corporate funding is provided by mutual of america-- designing customized individual and group retirement products. that's why we're your retirement company. and by: >> babbel. a language app that teaches real-life conversations in a new language, like spanish, french, german, italian, and more. babbel's 10-15 minute lessons are available as an app, or online. more information on babbel.com. >> additional support has been provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting, and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. from the tisch wnet studios at lincoln center in new york, hari sreenivasan. >> sreenivasan: good evening and thank you for joining us. the fallout continues over a new book about the west wing that questions president trump's fitness for office. this morning president trump returned to the white house after a weekend at camp david. he tweeted that "fire and fury" by michael wolff was a "fake book" saying he has dealt with" fake news" since he announced his candidacy. the president also tweeted his support for white house senior policy advisor stephen miller, who defended the president as "" genius" in a contentious interview with cnn's jake tapper. >> the portrayal of the president in the book is so contrary to reality, to the experience of those who work with him. >> sreenivasan: other members of the administration were also out supporting the president's fitness for the job in the wake of allegations. in his first statement in response to "fire and fury", former chief strategist steve bannon told axios that his support for the president is" unwavering" and said in part:" i regret that my delay in responding to the inaccurate reporting regarding don jr has diverted attention from the president's historical accomplishments in the first year of his presidency." in the book, bannon called a meeting between donald trump's eldest son donald trump junior, other campaign officials, and a group of russians during the campaign, as "treasonous" and" unpatriotic." bannon said those comments were aimed not at the president's son, but at then campaign manager paul manafort, who also attended the meeting." fire and fury" author michael wolff acknowledged there were minor errors, but stood by his reporting. >> the book speaks for itself. read the book. see if you don't feel like you are with me on that couch in the white house. and see if you don't feel alarmed, as you say. >> sreenivasan: the top democrat on the house intelligence committee, adam schiff, called president trump a "seriously flawed human being" in response to the revelations. >> i don't think there is anyone in congress, frankly, of either party, who does not concur at least privately with those observations and concerns. >> sreenivasan: temperatures on the east coast of the united states are expected to rise above freezing tomorrow for the first time in days, and the national weather service says that the region will return to seasonal norms or warmer this week. this follows last week's bomb cyclone that brought snow and single digit temperatures. the recent frigid weather is being blamed for at least 18 deaths. meanwhile, sydney australia is enduring scorching heat as temperatures reached 117 degrees fahrenheit, the hottest day recorded there in nearly 80 years. iran's revolutionary guard said today that security forces have put an end to anti-government protests that have been raging for the last week and a half. thousands of pro-government supporters marched for a fifth day today, protesting the biggest anti-government rallies iran has faced since 2009. economic unrest sparked protests around the country in last month, and at least 21 people were killed in clashes with authorities. the iranian government blames the unrest on outside influences, including the united states, israel, and supporters of the monarchy that was overthrown in the 1979 revolution. the entire crew of an iranian oil tanker is missing following a collision with a chinese freighter last night. the oil tanker, en route to south korea with nearly a million barrels of oil, burst into flames and began leaking oil into the east china sea, about 160 miles off the coast of shanghai. the chinese government and south korean coast guard dispatched planes and ships to search for the 32 missing crew members of the iranian ship and to begin clean up operations. all 21 members of the chinese ship's crew were rescued. the cause of the crash is not known. the 75th annual golden globes ceremony will be held tonight in beverly hills, the first televised awards show since the sexual harassment scandals that rocked the media and entertainment industry last year. on the red carpet tonight, many actresses will be wearing all black as a statement against sexual misconduct in hollywood. others are expected to wear pins with the logo of "time's up"-- the group recently launched by reese witherspoon, shonda rhimes and hundreds of other women to fight sexual harassment. host seth myers has said he will tackle the issue during the show itself, and the issue is very likely come up during awards acceptance speeches as well. >> sreenivasan: colleges have always been a source of political discourse in the united states. and in the past year, tensions on campus have risen as controversial guest speakers have been shut down, and faculty have been suspended over offensive comments in the classroom. some fear that so-called" political correctness" is overtaking free speech on college campuses. in 2016, the dean of students at the university of chicago went so far as to say to incoming freshman that the school would not condone "safe spaces" and" trigger warnings." in tonight's signature segment, newshour weekend's ivette feliciano examines the case of one small liberal arts college in the pacific northwest that's dealing with its own controversy surrounding race, equity in higher education, and political correctness. >> reporter: in the spring of 2017, evergreen state college, a public liberal arts school in olympia, washington, erupted with protests, and youtube videos of the unrest went viral. >> hey hey, ho ho racist teachers have got to go. >> reporter: students confronted biology professor bret weinstein in his classroom. weinstein, who identifies as politically left, had announced he was boycotting a decades-old event created by students of color at the school. now he was being accused of racism. >> if one spoke in a way that challenged the narrative that was being advanced, then one was portrayed as in particular, racist. >> resign! >> i'm not resigning! >> reporter: evergreen is a bastion of progressive values. classes offered include" alternatives to capitalism" an"" climate justice". yet in the days following the protests, students demanded the administration fire the professor and tackle what they call years of institutional racism. they barricaded campus spaces, wrangled with campus police, and stormed the president's office. >> it's not an accident that all of our administration is white. that's not an accident >> reporter: since the events, five faculty and staff have resigned their positions. that includes evergreen's chief of police, professor weinstein, and his wife heather heying, who is a chemistry professor. >> we've been grieving. i, at least, have been going through a mixture of feeling betrayed-- feeling angry. feeling dumbfounded. and really, you know, mourning the loss of an institution that i loved. >> reporter: every spring quarter since the 1970s, evergreen has hosted a "day of absence" event, where many students, faculty and staff of color gather off campus for a day to talk about race, privilege and other issues, while white students, faculty and staff are able to voluntarily participate in related conversations on campus. but tensions mounted last april when a request was made to change things up to allow participants of color to hold the day of absence activities on campus, while white allies participating in the day of absence activities were asked to go off campus. rashida love helped organize the day of absence events at evergreen. she believes the country's university system is designed for white americans. >> it's difficult all the time to kind of navigate your way around institutions that are not created for you. and people felt that even more, i think, in the political climate. rson planning committee, which included white members, made the change to the day of absence event as a show of solidarity with students who were feeling increasingly unwelcome at the school. in the months following the 2016 presidential election, love says flyers for black, transgender and undocumented student programming were torn down from college spaces. racist graffiti appeared on and off campus. and even before the election, gay and immigrant student organizers reported being targeted by the k.k.k. >> and so this was an opportunity to say, "no, you do belong here. we're going to take up space. and we're going to show everybody that we belong here and that we bring value to this institution. >> reporter: student activists like juan carlos ruiz-duran believe racial tensions started well before last spring. >> it was definitely out of feeling unheard or unrecognized. and so the result of that was to really get their attention without the administration being able to get out of it. >> reporter: he and other students had been protesting what they said was a culture of anti-blackness by evergreen campus police and the olympia police department. in 2015, two unarmed black students were shot and wounded by an olympia police officer for allegedly stealing beer and assaulting the officer with their skateboards. according to school data, 29% of the student body is not white. and evergreen reports a lower retention rate for students of color than for white students. students of color are also less likely to feel like they fit in. sophomore justin puckett often feels like an outsider in his classes. >> it can be kind of draining to have just to just be the only black person or the only a person of color in general and be looked at to speak for the black community as a whole, which i have experienced. it was about the use of the n- word. a faculty member asked if it was okay for white students or other white people to use that word and looked at me. >> reporter: one senior told us the school doesn't know how to support students like her who speak english as a second language and don't qualify for federally-funded programs. she says she was turned away from one such resource available to first generation and low- income students because she is undocumented, and that the school offered her no other options. >> for someone who's like already in a situation where they are afraid to ask for help, being told no it's like another setback. because i had to go out of my way to find those answers to my questions which i feel like as an institution and you should be prepared. >> reporter: participation in the day of absence event was voluntary. yet professor bret weinstein says he felt pressured by the administration to participate. >> there's a very big difference between people deciding to absent themselves from a shared space in order to make a point, which i support, and people deciding to absent somebody else, which i'm absolutely opposed to. >> reporter: the changes to the day of absence event came on the heels of other major changes on campus that weinstein and heying felt were being forced upon the faculty with no room for discussion. in 2015 evergreen's president created an equity council. among other proposals, it called for mandatory anti-bias workshops for staff and faculty and prioritizing diversity in all future hiring decisions. the council also proposed only hiring faculty who can incorporate race into their teaching, which weinstein opposed. >> the idea that we should prioritize a racial viewpoint on, who knows, maybe even organic chemistry, over somebody who is adept at understanding how to convey a difficult concept, is preposterous, just at an educational level. >> reporter: weinstein objected to the equity plan. >> when i voiced concern over the effect they were going to have on the college there was a tremendous backlash that accused me of opposing the proposals because i opposed equity itself. >> reporter: weinstein sent an email to protest the changes to the day of absence, arguing that encouraging another group to go away was "a show of force, and an act of oppression in and of itself." that email was circulated widely and fueled attacks that led to the charge that he was a racist. he says it brought threats that eventually drove him and his wife, professor heather heying, off-campus over safety concerns. >> you asked me a question. >> you're going to listen. >> i would like to answer it. >> hey hey, ho ho, bret weinstein has got to go. >> whatever one thinks of bret, he's not a racist. >> reporter: senior odette finn was a student of both weinstein's and heying's and identifies as multi-racial. she says she never saw racism as a problem at the school, but that her opinions about her experience weren't tolerated by many of her peers. >> i wasn't against bret and i was against their methods and the protests, i was deemed a traitor. they explained that we are trying to give voice to those who don't have a voice. i thought it was very ironic that the people who were telling me that they wanted to give a platform for minorities to speak weren't listening to mine. it creates a campus where you're just really scared to say anything, so you just keep your mouth shut. >> reporter: weinstein spoke to the media, and some homed in on the viral youtube videos as the latest example of a growing political correctness culture on college campuses. >> believe it or not it was far crazier than the video you just showed. >> reporter: some like, fox news, mischaracterized the day of absence as a mandatory event where all whites were being forced off campus. >> this year, student activists demanded that all white people leave campus or else. >> reporter: what happened next alarmed those on both sides of the debate. in june, two months after the day of absence, evergreen received a threatening phone call. >> yes i am on my way to evergreen university now with a 44 magnum. i am going to execute as many people on that campus as i can get a hold of. >> reporter: the call caused the school to shut down for several days and hold its graduation ceremony 30 miles from campus. two weeks later, a portland- based right wing activist group held a "free speech" rally at evergreen. throughout the spring and early summer, many students and faculty of color were flooded with violent and racist emails. among those who received threats were rashida love and her family. in november, she resigned from her position as director of evergreen's multicultural advising services. >> it was terrifying. it was really scary. people had googled me to the point that my parents' address and their phone number had been made available. >> reporter: do you have any regrets about any of that? >> what i would say is some of the reaction that came to evergreen was deeply unfortunate. and i absolutely wish it had not happened. do i feel responsible for it? no. i think the behavior on evergreen's campus was exactly the kind of bigotry that would lead to that overreaction by the far right. and that is on the people who behaved that way, not on me for exposing it. >> reporter: weinstein and heying filed a lawsuit against the college and received a $500,000 settlement in september. they resigned as part of the agreement. when you look at those videos from last spring, they were calling him a white supremacist, racist, and, you know, shutting him down. can you understand why some people view that as liberal intolerance? >> definitely. i think if that's the only thing you ever see about this event-- or about anything that's happened at evergreen, then i can definitely see how people are like, "oh, these are just privileged, spoiled kids, who are, like, crying racism whenever they get the first chance." but what those clips leave out is the fact that those students for years had been going about things the, you know, "right way." people get tired. >> the tactics might not have necessarily been the most appropriate but i think. we should all focus more towards the message. >> reporter: the college has hired a vice president and vice provost for equity and inclusion to do just that. it is also implementing the equity plan, which, among other things, includes new trainings for staff to better support undocumented students. meanwhile, evergreen's administration has not decided if the day of absence event will happen this year. >> sreenivasan: find out how evergreen state college is continuing to address racial issues. visit pbs.org/newshour. >> sreenivasan: on new year's day california joined the growing list of states and the district of columbia where it is now legal to sell marijuana. while state and local leaders may see marijuana as a taxable cash crop, the trump administration has a different point of view. on thursday, attorney general jeff sessions rescinded an obama administration policy that discouraged federal prosecutors, in most instances, from bringing charges in places where marijuana is legal under state law. joining me now from washington, d.c. is john hudak, the deputy director of the center for effective public management at the brookings institution to help assess the impact of this move. so just in plain english what is the attorney general calling for? >> what the attorney general is calling for is the freeing up for u.s. attorneys for federal prosecutors to start to go after state legal marijuana businesses who are complying with state law and are serving customers in states that have chosen to reform their marijuana laws. something that the obama administration put protections in against. the trump administration is repealing that. >> sreenivasan: and this was something that attorney general sessions said he wasn't going to take action be during his confirmation hearing, right. >> the attorney general has had a lot of mixed language when it kms to this issue. he has been cagey. there have been moments where he has suggested that he saw the standing policy as a good one or one to keep in place. and there are other moments where you hear the attorney general using the type of war on drugs language about marijuana that we really haven't heard from the top tiers of administrations for 15 or 20 years. >> what happens? there are small business thration are taking steps already in states that it is legal. and there are investors. there's possible bank loans, all sorts of institutions that are involved in this economy. what happens when this statement from on high comes in. does it add some uncertainty into how these businesses fare? >> certainly the statement itself, the policy change itself adds uncertainty to this industry. and of course uncertainty is bad for any business. but the statement itself won't necessarily enact change. a change will happen when u.s. attorneys working closely with dea and other law enforcement entities begin enforcing against these businesses. that day may never come. but if it does, that will be the moment where the industry feels the real affects of this policy and you'll start to see ripple effects spreading out from there. >> there's already been pushback from senator gardner in colorado. how do states respond to this. what can they do to encourage portant part of their economy? >> well, you're right about senator gardner in fact, dozens and dozens of house members and senators have come out and slammed the attorney general for this policy in part because it actually goes back on what were statements by the president when he was running for office about his view on this issue. he said that it should be a state's rights issue. so what do states have to do? what can they do. first off, they don't have to help the federal government enforce federal law. there is a protection against that under the 10th amendment to the constitution. and so you will see a lot of states, most states, probably, just say to the federal government if you want to enforce your laws go ahead and do it on your own. you're not getting a dime of state revenue to help do this. and that really is the first line of protection that states have. >> what about if the dea wants to come in to a growing operation in california and colorado and carry out what they say is this is my job, i'm doing it. this is what the federal law says, right? >> there is really nothing states can do. if dea goes into a state with recreational marijuana and begins to arrest people, shut down businesses, seize assets, seize plants, there's not of the state can do to combat that. it is illegal under federal law. dea and u.s. attorneys have the authority to investigate and bring charges against these entities. and it would be a difficult day for the marijuana industry. it would be a day that may frustrate governors across the country. but it's a day that would be completely in compliance with federal law law. >> all right, john hudak of the brookings institution, thanks so much. >> thank you. >> this is pbs newshour weekend, sunday. >> sreenivasan: five years after his presidency, theodore roosevelt undertook a journey into the amazon rainforest with legendary brazilian explorer candido rondon. their goal: to chart an unknown river in one of the wildest places on earth. their perilous trip is the subject of "into the amazon" from the pbs series "american experience." it premieres on tuesday january 9 at 9:00 p.m. here's a look. >> after traveling an unchartered river in brazil for over a month, roosevelt was too weak to continue. he told his son to go on without him. roosevelt say this is it. either we all die or i die and you all get out. obviously there's no choice. you have to leave me here. >> thee door roosevelt was now one of 21 men lost in one of the last unexplored regions on earth. facing crippling disease, perilous rapids, and a jungle alive with threats. americans thought in the middle of the night the indians could come in and slit your throat. >> the amazon jungle eats whatever comes its way. >> no one knew where the river might lead or when their ordeal would end. but one thing was certain, their fate was in the hands of brazilian explorer candido rondon. >> rondon was tremendously experienced, colonel rondon was essentially the brazilian equivalent of louis and clark. >> rondon knows he's got to get teddy roosevelt out of the jungle safe and sound. he can't have the president of the united states dying on him in the middle of the jungle. >> sreenivasan: tomorrow on the newshour, an interview with michael wolff, the author of "fire and fury" on the trump white house. that's all for this edition of pbs newshour weekend. i'm hari sreenivasan. have a good night. captioning sponsored by wnet captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org >> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: bernard and irene schwartz. the cheryl and philip milstein family. sue and edgar wachenheim, iii. dr. p. roy vagelos and diana t. vagelos. the j.p.b. foundation. the anderson family fund. rosalind p. walter. barbara hope zuckerberg. corporate funding is provided by mutual of america-- and by:ent company.urproducts. >> babbel. a language app that teaches real-life conversations in a new language, like spanish, french, german, italian, and more. babbel's 10-15 minute lessons are available as an app, or online. more information on babbel.com. additional support has been provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting, and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. woman: he wrote becauseeacher he felt like he had a mission. woman 2: the fbi knew how dangerous dolores was. this property does not go back to the federal government. announcer: "pbs previews the best of pbs indies" was made possible in part with contributions to your local pbs stations from viewers like you. thank you. unsparing and enthralling, intensely visceral. these are just a few of the rave reviews critics have given the films you're about to see. welcome to a special preview of some of the best new independent documentary films coming to your pbs station. you'll meet the filmmakers as they tell us what it took to bring these amazing stories to life