 50 years is that as progressives have gotten control of various cultural institutions, they've excluded a lot of conservative and working class voices. And so a lot of people feel completely shut out. And late-night comedy is the perfect example. You could be right or laugh.

You could watch Letterman. You could watch Carson, and you could laugh. But now late-night TV is, it's about laughter, but it's also about making progressives feel good about themselves, making them feel smug. And even I can't watch late-night TV anymore. And, but the difference is, you fight culture, if you don't like the progressive culture, create a conservative culture. And to his great credit, I rarely get to praise Tucker Carlson anymore.

But he went on his show and said, if the Trump administration tries to damage free speech using this as a pretext, it's time for civil disobedience. And so he understands you fight cultural power with countercultural power. That's how the game plays. To use federal power is definitely breaching a line. You used the term authoritarianism before, Jonathan. And do you, I mean, this has been now another one of the very successful efforts that the Trump administration has used with law firms, with universities, with media companies. Where do you see this going? Where do you see this ending? I mean, I don't know. I would like to think that there would be a media company or a band of law firms or a band.

of institutions of higher learning who would be willing to push back. It's not enough that Harvard is willing to push back. It's not enough that the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal are willing to push back. And I can't think of a media organization that other than the New York Times, but I'm thinking of television where they have been in the crosshairs of the president's rhetoric and have said, no, we're not going to do it. We're not going to do what you want. And, you know, again, I go back to sometimes I wonder, is it acquiescence?

Is it obeying in advance? Or is it, I'm kind of down with this. I'm fine with this. And I'm going to ride this wave because with the president doing what he's doing, maybe we can get some other things that we want. And that's why this slide, to me, it just, it, picks up speed every week that we sit here. We're talking about yet another level deeper into what lots of academicians and others have said,

you know, the march to authoritarianism. People say we're sliding into it. I say, no, we're in it. I mean, David, I remember a month or two ago you were sitting right here arguing that there needs to be this larger civic movement that you were just talking about. Do you think that there are any flames of that happening? Do you see it anywhere? I see little flames, but not the big ones. People are intimidated.

People don't understand the nature of the fight they're in the middle of. One big mystery I've had is I spent parts of this week in central and eastern Tennessee. And I probably had a conversation with three or four hundred people. And the way they talked about, the Kirk thing was all wonderful. Some people like Charlie Cook, some people didn't like Charlie Cook, but they had feeling for sympathy. The conversation I see online has nothing in common with the conversation I had. with all these people in Tennessee. And so my question is, if it's only 1% of America that really thinks violence is necessary

and likes what happened to Charlie Cook, does that matter? If 99% don't, the problem is, as Damon Linker, teaches a pen said this week on a podcast, 1% of America is 3 million people. 3 million people believe in violence, they can do an awful lot of damage. And I'm old enough to remember when I was 7 years old, sitting in my life, elementary school, the weathermen blew themselves up in a New York town home right by my school. And in those days, the 60s, there were 4,000 bombings on college campuses in the 6970. People forget that history.

And it was brutal, let alone Kent State, let alone the riots, let alone all that. And one thing that happened, I think that was fringes doing most of that, except for the National Guard at Kent State, that was not the fringe. But a lot of people pulled back. They looked into the abyss, and they pulled back. And what do they do? They elected, as my colleague, David French, put it, a Baptist Sunday school teacher as president in 1976. And then they elected the sunniest human being on the face of the earth as president in 1980. So the electorate said, no, we're not going down this abyss.

I don't think we're at that point where the whole country is pulling back and getting out of the spiral. But I'm hopeful. Hopeful? I'm perennially hopeful. I'm perennelally hopeful. But the one difference now is that we have a president of the United States who lives online. And if it's 1% who are listening to him and the things he puts on social media, the way he speaks about things, that doesn't help us as an electorate pull back from the abyss, pull back from the brink. Jonathan K. Part, David Brooks. So nice to see you both. Thank you. Thank you.

The music industry full of glamorous stars and thrilling performances can also be grueling for the musicians themselves, sometimes even with tragic consequences. A 2024 Music Cares survey revealed that over 8% of respondents within that industry had serious thoughts of suicide in the the past year. That is notably higher than the 5% rate among the general population. Senior arts correspondent Jeffrey Brown reports from Park City, Utah, on a side of the music world that is starting to get more attention. It's for our ongoing coverage of the intersection of health and arts, which is part of our Canvas series. The Sound of Music in the Mountains, the band on stage in a gorgeous setting, a happy crowd. Anyways, the quintessential summer music festival.

But listen to some of the stories we heard. It feels like extreme highs and extreme lows. I feel full gratitude and I feel extremely overwhelmed. You need help. Without people helping me back then, especially the first year, I would not be here. The problem that we were seeing was that we were losing music industry folks to addiction and suicide. People you knew.

People that I knew, yes. The Park City Song Summit in Utah had plenty of music over three days, headlined this year by bands such as Goose, and Dawes. But here the emphasis was also on mental health and wellness, an array of alcohol-free drinks at night, ivy drips and B-12 shots in the afternoon, yoga, meditation, and song baths for a positive start to the night.

morning. Good friends, one after the other. But things also went deeper, sometimes darker. Grammy nominee Marcus King, here was chef and TV host Andrew Zimmern, talked openly about the common pressures of their two industries and the toll taken. I was really going to check out, you know, that was my plan, was I got an old car, got a garage, so I exit, stage left, here we go. King was able to turn things around and help others through his foundation, destigmatizing addiction and mental health struggles. Just making that first leap, asking somebody for help. It doesn't make you look weak.

It's quite the contrary. These sessions are called labs. One signal says Song Summit founder Ben Anderson that this festival is different. Yeah, we're getting the chemistry together in there, and we're getting people in the same room in an intimate setting where their personalities and their heart and their spirit can come together, and they can be vulnerable and very transparent about things like mental health, about chemical dependency, about trauma, or maybe about their songwriting process, or why they wrote a particular song, what drives them, what

inspires them, what scares them. Things that they don't often get to talk about. Right. If anybody wants a check-in. Counselors like Keith Fairman made themselves available to support groups no matter how small. Behind the scenes, gatherings of audience members in recovery, even amid the performance stages. And for musicians, roadies, and others in the industry. I'm standing there.

A chance to check in, talk with peers who share without stigma, the hard knowledge of addiction and life on the road. Welcome to earth. Glory and strike. I lost everything. I lived in the park, homeless, penniless, career less, everything, yeah. Amazement and horror will carve out. Now 59 and 17 years sober, Swedish-born New Orleans-based blues rocker Anders Osborne says he survived his drug and alcohol addiction and found a way forward as a touring musician through the help of

friends. And he's paid it forward, creating an organization called Send Me a Friend, a database that allows working musicians wherever they are to ask someone to simply come sit nearby during a performance, just as his friends first did for him. So I played, and they kept people away, drug dealers, people that brought me shots or whatever, all this stuff. This is within the first year, six months into my sobriety. And I remember looking over and going, I'm working. I felt accountable.

I'm not partying. My tribe's here. I'm good. Not just feeling safe, but knowing why I'm there. I'm not there for any other reason than to entertain these people. You found a way to continue as a musician, as a creative person, while in recovery. Yeah, it's difficult. Yeah, still.

Not that I want to use, but it's, yeah, it's sometimes there are conversations I don't want to have with people that are in high or intoxicated that's part of, you know, the scene. So you have to find an attitude and be accepting of that as part of my job. For me, I have to meditate prior to the show. I have to be prepared for what's coming. Pressure is old and some new. Today's music industry revolves around new technology and business models, as well as always on social media.

Hillary Gleason heads a nonprofit called Backline. The pressure to be responsive to fans, to be on, to be showing them, you know, behind the scenes of your life. I think certainly technology has impacted in that way. way but also the rise of streaming platforms and the changing and the revenue models of the music industry have made it so that more and more folks have to go on tour to make a living and touring is incredibly challenging backline helps musicians and those working with them find a variety of services including

on-the-road wellness and therapy support and Gleason is seeing growing awareness of the need for an industry-wide approach labels We got you, but do you got us? One notable moment came at this year's Grammys when pop star Chapel Rowan accepted her award for Best New Artist and called on music labels to offer artists health insurance, including mental health services. But she's doing that as a star, right?

So if you're starting out, you can't go to your record label and say, give me health insurance. You can't, but you may be approached by several record labels. And it's the defining difference for some artists now in choosing where to sign. Just over the past year or two, we've started to see people make this actually a line item in their touring budgets. One artist working into the late hours at Song Summit, Electronic Dance DJ and producer L.P.G.O.B. Whose go-all-night, globetrotting life, one night here in Utah, the next in Spain, would leave anyone gasping for breath and a bit of sanity.

My name is L.P. Gobi. And you are at the time to offer a master class to young musicians. Like everyone we met here, L.P. Gobi spoke of those who didn't survive. Oh, sometimes. In the world, it was the phenomenally successful Swedish DJ, Avichi,

who took his life in 2018 at age 28. So I thought a lot more would change after Avichi. after Avichi, you know, there was a lot of talk about mental health and, but I don't know if much did. I believe she played some 300 shows last year. She's had her own struggles, living her dream in a very competitive field, especially she says for women, but always feeling on the edge of losing it and more. She now works with Hilary Gleason of Backline.

I've used the resources to find an amazing therapist and psychiatrist and wellness coach. And I find different breath for constructors in every city. And that's been a lifeline for me right now, like just breathing. And if I was going to talk to somebody who's starting out on this journey, protect your peace at all costs. Small personal steps and at one small music festival. But says Song Summits Ben Anderson with outsized impact. Still, this is a small gathering.

Yes. A few thousand people. Yes. Doesn't change all that much in the larger music world. Here's what I would say to that. Do you know how many people have come to me and said either their artist, someone in their camp or an audience member has gotten the help that they needed? That never impacts just one person. It's dozens of people.

So my mentality is never like, well, it's not big enough. It's we will have enough impact to where it will be bigger. For the PBS News Hour, I'm Jeffrey Brown in Kirk City, Utah. Remember, there is a lot more online, including a look at a new vaccine that aims to protect koala bears against chlamydia. You can find that on our Instagram page right now. Be sure to tune into Washington Week with the Atlantic later tonight right here on PBS. The panel exams President Trump's efforts to silence his critics. And watch PBS News Weekend tomorrow for a look at a public garden in Michigan that evolves with the seasons, thanks to meticulous design and an army of volunteer gardeners.

That is the News Hour for tonight. I'm William Brangham. On behalf of the entire NewsHour team, thank you so much for joining us. Have a great weekend.