GEOFF BENNETT: Good evening.

I'm Geoff Bennett.

Amna Nawaz is on assignment.

On the "News Hour" tonight: The influential right-wing activist Charlie Kirk is shot and killed at an event in Utah.

Poland and NATO take down Russian drones that violated Polish airspace, raising tensions across Europe and questions over the U.S. effort to end the war in Ukraine.

RADOSLAW SIKORSKI, Polish Foreign Minister: I think it's high time that President Trump should see that Putin is mocking him.

GEOFF BENNETT: And Judy Woodruff speaks with NBA star Steph Curry and Martin Luther King III about their effort to bring communities together through service.

STEPH CURRY, Golden State Warriors: Underneath the surface, we're doing the work that is hopefully meaningful and sustainable, no matter what voice out of Washington is coming out.

(BREAK) GEOFF BENNETT: Welcome to the "News Hour."

One of the nation's most prominent conservative activists is dead after being shot during a political rally at a Utah college campus this afternoon.

In a social media post, President Donald Trump announced Charlie Kirk, the head of the conservative youth organization Turning Point USA, died after being rushed to the hospital from an outdoor event at Utah Valley University.

In the post, the president praised Kirk, saying -- quote -- "No one understood or had the heart of the youth in the United States of America better than Charlie."

In the last decade, Kirk has grown as an influential political figure online and in organizing events on college campuses for conservative causes.

Our Lisa Desjardins has more on the shooting.

CHARLIE KIRK, Founder, Turning Point USA: OK, everybody, welcome back.

E-mail us, as always.

LISA DESJARDINS: Charlie Kirk was a MAGA superstar, a millennial hosting a daily and highly influential radio show on more than 200 stations that reached across generations.

CHARLIE KIRK: That's a lot of people, Utah.

LISA DESJARDINS: Video today showed Kirk speaking at his Utah event, the first in what he called the American Comeback Tour.

As Kirk hosted a segment where he took audience pushback, a shot echoed.

(GUNSHOT) MAN: Oh, my God.

MAN: Go.

Go.

Run.

Run.

LISA DESJARDINS: Crowd events were a staple for Kirk.

He regularly toured college campuses and was the founder of Turning Point USA, one of the largest conservative student and youth groups in recent years.

CHARLIE KIRK: The side that believes in freedom of speech is the side that I believe is on the right side of history.

Has there been an instance, guys, where a liberal has had an open mic on campus where conservative kids can ask questions and you guys feel respected?

LISA DESJARDINS: Billed as the next Rush Limbaugh, this spring, the Salem Radio Network proclaimed Kirk had the number one conservative podcast in the country and number two in all of news.

He drew listeners for his unapologetic style, proclaiming people should say outrageous things.

And, indeed, his words like these on guns could be controversial.

CHARLIE KIRK: I think it's worth to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the Second Amendment to protect our other God-given rights.

LISA DESJARDINS: Kirk was married with two small children.

He was 31 years old.

For the "PBS News Hour," I'm Lisa Desjardins.

GEOFF BENNETT: A university spokesperson said a suspect in the shooting was initially taken into custody, but police soon determined that person was not actually the shooter.

Political leaders on the left and right have expressed their shock over Kirk's murder and condolences for his family.

House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries said political violence is completely incompatible with American values.

Republican Senator Ted Cruz called it an act of unspeakable evil.

For more on Kirk and his influence on the political right, we're joined now by Dave Weigel, who covers politics for Semafor.

Thank you for being here.

DAVID WEIGEL, Semafor: Thank you.

GEOFF BENNETT: The kind of event that Charlie Kirk hosted in Utah with hundreds, potentially thousands of college students coming to listen to him, that was not at all uncommon.

DAVID WEIGEL: Not at all.

The format is important.

That format is going to be remembered, because Kirk did not pioneer, but he sort of perfected this idea of a conservative speaker going on campus and not just being in an auditorium with a guest list, going to the widest possible space, having his people film it, having everyone else film it, and debating students, ideally having somebody in the crowd say something silly that goes viral.

But he took it very seriously.

This is a man who he left college to start this organization was a very -- self-taught in a lot of philosophy, a lot of religion, a lot of history, very confident in his beliefs, his Christian beliefs, and thought he was making converts.

He was making converts.

The organization grew massively every single year he ran it.

GEOFF BENNETT: And he was no outside influencer.

I mean, he was personally close to President Trump.

They would go back and forth on issues, I'm told.

When Charlie thought that things were important to the base, he would tell President Trump.

There was this idea that he had his finger on the pulse of the MAGA movement more so than did some Trump advisers.

DAVID WEIGEL: He did.

They influenced each other.

Kirk started this organization when he was a teenager and it was much more Tea Party-focused, focused on the debt, the debt as a threat to generations.

He did not love Trump at first in 2016.

But Don Jr. loved his attitude.

The Trump family and the Trump Organization elevated Kirk.

Kirk elevated Trump.

And the image that Donald Trump has with young people has improved over the years.

Lots of people are going to take credit for that.

But part of that was Kirk aggressively organizing on campuses, in the media and not just the media that we're on, but on phones.

He was one of the most popular figures with people who were looking at the debate on their phones, scrolling through.

I want to see a video of something interesting.

I want to see interesting debate.

He was open with what kind of guests he'd have.

That was his theory, which Trump really adopted in 2024.

That comes from what a lot of Kirk was doing.

Go anywhere, talk to anybody, make a convert from somebody who might think they hate conservatives.

GEOFF BENNETT: And how did he influence the GOP's posture toward culture war issues, especially on college campuses?

DAVID WEIGEL: Yes, he said in a few of those clips, but think of the time he was coming up in.

On college campuses, this is one of the most -- big issues of our time.

There have been restrictions on what you can say about various identity groups, sexual groups, sexual identity groups, minorities, et cetera.

The conservative position has been, no, complete free speech, you're not allowed to do that.

So he had these traditional conservative views, and he framed them as somebody coming in from outside to say, you are being misled.

Your minds are being shrunk by what is happening on your campus.

You should have an open mind.

And he would think, if you talk to me long enough, you're going to agree with me.

But in terms of the culture wars, very aggressive on transgender rights, but on the entire kind of left-wing critical theory that had grown up over the last 40 years, he was very comfortable debating that.

And in the last nine months obviously with Trump and power winning on that, a lot of these ideas are informing how the Trump administration and -- and there are people in it who worked for Turning Point USA at some point in their careers -- how they view the left, which is, don't apologize, endless combat.

There's some of Trump in there, but Trump was never as comfortable in conservatism as Kirk was.

GEOFF BENNETT: And how does his work compare with earlier conservative youth movements like Young Americans for Freedom or anything that we saw during the Reagan era?

DAVID WEIGEL: Right, well, it was modeled on some of that, but the times had changed.

And, look, William F. Buckley in the 1950s and '60s, for example, did not have to say so much about how it was good to get married.

It was good to go to church.

It was good to have children.

Kirk saw part of his role as combating change in the culture.

And a lot of this is, feminism, is things that have been very mainstream in American politics for quite a while, and saying, no, they're actually making your life worse.

And he had different ways of coming at that.

Some were more combative, some were more welcoming.

But that was what changed.

And he came into the conservative movement at a time where marriages were falling, people were having children later, pop culture had changed the way it covers these life facts.

And that was part of it.

There's a lot of influencers in this space, the manosphere, you could even call him.

He took some of that and moved it into politics, saying, look, you all shouldn't just vote Republican because you want a tax cut.

You should vote Republican because look how happy your life is going to be with this family compared to how you will be angry and left-wing and finding enemies online.

GEOFF BENNETT: And his brand of activism in many ways fit within the broader trend toward politics as performance.

DAVID WEIGEL: Oh, it completely did, just the populist -- we talked about other concerns the past.

William F. Buckley was a big cultural figure and had his weekly show.

But Kirk, like I was saying, was in people's phones all the time.

He was -- he wrote his way, talked his way into the halls of power, had the influence of the president of the United States, first time and more so this time.

Trump has -- who had mastered the media in his own way, has elevated these figures and had an understanding that a lot of people are -- people who didn't used to vote, didn't take politics very seriously can come into politics through culture, through commentary.

So Turning Point USA, again, was growing, and Turning Point Action, the political arm, growing every year, but a lot of what it was doing was saying, all right, you're interested in our content because of this debate we had on campus, this viral video we had, this documentary we had, this reporter who was at a protest.

Here's how you can get involved and help Donald Trump get elected.

Very successful in 2024.

And I saw some of this up close, finding people who never would have cared about politics 10, 20 years ago, but they did care.

They had some issue that got them interested and Turning Point Action was getting them information on their ballots to turn out.

So this is an operation.

You have seen this from people in the White House already saying people will carry on his legacy.

That's some of the legacy that's going to be carried on is this combination of constant contact and attention and political action.

GEOFF BENNETT: Well, our thoughts are certainly with this family.

Dave Weigel, thanks so much for being here.

We appreciate it.

DAVID WEIGEL: Thank you.

GEOFF BENNETT: It was an ominous series of milestones today for the world's largest military alliance.

For the first time in NATO history, alliance airplanes engaged enemy targets in allied airspace.

And for the first time since Russia's full-scale war in Ukraine, NATO opened fire on Russian drones.

Nick Schifrin speaks to the foreign minister of NATO member Poland, where the attack took place, and reports on a day that rattled the alliance.

NICK SCHIFRIN: In Eastern Poland today, the aftermath of a Russian attack, a house destroyed by a shot-down Russian drone, its remnants a reminder of how the war in Ukraine can escalate.

Polish officials say 19 drones crossed into Poland on the alliance's eastern flank, fired not only from Russia, but also from Belarus.

European officials tell "PBS News Hour" the drones flew as far as 300 miles into Poland and the attack lasted seven hours.

It comes at a precarious moment for Ukraine.

Russia continues to achieve small territorial gains, but at enormous cost to its soldiers.

President Trump is vowing to impose economic pressure on Russia, but wants it coordinated with Europe.

Today, President Trump posted: "What's with Russia violating Poland's airspace with drones?

Here we go!"

And, today, Europe says it needs better defenses from those Russian drones, including its own wall of drones on its eastern flank.

Earlier today, I spoke to Poland's foreign minister, Radek Sikorski.

Radek Sikorski, thank you very much.

Welcome back to the "News Hour."

We have seen incursions in the past since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, but this seems to be a larger scale and deeper into Poland.

So how significant is this?

RADOSLAW SIKORSKI, Polish Foreign Minister: As you say, we have had incursions before, both by drones and by cruise missiles.

One of them actually landed 10 kilometers from my house in Western Poland.

But this is different, A, because there were 19 breaches of our airspace.

And, B, the operation lasted for seven hours.

It started before midnight, and we shot down the last drone at 6:30 a.m.

So it's hard to believe that it was accidental.

NICK SCHIFRIN: A senior European official tells me that one of these drones flew as deep as 300 miles, and also that they came not only from Russia, but from Belarus.

Does that indicate to you that this was purposeful, this was intentional?

RADOSLAW SIKORSKI: Indeed.

If it was just an accident resulting from the indiscriminate bombing of Ukraine, you would expect them to come from Ukraine.

NICK SCHIFRIN: Talk about what you believe Moscow intended by this attack.

Were they testing Polish NATO defenses?

Were they perhaps watching how cohesive a NATO response would be?

RADOSLAW SIKORSKI: The Russians are about to conduct a major cyclical exercise at our borders called Zapad.

So, yes, they could have been testing us, but if so, the test, as far as we're concerned, was positive for us.

We shot down the drones.

NICK SCHIFRIN: So what do you think they intended by doing this?

RADOSLAW SIKORSKI: Perhaps intimidation, perhaps trying to affect our information space.

It is -- the kinetic operation is being accompanied with a huge disinformation campaign.

NICK SCHIFRIN: The fact that one of these drones flew more than 300 miles, the fact that, as you say, this lasted for seven hours, do you think the Polish and NATO response was sufficient?

How short is NATO, how short is Poland of air defense and that drone wall you're calling for?

RADOSLAW SIKORSKI: It was effective, but F-16s and F-35s are not the most cost-effective ways of dealing with these swarms of drones.

We need to have a layered defense against this new Russian technique.

NICK SCHIFRIN: And that doesn't exist today?

RADOSLAW SIKORSKI: It needs to be created as a result of lessons learned from the Russian aggression against Ukraine.

NICK SCHIFRIN: Let's zoom out a little bit and talk about the West's willingness and ability to punish Moscow not only for today, but overall.

The European Commission is drafting a new sanctions package that would hit Russian energy revenues and the military industrial complex.

But a senior European official tells me that, this week, President Trump called into a meeting between European and American officials trying to coordinate some of these sanctions on Russia and demanded that Europe impose 100 percent secondary sanctions on China and India for buying Russian energy products.

Is that a step that Europe is willing to take?

RADOSLAW SIKORSKI: Well, President Trump also called on all of Europe to stop importing Russian oil.

The two countries that are doing that are Slovakia and in particular Hungary, which is run by a populist government.

So we hope that President Trump makes the call to Budapest and asks Viktor Orban to stop importing Russian oil and import it from other directions.

I think it's high time that President Trump should see that Putin is mocking him.

Instead of a cease-fire that was supposed to happen before the Alaska summit and serious peace talks, Putin is sending more and more droves, first at Ukraine and now at NATO.

So I hope that, at the end of this process, we have a series of coordinated moves to make President Putin realize that this exotic project of rebuilding the Russian empire will not stand.

NICK SCHIFRIN: President Trump has threatened sanctions on Russia before.

He has not followed through, although he has imposed secondary sanctions on India.

Bottom line, do you have faith that the United States is ready to impose economic punishment on Russia?

RADOSLAW SIKORSKI: We respect peace efforts.

We all want, as neighbors of Ukraine and Russia, to see a peace restored.

But we believe that Putin only answers to the most forceful actions and that Putin has been taking advantage of President Trump's goodwill for too long.

NICK SCHIFRIN: So, given the military pressure that you are trying to help Ukraine impose on Russia, given this economic pressure that we're talking about, do you believe that that combined really could convince Vladimir Putin to stop the war in Ukraine?

RADOSLAW SIKORSKI: Yes, I do, because this war will not end the way Second World War ended, with one party walking into the capital of the other.

It's much more likely to end by one side losing the resources to continue it.

And the Russian economy is already suffering and Russia is still receiving too much income from oil and gas being exported either by means of the shadow fleet or by means of pipelines to Hungary and Slovakia, for example.

NICK SCHIFRIN: And on the military pressure, Europe, of course, is purchasing American weapons to send you Ukraine after President Trump authorized that.

But the Trump administration has restricted the use of some Western weapons to be fired into Russia.

How important is it that that restriction get removed?

RADOSLAW SIKORSKI: Well, I agree with President Trump when he said that you cannot win a war by not attacking enemy territory.

And the Ukrainians have been very successful both at sea and at attacking Russian oil refineries.

There are now gas shortages in Russia, and success should be reinforced.

These are legitimate military targets.

The gas is used to power the Russian war machine.

And I'm sure American help in taking out such targets would be appreciated.

NICK SCHIFRIN: Radek Sikorski, thank you very much.

RADOSLAW SIKORSKI: My pleasure.

Thank you.

GEOFF BENNETT: In the day's other headlines: The Trump administration is appealing a judge's decision to let Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook stay on the job as she challenges her dismissal.

Judge Jia Cobb found that President Trump's attempt to fire cook over mortgage fraud allegations did not meet the threshold for sufficient cause.

Cook denies any wrongdoing.

Meantime, a Senate committee advance the nomination of White House economic adviser Stephen Miran to join the Fed board.

If approved by the full Senate, he'd be the third Trump appointee to join the seven-member board as the president continues to pressure the Fed to cut interest rates.

Three former FBI officials are suing the bureau over their terminations, saying they were part of a campaign of retribution.

Brian Driscoll, Steve Jensen, and Spencer Evans allege the FBI director, Kash Patel, indicated directly to one of them that he knew firing them was - - quote -- "likely illegal," but he did so anyway to fulfill President Trump's desire to remove all agents who helped investigate him.

The lawsuit also names Attorney General Pam Bondi, the Justice Department, and the office of the president itself.

Both the FBI and the DOJ have so far declined to comment.

In Colorado, a shooting at a high school outside Denver has left three teenagers in critical condition, including the suspected shooter.

Authorities say more than 100 police officers rushed to Evergreen High School as students were evacuated from the school grounds.

The alleged shooter is believed to be a student at the school.

No deaths have been reported so far.

A South Korean plane touched down in Georgia today to bring home more than 300 workers who were arrested in a massive immigration raid last week.

It's unclear when the plane will leave and whether the workers will qualify for voluntary departures or be deported.

Earlier today, Secretary of State Marco Rubio hosted South Korea's foreign minister, saying that President Trump has ordered that the matter be resolved swiftly.

Last week, ICE agents rounded up the workers at a Hyundai plant in Savannah.

It was the largest workplace raid of the Trump administration so far.

Meantime, an immigration enforcement effort in Upstate New York boiled over into a dramatic confrontation with protesters.

(CHANTING) GEOFF BENNETT: Video from the scene shows demonstrators surrounding immigration officers and their vehicles on Tuesday after agents took a roofer into custody at a job site.

The remaining workers refused to come down as the crowd rallied to their support.

The episode ended with agents retreating from the site and a Customs and Border Protection vehicle being taken away with four flat tires, which had reportedly been slashed.

In France, protesters clashed with police today in the latest challenge to President Emmanuel Macron's government.

In one instance, police used tear gas on crowds near a Paris high school.

Across that nation, authorities arrested more than 400 people at hundreds of protests related to the so-called Block Everything movement.

It started online this summer and called for a day of action against government budget cuts, among other grievances.

Protesters outside of an Amazon warehouse said they were rallying in support of workers there and called on President Macron to resign.

NINA, Protester (through translator): A dynamic has been created and self-organized.

It's truly a citizens movement that has organized itself.

Personally, at least, I will be there until the end to be able to fight and to really get the message across that we can't take it anymore and that Macron has to go.

He's the cause of all this.

GEOFF BENNETT: The latest unrest comes just a day after President Macron selected a new prime minister, his fourth in just a year.

In Nepal, troops are patrolling the streets of the capital, Kathmandu, as the military there tries to restore order after two days of violent protests.

At least 25 people were killed as public anger over a short-lived social media ban boiled over, forcing the country's prime minister to resign.

Talks began today to select an interim government, though no decision has been made.

Meantime, a cleanup effort has started following chaotic scenes that saw damage to the country's main parliament building, presidential house and government offices.

Cuba suffered a total blackout today amid ongoing problems with its aging infrastructure and fuel shortages.

Energy Ministry officials attributed the most recent outage to a malfunctioning thermoelectric plant, but an investigation is still ongoing.

This is Cuba's second major outage this year after a similar blackout back in March.

Officials say work is under way to restore power to Cuba's roughly 10 million people.

On Wall Street today, stocks ended mixed ahead of tomorrow's highly anticipated inflation data.

The Dow Jones industrial average fell more than 200 points on the day.

The Nasdaq added just six points, so about flat.

The S&P 500 closed once again at a new all-time high.

And we have some news from Mars.

Scientists say that NASA's Perseverance rover has discovered rocks that are being called the clearest sign of ancient life on that planet.

The stones are composed of finely packed sediment.

Close analysis reveals that they contain green, black, and white dots resembling minerals that on Earth are associated with microbial activity.

Researchers say the rocks will need more analysis, ideally in labs back here on Earth, before they can reach any firm conclusions.

Still to come on the "News Hour": the global fallout from Israel's strike on Hamas leadership in Qatar; how the National Guard is being used to combat crime in New Mexico at the behest of its Democratic governor; and a new book examines how artificial intelligence may be exacerbating sexism.

Today, the leader of the United Arab Emirates visited Doha to express solidarity with Qatar one day after an unprecedented Israeli attack on the Gulf nation, which is a major non-NATO ally of the U.S. Israel's airstrikes that targeted Hamas' political leaders reportedly failed to kill them, but rattled the region.

To discuss the attack and the regional ramifications, we turn to Marwan Muasher.

He's the vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

And he's also the former foreign minister of Jordan.

He joins us now from Amman.

Marwan Muasher, welcome back to the "News Hour."

MARWAN MUASHER, Former Jordanian Foreign Minister: Thank you.

GEOFF BENNETT: Israel's strike in Doha aimed at Hamas leadership was the first acknowledged strike on a Gulf state.

In your view, what message does it send to the broader region?

MARWAN MUASHER: I think the primary question that the region is asking today is, is regional peace a priority of Israel?

Because, judging from Israeli actions coupled with Israeli statements that they intend to annex the West Bank, it does not seem that regional peace is of any priority to Israel.

I think what it is also doing is, it is killing the prospects of any expansion of the Abrahamic Accords.

The Abrahamic Accords were a cornerstone of U.S. policy, both for the Biden administration and the Trump administration.

Today, there is not just no chance for Saudi Arabia to join the Abrahamic Accords because of this action, but even Gulf countries who have joined, like Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, are today, I think, revisiting their stand.

The UAE president was in Qatar today.

And, as I said, the whole issue of whether Israel regards peace as a priority is being seriously questioned in the region.

GEOFF BENNETT: The Qatari prime minister in an interview with CNN today, he called the Israeli attack an act of state terror and said that Qatar is reassessing everything about its mediating role.

Looking ahead, what are the long-term consequences if that country, which is one of the few players willing to mediate between Hamas and Israel, if they back away from their role?

What's the impact on any sort of future regional peace effort?

MARWAN MUASHER: I think it's very difficult to think today of Qatar resuming its mediation efforts, when it feels at risk that Israel is going to strike at the very negotiators that it is dealing with.

But, beyond that, it is going to be very difficult for any country to step in and mediate the release of Israeli hostages.

And so it has stark consequences on the region.

Unfortunately, it has stark consequences on the Israeli hostages themselves.

I think talking about peace in general today in the region is becoming very, very difficult with Israeli actions that are being taken without accountability.

Since October 7, Geoff, at least five Arab countries were bombarded by Israel -- Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, Qatar, not to mention Iran, of course, which is not an Arab country, and Tunisia, and without accountability.

Israel is clearly violating the U.N. Charter without any country in the world basically taking any action against it.

GEOFF BENNETT: What does this episode reveal about the Trump administration's influence and leverage in the region?

MARWAN MUASHER: Look, if the Trump administration has not been able to stop Israel from hitting a U.S. ally which has played a central role in releasing the vast majority of Israeli hostages, if the Trump administration is not able to implement its own priority in the region, which is expansion of the Abrahamic Accords, as I said, that says a lot about the Trump administration's ability to rein in its principle ally, Israel.

GEOFF BENNETT: Of course, there's the other view, that Hamas could release the hostages, and that would bring about an end to this, to which you would say what?

MARWAN MUASHER: The deal on the table is that Hamas has said it repeatedly.

It is ready to release all the hostages in return for an end of the war on Gaza.

But what it is being presented with is, release all the hostages, then we will come back and kill you and hit back at you.

And without agreeing with what Hamas did in October 7, it is not something that Hamas obviously is ready to accept.

I think Hamas has indicated repeatedly its willingness to release all the hostages.

But, in return, the war on Gaza needs to stop; 65,000 Palestinian civilians have been killed so far, with no end in sight.

GEOFF BENNETT: Marwan Muasher, thank you for your perspective this evening.

We appreciate it.

MARWAN MUASHER: Thank you.

GEOFF BENNETT: President Trump's emergency declaration in Washington, D.C., that gave his administration control of local police is set to expire tonight.

That, along with his deployment of National Guard troops to the city, has drawn sharp criticism from any Democrats, who have called it government overreach.

But, in New Mexico, a Democratic governor who deployed the National Guard has seen violent crime fall in her state's largest city.

In April, Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham ordered about 70 Guard members to assist Albuquerque police with duties like securing crime scenes, patrolling transit and traffic control.

And the governor joins us now.

Welcome to the "News Hour."

GOV.

MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM (D-NM): Thank you for having me.

I appreciate being on the show.

GEOFF BENNETT: So why did you decide to deploy the New Mexico National Guard to Albuquerque to support the police department there?

GOV.

MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM: Well, a multitude of reasons, but the biggest one is, public safety is a concern of every governor in the country.

I want all of my residents and constituents to feel safe wherever they are, on the road, at work, at home, at school, at church, all of it.

And I have got 1,000 fewer police officers in the city jurisdiction of Albuquerque than New Mexico had a decade ago.

There's a big difference between what I'm doing and what the Trump administration is doing.

I'm about cooperation and supporting community policing, not occupation.

I don't control the police.

I'm not taking over a jurisdiction or a city or a county.

I'm trying to give them the resources that they need to do the jobs that they were trained to do and then keep our communities safer.

GEOFF BENNETT: And on the ground, how is the Guard's role in Albuquerque different from what we have seen resulting from the president's decision to deploy the National Guard to Washington, D.C., and then, prior to that, Los Angeles?

GOV.

MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM: Well, first of all, there's no militarization of any of the policing.

So you don't see tanks.

You don't see men and women in riot gear.

You don't see a giant troop sort of just deployed in the middle of a city.

This is strategic, smart.

And, by and large, the National Guard is behind the direct community policing.

And what I mean by that is, is that they're doing the surveillance work.

They're doing the arrest, transportation and bookings.

They're doing the medical transports when that's required of an arrestee.

They're making sure that they're doing all the dispatch calls.

They are helping us with bus safety and transportation.

They're doing the kind of background work that allows for more police time on the streets and communities.

And to put that in perspective, since the start of this mission, the Guard has added 4,000 hours of direct policing time, which has led to more arrests, more deterrent -- and I can give you two really good examples of that - - and the kind of synergistic support that, frankly, our police departments do need, and I believe ultimately want.

But the police department in Albuquerque is in charge of the operation.

The State Police are doing what they do best.

They're integrating their support to the local jurisdiction.

And the Guard has been trained on this strategic mission.

GEOFF BENNETT: It sounds like that approach, as you describe it, is working, but is it sustainable?

GOV.

MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM: It's tough to sustain.

It is sustainable for the near future.

I'm getting into a season where it's easier to do this work because I have fewer fires, weather is changing, fewer floods, fewer of those kinds of emergencies that the Guard has to be available to do first and foremost.

But it speaks to another issue where I think the feds could be more helpful here.

We have seen huge increases in their budgets, but I'm not seeing that presence in New Mexico in this way.

I'd like to have more federal prosecutions.

I need more lawyers.

I'd like to see more U.S.

Marshals.

I'd like to see more FBI personnel.

I'd like to see more DEA and AFT personnel.

Now we're talking about being strategic and smart and elevating the amount of trained, qualified police officers or policing entities helping with our public safety issues.

When you have 1,000 fewer police officers than you did a decade ago, you're going to have to shift the way in which you do things.

And so I asked several administrations for that assistance, and I have certainly alerted the White House informally to date -- that could change -- that they ought to be putting more into their federal offices in states like New Mexico and along the border.

We could do a lot more in our drug interdiction work as a result.

I mean, my Guard already does that with the feds.

We ought to do more of that.

That makes people in Albuquerque and the rest of the state much safer.

GEOFF BENNETT: Speaking of the federal government, the Justice Department recently labeled Albuquerque one of 17 sanctuary cities nationwide, and it says it plans to bring litigation as a result.

What's your response to that designation?

And, more broadly, how are New Mexico cities engaging with federal immigration enforcement?

GOV.

MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM: Interestingly enough, if you were to just put a political lens on New Mexico, like any state, we have very Democratic or blue cities.

We have very red cities and counties.

And as the Trump administration was trying to get a sense about how many law enforcement jurisdictions, remember, they don't work directly for me as the governor, how they would help them with indiscriminate and I believe unconstitutional immigration enforcement and detentions and deportations, I'm not aware of any law enforcement jurisdiction anywhere in the state agreeing to that cooperation, because I think ultimately, it takes them away from the core public safety work that they must engage in.

And they -- I think they believe and understand that it's unconstitutional.

And if you don't believe that, it's certainly indiscriminate and unfair.

The sanctuary city has been an easy way for far too many jurisdictions, at least in my opinion, to try to declare that they're going to do right by all of their laws and efforts at public safety.

But immigration enforcement is, in fact, a federal issue.

What we all want is for Congress to pass a bipartisan, smart and fair immigration bill, so that you can get visas and come to the United States legally, that we use smart security and safety measures at the border, more technology.

And I don't think most folks in Congress are complaining or governors that we don't need more border personnel.

Strategic, smart, deal with the problem, depoliticize it.

GEOFF BENNETT: New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, thanks again for joining us this evening.

GOV.

MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM: Thank you, Geoff.

It's a delight.

GEOFF BENNETT: Artificial intelligence and emerging technologies are already reshaping the world around us, but how are age-old inequalities showing up in this new digital frontier?

In "The New Age of Sexism," author and feminist activist Laura Bates explores how -- bias now being noted everywhere from ChatGPT to the Metaverse.

That's the immersive virtual world launched by Meta back in 2021.

She recently spoke with Amna Nawaz about her new book.

AMNA NAWAZ: Laura Bates, welcome to the "News Hour."

Thanks for being here.

LAURA BATES, Author, "The New Age of Sexism: How A.I.

and Emerging Technologies Are Reinventing Misogyny": Thank you for having me.

AMNA NAWAZ: So this is your eighth book, correct?

You have spent years documenting, studying and writing about sexism and misogyny in all parts of our world.

But there is an urgency to this book, because, to be clear, you're not talking about what could happen.

You're talking about what's already happening.

And you say that we're on an edge of a precipice.

What does that mean?

LAURA BATES: Absolutely.

I mean, our world is about to be transformed by A.I.

and other emerging technologies in ways that I think it's hard for people to fully grasp, socially, culturally, economically, in terms of education, in terms of news media, in terms of the financial services industry, the criminal justice sector, you name it.

It is about to be changed.

And, right now, the foundations of those new forms, those new worlds are being built.

What's happening is that we are seeing that emerging technologies and A.I.

in particular are re-embedding existing problems, particularly structural inequalities like sexism and racism, into the foundations of that new world that we will all be living in.

So, if we don't act now, if we don't talk about this now, it's going to be very difficult to unpick later on.

AMNA NAWAZ: Just to kind of set the groundwork here, when you talk about the intersection of misogyny, sexism and these new technologies, how different are the experiences for men and women online and dealing with these tech?

LAURA BATES: I mean, they are so dramatic that it is almost like a different world.

For example, we know that women are 17 times more likely to experience online abuse than men are.

If we look at some of the forms of tech that are used to facilitate abuse, this is an overwhelmingly gendered problem.

For example, deepfake technology, we know that 96 percent of all deepfakes created are non-consensual pornography, and we know that 99 percent of those are of women.

In fact, most of these tools don't even work if you put in a picture of a man's body.

And it has a huge impact on uptake.

So, we're about to have a world transformed by A.I.

But, already, if you look at the 16-to-24 age bracket, 71 percent of men in that age bracket say that they're already using A.I.

weekly and only 59 percent of women.

So there is a huge gap in terms of access to tools that's caused by that difference in experience.

AMNA NAWAZ: The section on deepfake images and video really startled me, because you wrote about this division between men and women on there.

You said that you discovered as you researched -- quote -- "I found thousands of deepfake videos depicting every female celebrity you can think of.

I didn't see a single deepfake porn video of a male celebrity, not one."

LAURA BATES: Yes.

AMNA NAWAZ: Why not?

LAURA BATES: Well, partly because the tools literally have not been built to create them, and partly because we know that this is a very old problem.

Misogyny and violence against women and girls is so widespread.

This is a new iteration of it.

It impacts women to such a vast degree.

For example, one in six congresswomen here in the U.S. have experienced this particular form of abuse.

It is a huge problem for women, and it is very different for men.

AMNA NAWAZ: And I want to point out too, this isn't something you're writing about hypothetically or something you're just studying.

You have lived through this yourself.

Tell us about that and the impact it had on you.

LAURA BATES: Some of the men who were angry about my previous book, "Men Who Hate Women," chose to take out that anger by sending me deepfake pornographic videos that they had created of me.

These videos are highly realistic.

It is somebody who has taken your likeness, your face exactly as it is, and a video that looks seamlessly as if it is your body, and then chosen to create hugely abusive pornographic material, which you then -- not only watching it is like a gut punch, a huge shock, but you also know that that person may have shared it, may have spread it across the Internet, may have posted it on different Web sites, that other men, hundreds of other men may have downloaded it, may have kept it.

It is something that is utterly violating and utterly beyond your control.

And if it is so impactful for me, as somebody who is pretty seasoned in this space -- sometimes, I will get 200 death threats on a bad day.

I am used to this stuff.

AMNA NAWAZ: Two hundred death threats?

LAURA BATES: On a bad day, you can get maybe 200 rape threats and death threats.

So I already know about this stuff.

so imagine the impact on a schoolgirl who is 11 years old, and this content is being created of her and being spread.

Some of the girls that I write about in the book, they are 11 when this is happening.

They are developing PTSD.

They are dropping out of education.

Or you are a politician being driven out of an important job, a public service role that you love by this visceral form of abuse.

AMNA NAWAZ: Well, let me put to you what some of the folks in the tech industry would say in response to this, because you do quote who is now the former president of global affairs at Meta, Nick Clegg, who said it is kind of unfair to hold tech companies responsible for the behavior that people engage in on those platforms.

And he wrote -- you quote him in the book, as saying: "In the U.S. we wouldn't hold a bar manager responsible for real-time speech moderation in their bar, as if they should stand over your table, listen intently to your conversation, and silence you for things that they don't like."

What would you say to that?

LAURA BATES: Well, the first thing I thought when I read that quote was that many bars are not safe spaces for women.

You know, these are places where women experience abuse and harassment on a regular basis.

But I also think we need to think about what it is that the Metaverse and other spaces like it want to become, because they don't just want to be social and recreational spaces like bars.

They are pouring billions of dollars a year into creating a world where they hope that we will be attending virtual university lectures in lecture theaters in the Metaverse.

They hope people will be doing business there, meeting in virtual boardrooms.

And those spaces, I think we would hold to a higher standard in terms of safety.

There is also a part of me that thinks, if you want to create an entire new world, don't you want to start out by setting the bar a little higher?

AMNA NAWAZ: Are there policy prescriptions we should be looking at?

Do you see the work being done to regulate this or to stop it from getting worse than it already is?

LAURA BATES: So it is regulation and policy that we need.

And nobody is saying we shouldn't develop.

This isn't about being anti-tech.

But with any other industry, we would expect those commonsense guardrails at the point of rolled-out products to the public, right?

We wouldn't expect big food conglomerates to say, well, some people will die of salmonella, there's not much we can do about that.

We would accept that there should be safety regulations in place.

With tech, we just don't tend to have that same approach.

And so what we are seeing is that places like the European Commission are putting together frameworks of what commonsense safety protocols could look like for A.I., but we are also seeing enormous amounts of government pushback, not least here in the U.S., where President Trump recently signed an executive order really with the opposite aim in mind of, preventing DENI (ph) initiatives or policies from being enacted in tech firms and in A.I.

products specifically.

AMNA NAWAZ: The book is "The New Age of Sexism."

The author is Laura Bates.

Laura, thank you so much.

LAURA BATES: Thank you.

GEOFF BENNETT: Judy Woodruff has more now on a new partnership in Oakland, California, seeking to bring communities across the country together through service.

It's part of her series America at a Crossroads.

(CHEERING) JUDY WOODRUFF: This ear-splitting welcome during assembly time at the Martin Luther King Jr.

Elementary School in West Oakland was for some very special guests.

STEPH CURRY, Golden State Warriors: What's up, everybody?

Hello, hello, hello.

(CHEERING) STEPH CURRY: That's the energy I'm talking about.

That is why we are so excited to be here.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Standing next to the son of the civil rights icon, Steph Curry, the four-time NBA champion for the Golden State warriors, is about as big a celebrity as you could ask for in this city.

STEPH CURRY: You all have fun at school?

(CHEERING) STEPH CURRY: You all have fun at school?

JUDY WOODRUFF: Six years ago, around the time the Warriors left here to move to San Francisco, Curry and his wife, Ayesha, decided they couldn't walk away from this community with so many in need.

They started their Eat.Learn Play.

Foundation, supporting children's well-being through access to healthy food, literacy and play.

AYESHA CURRY, Eat.Learn.Play.

Foundation: These are the pillars and the foundation of what makes a child have a happy, thriving, healthy life.

JUDY WOODRUFF: The Currys were here to announce a new partnership with Martin Luther King III and his wife Arndrea Waters King's Realize the Dream Initiative, a nationwide call to action to mobilize 100 million hours of service by 2029, the 100th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s birth.

MAN: That's 100,000 hours right there.

JUDY WOODRUFF: The partnership pledges 100,000 volunteer hours here, a city where one in four African Americans and one in five Latinos live at or below the federal poverty line.

STEPH CURRY: It is very surreal to kind of be here in this moment, planting our flag in Oakland, to have a moment here at Martin Luther King Jr.

Elementary School and just the idea that we're a part of a -- not only a local movement, but a national, hopefully global movement of what service and volunteerism really means and following the legacy of Dr. King.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Coretta Scott King visited here way back in 1972, so this school is particularly important for the King family.

MARTIN LUTHER KING III, Civil Rights Leader: One of the things dad used to say is, everyone can be great because anybody can serve.

JUDY WOODRUFF: The school is the 21st that Eat.Learn.Play.has transformed here in Oakland.

When we visited last week, there was a book giveaway, a new playground and basketball court were being built, new murals painted and new gardens planted.

Roma Groves-Waters has been principal here for nearly 17 years.

Do you see a tangible difference that the Currys are making in Oakland?

ROMA GROVES-WATERS, Principal, Martin Luther King Jr.

Elementary School: Oh, yes.

The way they transform playgrounds, they make kids want to come to school.

So it helps with the chronic absenteeism.

It helps with uplifting the kids' spirits, as they're walking around -- they can walk around with something nice for a change.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Known as the West Coast center of blues music, West Oakland hosted singers like Billie Holiday and Aretha Franklin.

It's also where the Black Panther Party got its start.

But, today, the seaport, highways, a subway system and Oakland's main post office have displaced many in this historically Black neighborhood and contributed to high rates of childhood asthma in a place that offers few options for healthy food.

ROMA GROVES-WATERS: In 2025, we're still living in an area of the have and have-nots, like people have things and a lot of the kids here don't.

But we bring the joy to the kids when they come to the school.

JUDY WOODRUFF: That joy could be seen on the students' faces as they soaked in the celebrity guests, who told us they love the smiles, but are here to make a difference in the long run.

STEPH CURRY: You know, it doesn't happen overnight, but the idea that you can change the experience, school experience for a generation of kids, like, it's a very lofty goal, but it's something that we're committed to, not just financially, but with a clarity of thought about what impact really looks like and how to measure it.

JUDY WOODRUFF: At the nearby Bethlehem Lutheran Church, people gathered for a fireside chat with the Kings and the Currys.

Arndrea Waters King said her 17-year-old daughter inspired their most recent call to action, concern for the world she would inherit.

ARNDREA WATERS KING, Civil Rights Leader: At a time when we seem more divided than ever, at a time when services that are so needed in our communities were being cut away, we wanted young people to find themselves.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Her husband reflected on how his parents persevered in their own turbulent times.

MARTIN LUTHER KING III: I think my father and mother throughout their lives, if there was a -- if a person was 90 percent unfortunately bad, dad and mom would focus on that 10 percent good and work to extract that out of the human being.

And so this process, this project helps to extract good out of everyone.

JUDY WOODRUFF: But he suggests, even for him, it's not an easy task in this particular moment.

DONALD TRUMP, President of the United States: This week, I will also end the government policy of trying to socially engineer race and gender into every aspect of public and private life.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Since taking office in January, President Trump has pledged to end what he calls the tyranny of so-called diversity, equity and inclusion, saying that our country will be "woke no more."

In a backlash against the 2020 protests over the murder of George Floyd, DEI programs have been dismantled across corporations, higher education, and the federal government.

And Trump has sought to roll back protections offered by the 1964 Civil Rights Act, a landmark law and monumental achievement by Martin Luther King Jr. MARTIN LUTHER KING III: If dad had lived, we as a nation and world would be on a different trajectory.

Our challenge today is still working to get to that different place.

As a person who had a front-row seat for the modern civil rights movement, it is really terrible to be at this juncture.

But my mom used to say something that was so interesting.

She said, freedom is never fully won.

Each generation must engage to actually extend and sustain freedom.

So I was hoping she'd be wrong.

(LAUGHTER) MARTIN LUTHER KING III: I said, Mom -- but what she said is just so true.

I see it.

And it's reinforced.

ARNDREA WATERS KING: I don't know anyone that has lived through the past few years that has not felt that they were touched by chaos.

This is a way for us all to come together and build community.

I think that there is a thirst, there is a desire, there is a yearning for us all to find something that we can agree on.

STEPH CURRY: While all the noise and the politics might be the loudest voices in the room, might be pointing us in the wrong direction, like, underneath the surface, we're doing the work that is hopefully meaningful and sustainable, no matter what voice out of Washington's coming out.

We're going to continue to show up.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Do you hear that, people saying, can it make a difference at a local level?

Can it affect the whole country, ultimately?

STEPH CURRY: I think what we're trying to do in Oakland is create a model for what real impact looks like.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Through their Eat.Learn.Play.

Foundation, the Currys have reached 35,000 Oakland students and raised and invested $90 million in the community.

STEPH CURRY: I don't care which -- what your background is, which side of the line or the aisle you sit on, what experiences you have had in your life or what's informed those.

Like, at the end of the day, we understand, for a kid to have a proper childhood, those three pillars need to be there.

AYESHA CURRY: It's going to take the community.

It's going to take people locking arms and doing it together.

And so I just want to remind everyone that, when we go out to do this community service and these acts of service, it shouldn't be what we're doing.

It just needs to become who we are.

And I think we will start to see the change once it just becomes a part of our nature.

JUDY WOODRUFF: A call to service at this divided moment.

For the "PBS News Hour," I'm Judy Woodruff in Oakland, California.

GEOFF BENNETT: And that's the "PBS News Hour" for tonight.

I'm Geoff Bennett.

For all of us here at the "News Hour," thanks for spending part of your evening with us.