wow, you get to watch all your favorite stuff. it's to die for. now you won't miss a thing. this is the way. the xfinity 10g network. made for streaming. william: good evening. i'm william brangham. amna nawaz and geoff bennett are away. on the "newshour" tonight, alexei navalny's widow accuses the kremlin of covering up the opposition leader's killing and vows to continue his fight for a free russia. poland's foreign minister discusses the state of ukraine's nearly two-year-long war with russia, and the impact congres'' stalling of u.s. support is having on the battlefield. >> without the united states, we are behind the curve in making

the stuff that ukraine needs to defend itself. william: and, the conservative group behind allegations of illegal ballot stuffing in georgia's 2020 election admits it has no evidence to support its claims. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by -- the ongoing support of these individuals and institutions. and friends of the newshour, including leonard and norma carbine and the judy and peter bloom kohler foundation. the william and flora hewlett foundation. for more than 50 years, advancing ideas and supporting institutions to promote a better world. at hewlett.org. and with the ongoing support of

these individuals and institutions. ♪ this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. vanessa: i am vanessa relays in for stephanie sy. here are the latest headlines. russia has cemented a substantial battlefield win in eastern ukraine tonight after a grinding four-month fight. moscow says its forces cleared the last ukrainian defenders from avdiikva, a bombed-out city in the donetsk region. russian military footage showed

attacks on an industrial site in avdiivka. ukraine said a lack of ammunition forced its retreat and russia is exploiting the delay of new american aid. 26 members of the european union are calling for an immediate humanitarian pause in gaza. that came today as hamas health officials said guys is death toll has passed 29,000. -- said gaza's death toll has passed 29,000. and israel released security camera video purportedly showing a hostage and her two small boys wrapped in a sheet. they were seen in khan hounis in central gaza just after being taken captive in october. the u.n.'s top court has kicked off a six-day hearing into israel's 57-year occupation of the land that palestinians want for a state of their own. diplomats filed into the international court of justice at the hague today. the palestinian foreign minister opened with accusations of israeli apartheid. >> no occupying power, including

israel, can be granted a perpetual veto over the rights of the people it occupies. successive israeli governments have given the palestinian people only three options -- displacement, subjugation, or death. vanessa: israel submitted a written statement that alleged the hearing does not address israeli rights and security concerns. the court to if he has nonbinding opinion will be issued in the coming months. -- the court's nonbinding opinion will be issued in the coming months. houthi fighters in yemen carried out new attacks on shipping vessels today in continued retaliation for israel's assault on gaza. the iran-backed group says it again targeted ships in the gulf of aden. all of that follows sunday's attack on a ship in the bab el-mandeb strait. a missile caused severe damage, forcing the crew to abandon ship. a judge investigating the 2021 assassination of the haitian

president indicted several prominent figures today, including his widow. former chief of staff in a police leon charles faces murder and attempted murder charges. the president's widow is accused of complicity and criminal association, along with former prime minister claude joseph. nearly 50 other suspects were also indicted. back in this country, a minneapolis suburb is in mourning after a sunday shooting that killed two policemen and a firefighter. they'd answered a domestic dispute call in burnsville when a heavily-armed man opened fire. he was later found dead and seven children in the house were unhurt. last night, the community gathered for a candlelit vigil. they paid tribute to those killed and offered praise to the town's police force. >> we need to find a way to really honor these three. and just all police officers, you know, that protect and serve us. protect and serve is all over

our burnsville police cars, and i just think they do. they protect and they serve. they run towards trouble to keep other people safe. vanessa: the suspect had a prior assault conviction and was barred from having guns. the latest in a string of winter storms has put almost all of california under a flood warning. forecasters called for five to 10 inches of rain in central california before the storm moves south in coming days. still to come on the newshour, tamera keith and amy walter breakdown the latest political headlines. after paul giamatti on his oscar-nominated performance in "the holdovers." students and their teacher give their brief, but spectacular take on building trust. and much more. >> this is the "pbs newshour" from weta studios in washington, and in the west from the walter cronkite school of journalism at arizona state university.

william: alexei navalny's suspicious death friday in a russian arctic prison continues to reverberate around the globe. world leaders, including president biden, spoke today of stepped-up sanctions against russia, as navalny's widow picked up his fight against vladimir putin. meanwhile, russian authorities said they would hold navalny's remains for a further two weeks. >> [speaking russian john: -- william: heavy with equal parts grief and resolve, yulia navalnaya released this video today vowing to keep up her husband's fight. >> [translated] by killing alexei, putin killed half of me, half of my heart and half of my soul. but i still have the other half, and it tells me that i have no right to give up. i will continue the work of alexei navalny, continue to fight for our country. i urge you to stand next to me. to share not only my grief and endless pain, but also to share the rage.

william: navalny's cause of death remains unknown. russian authorities blocked navalny's mother from the morgue where her son's body is believed to be held. across russia, more than 50,000 people have signed a petition demanding navalny's body be released. today, his widow met with european union ministers in brussels, as they weighed how to respond to the dissident's death. >> what has happened reminds us all of the repressive and oppressive nature of the regime and the russian federation and of how president putin has ruthlessly put down any opposition and suppressed any dissent. william: in moscow, kremlin spokesman dmitry peskov blasted western leaders who've blamed putin for navalny's death. >> [translated] an investigation is underway and all necessary actions in this regard are being carried out. but so far, the results of this investigation have not been made

public, and in fact, they are unknown. therefore, in conditions where there is no valid information, we believe it is inadmissible to make such, well, frankly, boorish statements. william: makeshift memorials have popped up across russia as mourners pay tribute to navalny's legacy. >> [translated] he was a strong person and i think all of russia is suffering because we lost such a hero. william: in st. petersburg, men clad in black removed flowers from a memorial, carrying them away in garbage bags. but moments later, navalny supporters returned to replace them. other memorials have also been dismantled across the country. and police have detained nearly 400 people for attending events commemorating navalny's death. with less than a month ago before russia's national election and with putin's victory all but certain, navalny's death further scatters and weakens an already thin

opposition movement. for the latest on navalny's death and what it might mean for the future of russia's opposition movement, we turn to andrei soldatov. he's a russian investigative journalist and a senior fellow at the center for european policy analysis. thank you so much for being here. it has been four days since navalny's death was announced. russian authorities have not allowed his family to see his body or take possession of his body. what do we know about the circumstances surrounding his death? andrei: to be honest, the circumstances are getting more and more mysterious. the initial, official version was that he died on the 16th, but now there are some reports from, unofficial reports from the penal colony, that probably he died the day before, because there was a lot of unusual activities.

lots of cars coming to this place. apparently, it was somehow connected to his sudden death. why he died, we still don't know. we have no clue. the official reason is sudden death, whatever it means. as you pointed out, the family does not have any access to his body. william: do you think his family will ever truly know what happened? andrei: i very much hope so. of course, we have a very long record of political assassinations under mysterious circumstances over the last 20 plus years under vladimir putin. every time, it was extremely difficult to establish the cause. and we have a number of poisonings and very few people actually know what was used against them. in several cases, even now after 20 years, we don't know for

instance what was used against a famous russian journalist in 2003 and what was used against anna pretkozska. william: president biden and many other leaders have squarely placed the blame for this debt -- death on vladimir putin. do you share that belief? andrei: absolutely. what we have been seeing over the last three years, it was a deliberate systematic effort to kill navalny. moving him up north to morton -- more and more horrible conditions, and what happened his poisoning is a very clear -- what happened before his poisoning is a very clear sign that he was a target of a political assassination. it just failed back then. they did not fail now. we also know that vladimir putin, being a very practical man, made the political assassination part of his

toolkit. and now we can say that we have the upcoming election, putin is extremely nervous. again, it makes perfect practical sense for him. william: can you help me understand something? after that poisoning that navalny survived, he returned to russia. he had to know he would be imprisoned, perhaps for the rest of his life. help us understand why he might have done that. andrei: first of all, navalny didn't believe in his political future in exile. he believed he needed to get back and that he needed to conduct his political activity in the country. he was a strong believer. -- strong believer of this idea. of course now the circumstances completely changed, but remember it was before the full scale invasion started. it appeared to some people,

including navalny, that there was still some room for legitimate political activity in the country. he also built a very impressive network of supporters all over the country and he did not want to abandon them. he believed that ethically, he needed to be with them in russia. of course, he took his chances. it was extremely brave, but vladimir putin decided to imprison him and finally to kill him. william: what does this do to the opposition movement in russia? that movement has been splintered and fractured and disparate for many years. now with its ostensible leader gone, what does it do to that movement? andrei: it is impossible to deny that it is a horrible blow , because as you pointed out, yes, the movement was never cohesive and there were obvious

problems and arguments within the community of russian activists and opposition politicians. navalny was the most popular politician. of course, it is a blow. at the same time, he and his organization might pose several things that the political opposition believed was impossible. for instance, he organized protests in russian regions. we also had this concept that russian liberals live in big cities like moscow. and st. petersburg. navalny changed that. for that, he built an organization. for that, he got his supporters, a network of people. these people are still there. they are not going anywhere. some of them are still in the country. some of them left. but they are all very much active and very determined to remain active politically. william: thank you so much for

joining us. andrei: thank you. ♪ william: along nato's eastern flank are several former soviet satellite states, each with long and bitter memories of russian dominance. those nations are among the strongest supporters of ukraine's fight against russia's invasion, and of american support for europe more broadly. one nation loudly making that argument is poland. over the weekend, nick schifrin sat down with poland's foreign minister, radoslaw sikorski. they talked at the munich security conference, which highlighted europe's anxieties about putin's invasion and about america's resolve. nick: thank you very much. welcome back to the newshour. as of now, the u.s. house of representatives has not approved vital military aid to ukraine. already as we know, ukraine is rationing ammunition.

what impact is the debate in the u.s. having on american credibility? >> first of all, remember that europe has contributed financially more to the effort than the united states. nick: in total. >> when you count brussels and the member states. secondly, remember that this is money for weapons to be manufactured in the united states. thirdly, the ukrainians have already destroyed half of president putin's army without the involvement of a single american soldier. lastly, it is much cheaper to help ukraine now then it will be if putin conquers ukraine and has to be deterred. we think this is good value for money and this package is important. we appeal to the house of representatives, to mike johnson personally. nick: the speaker of the house. >> to please let it go to a vote. nick: do you believe that it is damaging u.s. credibility? >> if ukraine, having been

encouraged to resist, the president of the united states having put his standard on the ground in kyiv, the famous historic visit, then does not deliver on assistance that would send a message around the globe that you have to be careful because the united states, for important but regrettable reasons, might not be able to come through for you. nick: you mean trusting the u.s. in the future? >> that would have important implications, not only in eastern europe but around the globe, where there are other allies that feel exposed, bordering on more powerful countries. japan, korea, taiwan, others. philippines, australia even. so the world is watching. this really is not only about ukraine. nick: can europe make up the

shortfall for ukraine if the u.s. does not send military aid? >> we can make up financially, but there's literally not enough production capacity of shells and other equipment. w are 20 times bigger than russia economically, but russia has gone on to a war footing. it is producing ammo 24/7. we haven't. without the united states, we are behind the curve in making the stuff that ukrainians need -- that ukraine needs to defend itself. nick: many people have admitted that ukraine could lose without these weapons, but could ukraine win with these weapons? it has struggled to even match its own goals for the counteroffensive last year. >> ukraine has recovered 50% of the territory that the russians once occupied, and ukraine has cleared the russian navy from

half of the black sea and is now exporting grain, not thanks to putin's permission, but despite his best efforts. they just need the tools to do the job. they are doing god's work on our behalf. we just need to enable them because they cannot defend themselves with barehands. nick: if ukraine doesn't get these weapons, should it negotiate the end of the war? >> well, it will be the u.s. responsibility for having brought that about. for having allowed putin to abolish the taboo we established after two bloody world wars, that you may not change borders by force. it will get noticed by dictators and aggressors around the world. yes, the west will huff and puff. america will encourage to fight. but when push comes to shove, you can get away with it. that would then be a very costly proposition. nick: i notice you don't say no.

do you think ukraine should negotiate an end to the war if they don't have enough weapons? >> i have set it before. there's never a shortage of pocket chamberlains willing to trade other people's freedom or land for their own peace of mind. if it were to come to pass, this should be the ukrainian judgment. it is there people who are being conquered, being expelled, their children who are being stolen, not ours. nick: i know you are not going to want to talk about u.s. domestic politics, but i do want to ask about comments made by the former president recently, where he questioned whether nato should defend countries that don't meet the 2% threshold of gdp spending in terms of defense spending. do you believe the damage has already been done in some ways, that the very questioning of article five, the idea that the u.s. would come to european defense no matter which european country was attacked inside of nato, do you think that has already damaged article v? >> we heard the

secretary-general of nato, young stoltenberg, reporting to the munich security conference that this year 18 nato allies will be spending at least 2%. poland, i think, is number one actually. let's hope what the former president meant was to energize us, accelerate the increase of the defense budget. we prefer to remember that under his administration, the u.s. sent antitank weapons to ukraine. nick: is 18 countries out of 31, presumably soon to be 32, is that enough countries meeting the 2% threshold? >> some countries are behind the curve. the flank countries are not. nick: the eastern flank. >> it is not by accident. -- by accident that the closer you are to russia, the more you are spending on defense. nick: in the past, poland has resisted or worried about europe

making military plans, making defense plans outside of nato. are you reconsidering those worries that you had in the past? >> a very high-ranking pentagon official told me that the u.s. now supports european defense. they know that there may come circumstances in which, irrespective of whose president, you may be engaged in another part of the world and you want to have the freedom, the knowledge that the europeans can at least to some extent fend for themselves, provide their own security. this means that we need to develop some capabilities. nick: outside of nato? >> this should be done in strategic harmony with the united states, and then i think it is actually helpful to the united states. william: foreign -- nick: foreign minister, thank you very much. >> thanks. ♪

william: one of the key groups spreading false allegations of a rigged 2020 presidential election recently admitted to a georgia judge it has no evidence to support its claims. the group is called true the vote and its accusations of widespread voter fraud became the basis for several conspiracies around the 2020 contest. those debunked claims continue to be repeated by former president donald trump and many leading republicans in the lead up to this year's election. laura barron-lopez has been following all of this and she joins us now. hi, laura. so what were these claims and how did they come apart like this? laura: true the vote made repeated unfounded allegations of widespread voter fraud in 202 0. specifically through the vote had quite a few key claims. one, that a network of ballot meals paid $10 per ballot to be stuffed into ballots.

that they were contacted by an informant who took part in the alleged ballot scheme. that they had a team of researchers and investigators providing evidence of fraud. and that they received 117 hotline calls from georgia residents about voting irregularities. now, the georgia state board of elections filed a lawsuit against the group after they repeatedly tried to get information from them, investigating these allegations of voter fraud. true the vote never handed that overcommit finally, a judge ordered true the vote to respond with any information they may have to support their claims. true the vote responded in their recent legal filing with the same answer to each request for evidence, saying true the vote has no such documents in its possession, custody, or control. former president donald trump has repeated these concocted claims by true the vote, not just around 2020, but even to today. william: such an unbelievable admission to say we don't have the evidence. many of those allegations did

become the sort of backbone for a lot of these baseless conspiracy theories. can you sketch out how that became so integral here? laura: yes. donald trump's lies about the 2020 election led to many in his orbit taking on the mantle. true the vote, founded by catherine engelbrecht, pedaled election conspiracies in georgia and beyond. through the vote to vs allegations were amplified by businessman mike lindell and dinesh desousa, a trump ally who made a film called 2000 meals, about baseless claims of people traveling to multiple ballot boxes devote. voter fraud allegations were also circulated by rudy giuliani and sidney powell, attorneys who were co-conspirators in trump's attempts to overthrow the 2020 election. i spoke to denver riggleman, a former republican congressman from virginia, who worked on the house's january 6 committee that investigated the efforts of election subversion. he described this as an

orchestrated network of lies. >> what it comes down to, true the vote is just part of a massive, multi-headed monster of groups that want to monetize lies. there has never been any proof. it is always the same people. it is the same people pushing this. it is a massive grift. i have said it before. i believe this could have been the largest grift in american history. laura: true the vote, as recommended, and all those figures we highlighted had ample airtime on fox news to repeat those election lies. william: as you were saying, the former president continues to perpetuate those lies and spread them. how much of this is going to continue to be a part of the former president's campaign? laura: since he launched his campaign, former president trump has repeated election lies, saying that a rigged system is persecuting him and he has made vows to seek retribution. pres. trump: the radical left

democrats rigged the presidential election in 2020 and we are not going to allow them to rig the presidential election in 2024. laura: you hear that he's again laying the foundation as he did in 2020, priming his supporters to believe that if he loses this year, that 2024 will have been rigged. william: we heard the former republican congressman rigell men there pushing back on some of this but as you know, he is out in the political wilderness like liz cheney. is perpetuating this election lie now a requirement for being in the modern-day gop? laura: let's check the receipts. elise stefanik, the third ranking house republican, and republican senator j.d. vance of ohio, were recently asked if they would have done what then-vice president mike pence did in certifying the 2020 election results. >> i would not have done what mike pence did. i don't think that was the right approach. >> if i had been vice president, i would have told the state

s like pennsylvania, georgia, and so many others that we need to have multiple slates of electors and i think the u.s. congress should have fought over it from there. laura: senator tim scott of south carolina, a republican who campaigned against donald trump , has also refused to answer that question. all three of them, tim scott, j.d. vance, and elise stefanik are potentially on the short list for trump's vice presidential picks. i spoke toriggelman about this as well and he said election did nihilism -- election denialism has become a litmus test for the modern gop under donald trump. >> there is no way election was stolen. they are pushing the same conspiratorial thinking. there's no way the election was stolen. it was proven over and over again. they are allowing the base to drive them where they need to go so they can win reelection or have some kind of favor if trump were to win, in his administration. laura: another example of this loyalty paying off is that former president donald trump is pushing an election denier,

michael whatley, to be the new chairman of the republican national committee. he is also pushing for his daughter-in-law lara trump to be a co-chair. william: we saw what all of this misinformation and lies did to the country in the last election cycle. if this keeps up, what do you imagine this means for 2024? laura: former congressman denver riggleman told me he is concerned that voters are continuing to believe this. that when he talks to republican voters in his rural area of virginia, they say they already think that 2024 is being stolen by democrats, election workers are preparing for potential continued threats of violence against them in preparation for the election this year. and election denial has been so baked into the gop, but it is also something that americans are starting to accept as a part of the republican party. according to a poll conducted by cnn, the majority of voters

surveyed said they didn't think donald trump would concede the 2024 election if he were to lose. william: really such troubling reporting. laura barron-lopez, thank you so much. laura: thank you. ♪ william: the presidential primary season could come closer to an effective end later this week after voters in south carolina finish casting their votes on meanwhile, there's no saturday. end in sight for former president trump's legal troubles or for the debate on capitol hill over continuing funding for ukraine's defense. for more on all of this, we turn to our politics monday analysts. amy walter of "the cook political report with amy walter" and tamara keith of npr. welcome to you both. so nice to see you. thanks for being here on the holiday. tam, let's talk about south carolina. trump has a commanding 30 point

lead, if you believe all the polls, over former u.n. ambassador and former governor of south carolina nikki haley. if she gets totally blown out of the water in her home state, how does she go forward? tempora: she just -- tamara: she just proceeds forward without a mandate to proceed, which has been her entire time in this primary. she says we've got it down to the race i want. it is just me against trump. and guess what? republican primary voters seem to want trump. so she is saying she is going to keep competing through super tuesday at least. that is early march, march 5. she has been out to several of those states to hold events. she is also holding a lot of events in south carolina. trump has held very few, but he may not need to, it turns out. she can keep going as long as she has the money to keep going and as long as she is willing to

sort of take whatever political damage comes from losing -- a lot. amy: that's the question. is it political damage or is she positioning herself in a way that she can get something politically from doing this? everybody comes -- william: like what? amy: is she going to be the voice -- somebody wrote the other day -- the voice of i told you so after the election. she has been saying over and over again on the campaign trail, he cannot win. every time trump has been on the ballot, he has lost, our candidates have lost. if he does lose in 2024, people look to her and say, oh, she was the one who told us all along and we will now look to her for other political advice going forward. it may not happen but that is one pathway. the other is you are hearing from folks, from the wing of the party, some known as the anti-trump wing, others in this former establishment wing, the reagan wing of the party, that she will continue to carry that

torch going forward. that there will always be this element in the republican party of a strong interventionist, culturally but mostly fiscally conservative party. and that even though trump is ascendant now, she will be the one carrying that piece of the party and their agenda forward in whatever form that takes. theoretically, you could go forward and amass a bunch of delegates and have some leverage going into a party convention. but the way that the process works, south carolina is one of these -- it is a winner take all system so even getting 40% of the vote gets you zero. william: empty-handed. do you think that is her calculation here? i understand the theory you are describing. but it seems that the gop is not interested in having a principled republican-esque critic in its midst. amy: certainly not.

just look at who former president trump wants to lead the republican party. he wants to get rid of an rnc chairwoman who has been pretty darn loyal to him, and replace him -- william: this is rhonda mcdaniel. amy: and replace her with -- william: his daughter-in-law. members of his own family. amy: the longer nikki haley stays in this primary -- it is not that it helps her with the delegate math, but the longer she stays in, the more trump's challenges, legal, financial challenges, all of these issues, the longer they have to come to light. now we know there is a trial that will start in new york on march 25, as long as it sticks. he has had this big ruling against him, huge fines he has to pay. so she is able to more clearly make the argument she has been making all along -- is this really who we want to nominate? it still comes back to the same problem.

in the republican primary, the answer is still yes. william: the primary voters have been crystal clear about that. let's talk about that, some of the legal troubles that tam is bringing up. huge, multi-hundreds of millions of dollars, which could be a potential dent on his ability to spend money going forward, but also the stormy daniels case, the january 6 case potentially, maybe georgia, maybe mar-a-lago with the classified documents. i know you are always reluctant to say that this will have an impact or not, but do you think any of those cases could meaningfully change this election? >> yeah, so, it is a question that will get asked a lot throughout the entirety of this campaign. right now, it feels like for so many voters, this is white noise. even these judgments against donald trump have not gotten any sort of traction, it has not changed the math in the republican primary and certainly not in the general election.

the question becomes if there's criminal liability, if he is found guilty in one of these cases, the documents case or january 6, will that change people's minds? what's going to be fascinating to watch is, first, how this question gets asked of voters. right now it is very hypothetical. if something does happen, do voters' opinions of it change over time? that the immediate reaction may be different from, as tam pointed out, are we really going to do this? once we get to october and november, where you can see voters rallying behind trump maybe. you can also see them saying i will not vote for him but then rally around him at the end. this is also going to take an effort, i think, on the biden campaign's part to make this part of the campaign. it is not just this event is going to happen and then organically voters are going to end up where they end up. the job of the opposition campaign is to make that certainly a centerpiece. william: is biden going to do that? he has thus far been reluctant to touch trump's legal woes when

they have been obvious targets to shoot at. he has not. >> biden has been reluctant personally. his campaign has also been extremely reluctant. they feel like the legal challenges that trump has get a lot of attention. just think about, there were dueling court hearings last week. he got to hold court outside of the courthouse, both before the trial date was set and then afterwards. he's getting a lot of attention about this. for now at least, they think it is getting enough attention. they would like voters to focus on what does this mean for them rather than what does this mean for donald trump, and they are struggling to get voters to actually focus on that. they are struggling with that message. but they are trying to figure out how to do it. i think that for trump, these first cases on the calendar, if you look at it, the civil cases and penalties that he's faced in new york. the next case being the stormy

daniels hush money/campaign finance violation and cooking the books -- that is not the right phrase. but those cases are all in new york. he has done a fairly good job of convincing definitely republican voters, but even people who are not republican voters -- william: these are new york city liberals who hate me. >> yes. these are new york city liberals who hate me. these cases should not count against me. this is particularly a witchhunt. you don't necessarily get to a case where voters haven't had -- haven't been convinced of this. you don't get out of new york for quite some time in the calendar. william: let's shift across the atlantic for a second. the munich security conference just wrapped up this weekend. we just saw nick's tremendous interview with the polish foreign minister, talking about this yearning for europe to know where america stands. are we going to support ukraine or not? they just lost a city to the

russians, theoretically, reportedly, because they ran out of ammunition. what do you think comes out of that conference? we saw very dueling views. >> quite clear dueling visions. you had the vice president there saying we are standing with ukraine. we do see this as essential, america's role. and then you saw somebody like j.d. vance, the senator from ohio, who was there basically as a trump surrogate we could say, who said in his remarks that, yes, we like europe, we like nato, but don't see putin as an existential threat to europe. and that is something, if you are european, you probably don't like to hear that. and he basically said we will stay part of nato but we don't see that as important as we do other places in the world, especially the fight with china. william: lastly, tam, do you see that the republican move away

from supporting ukraine -- it used to be they were lockstep with democrats and now they are not -- does that hurt them in the election? >> generally speaking, foreign policy is not what decides elections. this could be the year where that changes, but it also could be the year where that doesn't change, where you continue the pattern where people think about their own lives. they look inward, they look to the united states. they are not looking at foreign policy. >> unless putin, something really does happen in europe, that is a different calculation. william: amy walter and tamra keith, thank you both. >> great to see you. ♪ william: in whatever role he appears, in films or tv, as a lead or as a character actor, paul giamatti makes an impression. last month, he won a golden globe award for his performance in the film "the holdovers." and the role has now brought him his first best actor oscar

nomination. he recently spoke with jeffrey brown for our arts and culture series, canvas. >> i can tell by your faces that many of you are shocked at the outcome. jeffrey: in "the holdovers," paul giamatti plays paul hunham, a crusty 1970's-era new england prep school teacher, ever ready to quote marcus aurelius and take down his pampered charges. >> i can't fail this class. >> don't sell yourself short. i truly believe you can. >> i'm supposed to go to cornell. >> unlikely. jeffrey: the setting was well known to giamatti, who had himself attended such a prep school as a teenager and comes from a family of educators, including his father bartlett giamatti, who served as president of yale university. but familiarity also presented an unfamiliar acting challenge. >> it's one of the first times i've ever felt that sort of close to something, you know, where there was that much available to me, consciously and unconsciously, which was a good

thing, i mean, and i was drawing on lots of, on a deep well of things. but yes, it was sometimes kind of uncomfortable. i was like, wow, i'm not acting enough. jeffrey: what does that mean, i'm not acting enough? >> this feels so familiar to me that i wonder if i'm doing, am i doing enough? am i doing the job well? i've never had the experience before of this. it was a really peculiar, peculiar thing. jeffrey: so, how did you deal with it? how did you overcome it? >> i just kept doing it. [laughter] >> the germans have been reinforcing the regiments all day. jeffrey: giamatti has made his mark in small parts. "saving private ryan" in 1998. >> when someone talks to you as though you were no consequence, you have two choices. jeffrey: and large, the showtime series, "billions." he's been a primate in "planet of the apes." and a founding father in the hbo series "john adams," for which he won an emmy. >> now either you are stark raving mad or i am. good day, sir. jeffrey: a breakthrough star

turn came in 2004 with "sideways," directed by alexander payne, with whom he's reunited for "the holdovers." >> need i remind you that it is not my fault that you are stuck here. jeffrey: in which three wounded souls find themselves left behind during the christmas break -- giamatti's hunham, a troubled student played by dominic sessa, and the school's cafeteria manager, a grieving mother whose son died in vietnam, played by da'vine joy randolph, herself a golden globe winner and best supporting actress nominee. >> can we say it's his birthday? >> it's my birthday. jeffrey: it's brilliant ensemble acting and, for giamatti, the very essence of his profession. >> it's interesting, the whole idea of sort of chemistry, because people often ask actors like how is it that you find this chemistry? and i actually just think it's at bottom, it's my job. it's my job to get along with other people.

it's my job to engage. jeffrey: you mean in a staged, theatrical sense. >> yes. but it's my job to find something that i connect with these people and then can do it. it really seems at bottom mostly what i do, is to try to find chemistry. and sometimes, you have to fake it and it'll still, if you're good at it, it'll still look like it works. but then most of the time, you have something like this where we all just melded and it was really nice and we had that magical thing just happening anyway. jeffrey: he knows, your character, that everybody can't stand him. >> he kind of likes it that people can't stand him, to some extent. jeffrey: he also knows, though, and this is where i think you, you struck me as doing something very interesting. he knows the holes in himself. that somehow you have to show us that. >> yeah, well, he has a self-awareness. he's a self-aware man, which is probably only makes life harder for him. probably if he was more oblivious, he would be better off. and hopefully, yes, you see

these kinds of holes in him and his awareness of them, and that gives you some sympathy for him. >> the blue breaded -- blooded prick has allies on the faculty, his name is on the library,. he accused me in order to sanitize his treachery and they threw me out. jeffrey: but how do you do that as an actor? how do you bring that out? i'm thinking of roles where you're talking a lot more, where you're emoting a lot more. this character is a little calmer, a little quieter for the most part. >> yes, for the most part. yes, that's interesting. i start from the script, i mean, i really do. that's the basis and the foundation of the thing, and i'll discover more about the character the more i sort of investigate the script. and the interesting thing with film is so much of film really, really lives in the, in the inarticulate moments, the wordless moments. [whistling] jeffrey: do you like those moments? >> i actually like those the most in things. where film acting, where it

flowers. because you're expressing everything just through, you know, it's all just bodily expression. and that's amazing. because it is the kind of exploration of consciousness and unconsciousness that makes film different from stage. jeffrey: always, though, his decision to take a role begins with the script itself. a close reading to see if he wants to keep turning the pages. >> i'm not being facetious when i say this, but to actually just keep reading the script, if that's what i get, is the script at first. which is usually what i want to see first, you know, even before i'll meet the director or something, i want to see what the story is. if the story compels me to keep reading it, that's the most important thing. then, it'll be maybe the character and the director and who else is doing it. i'm lucky to be able to choose like that. jeffrey: wasn't always like that, i assume. >> no. no, it's not for most actors, no. jeffrey: or even for you at some point, right? >> oh, no. definitely, for a long time. jeffrey: did you have doubts

about whether it would all work? >> sure. i don't think there's an actor alive who doesn't have doubts, who hasn't sort of encountered doubt at some point, if not all the time. sure. you just don't know. it's such a crazy gamble of a thing to do with yourself. jeffrey: you have any sense why it worked out? what do you tell yourself? [laughter] >> i don't know! you know, at the same time, i had a funny sort of sense that i'd manage. i would manage to find work. i had this, a funny kind of low level confidence that i'd find stuff to do. jeffrey: low level. >> yeah, low level of confidence. i wasn't going to go too far and i didn't want to jinx things. but i had a sense that doing, as you say, the kind of character actor work, i would find stuff, i'd be ok. but you go through rough patches where you're not sure, you know. and then, i don't know, i just, i kept enjoying it, i kept loving it. so that kept me going. jeffrey: congratulations, paul giamatti, thanks for talking to us. >> yeah, my pleasure, man. thank you. william: online, hear more from paul giamatti, including what's

his favorite holiday and why. that's on our youtube page. in nashville, valor collegiate academy encourages students to share what's going on in their lives and to accept support from others. tonight, we hear from high school teacher natalie nikitas and some valor students, as they give their brief but spectacular take on building trust. >> when i go somewhere, the uber driver is talking and inevitably they ask, what do you do? i say, i'm a teacher. they go, oh! and they have their reaction. a lot of times, they are like why? i asked them who is your favorite teacher? 99% of the time, they are able to name the person and 99% of the time, they smile. yeah, i don't know another profession other than being a superhero that could do that. i teach here at valor college prep. i do july been to grade ap u.s.

history. at valor -- i teach 11th grade ap u.s. history. at valor, the focus is much more on social and emotional learning. teaching students how to navigate the onslaught of emotions and feelings they are experiencing every single day, along with traditional math, science, social studies. >> hi, my name is chester. i am feeling kind of nervous today. valor is unique. so, circle the best way that i have come to describe it is it is halfway between a group therapy session and an aa meeting. >> circle basically is about a 55 minute experience where students will sit together and basically take the time to share how they are feeling. >> i am feeling kind of worried today. >> i am a little bit stressed but mostly excited. >> i am feeling a mix of stress but it is kind of at peace. >> it is a moment for us to decompress and focusing on how

we are doing emotionally and give us that safe space to just be a collective individually. >> what if i don't get what i had before and i have to pull more? i did not study and i regret it a lot. i feel like i should have listened to my mom. >> i definitely understand the idea of procrastinating, but i feel like that same pressure you are under, wanting to do really well so you can apply to college and get your scholarships and everything. i also resonate with the fact of how your mom was saying, making sure you study. i also kind of did the same thing with mine. >> on our best days, i truly have seen students look out for one another and make connections that i think every teacher and member of a school hopes to see. >> expressing my worries about school and the stress and the overwhelming feelings that i usually have throughout the day in class, talking about those are pretty relieving because you

realize almost everyone is feeling the exact same way. >> i shared last year, my 10th grade year, it was my first time in front of everybody. like, i was nervous. you just get put on a spotlight basically. you just talking and people are listening to you. i would tell my teacher i didn't want to do it. >> you are supposed to have them share out basically their feelings, emotions, struggles. a student is not going to do that unless they trust you. to do that is a feat. but if you do it well, the reward is astronomical. >> i personally really disliked it as a middle schooler. i just really didn't think sitting down, talking about my feelings was important. but over time throughout the years, i started to realize it was something that was useful to me. >> people know who i am today at valor. they know what i went through

and everything. >> the hardest part is being vulnerable, but in almost every circle i've been in, vulnerability is always met with support. >> i am able to trust more with people that i love, like my friends. >> even if we don't understand what a teenager is going through, you say, it is tough, your feelings are valid. for a student to hear that from a teacher, like they actually care about them as a human being , what i have seen happen is students start to excel. >> there is more to life than all of this. there is a lot of stress in school and i realized i worked myself into this. this is my life. no one can take that away from me. so what i have been doing for the past couple of days is appreciating the things in life i have. >> i want to appreciate chris. how are you even the same person right now? you have taken such an initiative and said i am not

just going to sit here, i will do everything i can to be the person i want to be. >> once you see students open up, it is like this is everything we've been trying to do. for one brief magical moment, students get to feel whole. i think without recognizing students as whole humans with desires and dreams and setbacks and obstacles, we are truly missing out on half of a student. >> ready? >> my name is natalie and this is my brief but spectacular take on building trust in a circle. william: tonight's brief but spectacular is part of a six-part collection on the future of education. the entire series can be seen on our website, pbs.org/newshour. later tonight on pbs, independent lens premieres a documentary about how a group of women and lgbtq-plus journalists

banded together to launch the nonprofit newsroom, "the 19th." "breaking the news" airs at 10:00 p.m. eastern. check your local listings. that is the "newshour" for tonight. i'm william brangham. on behalf of the entire "newshour" team, thank you for joining us. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by -- >> thanks. >> cunard is a proud supporter of public television. on a voyage with cunard, the world awaits. a world of flavor, diverse destinations, and immersive experiences. a world of leisure and british style. all with cunard's white star service. >> the kendeda fund, committed

to advancing restorative justice and meaningful work through investments in transformative leaders and ideas. more at kendeda fund.org. supported by the john d. and catherine t macarthur foundation. committed to building a more just, verdant, and peaceful world. more information at mac found.org. and with the ongoing support of these institutions. this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy.] >> this is pbs newshour west, from weta studios in washington and from our bureau at walter cronkite school of journalism at arizona state university.

wow, you get to watch all your favorite stuff. it's to die for. now you won't miss a thing. this is the way. the xfinity 10g network. made for streaming. ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -today on "america's test kitchen," we're pulling out our multicookers,