AMNA NAWAZ: Good evening.

I'm Amna Nawaz.

Geoff Bennett is away.

On the "NewsHour" tonight: Former President Trump calls for the judge overseeing the 2020 election interference case to recuse herself and change the venue.

He argues he cannot get a fair trial in D.C. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland discusses a new monument near the Grand Canyon that protects sacred indigenous land and bans mining.

And many American cities look to convert vacant corporate spaces into housing units, as the future of downtown office work remains in question.

STEVEN PAYNTER, Gensler: What we're seeing right now is a lot of developers and owners making that decision to go residential because there's a lack of confidence in the office market.

(BREAK) AMNA NAWAZ: Welcome to the "NewsHour."

The nation's weather has etched more entries today in the journal of extremes that's marked this summer.

Millions of Americans faced everything from steaming heat across the South to stormy destruction in the Northeast.

Laura Barron-Lopez has our report.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: In North Baltimore County, emergency crews cleared through the damage.

Enormous trees completely uprooted left homes crushed, and roads impassable.

This morning, Maryland Governor Wes Moore said it's a long road ahead.

GOV.

WES MOORE (D-MD): This is going to take some time to fix.

The damage from last night is significant, and it will take time to make sure that we are getting everything done.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: A fast-moving storm swept through the East Coast on Monday night, prompting severe weather advisories in 10 states and the District of Columbia.

In Upstate New York, outside Dryden, tornado funnel clouds whipped through gray skies.

Nearly 30 million people were under a tornado watch yesterday, as strong gusts caused tree limbs in several states to snap.

BILL, Pennsylvania Resident: This is the worst I have seen it.

I mean, I have no trees left.

They're all gone now.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: The storm the storm killed two people, officials said, after a tree fell on a 15-year-old boy in South Carolina, and a 28-year-old Alabama man was struck by lightning.

Last night, more than 1.1 million households and businesses lost power.

By midday today, that number was down to 240,000 customers.

The huge storm front also wreaked havoc on air travel in the region.

Yesterday's storm led to some 10,000 flights being canceled or delayed.

By midday today, more than 2,500 flights in and out of the U.S. were delayed and 370 canceled, according to FlightAware.

And, in Washington, D.C., as ominous clouds rolled over the White House on Monday, federal offices shut down early, giving government employees time to dodge the hazardous commute.

Today, about 10 million residents in New England remained under flood watches as the system moved north.

Elsewhere in the U.S., dangerous heat is in the forecast for 67 million people, roughly 20 percent of the U.S. population, from Southern California to the Florida Panhandle.

KRISTIE EBI (University of Washington): Summer temperatures are increasing.

And along with that increase is an increase in the frequency, the duration and the intensity of heat waves.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Kristie Ebi is a professor of global health at the University of Washington.

She says health problems caused by extreme heat are becoming more and more frequent.

KRISTIE EBI: People, for example, who have a heart attack who didn't have a heart attack otherwise, or pregnant women of having an increased prevalence of low birth weight babies, with babies coming sooner.

And so you see a wide, wide variety of impacts that people experience that show up in doctor's offices, urgent care facilities and our emergency departments.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Blistering heat and severe storms, both made more frequent and deadly by climate change, creating a more unpredictable world to live in.

For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm Laura Barron-Lopez.

AMNA NAWAZ: Severe weather also dominated Northern Europe again today, as a powerful storm battered the region.

Heavy rainfall inundated Norway, Denmark, Sweden and the Baltic states.

Downpours in Western Sweden sent a river pouring out of its banks, flash-flooding a nearby town.

A day earlier, a train derailed when the rail bed was washed away.

So far, the storm is blamed for two deaths in the Baltics.

Forecasters say the rough weather could continue through tomorrow.

There's fresh evidence of global warming affecting Antarctica.

A study out today finds sea ice in the southern polar region hit a record low in February, and minimal ice levels were 20 percent below the 40-year average.

The findings appear in the journal "Frontiers in Environmental Science."

In Niger, leaders of the military coup rejected a proposed visit today by U.N. and African diplomats.

They cited popular anger at the West African regional bloc ECOWAS and its threat to use force to reinstate Niger's elected president.

Meanwhile, a delegation from neighboring Burkina Faso and Mali arrived in Niger's capital, in a show of support for the coup.

ABDOULAYE MAIGA, Mali Government Spokesman (through translator): To the brotherly people of Niger, these are difficult times.

Mali and Burkina Faso have been through similar ordeals.

We would like to reassure them most firmly of our support and solidarity.

Let us remain resilient and stoic.

AMNA NAWAZ: Later, the president of Nigeria, who chairs the ECOWAS bloc, said the group now prefers a diplomatic resolution in Niger.

Thousands gathered in Ireland today to say goodbye to Sinead O'Connor.

Ahead of a private funeral, mourners lined up to view a procession through the late singer's hometown of Bray.

A hearse carrying the coffin drew rounds of applause and flowers, as fans honored O'Connor's legacy of music and activism.

PAULINE SCULLION, Mourner: She was so passionate, and she was so forthright, and she stood up for people who couldn't stand up for themselves.

And she spoke for people who couldn't speak for themselves.

And she was vilified for it.

And it was just wrong.

And time has proven that she was right.

AMNA NAWAZ: O'Connor died on July 26th in London.

She was 56 years old.

Back in this country, the Supreme Court has reinstated a federal regulation aimed at curbing the spread of ghost guns.

Such weapons, privately assembled from parts, have no serial numbers.

A Biden administration rule sought to change that, but a federal judge in Texas tossed it out in June.

The Supreme Court today set that ruling aside while the legal challenge proceeds.

More than 11,000 Los Angeles city employees were on a 24-hour strike today.

Sanitation workers, lifeguards, and airport staff accused the city of unfair labor practices.

The mayor denied that.

Two other major strikes are already under way in Los Angeles.

Hollywood writers have been off the job since May, and actors walked out a month ago.

Hotel workers have staged job actions through the summer.

And on Wall Street, stocks retreated, as China reported sharp drops in exports and imports, and Moody's downgraded credit ratings for 10 smaller and mid-sized banks.

The Dow Jones industrial average lost 158 points to close at 35314.

The Nasdaq fell 110 points, and the S&P 500 slipped 19.

Still to come on the "NewsHour": Ukraine continues its counteroffensive against Russia, but progress remains slow and casualties continue to mount; questions mount about the lack of consequences for COVID misinformation that led to injury and death; award-winning author James McBride discusses the themes of race, religion, and personal history in his new novel; plus much more.

President Biden headed to Arizona today, where he made an historic announcement, designating some million acres of land around the Grand Canyon as a national monument protected by the government.

JOE BIDEN, President of the United States: By creating this monument, we're setting aside new spaces for families to hike, bike, hunt, fish, and camp, growing a tourism economy that already accounts for 11 percent of all Arizona jobs.

Folks, preserving these lands is good, not only for Arizona, but for the planet.

It's good for the economy.

It's good for the soul of the nation, and I believe with my core -- in my core it's the right thing to do.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE) AMNA NAWAZ: The move would stop future uranium mining projects on the land, marking a key victory for environmentalists and tribal leaders, who have long noted the historical and cultural significance of the land to Native tribes.

Department of Interior Secretary Deb Haaland visited the area and met with tribal leaders just a few months ago.

She joins me now.

Secretary Haaland, welcome, and thank you for joining us.

DEB HAALAND, U.S.

Interior Secretary: Thank you for having me.

AMNA NAWAZ: So, you have described your may visit to the area as one of the most meaningful trips of your life.

Explain to us why this land is so important to indigenous communities.

DEB HAALAND: Yes.

Well, earlier in the summer, we had an opportunity to hike down the Grand Canyon to Supai Village to visit with the tribe there who live at the bottom of the Grand Canyon.

At one time, they were banished from their ancestral homelands.

And it took a lot of work by tribal leaders and supporters and some lawsuits.

And they were painstaking about needing their travel homelands back.

They were back there on the floor of the Grand Canyon.

They had a chance to visit with people where they are.

And it's -- it was astounding.

They're living on the lands that their ancestors lived on, those beautiful blue-green waterfalls.

They cherish that land.

The bones of their ancestors are there.

And so I understand how important that those places are to the tribes.

AMNA NAWAZ: And we should note, statewide, in Arizona, there is broad support for the move that President Biden made today.

But there are some concerns from local ranchers and from others.

Republican Senator Mitt Romney of Utah says renters in Southern Utah will also be impacted.

He also expressed concerns about U.S. energy independence.

He said: "By eliminating this important source of uranium, President Biden has increased both our dependence on Russia and China and our ultimate carbon footprint."

Is he wrong?

DEB HAALAND: Thank you so much.

Well, I will address the collaboration issue first.

We have many public meetings.

This is what you would call collaborative conservation, where tribes and organizations and people get together and work towards something that they want.

But this hasn't gone -- this didn't just happen since President Biden came into office.

This is a decades-long, step by step, one step forward, another half-baby step forward.

People have been working on this issue for decades.

And we're happy that we're able to get it done under this administration.

With respect to the lands that are conserved as a national monument, it doesn't -- it excludes valid existing rights.

And people who have valid existing rights within that area will keep those.

That includes folks who have current mining operations or those claims.

Additionally, we should all know -- and I think most people do know -- that this land has already been -- it's -- we're going with the status quo.

The land has already been protected.

It had a 20-year withdrawal on these parcels of land.

And there are places to mine, and there are places not to mine.

And this area, as I said, with the bones of these tribal ancestors, with thousands of cultural sites and ecosystems that sustain wildlife and species that we don't see every day, those places are too special to mine.

AMNA NAWAZ: If I may, Secretary, the climate crisis message, I'm sure, resonates on the ground in Arizona, where they have seen record high temperatures.

We know President Biden spoke about it as well today.

But broadly among Americans, some 57 percent disapprove of this president, the administration's handling of the climate crisis.

Why do you think that is?

DEB HAALAND: Well, the president today in his remarks talked about his goal of conserving 30 percent of our land and waters by 2030.

He has conserved more land and waters than any president since John F. Kennedy, I believe.

(CROSSTALK) AMNA NAWAZ: If I may, I apologize for the interruption.

I know our time is limited.

Why do you think people disapprove of his handling?

DEB HAALAND: Well, I'm saying I feel very strongly that perhaps the message isn't getting out, right?

I mean, this has -- this has been the best president in modern history for conservation of our lands.

And those conserved lands, they are -- they help avert the climate crisis.

So we're going to keep doing what we're doing.

The president has clean energy goals.

We have conservation goals.

I feel very honored to serve under him.

And we're going to keep moving forward.

AMNA NAWAZ: That is Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland joining us tonight.

Secretary Haaland, thank you very much for joining us.

Please come back soon.

In the federal criminal cases involving former President Trump this week, we have seen the first legal skirmishes, significant questions over venues and evidence and, from Trump himself, a push for the judge assigned to his criminal trial to in D.C. to recuse herself.

Lisa Desjardins has more on the brewing legal fight.

LISA DESJARDINS: The former president has said on his social media platform that he could not receive a fair trial in a case presided over by D.C. District Judge Tanya Chutkan.

Chutkan was nominated the bench by former President Obama and approved 95-0 in the U.S. Senate.

She has issued firm sentences in cases involving January 6 rioters.

This is one of the former president's recent arguments trying not just to shape the trials ahead, but the perception of them, in these important early days.

Joining me now is David Kelley, the former U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York.

David, let's start with this idea of venues.

How often do judges give in this argument, agree with defense attorneys that a venue should change?

DAVID KELLEY, Former U.S. Attorney, Southern District of New York: Venue arguments are rarely granted in federal criminal cases.

They're often thought of.

They're often -- applications are often made for it, but rarely are they granted.

I think part of that is the tremendous faith that the system has and should have in the ability of jurors to abide their oath to try to decide cases based on the fact putting aside any kind of preconceived notions of the issues involved.

LISA DESJARDINS: Now, the judge also in the Florida case, the classified documents case, is raising a different question about venues.

She is asking the Justice Department why they had one grand jury initially start this case in Washington and then transferred the case to a grand jury in Florida.

Trump's team is making a lot out of that.

What do you make?

Is that unusual to have two grand juries for one indictment?

DAVID KELLEY: It's a little unusual, but I don't see it as a big deal.

The grand jury rules for the federal system are free -- are pretty liberal in that regard.

So, for example, if Jack Smith had presented a tremendous amount of evidence in D.C., on this particular case, but then decided the venue was more properly placed in the Southern District of Florida, it would be very simple to, for instance, just sit down with the D.C. - - with -- excuse me -- with the Florida grand jury and simply read to them the transcript of the proceedings before the grand jury in D.C.

So, it's a pretty simple procedure.

And I don't really think it's a big deal for them to have used both grand juries, so long as sufficient evidence was presented to the grand jury in the Southern District of Florida.

And I would -- I would have no question that it has been.

LISA DESJARDINS: Now, the former president is known for taking on his opponents sharply attacking them.

And, as we mentioned, he has said he has problems with Judge Tanya Chutkan in the D.C. case right now.

Our Judy Woodruff spoke to another former federal judge, Michael Luttig, about his accusations against her yesterday.

JUDY WOODRUFF: The former president is criticizing the judge who's hearing the case.

He's saying that he can't get a fair trial and she ought to be removed.

I mean, how does something like that sit in a situation like this?

J. MICHAEL LUTTIG, Former Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge: Now, this is radical and it's unprecedented in American history that any person, let alone a president of the United States of America, would conduct himself toward the courts of the United States in the way that he has already begun to do and will continue.

LISA DESJARDINS: Those are some strong words.

Is this kind of idea unprecedented?

And what do you think the chances are of success for a judge removing herself?

DAVID KELLEY: Look, Judge Luttig is one of the more thoughtful and accomplished jurists in this country.

And I wouldn't disagree with him at all.

I think that the accusations are completely baseless.

I mean, he hasn't even really had any contact with this judge.

And, already, he's making claims that she should be recused.

And it's funny that his own appointee in Florida, he's not making those accusations about it.

And he's had about as much contact with her as he has with the judge in D.C.

So it's really -- it's really unfortunate that he's taking this attack.

And I think it's unfortunate, because I think it sets a really bad example for people in the country, number one.

Number two, from a legal and a strategic standpoint, it gets him absolutely nowhere.

LISA DESJARDINS: I want to step back a little bit and think a little bit more big picture to all of this.

It's the job of every defense attorney to try and poke holes in what the prosecutors are doing.

But, in this case, we know that the Trump team, from my reporting, is raising a very broad idea.

They are asking, I know, if their client can get a fair trial anywhere in this country.

He is a unique defendant.

Most of this country decided whether they wanted him as president or not, has rendered an opinion him.

What do you think of that idea that they are putting out there that any fair jury might be hard to find?

DAVID KELLEY: Look, first off, on both issues, one of the old sayings is, if you have a really good case, you pound the facts.

And if you have a really bad case against, you pound the table.

And that's what we're hearing, a lot of screaming.

No one's really dealing with the facts here.

I don't think it's a fair assessment to say you can't get a fair trial anywhere.

That's really a bogus claim, and that when you look at cases where there have been change of venues motions that have been unsuccessful, you still see at the end of the day a very fair trial, one that is unassailable.

And I think that's what we're going to see here.

This is not an election.

The issues for the jury to decide are not about public policy.

They're not about politics.

They're about facts.

And jurors are sworn to uphold an oath to listen carefully to the facts, to the evidence to the testimony, and make their decision based on that.

And my experience, in having tried a number of cases and been around the justice system, I think jurors -- I like to say that, when anybody comes to me and said they'd like to get out of jury duty, they complain and moan about doing jury service, but, once they take that oath, I find that the vast majority abide their oath dutifully.

LISA DESJARDINS: David Kelley, thank you for your time.

DAVID KELLEY: Sure thing.

Thanks so much.

AMNA NAWAZ: This has been a long and brutal summer in Ukraine, as Kyiv's counteroffensive continues to retake its lands in the east and south now occupied by Russia.

A leading British military think tank today reports that the Ukrainian operation is going more slowly than expected and blames the slow provision of advanced weaponry by Western partners.

Meantime, the fighting and dying continue at a horrendous pace.

In the eastern Ukrainian city of Pokrovsk, a desperate search for survivors a day after a deadly Russian attack, residents still reeling from the shelling that killed at least seven people and wounded dozens, even the most innocent.

Ukraine says Russia launched two missiles, 40 minutes apart, to target rescue workers after the initial strike, a tactic called a double tap.

The attack came late in the evening, destroying vehicles and apartment buildings; 58-year-old Kateryna was at home at the time of the blast, the blood from injuries on her face still fresh.

KATERYNA, Pokrovsk Resident (through translator): The flame filled up my eyes.

I fell down on the floor, on the ground.

My eyes hurt a lot.

Otherwise, I am OK, just the shrapnel in my neck.

AMNA NAWAZ: Meanwhile, Ukrainian soldiers continue the fight against Russia in their now-two-month counteroffensive.

They have Western training, U.S.- and European-made weapons, and seemingly infinite resolve, despite soaring temperatures.

YEVHEN, Ukrainian soldier (through translator): We don't pay attention to heat.

Work must be done.

We don't spare ourselves.

AMNA NAWAZ: At the end of July, Ukraine liberated Staromaiorske in a campaign that aims to cut Russia's land bridge from the east to the south and occupied-Crimea.

But progress has been slow along the 900-mile front line, and it comes at great cost.

There's no official figure for Ukrainian casualties, but at field hospitals like this one near Bakhmut, soldiers stream in from the battlefield, their injuries a relentless reminder of the toll of war.

Ukrainians are facing deeply dug-in Russian forces, who've constructed and fortified hard-to-overcome obstacles, including these so-called dragon teeth barricades and hundreds of miles of concentrated land mines, where now even Russian corpses can kill.

VOLODYMYR, Deminer (through translator): When they leave, they plant quite a lot of explosives under their own soldiers.

And this is very dangerous for us.

AMNA NAWAZ: Despite the front-line dangers, last week, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Ukraine is succeeding.

VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, Ukrainian President (through translator): The occupiers are trying to stop our boys with all their strength.

But whatever the enemy does, it is Ukrainian strength that dominates.

AMNA NAWAZ: For more on the state of the war, we get two views.

Michael Vickers was a senior Defense Department official under Presidents George W. Bush and Obama and served as the CIA's chief strategist during the Reagan administration.

He is the author of "By All Means Available: Memoirs of a Life in Intelligence, Special Operations, and Strategy."

And Jennifer Cafarella is the chief of staff and national security fellow at the Institute for the Study of War.

That's a think tank that tracks military developments.

Welcome to you both.

And, Mike, I want to begin with you and the counteroffensive that we were just reporting on.

You heard President Zelenskyy there say they are succeeding.

What's your assessment?

Is he right?

MICHAEL VICKERS, Former U.S.

Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence: Yes, I think they hold the strategic initiative, but the counteroffensive is going slower and is proving more difficult than I think many hoped.

And while it's important to note Ukraine hasn't committed its primary force yet, they haven't been able to make much progress against a dug-in enemy, numerically superior enemy, that's had a lot of time to prepare defenses.

AMNA NAWAZ: Jennifer, what's your take on that?

Why have they run into -- the Ukrainian forces, run into the problems they have?

JENNIFER CAFARELLA, Institute for the Study of War: Look, the operation that Ukraine has launched is an incredibly difficult one.

And they faced an enemy that had many months to prepare and layer in defensive positions and fortifications.

And what we're watching is the Ukrainians do what all hard-fought military gains require, which is to learn and adapt on the battlefield.

They are learning and adapting, and they are experiencing some success, although they have not yet achieved that breakthrough that we all hope that they will ultimately achieve.

They are stretching Russian forces.

And, as was already mentioned, the Ukrainians have a reserve that they can still commit to the fight, whereas the Russians do not.

So, there are many reasons to think that, while this is a grind, the Ukrainians can still advance.

AMNA NAWAZ: Well, Mike, the expectations, especially from the Americans, going into this counteroffensive were quite high, right?

There was a lot of optimism, the idea that, with the provision of those advanced military systems with the cluster bombs, that Ukrainians could break through those Russian lines.

Were those expectations unrealistic?

MIKE VICKERS: Well, let me say, we have given Ukraine a lot of military assistance, but I don't think we have given them enough to win.

And they can win.

But while the cluster munitions were a big step forward, we haven't given them, for example, long-range surface-to-surface missiles or the army tactical missile system that can reach out 300 kilometers.

The fighter aircraft is still on the way, as are some armored vehicles.

And the ammunition supply is being built up over time.

So, we wouldn't fight the way we're asking Ukraine to fight.

And we hope they will have success.

But if we really want them to win this thing, we're going to have to provide more assistance.

AMNA NAWAZ: Jennifer, do you agree with that?

JENNIFER CAFARELLA: I absolutely would agree.

And I would only add that we would never fight this way, in part because the casualties are so high and the cost is so high.

But, by God, the Ukrainians are committed to this fight, and they are still advancing.

So this is a question of enabling them to advance faster, to reduce their costs, and, ideally, to overpower the Russians before the Russians are able to patch some of the vulnerabilities that have plagued them thus far.

AMNA NAWAZ: Jennifer, what about those casualties so far, though?

We talk a lot about the losses on the Russian side.

What about casualties on the Ukrainian side and the morale there?

JENNIFER CAFARELLA: Well, the Ukrainians are obviously tight-lipped about the actual numbers of casualties that they're experiencing for very good reasons.

But what we know is that Ukrainian commitment to this fight remains extraordinarily high.

The Ukrainians do not seem in any way deterred by the slow progress that they are experiencing on the battlefield.

I think, in many respects, going into this offensive, they may have had more realistic expectations about the nature of the fighting and the costs that they would take than perhaps some in Washington looking at the situation hoping for a major breakthrough.

AMNA NAWAZ: So, Mike, some of the conversation leading into the counteroffensive was, with enough support, Ukraine can make enough gains that they at least improve their position for a better potential negotiating position down the line.

Do you see that happening?

MICHAEL VICKERS: Well, it may take into next year.

There's a chance the Russian army could collapse this year.

But if we want to increase the odds of that outcome -- and I sure hope we do -- we will have to make the political case for it and provide the assistance that I mentioned earlier.

AMNA NAWAZ: Jennifer, what do you make of that?

JENNIFER CAFARELLA: I would say that it's important that we not impose upon Ukraine a desire for what they might regard as a premature negotiation.

The Ukrainian position is clear.

They expect to retake all of their terrain, and they expect the Russians to pay for damages and for war crimes to be prosecuted.

Those are the Ukrainian war aims in this case.

And while, of course, diplomacy always has a place, and we would hope that it would be possible to negotiate an end to this conflict that sees a withdrawal of Russian forces, so far, Vladimir Putin has shown no willingness to negotiate.

AMNA NAWAZ: Mike, do you see this conflict changing shape significantly, as we move into the end of the fighting season later this year?

MICHAEL VICKERS: Well, eventually, weather will slow down offensive operations.

But the conflict has morphed in a variety of ways since the beginning.

And the Ukrainians have performed in a spectacular fashion throughout, but the decisive phase is yet to come.

And, as I mentioned, the Ukrainians will need more assistance to give them the best odds of doing that.

We're asking them to fight, essentially, World War I style right now, when military affairs has moved way beyond that.

AMNA NAWAZ: But if there is not -- Mike, if I can follow with you, if there's not significant amounts of additional support coming, how do you see this unfolding?

Are we moving into a much longer-term, frozen conflict?

MICHAEL VICKERS: So, some of the next tranche of support or more short range anti-aircraft systems.

And that -- while that will help with mobile air defenses, the Ukrainians will need more than that to achieve fire superiority and break through Russian lines and then cut off that land route to Crimea from the Russian mainland.

And that's really the next phase.

AMNA NAWAZ: Jennifer, look ahead for us, if you will.

These concerns about a longer-term frozen conflict, are they real?

JENNIFER CAFARELLA: Concerns about a protraction of the conflict are real and are further argument for why the West needs to continue to not only provide aid, but ideally to accelerate the provision of aid.

But we also need to keep in mind that this kind of war is not going to be linear.

So, I am sure there will be further surprises.

Those surprises can include a loss of Russian morale or a breakdown in Russian defenses at one place on the front line, which could fundamentally change this conflict.

It's very difficult to predict when or where that could happen, but it is very much still on the table.

And so they're very well could be surprises to come in coming months.

AMNA NAWAZ: We'd love to have you both back to talk about those.

Jennifer Cafarella and Michael Vickers, thank you both for joining us tonight.

Appreciate it.

MICHAEL VICKERS: My pleasure.

JENNIFER CAFARELLA: Thank you.

AMNA NAWAZ: What happens when, in the middle of a pandemic, doctors spread misinformation, potentially endangering people's lives?

William Brangham spoke recently with a reporter who set out to answer that very question.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: A new investigation from The Washington Post reveals how doctors who pushed medical misinformation, particularly about dangerous alleged COVID remedies, faced few, if any, repercussions.

One of the lead reporters on that investigation was Lena Sun.

She covers health and infectious diseases for The Post, and joins us now.

Lena Sun, welcome back to the "NewsHour."

LENA SUN, The Washington Post: Thank you.

Nice to be here.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: You looked at complaints against doctors in all 50 states, and from the starting of the pandemic until just recently.

Before we get into what you found, can you tell us, what are these doctors alleged to have been doing?

LENA SUN: It covers the range, but many of the doctors that we looked into that actually were disciplined were prescribing ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine.

Those are two treatments that are shown to be not effective for treating COVID-19.

But they, of course, gained a lot of popularity during the pandemic because they were pushed by former President Trump and his allies.

So that was the prescription side.

But then there were other physicians who were spreading false and misleading statements about vaccines and masks and treatments, saying things like equating the COVID vaccine to needle rape or... WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Needle rape?

LENA SUN: Needle rape, yes.

And that was one Idaho pathologist who is under investigation in Washington state.

Or saying that ivermectin, if you take it, it's up to 90 percent effective in getting rid of the disease.

These are blatantly untrue.

And -- but what happened is that they would fill the vacuum out there on social media.

A lot of people wanted to know -- remember, during the pandemic, there was a lot of confusion.

A lot of people latched on to these conspiracy theories, these ideas, and they would march into the hospital E.R.s demanding these medications.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Were their actual harms that came from these untruths and prescriptions?

LENA SUN: I think what the disciplinary documents show us is that some doctors would prescribe these unproven treatments to people and then, days later, the person died.

Now, they died.

Whether that was a direct linkage, or if it was that they were going to die from other causes, it's not that clear, but we do know that they were prescribed this medication, and then they died.

And then you have to think about the delayed opportunity cost, right?

So if I am prescribing you some quack medicine, and that prevents you from going to get a vaccine or antiviral that could actually prevent you from getting serious disease or dying, well, you know, you figure it out.

The reason this is so important is that, for the American public, doctors are the people who are most trusted, have the greatest credibility.

And for those doctors to go out there and spread this misinformation is a huge disservice and harm.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: So, you examined what happened to so many of these doctors where complaints were alleged.

What did you find overall?

LENA SUN: Well, we surveyed all 50 state medical boards, asked for their records.

It was a very long process.

And we found that there were -- nobody really monitors complaints about COVID misinformation or misleading statements about vaccines and masks.

But we were able to get about -- at least 480 COVID misinformation-related complaints of -- and then we looked at the disciplinary records and showed that at least 20 doctors nationally were sanctioned in some way.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: It seems like a very small fraction.

LENA SUN: It's a very small fraction, because the 480 is not the entire universe, right?

This is just what we were able to find.

A lot of states don't monitor, or, even if they do, they're not going to share it with us.

So, it's a drop in the bucket, I think.

And then, of those 20, five doctors lost their licenses.

Only one had his license revoked, which is the ultimate penalty.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: And how do you explain that?

LENA SUN: The agencies that regulate doctors in this country -- there's over a million licensed physicians in the United States, and they're regulated by state medical boards.

Each one is different.

They're covered under different state medical practices acts in their states.

And they are traditionally, historically, underfunded, underresourced.

They have to be the ones who give you the license in the first place.

They have to do all these other mundane tasks.

They don't have time to monitor social media.

And, in most cases, the complaint process only starts if you -- if there's a complaint filed.

So, somebody has to file a complaint.

And then, finally, these boards are made up of doctors and maybe public members.

And doctors are loath to tread on the right of a physician to do what he or she thinks is in their best medical judgment.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Right, because it is not "illegal" -- quote, unquote -- to off-label prescribe something.

LENA SUN: Right.

Off-label is something that doctors do all the time.

And that's their right.

That's their medical judgment.

But what we have here is doctors prescribing medications that are way outside medical consensus.

It's not like, OK, this might work.

It's -- and this was done after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Food and Drug administration expressly warned against doing this because of potential harm.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Your reporting also shows that not only are these oversight boards overtaxed and have a myriad set of different rules governing them, but, also, some states are taking specific steps to make it harder for them to do their job, specifically about this issue.

LENA SUN: Exactly.

So, already, you have these state medical boards that are underfunded, underresourced.

They have their hands tied, right?

Then you have state legislatures or attorneys general who say, oh, you know what?

You guys, you don't have the authority to discipline any doctors if they're prescribing ivermectin or hydroxychloroquine.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Those drugs specifically?

LENA SUN: Yes, those specifically.

WILLIAM BRANGHAM: Lena Sun of The Washington Post, really a tremendous investigation.

Thank you.

LENA SUN: Thank you.

AMNA NAWAZ: In American cities, two problems loom large, a housing shortage and an office glut, with millions of square feet of office space sitting vacant since the onset of the pandemic.

Office-to-housing conversions are becoming an increasingly popular two-in-one solution for city leaders.

But will they result in housing that's affordable for all Americans?

Paul Solman heads to New York City to investigate.

SHAMS DABARON, Housing Advocate: This is one of the places in New York City where the vacancy rate is so high, the tenants, the people who have been renting these offices, are gone.

PAUL SOLMAN: In Midtown Manhattan, Shams DaBaron, long known as Da Homeless Hero, advocating for those who, like him, lived in New York's shelters.

SHAMS DABARON: Everyone deserves a home.

Housing justice is racial justice.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE) SHAMS DABARON: The owners of these buildings still have to pay property taxes, still have to pay insurance, all of those things with no income.

PAUL SOLMAN: So, eventually, they give it back to the lender.

SHAMS DABARON: Or they just foreclose.

It becomes an empty building.

How does that make sense in an environment where we have so much of a need for affordable housing?

PAUL SOLMAN: A migrant crisis has now swelled New York's already substantial homeless population, driving more than 100,000 to the city's shelters.

SHAMS DABARON: They're horrible places.

So to be warehoused there for years on end, it doesn't make sense.

PAUL SOLMAN: DaBaron himself left them for the streets.

But what's the alternative?

The average rental rate in Manhattan is $3,236 a month for just a studio apartment.

Therefore, says DaBaron: SHAMS DABARON: Let's take these buildings that are now empty, and let's convert those and produce affordable housing there.

PAUL SOLMAN: But, hey, conversions are already happening, says architect Steven Paynter.

STEVEN PAYNTER, Gensler: What we're seeing right now is a lot of developers and owners making that decision to go residential, because there's a lack of confidence in the office market.

And -- but there's also real confidence, and there's a real housing need, especially in places like Manhattan.

PAUL SOLMAN: At 160 Water Street, not far from Wall Street, Paynter's firm is converting a 1972 office building 24 stories high into nearly 600 apartments.

What do you have to do as a designer to make this into housing?

STEVEN PAYNTER: The first thing we actually do is analyze the buildings.

Do they have the right bones, do they have the right structure, the right depth from the elevators to the windows to make perfect units?

PAUL SOLMAN: 160 Water fit the bill.

But the core of the building, 60 feet from the windows, was dark, uninhabitable and useless for apartments.

STEVEN PAYNTER: We have demolished it out and closed it, put some mechanical shafts in there.

And we're actually able to redeploy that space, that density that we had in there to the roof to create some great rooftop amenity that has views across the city.

Yes, so this is actually the amenity floor.

So we have got about 30,000 square feet of amenity up here.

PAUL SOLMAN: For private dining rooms, a terrace, a barbecue.

Now, it turns out conversions, though not quite so amenitized, are old hat in New York.

Obsolete manufacturing spaces and offices became loft apartments in the 1970s.

A push for residential conversion in the '90s turned Lower Manhattan from 9:00-to-5:00 offices into a 24/7 community.

And 9/11 accelerated the trend.

DANIEL GARODNICK, Director, New York City Department of City Planning: Some of these changes felt unfathomable at the time.

And now they're just part of the experience of being in New York City.

PAUL SOLMAN: To Dan Garodnick, New York's director of city planning, much of the city's estimated 79 million square feet of vacant office space -- picture more than 29 Empire State Buildings -- is ripe for conversion.

DANIEL GARODNICK: We have seen our population go up.

And we have not kept pace.

In the last decade, we created 800,000 jobs and only 200,000 new homes.

We have a housing crisis.

We need to find ways to create housing.

PAUL SOLMAN: Well, so what's stopping you?

DANIEL GARODNICK: There's nothing stopping us, other than our own process for changing the rules.

PAUL SOLMAN: Rules dominated by old zoning restrictions, which make conversion of pre-1961 buildings impossible.

In Lower Manhattan, the cutoff was raised in 1977, making 160 Water eligible.

Now, says the city's Garodnick: DANIEL GARODNICK: We now support and want to see mixed-use 24-hour neighborhoods.

So we are looking to update our own rules to allow for more opportunities for office-to-residential conversion.

PAUL SOLMAN: As cities almost everywhere are, says New York University housing policy research director Matthew Murphy.

MATTHEW MURPHY, New York University: Any urban place in the country that has office space - - we all went through the pandemic -- they're all asking the same question.

PAUL SOLMAN: Chicago recently announced a plan to turn about a million-and-a-half square feet of vacant downtown office space into mixed-income housing.

Mayors in Washington, D.C., and San Francisco plan to ease financial burdens to encourage conversions and roll back the zoning restrictions stopping them.

Architect Paynter's firm has looked at nearly 1,000 office buildings in the U.S. and Canada.

San Francisco, Calgary, Calgary, Boston, Chicago, Seattle, Denver, Denver, Denver.

STEVEN PAYNTER: Yes, it's about 30 percent of the buildings across the U.S. and Canada that make good conversion candidates.

PAUL SOLMAN: But here's a question I had.

You may well too.

Will these conversions really do anything to address New York's and other cities' housing crises?

This one will cost literally hundreds of millions of dollars, a cost that will be inevitably passed on to future tenants.

Developer Joey Chilelli: JOEY CHILELLI, Vanbarton Group: Our studios will range from $3,500 up to two bedrooms up to $7,500.

PAUL SOLMAN: The street vendor right on the corner's response?

MAN: Mucho dinero.

PAUL SOLMAN: "That's a lot of money."

No, imposible?

MAN: No.

Mucho dinero.

PAUL SOLMAN: Where do you live?

MAN: Brooklyn.

PAUL SOLMAN: Brooklyn.

Four people, $1,800 a month.

BARBARA LAMOTHE, New York: It's tough.

PAUL SOLMAN: Barbara Lamothe, who was just passing by, is looking to move on from her parents and get a New York apartment closer to where she works, earns $54,000 a year.

This building is being converted from offices to apartments.

A studio starts at $3,500.

BARBARA LAMOTHE: Three thousand, five hundred?

I will never take it.

(LAUGHTER) BARBARA LAMOTHE: I can't afford that.

PAUL SOLMAN: And right on the property itself, there are hundreds of people working here, but they won't be able to afford to live here, right?

I asked a couple, and they said no way.

JOEY CHILELLI: This is not an affordable housing project.

What I will say, though, is that what we are doing, we are helping that overall housing crisis.

PAUL SOLMAN: How so?

JOEY CHILELLI: We are putting more units on the market.

You put more units on the market, you put more supply into the system, and that will bring prices down.

PAUL SOLMAN: Which would mean more affordable housing for some, but, of course, not everyone.

MATTHEW MURPHY: We're not going to get affordable housing, purposeful, low-income housing.

PAUL SOLMAN: Not if the market dictates price, says Murphy.

MATTHEW MURPHY: To get low-income housing or the type of housing that really reaches the workers, that really takes purposeful subsidy.

And that model has worked in New York City.

There's no reason we couldn't make it work for offices too.

PAUL SOLMAN: But, at the moment, the street vendors, construction workers, and the likes of Barbara Lamothe are left out and Shams DaBaron' constituency left out in the cold.

For the "PBS NewsHour," Paul Solman.

AMNA NAWAZ: The National Book Award-winning author James McBride has a new novel out today, "The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store."

Like much of McBride's work, it's rooted in race, religion and personal history.

Jeffrey Brown turns the page for our arts and culture series, Canvas.

JEFFREY BROWN: Rehearsal for a musical called "Bobos."

Make that a would-be musical.

Novelist and musician James McBride actually wrote it 35 years ago, and it's since done nothing, no productions, zero success.

But McBride is unfazed.

JAMES MCBRIDE, Author, "The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store": I just can't let it go, in part because I think it's good.

And, also, I don't mind failing.

Writers, most of what we do fails.

And that's the lesson that writing teaches you.

I tell young writing students all the time, fail, and fail better.

JEFFREY BROWN: By that and pretty much any standard, the 65-year-old McBride, who lives in Lambertville, New Jersey, has been failing quite well.

He's author of five novels, including "Miracle at St. Anna," made into a film by Spike Lee, and "The Good Lord Bird."

ETHAN HAWKE, Actor: My name is Captain John Brown.

And I'm here in the name of the great redeemer.

JEFFREY BROWN: The irreverent Take on the abolitionist John Brown that won the 2013 National Book Award and was later made into a Showtime series.

He's also written a biography of singer James Brown and the bestselling 1996 memoir "The Color of Water: A Black Man's Tribute to His White Mother," the story of his white Jewish mother, Ruth.

Ostracized by her family for marrying a Black man, she converted to Christianity and raised her 12 Black children in New York, much of the time on her own.

McBride's new novel, "The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store," began with the story of another family member, but one he never knew, and only learned about later in life, his grandmother.

JAMES MCBRIDE: My grandmother was Jewish.

And my mother was Jewish, of course, but my grandmother, I never met.

She died in 1942.

But I wanted -- and she died.

And she was an immigrant from Poland.

And she had a very unhappy marriage.

And I wanted my grandmother to be -- to have a wonderful life.

I wanted her to be loved.

So I wrote a book in which she was loved, and I made her loved.

JEFFREY BROWN: So this became a kind of alternate life of a grandmother that -- who you didn't really know?

JAMES MCBRIDE: That I never knew, yes.

JEFFREY BROWN: Through fiction.

JAMES MCBRIDE: Through fiction, yes, yes.

Fiction is magical that way.

Fiction allows your dreams to come true.

JEFFREY BROWN: Like his own grandmother, McBride's main character runs a grocery store in a predominantly Black neighborhood.

He's grounded his fiction in a real place and time, Pottstown, Pennsylvania in the 1930s and '40s.

JAMES MCBRIDE: This is the notebook that I - - that I keep notes in, that I have all kinds of Jewish faith, Friday night, can't touch money.

JEFFREY BROWN: Combing through archives and local histories, he took notes about the largely Black community of Chicken Hill, with a mix of Jews and other immigrant groups, all facing levels of discrimination and antipathy by the surrounding white majority.

JAMES MCBRIDE: Everyone was just kind of trying to stay in their own lane, but it was impossible because of outside influences.

And so, in that regard, Pottstown is a represent - - it's my Mayberry.

Mayberry was where Andy Griffith was, and everyone was happy, and all the folks were white, and everything was good old America, which is just fiction.

Pottstown, my Pottstown, my Mayberry, which is Pottstown, is real.

It's much more real.

It's much more, in my opinion, accurate in terms of its depiction of American life.

JEFFREY BROWN: McBride has always grounded his life in music, often tying it to his writing, as when he toured the country with his Good Lord Bird Band, when that book came out.

He's also taught music to children at New Brown Memorial, the Brooklyn church his parents founded in 1954.

His art, he says, explores big themes in American life, including race, but always through characters he creates who live and survive on the margins, like the people he's known and loved.

JAMES MCBRIDE: If you're a writer and you're writing about race, the best thing you can do is forget about it and deal with the humanity of characters.

You know what the boundaries are.

Now you have to see which characters can kick up against those boundaries or illuminate those boundaries, so -- to make your story go.

So I look at it from that point of view and also from the point of view that cynicism is like -- cynicism in a story is toxic.

You have to really have a desire to see the good in people, to them push past their boundaries.

JEFFREY BROWN: An openness to who they are.

JAMES MCBRIDE: An openness to who they are, because they will lead you into a story that shows you good stuff.

And so I'm trying to get these characters to move to show readers, in a way that's not boring, that this history is important.

Someone came here before you.

And, believe me, it's going to be OK. Watch what he or she did.

JEFFREY BROWN: That sense of hope amid adversity clearly comes from his mother, who died in 2010.

And the story McBride told in his memoir has remained a touchstone for many, as mixed-race families have become more common.

JAMES MCBRIDE: When my mother was -- married my father and had us, and we'd go on the subway and so forth, people would call her names.

Like, I remember, one time in the subway, and somebody went at her calling her N-lover and all this crap.

And we got off the train.

And, later on I said -- I said: "Ma, why do you -- why do you -- you can't let people talk to you like that."

She said: "Their names can't hurt me.

I'm happy.

I just -- what -- did you do your homework?

Where is your homework?"

She didn't care.

She already -- her world was good.

Self-definition is the first step towards self-control and peace.

Now, that journey is difficult, I agree.

And I have been through it.

But, ultimately, the best way to be happy in that regard is to just appreciate everyone for who they are.

JEFFREY BROWN: Read in that light, "The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store," weaving together characters from different backgrounds, is James McBride's latest appreciation of the lives lived just below the surface of American history.

For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm Jeffrey Brown in Lambertville, New Jersey.

AMNA NAWAZ: That's a great line.

Fiction allows your dreams to come true.

Thanks to Jeff Brown.

And that is the "NewsHour" for tonight.

I'm Amna Nawaz.

On behalf of the entire "NewsHour" team, thank you for joining us.