♪ >> From NJPBS Studios, this is "NJ Spotlight News" with Brianna Vannozzi.

>> Hello, and thanks for joining us tonight.

I'm Joanna Gagas.

Coming up, freedom to read -- the debate over challenging and banning books is sparking conversations at schools and libraries across the country, even right here in New Jersey.

Plus, we take a look back at one of our most beloved stories on teens finding hope in the midst of war and turning it into a children's book.

But first, U.S.

Senator Andy Kim talks about the Democrats' chances in the midterm elections and concerns over AI.

Brianna Vannozzi has that conversation next.

Major funding for NJ Spotlight News is provided in part by NJM Insurance Group, serving the insurance needs of residents and businesses for more than 100 years.

-Democrats are looking for a blue wave in the upcoming midterm elections.

To hear what's on voters' minds, Democratic U.S.

Senator Andy Kim recently held a town hall in Hunterdon County where he says residents expressed frustration on issues like affordability and healthcare, but one area of concern that both sides seem to agree on needs to be addressed is AI.

Senator Kim spoke with Brianna Vannozzi about his bipartisan legislation that would put some guardrails on artificial intelligence.

Here's that conversation.

Senator Kim, it's great to have you on the show one last time.

We're six weeks out, I don't have to tell you from the midterms.

You've spent a lot of time in the last year traveling through the counties, through towns, speaking with voters.

What do you think it is that Democrats need to do to earn the vote of folks who have been dissuaded by both parties, who are frustrated with what's happening in Washington, and may feel apathetic, something that I know you talk about quite a bit.

Yeah, I talk about it a lot.

In fact, I have this line I say often where I say, "I believe the opposite of democracy is apathy."

It's if people give up and feel like, "Why bother?"

I just had a town hall the other week in Hunterdon County, right in an incredibly important part of the state right now when it comes to elections, but it's also an area that's been more Republican-leaning in the past.

But what I'll tell you is people there are paying close attention.

They're furious about their high costs of living right now.

They're furious about the gas prices and healthcare costs going up.

And what's important is, yes, we want to point out the things that Trump is doing wrong.

Like, for instance, this war in Iran is deeply unpopular.

Well over 70% of Americans saying that we're on the wrong path, and Trump's not doing enough to end it.

You know, there was a study that keeps track of this saying that Americans have paid over $113 billion more in gas and diesel since the war began, which is over $800 per household.

I mean, huge problems.

But again, it can't just be about what we're against, about what we're for.

And I think showing the people that the Democratic Party is a party that is about standing up to corruption, about reforming our broken political system, because that's where so much of the apathy is, just a feeling that the system is broken.

One thing I heard at the town hall is people across the political spectrum were furious about dark money, about the billions that are being spent to try to push disinformation before the voters.

But the last thing I'll just say, as someone who was a Democrat that won a congressional district that Trump won, is we have to speak human about what we're trying to do.

You know, when I talk about health care, sharing that I have a father that has Alzheimer's and the struggles that my family is dealing with his care, that I'm a father myself of two little boys, and I'm worried about their health care and their needs as they grow up.

That's what breaks through so much of just the rigid tribalism in this country, is recognizing that we're human and that people in political office, that we understand that and feel it too.

- I wanna ask you about that, the healthcare affordability component, because you introduced legislation aimed at cutting down on the time or eliminating the delays that folks who are waiting for social security disability, for Medicare, they're qualified for it, but sometimes they wait many months, even longer before they see that benefit.

What is the bill aiming to do and how did it get to be this way to begin with, this fraud of a process?

- I mean, it's just, it's devastating, especially when you're talking about, you know, people who have real needs, people who have disabilities.

And so what we're trying to do, it's called Stop the Wait Act.

We're trying to cut through the bureaucracy, the head and the paperwork.

And hopefully that's something that again, can reach across the aisle in terms of support amongst the American people.

I came across this statistic that was saying that in about a 10 year period about 109,000 Americans died while they were waiting for their Social Security Disability Insurance, the SSDI, to be approved.

That many, you know, over a million Americans have been kept in wait lists when it comes to Medicare in terms of some of the benefits they provide.

I mean, this is ridiculous.

Like, these are people that need help, people that need care.

There's no reason why we need to be having wait periods and just add more bureaucracy.

So this legislation is about working to get rid of that and trying to make sure that when somebody has a need, it's a real need.

This is not something where you can just kick the can down the road some months or sometimes even years.

And again, I hope that that's something people across the political spectrum can agree on.

Let's make things more efficient and effective in a real meaningful way.

Well, one area where it seems anyway, there's some bipartisan agreement is around a I you had some strong words this week about perhaps not trusting these companies to regulate themselves to slow down on their own and that guardrails need to be in place.

I know you've sponsored a lot of legislation, bipartisan legislation around the industry.

But I guess my my question is, how do you do that without also hindering the industry from growing and the progress?

We've heard a lot about globally, China, the race there.

How do you achieve both?

Yeah, well, first, you got to, you got to show the American people that you care.

And I completely disagree with the president when he calls the American people's concern a hoax.

It is not a hoax.

There are real concerns when you have an industry come forward and literally say that the product that they're creating has real problems and concerns going forward.

I'll be honest like that's rare.

Like I'm in Congress.

I very rarely have heard industry leaders come to us and say, please regulate us.

And so we need to take this seriously.

There are steps that we can take.

I want us to be competitive.

I want American businesses to be leading this technology.

And that's why I have bipartisan legislation called the match act that would help us control the flow of semiconductor chip manufacturing equipment into China.

I think the one thing hopefully we can all agree on is that we don't necessarily want China to be able to have all these tools for them to build these chips themselves.

Every time China has been able to go and manufacture on their own, they have done everything they could to undercut American businesses and businesses around the world.

And we can't let that happen on the most important technology of our generation.

So there are steps that we can take.

So if the president is concerned about China and about our innovation lead them, I call on the president support the match act, support the legislation that we have ready to go.

And while we have that, we can give us space for us to be able to ensure that we are safe about this here at home.

It's not one or the other.

It's not like we have to choose innovation, competitiveness or safety for our kids and our family.

That is something we can do together.

Very quickly, I'm going to switch gears.

You were in Texas.

We know that there was a shooting between ICE agents and a 28-year-old Venezuelan man.

There's been a lot of back and forth about where he's being held and whether he's back in the hospital.

What were you able to learn about that incident?

What can you share with us about anything that you've been told or your colleagues have been told about that incident, which is now three shootings that have happened with ICE agents in Texas just in recent times?

- Yeah, you're absolutely right.

I mean, this is something that keeps a lot of people up at night just when we see the level of violence and escalation in our streets.

We certainly saw it in Minnesota, in Maine, we saw escalation in our streets in New Jersey outside Dulaney Hall.

Thankfully, nothing fatal happened, but we see just that level of challenge that we see.

I mean, look, we're still getting a sense of what happened down in Texas, but what we are just continuing to see is an unwillingness by ICE and DHS to put any effort to push for de-escalation.

You know, I am somebody that has been pushing legislation, for instance, in the Senate, calling for there to be de-escalation training for every ICE officer, every CBP officer.

And unfortunately, the Republicans continue to reject that.

And here, you know, we demand answers to this because people don't feel safe.

So we're going to continue to push.

Do we know if he had a criminal background or if it's confirmed that he was on a final deportation list?

I don't have all the details right in front of me so I don't want to misspeak.

But, you know, again, we need much more transparency about what is out there and what has happened.

But I'll be honest with you, Brianna, like, we still don't have full answers about what happened to Renee Good and Alex Preti in Minnesota.

We've been pushing for an independent investigation there as far as we can see that is not happening.

And, you know, the families of Renee Good are actually here at the Capitol today to be able to talk about their concerns and the lack of answers that they are getting about their loved one.

So again, this is not an isolated incident that we're seeing right now in Fulton, Texas.

We just see over and over again, efforts to cover up what happens, especially when there's a fatality in the mix, as well as refusing to change tactics.

When ICE is buying literally gloves that deliver electric charges, and they want to use that out on the streets here in the United States, like absolutely not.

Don't use taxpayer dollars for these types of tools that are just about delivering more and more violence into our streets when we see the unaccountability that ICE is operating under.

U.S.

Senator Andy Kim has been on our show dozens of times.

We appreciate that accessibility to you.

Thanks for your time.

-No, thanks for serving the people of New Jersey and the American people, getting this information out there.

Thank you.

-The debate around which books belong in the library has gotten heated in recent years, so much so that in 100 and County School District, a police officer will now be at all board meetings.

This as Banned Books Week is coming up on October 4th.

It's a movement that started in the 80s in response to book challenges being raised then.

All of this though raises the broader question who should decide what young people can read?

Joining me now is Jenny Poo, director of the Hoboken Public Library, which is New Jersey's first book sanctuary library.

Jenny, great to have you back on the show.

We're talking about books and book bans.

Now, books have been challenged and even banned for decades, fair to say even centuries, if you go back into, you know, early days in this country.

When we look at right now, the conversation and the dialogue around banned and challenged books, what are typically some of the concerns that you hear, that you see?

First of all, thank you for having me back on.

Yeah, you know, especially in the last five years, what we've seen is a change.

So like you said, historically, there've always been individuals who have challenged individual titles.

What we've seen the last five years is a great increase in network challenges.

So these are challenges coming now from government bodies, from boards, electeds, and so far less from individuals and challenges come in groups of titles.

We all have seen the same titles on the same list.

So years ago it would be one title from one parent, now it could be upwards of hundreds of titles from a handful of individuals using the same language across the country in all these communities.

What does that language sound like?

What are some of those concerns that are raised?

And if you want to get into a couple specifics feel free here.

Absolutely, like we see one right here playing out.

Perks of Being a Wallflower.

This book was published 27 years ago and has been consistently on the top 10 most banned books.

This is, if you haven't read it, this is a coming-of-age novel that explores really difficult themes and gives languages to young people who may not have that.

So the kinds of content that we're seeing being challenged over and again, you know, whether it's content that has sex, sexual content, or explains themes of trauma, of really, really hard stuff, but also universal themes, which is why it's resonated so widely with readers of loneliness, of friendship of coming age, grappling with identity.

This book came out when I was coming of age and was hugely influential.

And it's so interesting to see.

I mean, it's, Stephen's book has been challenged for years, for the same kind of reasons.

The difference now is the kind of pressure that's coming from organized groups, network coalitions with big money behind it, continue to try to pressure libraries, school libraries and public libraries to remove this title, because what's at stake is much larger than just the book.

It's really about who gets a say.

And it's about attacking our First Amendment rights and free speech.

You raise a lot of interesting points.

And really, it's I think, the rise of culture wars as we've seen them.

And you have to look at social media as playing a part in that where more people than ever before are hearing and seeing some of this discourse that goes on.

But in some places, including here in New Jersey in Reddington Township, debate over that book, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, got so heated that now there's police presence required at board meetings.

We saw something similar over a separate book in Wayne a couple years ago.

Many, you know, many instances that we could point to where police presence has been required.

I'm just curious as a librarian what you believe these conversations could and should look and sound like.

Well, you know, it's unfortunate that it's come to this and I think it speaks to the national partisanship and the acrimony that we're seeing across communities.

I mean, ideally, you have civil discourse.

We can agree to disagree.

And I want to say it very clearly, not book is for every reader.

And that's the beauty of having a diverse collection.

This is why librarians go to school, undergo training to be able to ensure that our libraries are diverse and well represented.

Because that shows someone who's exposed to a diverse collection becomes a better reader, a more interested reader.

And so we're seeing play out in communities like Redington right now, which by the way, you probably have covered, that title has already been restricted to eighth grade readers for many years.

So this is something new that's coming from one individual, a board member, who objects over an excerpt of the book without giving any consideration to the totality and the literary value that has been affirmed over the years by readers who have written to Mr.

Szpotsky about how this book has literally saved their lives.

So yeah, we're seeing that play across and it's really, it's also affecting beyond books.

We're seeing it come into policy, legislation, New Jersey, as you know, passed the Freedom to Read Act in 2024, Massachusetts just passed theirs, and to litigation in states like Arkansas and Idaho.

So unfortunately, we're going to continue to see an acceleration of this kind of politicization of our ideas and who we are as a nation play out.

October 4th through 10th is Banned Books Week.

Hoboken Library is participating in that.

What will happen during this week?

- Well, first of all, we're gonna give lots of talks.

We actually are undergoing a temporary renovation so the building won't be open.

We open the next week, but I will be giving, I'll be on panels talking about the freedom to read, talking about why you should read a banned book, why you should make your own opinion.

I wanna highlight that the documentary, the librarians that just won an Emmy Award for merit in filmmaking.

This documentary by Kim Snyder follows this issue in several states, Texas and notably New Jersey, in Hunterdon Voorhees High School, my friend and colleague Martha Hickson, now retired, and also features what this looks like with parents, communities, legislators.

There's a scene in this, I won't give it all away, but there's a scene in Trenton where we're testifying before the assembly.

So I encourage you to, during this week, read a banned book, make your own opinion, attend a library board meeting, reach out to your librarian, you know, ask questions.

If you can, check out the documentary.

It's streaming on PBS and also on Canopy, which is of course is available through your public library for free.

We have just a little bit of time left, but is there a role, what do you believe is the role of parents here in terms of what their children read, having any say or oversight or conversation?

Well absolutely we affirm the right for every caregiver to decide what's appropriate for their decision.

I'm a parent of two kids, and at home, I get to exercise that decision-making.

What we absolutely don't support, and no one should support, is one individual making that decision for someone else's child or for an entire community.

The Freedom to Read is about making sure that we protect your right as an individual to what you want to read regardless of opinion.

And so that's what I think we affirm parental rights and we affirm the First Amendment because we believe that you should make the final decision for your family.

All right, Jenny Poo, director of the Hoboken Public Library.

Thank you.

Great to have you on the show again.

Great.

Thank you so much.

Finally tonight, a look back at an inspiring story about a girl and a cat caught up in the war in Ukraine and the young teen who shared their story with the world.

Our senior correspondent, Brenda Flanagan, brought us this Emmy award-winning report back in 2024, looking at the book "Finding Messi" inspired by the true account of one girl's quest to find her cat after she fled the invasion of Ukraine.

The book was written by a New Jersey teenager who heard their story and made it his mission to help reunite them and share it with the world.

This story is about how two teens connected to create a children's book about the war in Ukraine and a much loved cat named Messi.

The plush kitten belongs to Irina Cherniak, who was 11 years old, living in Kiev when Russia launched the first missile strikes.

Like many families, they fled for their lives and left pets behind.

In the book, Irina tells her beloved Messi, "I will be home soon, my kishka."

On the road with refugees, she remembers explosions.

IRINA, Refugee (through translator): Bombs and siren.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Siren?

IRINA, Refugee (through translator): Yes.

And so scary.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Irina speaks in halting English.

Her mom thought they'd be home in a couple of weeks.

IRINA, Refugee (through translator): All my things was about Messi, how she stay alone at home.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Family and friends tried to rescue Messi, but the terrified cat escaped her carrier in Lviv.

The news devastated Irina, who urged her mother to post Internet photos in a desperate search from their hotel room in Warsaw.

IRINA, Refugee (through translator): Irina forced me to post on the Internet that we lost Messi.

I don't believe in that.

I don't believe.

I said, it's not going to help, because it's a war.

Who will find some cat?

But she said, mom, you need to do post.

You need to do post.

She was ever going to see Messi again.

Kind of just made the whole situation a whole lot worse.

Trevor Osfeldt's a high school junior from Tenafly who met Irina during a trip to bring humanitarian aid to Ukrainian refugees.

His synagogue, Temple Emmanuel, delivered nine thousand pounds of supplies for families stranded by war.

As Irina told their group about how she needed to find Messi, it reminded Trevor about his own pet, Rocket.

Just like losing another thing, like a best friend.

Like, Rocket is-- I spend a ton of time with Rocket.

Trevor's family also has deep roots in Ukraine.

His great-great-grandfather was executed during pogroms there.

His own family fled persecution.

It's not easy fleeing as a little child with your small family, going to a new place where you don't speak the language.

Meanwhile, the search for Messi continued.

People sent photos, and finally, miraculously, one of them was Messi.

Irina's stepdad carried the little cat to Warsaw in Irina's arms.

Her mom translates.

I think it was one of the happiest days in my life.

I started to realize that the story is, number one, inspiring by showing how many people came together you know in a time of war to help a girl get her cat back.

As Trevor worked on writing the book he took care to present a story that helps children understand what it means to be displaced by war.

Finding Messi, who yes was named for the soccer star, resonates with kids.

It's a story of community, arena's determination and hope, says crisis counselor Jen Velton.

Having a very specific goal and not giving up on that goal meant just a world of healing and possibility for her when everything else was shattering.

When bombs were raining down, she felt in her heart, "I can and I will be reunited with this animal."

Even if you don't understand completely the politics of the war, the effects of the war in terms of data, almost everybody understands what it's like to lose a pet.

The book is selling briskly and all of the proceeds go to benefit refugees of the war in Ukraine.

As for Messi and Irina, they're doing OK.

Irina's 13 now in seventh grade.

Messi's back in Warsaw.

Good.

She's so happy, I think.

How are you?

Good.

They're hoping for another miracle to go back home to Kiev.

The book is dedicated to the children of Ukraine.

I'm Brenda Flanagan, NJ Spotlight News.

That's gonna do it for us tonight.

I'm Joanna Gaggis for the entire team here at NJ Spotlight News.

Thanks for being with us.

We'll see you right back here tomorrow.

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