PBS NewsHour full episode, January 19, 2018

JUDY WOODRUFF: Good evening.
I'm Judy Woodruff.
On the "NewsHour" tonight: deadline day.
President Trump and leading lawmakers scramble to reach a deal to avoid a shutdown of the
federal government.
Then: The complicated war in Syria takes on a new dimension -- how Turkey's stepped-up
shelling complicates the U.S. mission to eliminate ISIS.
And it's Friday.
Mark Shields and David Brooks on how we got to this 11th-hour push to avoid a shutdown.
All that and more on tonight's "PBS NewsHour."
(BREAK)
JUDY WOODRUFF: As the hours ticked down to midnight, and a possible federal government
shutdown, it was a day of dealing and blaming for politicians on both sides of Pennsylvania
Avenue.
Lisa Desjardins begins our coverage.
LISA DESJARDINS: The day began with a tweet, President Trump writing: "Senate Democrats
are needed for a short-term spending bill, but want illegal immigration and weak borders."
He then asked, "Shutdown coming?"
However, within hours, it was fellow Republican Lindsey Graham who tweeted that he is not
going to support the president's one-month deal, calling the situation a fiasco.
Across town, the defense secretary, responsible for roughly two million personnel, troops
and civilian, stressed a decade of budget crises have choked military planning.
JAMES MATTIS, U.S. Secretary of Defense: Wasting copious amounts of precious taxpayer dollars.
LISA DESJARDINS: At 11:00 a.m., the Senate was back in session, and in the hallways,
rumors were flying of a possible five-day deal.
But on the floor, party leaders showed only acrimony.
SEN.
MITCH MCCONNELL (R-KY), Majority Leader: Now that we are 13 hours away from a government
shutdown that Democrats would initiate and Democrats would own, the craziness of this
seems to be dawning on my friend, the Democratic leader.
SEN.
RICHARD DURBIN (D-IL), Minority Whip: The Republican majority in the House and Senate,
with their president, have failed to come up with a blueprint for spending for this
great nation that we serve and are proud to be part of.
LISA DESJARDINS: Meanwhile, Republicans, including Office of Management and Budget Director Mick
Mulvaney, were trying to brand the shutdown with a Democratic name.
MICK MULVANEY, White House Budget Director: OMB is preparing for what we're calling the
Schumer shutdown.
LISA DESJARDINS: After Democratic Senate leader Chuck Schumer.
Schumer himself was staying quiet, behind the scenes looking for short-term options.
But just before noon, a setback: House Freedom Caucus Chair Mark Meadows Told "NewsHour,"
House leadership rejected a five-day deal.
More signs of a shutdown, House members, taking what were supposed to be their last votes
of the week, were told not to leave town.
And President Trump canceled his flight to Mar-a-Lago.
Within the hour, Mr. Trump called Schumer, summoning him to the White House for a one-on-one
summit of sorts.
Schumer returned to the Capitol with positive words, but no deal.
SEN.
CHUCK SCHUMER (D-NY), Minority Leader: We had a long and detailed meeting.
We discussed all of the major outstanding issues.
We made some progress, but we still have a good number of disagreements.
The discussions will continue.
LISA DESJARDINS: Next, hours of waiting, filled only by speeches on the Senate floor that
changed nothing, except they passed the shortening time until a shutdown.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So, if Congress and the White House do not meet their deadline tonight,
hundreds of thousands of federal employees, almost half of all civilian federal workers,
wouldn't be able to do their jobs.
Some government functions will not be affected.
The Postal Service will continue to deliver mail.
Air traffic controllers from the FAA and airport security officers from the TSA will stay on
the job.
And the government will keep providing Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid benefits.
In addition, the Interior Department says that it will keep national parks as accessible
as possible.
And that's a shift from previous shutdowns.
Still, this shutdown could have serious ramifications for many government agencies.
More than half of IRS employees would be sent home, even as it gets ready for tax season
and adjusts to the new tax law.
And it could tie up the Department of Health and Human Services, as it grapples with the
difficult ongoing flu season.
But back to the swirl of shutdown politics ahead of tonight's deadline.
Lisa Desjardins, whose report we just heard, she joins us from Capitol Hill.
And Yamiche Alcindor, who's been watching this story unfold from the White House today,
is with us here.
Welcome back to both of you.
Lisa, I feel like I have been asking you this question every night for many, many nights,
but where do we stand right now?
LISA DESJARDINS: What is going on?
Yes.
Actually, Judy, in the last half-hour, there is a glimmer of hope.
Senate Majority Leader John Cornyn -- Senate Whip John Cornyn came out and told members
of the press that he thinks there will be a vote tonight.
Also, we heard from the OMB director, Mick Mulvaney, that he also thinks there is a potential
for a deal tonight speaking on other networks.
Now, what this means is that potentially Democrats and Republicans are getting closer to at least
having a vote.
We don't know if that's going to be a final agreement or not.
I spoke to -- I e-mailed with one of my top Democratic sources.
They said it's unclear.
But, Judy, I think the biggest sign is this sound right now, which is silence.
The last two hours, three hours here at the Capitol have been incredibly quiet.
And I think we both know that means actually maybe there is progress behind the scenes.
Democrats have asked for a shorter-term C.R., five days or less.
That was rejected, I'm told, by Republicans this morning.
Now Republicans say they will accept something only two weeks or more.
Maybe they're negotiating somewhere in between, but I think the next few hours will tell us
a lot.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So, Yamiche, we know the president tweeted, but he's been kind of unusually quiet
on that front today.
What's is he saying?
What is his role?
YAMICHE ALCINDOR: Well, I think he has actually stepped up a lot of his efforts, in that he's
actually summoning people the White House.
He's actually sending out both Marc Short, the legislative director, and Mick Mulvaney
to go out and publicly speak about this.
And then he's sending Marc Short to the Hill, where, from my understanding, he's there now
meeting with lawmakers.
The idea is that President Trump is saying he had an excellent meeting with Chuck Schumer,
he's saying that they're making progress on Twitter, and he's also saying that he's wanting
a four-week extension, which is probably not going to happen.
But the idea is that he's actually saying and being clear about what he wants, which
Mitch McConnell has said in the past was a real problem, that lawmakers didn't know what
he wanted.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So, the four-month -- I mean, four-week extension is what is in the proposal
right now.
Lisa, let's talk about the pressure on both sides.
What are these -- what are the Democrats and the Republicans dealing with right now?
LISA DESJARDINS: Right.
A shutdown usually happens when either one side believe it's in their favor or both sides
do.
Right now, speaking to sources outside of the Capitol, sort of lobbyist sources on the
left, there are some progressive groups who do believe a shutdown would help negotiations
over DACA.
But there is a very earnest conversation happening right now on the left over whether they have
overplayed that and whether in fact the momentum is going the other way.
On the right, there are some conservatives who think a shutdown would help them, in that
they believe Democrats would be blamed.
However, there was polling today in The Washington Post showing that more Americans, at least
in that poll, blame Republicans.
So there are Republicans who are worried that they would be blamed more.
And, Judy, I think while we look at who would gain from a shutdown, right now, we have a
situation where there is pressure on both parties starting to believe that both of them
would be blamed.
Judy, maybe the smartest people I talked to today -- I'm not exaggerating -- were the
tourists in the Capitol.
It was full of tourists today, not just because of the March of Life is here, but also because
of several conventions in town.
Americans are very well read in on this situation.
And nearly everyone I talked to, Democrat, Republican, said they would in fact blame
both sides.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Yamiche, if this shutdown happens, if they don't get it figured out tonight,
what does that mean for all the federal workers here?
YAMICHE ALCINDOR: Mick Mulvaney essentially said that there are going to be a set of workers
that are going to have to go to work and not get paid.
He said that military workers, post office workers, people that are patrolling the borders,
these are people that are going to have to essentially show up and not get a paycheck.
And then reporters started shouting, well, are they going to get back pay -- in the past,
reporters and workers essentially have been able to get back pay, but in this case he
wouldn't answer the question.
I e-mailed the office later to ask.
And I still have not gotten an answer.
So it's a real question mark.
The contingency plans put online by the federal government illustrate that they are likely
going to pay people if they don't get paid.
But part of the other issue that's going on here is that military families are going to
be impacted by the services that they receive.
Something that people are very familiar with, which is commissaries, these are subsidized
grocery for military families, those things would be closed down.
So you potentially would have people working for no pay and then having to pay more money
for their milk and their sugar.
So, it's going to be a real mess.
JUDY WOODRUFF: And, Lisa, just quickly, you have been also looking at the effects on federal
agencies, taking a look at what it means for individual government workers.
LISA DESJARDINS: Right.
And I think one thing, you covered it so well earlier, but I think people don't realize
that there are many agencies that in large part have the vast majority of their staff
remain.
That is Defense and Homeland Security have hundreds of thousands of people who stay on
the job.
The smaller agencies are the ones that are affected the most.
They are the ones that usually shut down the most.
Here at the Capitol, I can tell you one of the door keepers, whose job it is to -- kind
of unsung heroes, stand around outside of the chamber and protect the members of the
Senate -- told me they just wish this was a day where someone was handing out free Tylenol.
There really is a sense of frustration here about this whole situation.
JUDY WOODRUFF: And for the press, for the reporters.
(LAUGHTER)
(CROSSTALK)
JUDY WOODRUFF: Lisa Desjardins, we will see how long you have to stay there tonight.
Same with you Yamiche.
Thank you very much.
LISA DESJARDINS: Thanks.
JUDY WOODRUFF: And in the day's other news: Secretary of Defense James Mattis insisted
that the U.S. military must focus more on opposing China and Russia's growing influence.
He outlined a new national defense strategy that would prioritize preparing for war against
major world powers over fighting terrorism.
Mattis vowed that the Pentagon would restore its competitive edge that had -- quote -- "eroded
in every domain of warfare."
JAMES MATTIS: We face growing threats from revisionist powers as different as China and
Russia are from each other, nations that do seek to create a world consistent with their
authoritarian models, pursing veto authority over other nations' economic, diplomatic and
security decisions.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Mattis also called out Iran and North Korea for threatening regional and
global stability.
Clashes between military forces of Indian and Pakistan flared for a third day in disputed
Kashmir.
Villages and border posts in the Himalayan region came under heavy shelling from both
sides.
Three civilians and two soldiers died, and at least two dozen civilians were wounded.
Schools were forced to close, and local officials urged residents to stay indoors.
Back in this country, the Supreme Court agreed to hear a challenge to President Trump's travel
ban.
Earlier versions of the ban were blocked by lower courts.
The latest version bans -- excuse me -- the latest version bans travelers from six Muslim-majority
countries.
The justices are expected to hear arguments in April, and issue a ruling by late June.
Today marked the 45th annual March for Life in Washington.
Thousands of anti-abortion activists marched through the streets of the capital, carrying
signs and chanting pro-life slogans.
Before the march got under way, President Trump pledged his support to their cause,
addressing the rally via satellite from less than two miles away, at the White House Rose
Garden.
DONALD TRUMP, President of the United States: You love every child, born and unborn, because
you believe that every life is sacred, that every child is a precious gift from God.
Under my administration, we will always defend the very first right in the Declaration of
Independence, and that is the right to life.
JUDY WOODRUFF: The Trump administration used this day to take two more steps today in its
anti-abortion fight.
The Department of Health and Human Services issued regulation to protect medical providers
who refuse to perform abortions over moral or religious objections.
The agency also rolled back Obama era legal guidance that made it harder for states trying
to defund Planned Parenthood.
The U.S. Justice Department says that it plans to retry New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez.
The Democrat was charged in a federal court in Newark with bribery and corruption for
allegedly trading political favors for gifts and campaign donations.
His first trial ended in a hung jury, and prosecutors say they want a retrial -- quote
-- "at the earliest possible date."
Menendez said that he expects to be -- quote -- "vindicated again."
A former gymnastics doctor faced more of his accusers during an emotional fourth day in
a Lansing, Michigan, courtroom.
Larry Nassar has plead guilty to sexually abusing patients while working at Michigan
State University, under the guise of medical treatment.
He was also a team doctor for USA Gymnastics.
Olympic gold medalist Aly Raisman was among some 80 victims who addressed Nassar in to
his face.
ALY RAISMAN, Olympic Gold Medalist: Abusers, your time is up.
The survivors are here standing tall, and we are not going anywhere.
And, please, Your Honor, stress the need to investigate how this happened, so that we
can hold accountable those who empowered and enabled Larry Nassar, so we can repair and
once again believe in this wonderful sport.
My dream is that, one day, everyone will knows what the words me too signify, but they will
be educated and able to protect themselves from predators like Larry, so that they will
never, ever, ever have to say the words me too.
JUDY WOODRUFF: The 54-year-old has already been sentenced to 60 years in prison on separate
federal charges of child pornography.
And stocks closed higher on Wall Street today.
The Dow Jones industrial average gained nearly 54 points to close above 26071.
The Nasdaq rose 40 points, and the S&P 500 added 12.
Both of those closed at record highs.
For the week, the Dow, the Nasdaq, and the S&P 500 rose around 1 percent.
Still to come on the "NewsHour": what is at stake for Senate Democrats in this funding
fight?; no end in sight in the brutal war in Syria; Mark Shields and David Brooks on
who's responsible for this round of Washington brinkmanship; plus, much more.
We return now to the top story of the day, the 11th-hour push to fund the government
and avoid a shutdown.
We get two takes from Senate Democrats about the way forward.
I spoke first with Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon -- he's on the Senate Budget Committee
-- about any possible deal.
SEN.
JEFF MERKLEY (D), Oregon: Well, we're all waiting to hear the details of the conversation
between Senator Schumer and President Trump.
Hopefully, that is going to shine a light on the path.
JUDY WOODRUFF: What we're hearing is very skimpy, but we're told that Senator Schumer
did present some ideas to the president.
And we're separately told that the Republican leadership in the Senate is saying the minimum
time they'd agree for an extension is two weeks.
Does that shed any light on anything?
(LAUGHTER)
SEN.
JEFF MERKLEY: Well, it just shows how unprepared the Republican leadership is for this dialogue.
I mean, these are issues that have been there going back into July and August, in preparation
for the next fiscal year, but they set aside the fundamental work of governance in order
to pursue a health care plan that would rip health care from 30 million Americans and
a tax plan designed to deliver a trillion dollars to richest Americans, and let the
basic issues of governance, children's health care and opening our clinics and what the
spending bill should look like for fiscal year 2018, they left all these things untended.
And so here we are.
So we want a short continuing resolution, a day, two days, short, in order to hold their
feet to the fire and say, get serious, get in the room and let's start resolving these
issues.
We have bipartisan proposals sitting right in front of us ready to adopt.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Well, Senator, as I'm sure you know, the White House Republicans are
saying they are taking care of children's health insurance, that they're saying the
issue is Democrats holding this up over DACA, these young people who came to this country
from Mexico and other countries without documentation.
And they're saying Democrats are making that more important than even children's health
insurance, which, I know, in your state, is particularly important.
SEN.
JEFF MERKLEY: Well, let's be clear.
The children's health insurance expire at the end of September.
We were pushing through the summer to get this bill done.
Here we are almost into the spring of 2018.
Feels like we're headed that direction.
And they're just getting to it and doing it in a fashion to turn one group of children
into a bargaining chip against another group of children.
That's so unnecessary, and it's wrong.
The dreamers are members of our community who have been there virtually their entire
life.
They contribute to our communities.
We are going to make sure that they are treated decently and get a foundation, but a foundation
for having a solid, if you will, sense of their legal status.
And that should have been done long ago.
The president says he wants to get this done.
Republicans have said they want to get this done.
There is a bipartisan bill ready to adopt, so let's do it.
JUDY WOODRUFF: That's what I want to ask you about as well, because the White House legislative
affairs director, Marc Short, said today there is no legislation that could be voted on right
now.
SEN.
JEFF MERKLEY: Well, that's simply not the case.
We have a proposal that three Democrats and three Republican senators worked out.
The president said bring this compromise over to the White House.
They did last Thursday.
Since then, we have had, at various points, up to seven Republicans say they were ready
to agree to this, just voluntarily saying that they were on board for it.
Clearly, you have the makings of a bipartisan deal.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Senator, you're not worried that Democrats will get the blame if the government
shuts down?
SEN.
JEFF MERKLEY: Well, not at all, for two reasons.
One, we have proposed a very short C.R. to keep the government open that also keeps the
negotiating at high speed.
I think the American people want negotiating on high speed.
They don't want what the Republicans have done and just kick it down the road.
Furthermore, since we're offering to keep it open, and the Republicans are saying, no,
that's the second reason it's the Republicans who are at fault here.
And the third is, they control every bit of both houses of Congress and they control the
presidency, so they're clearly in charge.
In fact, Mitch McConnell even blocked the ability for the Democrats to put a bipartisan
proposal on the floor last night.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon, thank you very much.
SEN.
JEFF MERKLEY: You're welcome, Judy.
Good to be with you.
JUDY WOODRUFF: And now for another perspective from Capitol Hill on the government funding
fight, I'm joined now by Democratic Senator Catherine Cortez Masto.
She is the freshman senator from Nevada, where she served as that state's attorney general
for eight years.
Senator Cortez Masto, thank you for being with us.
What a way to begin your second year in the Senate.
SEN.
CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO (D), Nevada: I'm happy to be here, Judy.
You're absolutely right.
This has been an incredible year so far, definitely exciting.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Well, we just -- in listening just now to Senator Merkley, I talked to him,
taped that interview about an hour-and-a-half ago -- he made a very valiant argument.
But we now know that, in the last couple of hours, two more Democratic senators from red
states, states that voted for President Trump, have said they will go along with the Republican
proposal.
Are Democratic ranks now basically crumbling?
And do you now see movement toward Democrats ultimately -- enough Democrats supporting
this Republican government funding bill?
SEN.
CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO: No, not at all.
They need 60 votes to move forward.
But, Judy, here's the deal at the end of the day.
Not only do Democrats have concerns about moving forward with this continuing resolution
that's been put before us.
As you know, Republicans do as well.
And now we have time to come together, negotiate, figure out how we address all of the issues
we have concerns about, because we're all representing constituents from our states.
We're all representing the United States.
So now it's time to come together.
And, really, it's time for this leadership, leadership here in Congress, to start working
with everyone.
This isn't about politics.
This isn't about a win.
This is about finding solutions for the people across the country.
And that's what they expect us to do.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Well, what do you think is going to happen?
Because, as you know, this measure says, let's wait another month, and then we will try to
work on DACA, the measure to help the young people who came here without documentation
from other countries.
Democrats are saying, no, no, no, we don't want it to go for a month.
Are we just talking about a matter of days?
Is that the difference?
SEN.
CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO: Well, yes.
The difference is this, Judy.
We have already gone -- this would be our fourth continuing resolution.
There's a tendency for the leadership to really just -- they say kick the can down the road
every 30 days, every 30 days, and nothing happens.
And so now it's time to hold their feet to the fire.
And if we have to stay here tomorrow and the next day and the next day to say, let's get
in a room, let's figure this out, we have an obligation to come up with a budget, we
have an obligation to protect dreamers, we have an obligation to fund our military, we
have an obligation for our veterans, for our retirees, for our community health centers,
centers for our children, that's what we should be doing.
And I think that's what you're hearing from the Democrats, is enough time frame about
moving 30 days, every 30 days, every 30 days, and letting the Republican leadership pick
and choose who wins and who loses.
Now it's time to fight for everyone.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So, do I hear you saying that you and other Democrats are prepared to see
the government shut down tonight because this proposal by the Republicans doesn't include
the immigration language?
SEN.
CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO: The current resolution that's before us now, I wouldn't support,
for that very reason.
And my colleague has said it.
You have heard Senator Merkley.
And I feel the same way.
These dreamers that are in our country, they're in my state.
I have met with them.
We have teachers who are dreamers.
And now we're telling our teachers, not only are we going to rip you out of the communities
and the classrooms where you are.
We're going to take you away from your families.
The students that you're working with, we're going to take you away from those students,
and send you back to a country that you do not even know.
That's why 80 percent of the country supports dreamers and protecting them and passing something.
And we have -- we have something before us right now, bipartisan work, that we could
work on and actually move forward and get something done.
JUDY WOODRUFF: But, Senator, Republicans are in charge of the Senate.
If they call up a vote on this measure that passed the House, you're saying enough Democrats
are not going to support it.
That means the government will shut down at midnight.
SEN.
CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO: Yes, I can't speak for all of my colleagues.
I can tell you where I am and why I believe in what I'm doing in fighting for everyone.
I think it's time we stood up for everyone, and not pick and choose who gets to win and
lose every time we have a continuing resolution.
You know, I was on the floor in the September in October 26 of 2017 fighting to pass CHIP
then, because it had already expired in my state, and we only had a few months left to
cover it.
And I didn't hear the Republicans saying it was important and they were going to bring
it up at that time.
We're hearing from them for the first time, because they're using it as bargaining chip.
They're picking and choosing who wins.
And I am here to fight for everyone.
And that's why, to me, it's so important we hold out and we continue this fight.
And if it means that we have to negotiate every single day, and we have to stay here,
then that's what we should be doing, because that's what the American public expects.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Even through a shutdown?
SEN.
CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO: Stay here and get it done.
Stay here and negotiate and get things done.
And that's what I can tell you is so important.
That, to me, is our priority.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Senator Catherine Cortez Masto from Nevada, we thank you very much.
SEN.
CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO: Thank you.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Turkey's military appeared ready to invade a Kurdish area of Syria today,
and attack a force backed by the United States.
This comes as Syria's near-seven-year war grinds on, with the Assad regime and its Russian
allies hammering opposition areas.
So, as Nick Schifrin reports, an already-complex battlefield might soon become even more so.
NICK SCHIFRIN: On the Turkish-Syrian border, the Turkish military appears ready for battle.
They're amassing tanks and firing artillery into Syria.
Today, Turkish media said a hospital was targeted and destroyed.
This is Syria's north and northwest, controlled mostly by Kurds, in yellow, the same Kurds
who helped liberate former ISIS headquarters Raqqa.
The U.S. wants to convert these forces to a 30,000-strong stabilization force.
But Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called the U.S.-backed group a grave threat.
RECEP TAYYIP ERDOGAN, Turkish President (through translator): A country that we call our ally
insists on forming a terror army along our border, despite all our objections, warnings
and well-meant advice.
Do you think a terrorist organization formed along the Turkish border has a target other
than Turkey?
NICK SCHIFRIN: The U.S. insists the force poses no threat to Turkey.
But the U.S. will support them for years, as part of a long-term military commitment
designed to prevent ISIS from returning, says Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
REX TILLERSON, U.S. Secretary of State: ISIS presently has one foot in the grave.
And by maintaining an American military presence in Syria until the full and complete defeat
of ISIS is achieved, it will soon have two.
NICK SCHIFRIN: The 2,000 American troops in Syria are a mix of trainers, Marines, and
front-line special operations forces.
They will target ISIS and al-Qaida, but also have other goals, eliminating the chemical
weapons that the Syrian regime has used against its own people, diminishing Iran's influence
and Iranian-backed Hezbollah fighters, and helping the 11.5 million refugees and internally
displaced.
That's a huge order after seven years of war.
It could mean U.S. troops are in Syria indefinitely.
REX TILLERSON: Responsible change may not come as immediate as some hope for, but rather
through an incremental process of constitutional reform, U.N.-supervised elections.
But that change will come.
NICK SCHIFRIN: But, today, what's coming is still Assad regime bombardment.
Syria obliterated buildings in Idlib province, the largest area still held by rebels.
The war has killed as many as half-a-million, and counting.
For more on Syria, the U.S., Turkey, and the Kurds, I'm joined by Andrew Exum.
He's a former Army Ranger and served as deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle
East under President Obama.
He's now a contributing editor to "The Atlantic."
And Mona Yacoubian, she is the senior adviser for Syria, Middle East and North Africa at
the United States Institute of Peace here in Washington.
And welcome to you both.
Thank you very much.
ANDREW EXUM, Former U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense: Thank you.
NICK SCHIFRIN: Andrew Exum, let's start with Turkey and the border in the northwest right
now.
You faced this under the Obama administration.
The Trump administration has also found that these Kurdish forces are the most effective
against ISIS, but Turkey sees them as terrorists.
So how big of a threat is it when Turkey starts talking about invading Northwest Syria?
ANDREW EXUM: Yes, Turkey has been very transparent and what about their interests are in Syria.
They don't like the Islamic State.
They don't like Nusra.
They don't like the Sunni militants.
They also don't like the Assad regime, but their primary concern is the Kurdish forces
that are in mostly Northeast, but also some in Northwest Syria.
They are petrified that there is going to be some sort of semiautonomous Kurdish region.
They view the Kurdish factions that are in control in Northern Syria as being one in
the same as with the same PKK terrorists who have been waging the campaign against the
Turkish state.
And so their interests are at odds with what the United States is trying to do, which is
use these forces as a proxy force to carry out U.S. interests on the ground.
NICK SCHIFRIN: And show how big of a threat is it if Turkey uses its military in Northwest
Syria against those Kurdish forces?
ANDREW EXUM: Well, this is something that we had to deal with this in the Obama administration,
and now the Trump administration is dealing with it as well.
For a long while, the Turks talked a lot about what they might do.
However, a little over a year, a year-and-a-half ago, they actually went into Syria.
So they have shown a willingness to intervene militarily in Northern Syria in a way that
can complicate efforts against the Islamic State.
Now, the good news is the war against the Islamic State has largely been won at this
point.
However, that doesn't mean that the war in Syria might continue for quite some time.
NICK SCHIFRIN: Well, Mona Yacoubian, let's talk about that more strategic notion of where
Syria is.
And let me bring up a map we have here, the various factions in Syria.
Kurdish forces in yellow in the north.
The Syrian regime, the majority of the country, in red.
Those Turkish forces that Andrew Exum just mentioned just in that sliver of green.
In orange, the anti-Assad forces, various groups, and where we talked about fighting
in Idlib.
Are we looking at the endgame for Syria right now?
MONA YACOUBIAN, United States Institute of Peace: I think we are, in the sense that it's
clear that the Assad regime has consolidated its control certainly over Damascus and over
the main parts of Syria.
But at the same time, this is going to be a very protracted and messy endgame.
And I think many of the conflicts and the subconflicts that have already been referenced,
the Turks staking their claim and what their red lines are, the regime looking to regain
control of Idlib, which is, as you see on the map, very, very centrally located, the
Kurds attempting to stake their claim, I think that's -- it is an endgame, but it will be
long, it will be messy, and it will be, unfortunately, rife with conflict.
NICK SCHIFRIN: So, a lot of conflict, long and messy.
But, Andrew Exum, is the war strategically over?
Did the Syrian regime win?
ANDREW EXUM: No, I think Mona put it very well.
I think that the war strategically, for all intents and purposes, is over.
The Syrian regime did win.
We often pressed the Russians and others about, hey, if you're in Syria to go after the Islamic
State or Islamist militants, why aren't you in Idlib right now?
But, of course, they went to Aleppo.
They went to the strategically important areas in 2016 to try to consolidate their victory.
And now they're more or less mopping up against some of the Islamist militants.
Now, I will say, strategically, it's over.
However, this conflict could last for quite some time.
And there's still going to be quite a lot of suffering, especially in places like Idlib.
But as we see, and as we see in every civil war in the region and elsewhere, all the factions,
they're fighting with an eye towards what that postwar settlement looks like, towards
who gets to be in control of which areas.
And so I think it's likely that you are going to see some fighting for some time.
NICK SCHIFRIN: And fighting for some time.
And, Mona Yacoubian, we heard Rex Tillerson try and lay out what the U.S. strategy or
what the U.S. goals perhaps were, including not only against ISIS and al-Qaida, but removing
weapons of mass destruction, helping refugees, diminishing Iranian influence, resolving the
underlying conflict.
This is a long list.
Is this a forever war for the U.S.?
MONA YACOUBIAN: Well, I think the secretary laid out a very ambitious plan.
I think the reality is, the priority remains defeating ISIS and stabilizing those areas
that have been liberated from ISIS.
The other parts of what the secretary laid out I think are aspirational.
I don't know that this is a forever war, but it is important to note that the secretary
staked the U.S. military presence on the enduring defeat of ISIS and on a sort of settled and
peaceful Syria.
That's going to -- of course, as we have both noted, that's a long ways away.
NICK SCHIFRIN: And so, Andrew Exum, is it really feasible to talk about all of these
things, when the goal is still to defeat ISIS?
ISIS is still there.
It won't be there forever.
Can the U.S. stay there long enough to actually accomplish these goals?
ANDREW EXUM: Yes, I think if I were to give the most charitable interpretation of Secretary
Tillerson's really wish list that he laid out the other day, I think what he's trying
to do is preserve options for the United States in Syria.
He's not going to take anything off the table, not going to say that we don't care about
the Assad regime, not going to say that we don't care about Bashar al-Assad stepping
away from power, even though we know that the trajectory of the campaign is largely
set in those terms.
Also, keeping those U.S. forces on the ground, that also preserves options, in terms of pushing
back against Iranian influence, but also continuing the fight against the Islamic State.
The bottom line, it just gives you that option to continue to project power for the foreseeable
future.
NICK SCHIFRIN: And, Mona Yacoubian, last question.
We cannot forget the humanitarian aspect of this war.
Idlib is going to be very bloody.
You were former USAID.
Are we looking at another humanitarian catastrophe in Idlib?
MONA YACOUBIAN: Unfortunately, Nick, I think we are.
Idlib has tomorrow million civilians in it, a million who are from there, a million who
have already been displaced multiple times and have ended up there.
Already with the fighting, we have seen more than 100,000 civilians displaced further north.
And this is in the midst of winter conditions, no shelter.
Unfortunately, I think we are going to see more displacement, more suffering as a result
of the ongoing violence.
NICK SCHIFRIN: Mona Yacoubian, Andrew Exum, thank you very much.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Now, on the eve of the anniversary of his first year in office, the president
faces the possibility of a domestic crisis, a midnight deadline to keep the federal government
open.
And with fears of a shutdown growing, both parties are pointing fingers at each other.
That brings us to the analysis of Shields and Brooks.
That's syndicated columnist Mark Shields and New York Times columnist David Brooks.
Welcome, gentlemen, on this deadline night.
So, David, where is your finger pointing?
DAVID BROOKS: I really don't know.
I'm embarrassed for my country.
We have gotten used to these shutdowns, but we really shouldn't ever.
It's all so stupid.
If we had like a Dwight Eisenhower or Franklin Roosevelt, they would just say, OK, let's
get in a room, we will figure it out, and they would act like grownups.
They would feel so demeaned to go through the rituals of condemnation.
And so we shouldn't forget that elemental fact, it shouldn't be like this.
The second thing, though -- and the way I think this is actually a significant moment
is that it does represent the parties defining themselves in the base, in the middle of a
big demographic shift in the country.
This is all funneling down to a debate about immigration.
We used to have debates about the size of government or debates about war and peace,
but immigration is now one of the central issues in American life, and it's really at
the core of this thing.
And the Republicans clearly feel, especially in red states, they can go to red states and
say, you know, we wanted to keep government open for Americans, we wanted to keep health
care for Americans, we wanted to keep the Army for Americans, and they wanted to hold
it up for a bunch of illegal Americans.
So which party do you support?
And that's what the Republicans are going to hang their hat on in a country that's rapidly
diversifying.
JUDY WOODRUFF: How do you size all this up?
MARK SHIELDS: Well, the only place I disagree with David is, the Republicans don't say illegal
Americans.
They say illegals.
And like everybody else, like David and I, and I'm sure you, we made a decision at the
age of 6 or 8 where we were going to live, where we were going to go to school, and what
country we were going to -- whose flag we were going to honor.
And, overwhelmingly, this is an issue on which Republicans are on the short side.
Americans of both parties, independents believe that people who have been brought here, had
no decision in illegal entry, who've grown up here, worked, and contributed to the country
are entitled to legal status.
The problem is, quite frankly, the Democrats have chosen this as the one issue to make
a fight on, and which does echo not simply the cause itself, but the politics of 2016,
and identity politics.
And of all the targets of opportunity that Donald Trump and these Republicans have given
them, from knocking people off health care, to attacking widows and orphans, they have
chosen this one.
It is one, quite frankly, this issue, that the Democrats prevail on overwhelmingly across
the country.
What Mitch McConnell and the Republicans in the Senate are playing right now is state-by-state
politics.
It puts Democrats in red states, they think, on the defensive, whether it's Joe Manchin
in West Virginia, Joe Donnelly in Indiana.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So, it sounds like, David, Mark is saying the Democrats are making the
wrong call by hanging this argument, hanging their argument on whether to keep the government
open on immigration.
DAVID BROOKS: Yes, well, I would say it depends on your time frame.
In the short term, it probably redounds to both parties' ill will.
Nobody is going to be persuaded here.
The polls say who's to blame.
Democrats say the Republicans are.
Republicans say the Democrats are.
This is not the sort of issue on which people are persuaded by evidence.
They just go back to their partisan camp.
In the medium term, 2018, if it matters in 2018 -- and I think the parties' basic posture
on immigration -- I agree with Mark.
It's bad -- if you're a red state senator trying to hold onto your seat, this is a bad
posture for you.
It's just not good.
In the longer term, of course, if the Republicans maintain the party, not only of Donald Trump,
but they turn into the party of Tom Cotton, who wants to cut legal immigration by 50 percent,
then that to me is ruinous for the party.
And one of the things that's fascinating, I think one of the reasons there is so much
confusion here, is this was a party that had a very strong Lindsey Graham, John McCain,
George W. Bush wing.
And, suddenly, that's shifted.
And how far has it shifted?
Has it shifted all the way over to Tom Cotton?
A lot further than a lot of us thought.
And so people are trying to catch up to where the party has shifted.
And Donald Trump has muddied the waters by being here, being there, being there, but
mostly pretty restrictionist.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Mark, you're saying the Democrats had a choice.
They didn't have to make this about DACA, about immigration, but they chose to do that,
and they are taking a risk, you're saying.
MARK SHIELDS: Well, yes.
Let me be very clear.
I think Democrats are on the right side of history.
I think they are on the right side morally.
I'm talking about the political judgment and the political assessment that is made.
And will it work for Democrats in House races across the country generically?
Yes, it will give -- put the Democrats on the advantage, Republicans at a disadvantage.
But when you're Mitch McConnell and you're trying to hold on to the Senate, you're trying
to figure out how I can put Heidi Heitkamp in North Dakota on the defensive.
The Republicans can't find anybody to run against her.
Everybody's passed on it.
And how do they take on Claire McCaskill in Missouri or Joe Donnelly in Indiana, both
of whom have proved themselves to be formidable in red states and in winning elections?
So I think that's really where it is.
I just think that there are more opportunities for the Democrats who, in 2016, were, and
I think rightly, rightly, targeted as a party of identity politics, of reaching out to constituency
by constituency.
(CROSSTALK)
DAVID BROOKS: I would say the one thing that -- the tide has been swinging, it looks like,
in the Democratic direction in 2018.
And the only way they can mess it up that I can imagine so far is if they have a base
election, if they go -- if they make their voters in New York, and San Francisco and
L.A. super happy but make the voters in Indiana and Tennessee and Missouri super unhappy.
And they risk that sort of fissure with this.
JUDY WOODRUFF: So that's the state-by-state or district-by-district political calculus.
But, David, is there a price to pay from standing back and looking at this from the way Washington
runs standpoint, from the fact it just looks, again, like it's a place where they can't
get the job done?
DAVID BROOKS: Well, I think the big story there is a lot of people around the country
look at Washington and say, why would I ever want to go there?
Why would I ever want to pay attention to that stuff?
Why would I ever believe in that system?
And that's a problem for the country as a whole.
It's just, government is obsolescence.
If we're going to fix problems, we have got to do it some other way, because that thing
ain't working.
It's a more specific -- and Mark has made this point in the past -- it's a more specific
problem for Democrats, because the party of government has to live with the discrediting
of government.
And in the long term, as people become more disgusted and distrustful of government, it
served the Republican Party, at least politically, reasonably well.
JUDY WOODRUFF: And this coincides, Mark, as we have been saying, with the one-year anniversary
of President Trump's year in office, time in office.
How does he come through this?
I mean, how is he looking right now?
Does he come out of this looking stronger?
What?
MARK SHIELDS: Well, I wanted to take a step back, so I talked today about Peter Hart,
who conducts with Bill McInturff, the Republican, Peter being a Democratic pollster, the Wall
Street Journal/NBC poll.
And they did a year assessment.
And Peter said the most common word that was used to describe voters' feeling a year ago
about Donald Trump after the election was hopeful.
The most common word used now is disgust.
And he called it the year of alienation, that Donald Trump -- and why is this important,
Judy, how people -- because a president needs a reservoir of good feeling and goodwill and
confidence.
Ronald Reagan had it at Iran-Contra.
And it sustained him.
John Kennedy had it at the Bay of Pigs, where people had a personal relation.
Lyndon Johnson didn't have it.
Richard Nixon didn't have it.
So when they hit rough patches politically, they didn't have that core of affection, feeling,
confidence that voters just extended to them and gave them the benefit of the doubt.
And Donald Trump doesn't have it.
He lacks it.
Voters don't think he has temperament, maturity, judgment or selflessness.
JUDY WOODRUFF: But he does have that core of voters who say they're still with him,
the 35, 40 percent.
MARK SHIELDS: He does.
No, no question about it.
But, Judy, think about it.
We now have the best economic times probably since the late 1990s, tech boom, really just
phenomenal times economically.
The stock market is going through the ceiling.
And he's still, you know, mid-30s?
I mean, ordinarily, any president, president -- would be 60 percent favorable in this kind
of an economic...
DAVID BROOKS: And that base, it's a slow erosion.
It's a lot slower than I thought, but it's an erosion.
I cited on the show several weeks ago the FOX News voters are less pro-Trump than they
were.
I saw a poll today.
Among white evangelicals dropped -- support -- favorability for Trump has dropped 17 percent,
from 83 percent, down 17 percent.
So that's an erosion.
And all of this -- this porn star stuff, this stuff he says about the countries, that has
this slow erosion.
It doesn't mean they're fleeing, because what we have in this country is negative polarization.
Nobody likes their own party very much, but they really hate the other party.
So that inhibits it.
But we're seeing just a steady, slow drip, drip, drip.
JUDY WOODRUFF: But you still have -- you look at the polls, you look at interviews that
are done with voters.
I have seen some of them in the last few days that people have gone out and done these one-year-in
interviews.
The people who liked him, many of them are still saying, I just like the fact that he's
standing up to the establishment, that he's telling everybody to go jump in a lake.
DAVID BROOKS: Some of this is aesthetic, a mode of talk.
The things he said about El Salvador and Haiti and those countries, a lot of us find it offensive.
But a lot of people, whether they think anything of those countries or not, they think he's
talking straight, that's the way I talk, that's the way we talk in the bar here.
And so that was never going to hurt him, that kind of stuff.
Straight talk, even if it can be vile, that doesn't hurt him because people see it as,
he's like me and he's sticking it in their eye, those people who I dislike.
JUDY WOODRUFF: And, Mark, you brought up the economy.
In the end, the old saying is people vote their pocketbooks, they vote their wallets.
(CROSSTALK)
MARK SHIELDS: Well, two things.
From all available evidence at this point, I mean, it's heading to be a bad Republican
year across the board in the face of these economic tailwinds that -- not headwinds,
but tailwinds, that should be helping the party in the majority.
I just point out one thing, Judy.
We go through this about the closing of the government.
In both '96 and '13 -- Bill Clinton was president in '96, Barack Obama in 2013 -- in both cases,
voters overwhelmingly blame the Republicans.
The Republicans retained their majority in the Congress, even though they had closed
down the government, in '96.
They picked up dozens of seats in 2014, even though they were regarded as the villains
in closing down the government and depriving people of public services.
This has never been an issue on which voters have voted in an election.
DAVID BROOKS: There's a lot of news between now and 2018 to come.
But I do think the fact that we're focusing on race, that the Democrats have said, we
can pin Trump racism, that's what we're going to run on, and the Republicans have said,
we're going to pin American identity vs. the aliens, that's what we're going to run on,
it shows what a different era this is.
It's not a normal economic era.
It's not a peace and war era.
It's an identity era.
And even something as silly as a government shutdown revolves around fundamental issues
of race and identity.
MARK SHIELDS: It's a good point.
And let's be very honest.
Donald Trump's, the president's remarks, his despicable and loathsome remarks about people,
where they come -- the countries they came from, gives the Democrats an opening, an advantage,
if not a challenge, to raise this issue.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Something that will be remembered.
Well, we will know in a few hours what happens.
Mark Shields, David Brooks, thank you both.
JUDY WOODRUFF: Finally tonight: Have you ever had trouble getting ketchup out of a bottle?
How about stopping an oil rig from exploding?
A lab in Boston has developed a slick solution for both problems.
Our science producer, Nsikan Akpan, reports about this new coating in our latest episode
of ScienceScope.
NSIKAN AKPAN: Look at this ketchup sliding, so smooth, so easy.
Back in the day, using condiments tended to end with a caveman-mess, but not with these
high-tech bottles.
Their insides are coated with something called LiquiGlide.
KRIPA VARANASI, Massachusetts Institute of Technology: It's a coating technology that
can basically get every last bit of the product out, so you can save on billions of tons of
product that's wasted.
What LiquiGlide does is fundamentally changes how liquids and solids interact.
NSIKAN AKPAN: That's Kripa Varanasi, a mechanical engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology who co-created LiquiGlide to battle the nefarious issue of interfaces.
An interface is any spot or surface where two things meet.
You're familiar with the physical forces creating friction and solid interfaces, like when a
tire skids on a road.
But a liquid sliding across a solid also experience this is friction in tension.
It's part of what makes some liquid sticky, such as maple syrup.
KRIPA VARANASI: It's a ubiquitous problem, whether it be in consumer products, or personal
products to chemical industry to energy industry.
NSIKAN AKPAN: LiquiGlide came about due to an infamous interface problem in the oil industry.
Drilling oil unearths all types of crud, mucky sediment and minerals.
This includes methane hydrate crystals, which can form molasses-like goop and plug a pipe.
KRIPA VARANASI: If they form, it can be very catastrophic, because if you release some
of this methane hydrate plug, the methane can come out and essentially lead to an explosion.
NSIKAN AKPAN: Kripa was mulling how to prevent these plugs from forming when a similar problem
sprouted at home.
KRIPA VARANASI: And at that time, my son was about a year old.
My wife was trying to get honey out of a bottle.
And, you know, she said, you know, why don't you apply this technology to bottles?
NSIKAN AKPAN: Kripa knew a plastic surface, a glass surface, any solid surface, for that
matter, isn't truly smooth.
It's covered with microscopic ridges and gaps.
These pockets trap liquid and cause friction at interfaces.
So, Kripa and his former grad student Dave Smith chemically designed a liquid to intentionally
experience so much friction, it gets stuck in these pockets.
This embedded liquid acts as a lubricant.
Put ketchup in the bottle and it glides against the lubricant nano-layer, never coming in
physical contact with the glass.
Get it?
LiquiGlide.
DAVE SMITH, Massachusetts Institute of Technology: Then we thought about, how can we make it
easy and sprayable?
NSIKAN AKPAN: Smith developed a formula that can predict and build coatings for any solid
surface.
Once sprayed, LiquiGlide adheres so firmly to the bottle that it can't seep into the
container's contents.
But, as a precaution, the coatings they use for food applications are edible and FDA-approved.
They founded a start-up in 2012 and their sprayable coatings now help squeeze out the
stickiest stuff, toothpaste, cream cheese, paint.
Even Elmer's Glue uses LiquiGlide.
LiquiGlide won't work for every pocketbook.
Uniformly applying a coating becomes tricky for larger containers.
And specialized coating are more expensive than materials like plain old glass.
So, right now, LiquiGlide is best suited for smaller containers or situations where you
can easy respray it, like with industrial bins.
Back at Kripa's lab, a new legion of grad students is conquering other interfaces.
Say you're tired of flight delays due to ice-covered planes.
MAN: If you have icing rain, for instance, on a wing, the time that it's going to spend
on the surface will determine whether it ices or it doesn't.
So we want to minimize the time that it spends on the surface.
And the way we do that is that we create microscopic ridges on the surface.
And if we impact a drop now on the middle of the ridge, we can see that it breaks up
in two parts that will bounce off independently.
And because these two parts are smaller than the initial drop, they bounce off faster.
And this is because when the drop bounces, it actually acts like a spring that gets compressed
when it expands and then retracts.
And smaller drops act like smaller springs that are actually stiffer than the larger
drop.
And stiffer springs will bounce off faster.
NSIKAN AKPAN: If smaller drops bounce off faster, then water is less likely to stick,
so covering a plane in these microscopic ridges could eliminate the toxic chemicals airlines
currently use.
Other students in Kripa's lab are learning how to stop clogs at desalination water facilities
by observing how saltwater evaporates, or they're keeping water from condensing on steam
turbines to improve energy efficiency at power plants, or they have brewed a pesticide spray
that sticks to plant leafs more effectively, rather than washing away into the environment.
That's all from now.
I'm Nsikan Akpan, and this is ScienceScope from the "PBS NewsHour."
JUDY WOODRUFF: Fascinating stuff.
On the "NewsHour" online right now: In a shifting health insurance landscape, a growing number
of Americans have turned to health care sharing, where members pool money to pay for their
medical expenses.
But while religiously-affiliated sharing ministries have boomed, they don't come with the same
consumer protections as traditional insurance.
You can learn more on our Web site, PBS.org/NewsHour.
And tune in later tonight on "Washington Week."
Robert Costa will have more on the push to strike a deal to fund the federal government
and avoid a shutdown.
On tomorrow's edition of "PBS NewsHour," Jeff Greenfield reports on the conservative split
over President Trump's first year in office.
And that is the "NewsHour" for this Friday night.
I'm Judy Woodruff.
We will have updates online of the last-minute negotiations in the Senate.
Have a great weekend.
Thank you, and good night.
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