GEOFF BENNETT: Good evening.

I'm Geoff Bennett.

AMNA NAWAZ: And I'm Amna Nawaz.

On the "News Hour" tonight: Desperately needed food enters Gaza, but a new group distributing the aid comes under scrutiny.

GEOFF BENNETT: President Trump pardons a convicted tax offender after his mother attended a $1 million fund-raiser at Mar-a-Lago.

We speak with the Justice Department's former pardon attorney about the implications.

AMNA NAWAZ: And an online university rethinks the college experience by offering students around the world an inexpensive education.

SHAI RESHEF, President, University of the People: I saw that you actually take people and give them their education, their future is totally different.

(BREAK) AMNA NAWAZ: Welcome to the "News Hour."

There is a new aid distribution system in Gaza, and, today, it was quickly overwhelmed by Palestinians who for 11 weeks have been blocked from international assistance.

GEOFF BENNETT: The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation is backed by the U.S. and Israel, which says the old U.N.-led distribution system allowed Hamas to flourish.

But humanitarian groups today said the new system was incapable of alleviating the suffering of two million people and could be used to help Israel forcibly move the population.

Nick Schifrin reports.

NICK SCHIFRIN: This is what aid distribution in Gaza now looks like, with Israeli warning shots in the distance, the hungry grab boxes designed to feed a family of five for three days with pasta, rice, cooking oil, beans, and tomatoes.

MAN (through translator): These boxes provide somewhat of a solution to the crisis.

It has been over 88 days since the crossings were closed and we are suffering from a great famine.

MAN (through translator): We are dying of hunger.

The children are saying: "Father, I want to eat."

So I want to sell even my blood to feed them.

NICK SCHIFRIN: Humanitarian officials have been warning against these sites because they funnel and screen the desperate into small areas.

They are also secured with private American contractors and the Israeli military, today's warning shots apparently injuring at least three.

Even the group's initial head quit this weekend because he said the effort couldn't be done with humanity and impartiality.

But Israel says these sites are necessary because Hamas has stolen U.N. aid to maintain its military capacity, an accusation the U.N. denies.

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, Israeli Prime Minister: The idea is basically to take away the humanitarian looting as a tool of war of Hamas, to give it to the population, eventually to have a sterile zone in the south of Gaza, where the entire population can move for its own protection.

NICK SCHIFRIN: The Israeli military has enlarged what it calls a buffer zone along the Gaza border, a corridor that bisects Gaza, and this weekend launched what it called an unprecedented attack through Khan Yunis, Gaza's second largest city, toward the sea.

The military says it has operational control of at least 40 percent of Gaza, and the government vows to control all of Gaza, in part by creating and securing the new aid distribution points in Southern and Central Gaza.

But after 11 weeks of blocked aid, this is hunger in Gaza.

Food has become so rare, Islam Abu Taeima and her daughter can only find it in the trash.

Half-a-million Gazans are extremely food-insecure and on the verge of famine.

Abu Taeima admits eating what one family discarded might make her family sick, but she says it's better than letting them starve.

ISLAM ABU TAEIMA, Gaza City Resident (through translator): As you can see, we're here as stray dogs collecting food from the trash.

I swear this is our life day-to-day.

We collect food every day from garbage.

If we don't gather anything, then we don't eat.

NICK SCHIFRIN: Israel hopes the new pressure forces Hamas to release all of the nearly 60 Israeli hostages it still holds, including 20 believed to be alive.

The military campaign features punishing airstrikes, including one that Palestinian officials say killed nine of Dr. Alaa al-Najjar's children.

They were from 7 months to 12 years old.

Palestinian rescue officials say they were all killed by an airstrike that Israel says targeted Hamas fighters.

The husband survived, now in critical condition at the very hospital where she works as a pediatrician and where their sole surviving son is recovering.

In recent days, Israel's closest allies have called for the war to end.

DONALD TRUMP, President of the United States: Israel, we have been talking to them, and we want to see if we can stop that whole situation as quickly as possible.

NICK SCHIFRIN: And to discuss the implications of this new American-backed aid initiative, we turn to Ciaran Donnelly, senior vice president at the International Rescue Committee, an aid organization.

He joins me from New York.

Ciaran Donnelly, thank you very much.

Welcome to the "News Hour."

You saw the scenes that unfolded today in Rafah in Southern Gaza as the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation began to deliver aid for the first time.

What is your response to what happened today?

CIARAN DONNELLY, Senior Vice President, International Rescue Committee: The chaotic scenes that we have seen in Rafah today really just bear out the warnings that the IRC and other humanitarian agencies have been putting out for the last number of weeks around this Israeli-led aid initiative.

The situation in Gaza is dire, as you know.

There's over two million people who are living in acute food insecurity.

That means they don't have enough food for themselves and their families.

There's almost 500,000 of those people who are living in catastrophic -- that's famine-level -- food insecurity.

Our teams on the ground are saying families of five and six people are sharing a single piece of bread among themselves as a meal before they go to bed every night.

So it's a really dire situation.

Now, there are solutions to this, scaling up aid at the speed and volume that's needed, but doing that requires working with the humanitarian community on the ground, organizations like ours that have the experience and expertise to be able to deliver aid in conflict environments in ways that are transparent, safe, accountable, ways that respect the dignity of the people receiving aid.

But the ways in which this new initiative have been developed have essentially left us excluded from the design of it and unable to work on the ground and deliver the programs that we most desperately need to be able to do.

NICK SCHIFRIN: So, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation does say that it is trying to adhere to the same values that you just described.

And it says they have distributed 460,000 meals so far and hope to deliver three million meals over the next 90 days.

Is that enough?

CIARAN DONNELLY: So, it's a drop in the ocean.

But, equally, the way that that aid is being distributed through a limited number of distribution sites that force people to walk for miles through dangerous and difficult terrain, risking the exclusion of the most vulnerable, those who can't make it, it excludes organizations from being able to monitor how the aid is being used after it's distributed.

It also means that people can only access a very limited scope of services.

They can receive items that they can take away and distribute.

But in the context of Gaza, with the situation as dire as it is after months of war and devastation, people need a much more expansive set of services.

If you want to treat kids for acute malnutrition, you don't just give them specialized food supplies.

You have to monitor their recovery.

You have to be there with their families.

You need a community-based approach to aid distribution, one that's run independently and impartially, to be able to effectively support populations to survive and to recover in a situation like this.

NICK SCHIFRIN: Israel says that these sites are necessary and something like the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation that some Israeli officials have been working on for more than a year is necessary because Hamas steals the aid in order to sell and convert into military capacity.

What's your response to that Israeli concern?

CIARAN DONNELLY: So the IRC and our partners and peers in the humanitarian community have been working across Gaza for over a year now to deliver vital humanitarian relief.

We deployed all of our best efforts to scale up during that brief cease-fire.

Unfortunately, we have seen a complete halt to access to Gaza for aid and supplies during the Israeli blockade over the last 2.5 months.

What our teams have reported on the ground is that they have not observed any systematic diversion by any group operating in Gaza.

What we have seen are examples like we saw today of desperate people looting supplies to take care of themselves and their families.

That's the extent of what we have reported.

Now, the best mitigation for that kind of risk is to work with aid agencies like ourselves, like the U.N. infrastructure on the ground that have the experience and the capability honed over decades and conflict zones around the world to be able to work effectively and safely in these places.

NICK SCHIFRIN: But, in some ways, if this is the structure that Israel is demanding, why not as an international humanitarian aid organization back this structure if this is what the government of Israel requires in order to feed two million people?

CIARAN DONNELLY: The starting point for our work as a humanitarian organization is a very simple principle.

First, do no harm.

And a simple test for whether or not this distribution mechanism can do more good than harm hasn't yet been met.

The way that it's been organized, with limited distribution sites, forcing people to concentrate themselves in fundamentally undignified and inhumane conditions to receive food, just simply doesn't meet that very basic test for good humanitarian work.

We stand ready to work with any group in any place in the world that we work in that's committed to delivering effective and principled humanitarian assistance.

And we call on anyone with influence in the region and, in particular, the Israeli government to establish a mechanism for a good faith dialogue with the humanitarian community around how best to distribute effective, safe, transparent and dignified aid in Gaza.

But this structure doesn't meet that test.

NICK SCHIFRIN: Finally, in the time we have left, the IRC has been working on the ground in Gaza since this war began.

What is the scale of the humanitarian crisis after what ended up being more than 11-week block on aid deliveries?

CIARAN DONNELLY: It's absolutely unprecedented.

There are certainly crises around the world that have larger numbers of people affected, but I can't think of a single country that has the level of people, the entire population of Gaza, 100 percent of the people there, living in acute crisis levels of food insecurity.

People just don't have enough food to eat.

They struggle for access to basic services.

We have pallets of nutrition and food and other supplies waiting to get in.

We can't get access for our supplies to get in.

The same is true of the U.N. and other partners.

And so we are being effectively prohibited from delivering the humanitarian assistance that is so vitally needed on the ground.

NICK SCHIFRIN: Ciaran Donnelly of the International Rescue Committee, thank you very much.

CIARAN DONNELLY: Thank you.

AMNA NAWAZ: In the day's other headlines, Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. says the CDC will no longer recommend COVID vaccines for healthy children and pregnant women.

Kennedy made the announcement in a video message on social media, standing alongside the FDA commissioner and the head of the National Institutes of Health.

No one from the CDC was featured.

The new policy jumps ahead of a planned meeting next month by a CDC panel to address shots for the fall.

It also follows the decision by the FDA last week to require new data before approving booster shots for healthy adults and kids.

Today's announcement could affect how doctors advise their patients on the vaccines and how insurers cover them.

The Trump administration is directing federal agencies to cancel all remaining contracts with Harvard University totaling about $100 million.

That's according to a letter from the General Services Administration.

The government has already cut more than $2.6 billion in federal research grants for the school, which President Trump has accused of fostering antisemitism and having a liberal bias.

Today's action follows weeks of increasing tensions involving Harvard's hiring practices, its tax-exempt status, and its ability to enroll international students, among others.

In the U.K., police say they have arrested a 53-year-old British man on suspicion of attempted murder following a car ramming yesterday at a Liverpool soccer parade.

Forensic officers were at the scene of the crash today, where hundreds of thousands of people had gathered to celebrate Liverpool's Premier League championship.

Authorities say 11 of the 50 people who were hospitalized are still there receiving treatment, but are in stable condition.

Fans are still grappling with how a day of festivity turned into tragedy.

AARON JONES, Liverpool Parade Attendee: Such a shame.

It's just ruined it for everyone, really.

It's supposed to be celebrations.

And, instead, the day is always going to be remembered for this now, instead of the trophy parade, like it was supposed to.

AMNA NAWAZ: Authorities are not treating the incident as terrorism and believe the suspect may have been driving while on drugs.

King Charles III opened Canada's Parliament this morning, saying the commonwealth member is facing a critical moment.

Charles received a warm welcome in Ottawa with music and pageantry.

He was invited by Prime Minister Mark Carney to deliver the so-called Speech from the Throne amid threats from President Trump that the U.S. annex Canada.

In comments largely written by Carney's government, Charles told the assembly that -- quote -- "The true north is indeed strong and free."

KING CHARLES III, United Kingdom: All Canadians can give themselves far more than any foreign power on any continent can ever take away, and that, by staying true to Canadian values, Canada can build new alliances and a economy that serves all Canadians.

AMNA NAWAZ: Charles was the first British monarch to personally deliver the Throne Speech since his mother, Queen Elizabeth II, did so in 1977.

The Supreme Court rejected an appeal today from a Massachusetts student who was barred from wearing a T-shirt that said -- quote - - "There are only two genders."

Instead, the justices let stand a lower court's ruling that the ban did not violate the student's free speech.

Local school officials had argued that the wearing of the shirt would have a negative impact on transgender and gender non-conforming students.

Separately, the justices also declined to hear an appeal from a Native American group to stop a copper mining project on land it considers sacred.

The dispute centers on the transfer of federal land in Arizona known as Oak Flat to a subsidiary of mining giants Rio Tinto and BHP.

The company says the project will create thousands of jobs.

On Wall Street today, stocks jumped as investors got their first chance to react to President Trump's delay over the weekend of his European tariffs.

The Dow Jones industrial average added more than 700 points on the day.

The Nasdaq rose about 460 points, or nearly 2.5 percent.

The S&P 500 also ended sharply higher.

Still to come on the "News Hour": NPR sues the Trump administration over ordered funding cuts; President Trump's repeated criticism heightens concerns for judges' safety; and a new book examines the impact of Malcolm X's advocacy for civil rights 60 years after his murder.

GEOFF BENNETT: In the first months of his second term, President Trump has moved to pardon many who were considered to be loyal to him, from local Republican officials convicted of fraud to rioters at the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

AMNA NAWAZ: This evening, the president called the daughter of reality TV stars Todd and Julie Chrisley to tell her that he plans to pardon her parents.

The pair are both serving yearslong prison sentences for bank and tax fraud.

Also today, The New York Times published new details about the pardon of a Florida businessman convicted of tax evasion.

Our White House correspondent, Laura Barron-Lopez, has more.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: A report from The New York Times found that the Trump administration pardoned Paul Walczak after his mother, Elizabeth Fago, attended a $1 million-per-plate fund-raising dinner for the president's super PAC.

Three weeks after the dinner, the president signed the pardon, getting Walczak out of an 18-month prison sentence and a $4 million restitution payment.

To discuss this and more, I'm joined by Liz Oyer, former pardon attorney at the Department of Justice, who was fired from her post earlier this year.

Liz, thank you so much for joining the "News Hour."

LIZ OYER, Former DOJ Pardon Attorney: Thanks for having me, Laura.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: So let's start with the recent revelations about the pardon Trump issued to Paul Walczak.

Walczak is a former nursing home executive.

He was convicted of cheating on taxes to finance his lavish lifestyle, including purchasing a $2 million yacht.

The sequence of events is the story here, because Walczak's mother was invited to and attended that $1 million-a-plate dinner at Mar-a-Lago, the president's club, and then Trump signed the full pardon for Walczak.

What signal does that send to other wealthy individuals who may be seeking a pardon from the president?

LIZ OYER: Well, one other thing that's so striking about the timeline here is, Walczak was just sentenced to prison days before he received that pardon from President Trump, and the judge who sentenced him said at that proceeding that he wanted to send the message that wealth is not a get-out-of-jail-free card.

And, for that reason, he sentenced Walczak to 18 months in prison, in addition to having to pay back the money that he owed by defrauding essentially taxes, by not paying taxes.

So this sends a message that accountability for the wealthy is not the same as accountability for those who don't have resources, and it creates essentially a two-tier system of justice for regular people and then for those who have political connections and wealth.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: And, yesterday, President Trump pardoned Virginia Sheriff Scott Jenkins, who was handing out deputy sheriff badges in exchange for money.

He was paid more than $75,000 in bribes in what the DOJ called a -- quote -- "cash-for-badges scheme."

Jenkins was also a big supporter of President Trump and expressed some anti-immigrant sentiments.

What's your takeaway from that pardon?

And is this normally how pardons work?

LIZ OYER: This is not at all how pardons normally work.

Pardons are normally reserved for people who show remorse for a crime they have been convicted of and who have actually served at least some and typically all of their sentence and have shown personal growth and rehabilitation during that time.

However, this administration appears to be using pardons in a completely different and new way, which is to reward people who demonstrate political loyalty to the administration.

And that is unprecedented.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: The present used his pardon authority in his first administration.

President Trump did when he pardoned his campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, who had been convicted of bank and tax fraud.

And that's not the only Trump ally that was pardoned when he was president the first time.

Is there a pattern to Trump's pardons?

LIZ OYER: There is a pattern.

This is something that began in the first Trump administration, but has gotten worse under the new administration for two reasons.

One is that many of the pardons are happening in secret.

And the second thing that is really different is that Trump appears to be doing this just for wealthy, well-connected people.

In the first administration, there were some truly deserving individuals who were more along the lines of ordinary Americans who did benefit from pardons, alongside the politically connected and those who had personal relationships with President Trump.

But now the ordinary people seem to have been completely forgotten.

There are applications piled up at the Office of the Pardon Attorney from individuals who are incarcerated around the country, some of whom have been waiting years for their applications to be considered.

And those are being ignored in favor of the wealthy and well-connected.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: President Trump isn't the only president to use this power.

Former President Joe Biden used his pardon power, including to issue a full unconditional pardon of some of his family members, including his son Hunter Biden, who was convicted on federal gun charges and pled guilty to tax evasion.

Is Trump's use of the pardon power and former President Biden's use similar or different?

LIZ OYER: Well, Trump's use is very different.

I will say it's impossible to talk about Trump's use of the pardon power without acknowledging that some of the pardons that President Biden granted were ones that, frankly, raised questions about the legitimacy of the pardon power and why this power exists.

However, President Biden, for the most part, relied on the Department of Justice to make recommendations and granted clemency to people who did not have political connections, although there were some very notable and significant exceptions.

In the current administration, there is no path forward that we know of right now for ordinary people to be considered for clemency.

And the other thing that's really striking and shocking is that the president is granting clemency to individuals who owe tens of millions, hundreds of millions of dollars in restitution and fines and other financial penalties.

And it's never been done by any other president.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: I also want to talk to you about Ed Martin, the new pardon attorney who now holds the position you once held.

He fully supported the pardons of January 6 rioters, including those who were convicted of violently assaulting police.

And, recently, when Ed Martin was praising Trump's decision to pardon convicted Virginia Sheriff Scott Jenkins, Martin posted on X: "No MAGA left behind."

What message does that send and what does it mean that Martin is now in this position?

LIZ OYER: It sends a message that the pardon power is now being totally and thoroughly politicized, that it will be used as a benefit to those who are supporters of the president and not for those who do not express political loyalty.

That is really an unprecedented use of the pardon power.

And just the fact of Martin's appointment to the position of pardon attorney is really striking, because that is a position that historically has always been filled by a nonpolitical appointee.

At the end of the day, the president has plenary power under the Constitution to grant clemency to whomever he chooses, but it is important to have someone in a nonpolitical position providing that advice to the president about who should receive clemency and ensuring that individuals who do not have political connections can still have their applications considered.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Liz Oyer, former pardon attorney, thank you for your time.

LIZ OYER: Thank you for having me.

GEOFF BENNETT: NPR and three Colorado public radio stations today filed suit against the Trump administration in federal court over the president's executive order targeting NPR, PBS, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, also known as CPB.

The order signed earlier this month bars congressionally approved funds from being distributed to the public media organizations.

The lawsuit contends the president's order is a violation of the First Amendment.

We should note that PBS has not joined this lawsuit, but in a statement today said: "PBS is considering every option, including taking legal action, to allow our organization to continue to provide essential programming and services to member stations and all Americans."

Katherine Maher is the president and CEO of NPR, and she joins us now.

Thanks for being here.

KATHERINE MAHER, President and CEO, NPR: Thank you for having me.

GEOFF BENNETT: So how precisely does President Trump's executive order against NPR and PBS violate the First Amendment?

What's the case that you're making against the Trump White House?

KATHERINE MAHER: Well, it's interesting because the executive order is very specific, in that it accuses NPR and PBS of not airing fair or unbiased news.

And so it is a textbook example of viewpoint discrimination from a First Amendment standpoint.

Essentially, by blocking funding to NPR and PBS, it is a form of retaliation against our organizations for airing editorial programming that the president might disagree with.

The safeguards for our editorial independence go very far back.

They go back to the Public Broadcasting Act.

It was one of Congress' sort of paramount objectives was to ensure that public media was independent from government influence.

And so you have the editorial safeguards that should exist for our organizations.

But then you also have the member stations.

We have a network of stations across the country.

In the case of NPR, that's 246 stations.

And the order functionally says that they can't use their funding, federal or private, to be able to acquire programming for NPR, to remain NPR members, which is also a violation of their First Amendment rights for association and for editorial speech.

GEOFF BENNETT: This lawsuit, as we mentioned, is filed in conjunction with Colorado Public Radio, Aspen Public Radio and KSUT, which serves Native American communities in the Four Corners region.

Why that collective approach?

KATHERINE MAHER: Well, believe it or not, we didn't set out to get three stations in Colorado.

That is sort of a happenstance of the types of stations we were looking for.

We wanted an urban station that represented a larger metropolis.

We were looking for a station that served a primary rural community, which is where Aspen in the Roaring Fork Valley.

And then the KSUT serves the Four Corners and was originally a tribal station and still retains a significant amount of tribal-based programming.

And so I think it really speaks to the diversity of communities that public radio serves across the country.

GEOFF BENNETT: PBS not included in this suit.

Why not?

KATHERINE MAHER: Well, this is our suit.

This is NPR's suit on behalf of NPR.

We have obviously been in close coordination with PBS, and they have expressed not -- in the statement you just shared their support for this particular action.

And we know that, when the executive order first came out, they were clear that they also believe that this is unlawful.

GEOFF BENNETT: The White House and some Republicans in Congress, as you well know, have accused NPR of promoting a liberal bias.

Beyond that, the former NPR editor Uri Berliner, he accused the network of having what he called a lack of viewpoint diversity.

How do you respond to those critiques?

KATHERINE MAHER: Well, I first of all, respond by saying we're a nonpartisan news organization.

We seek to be able to provide a range of different viewpoints in terms of who we bring on air, the stories that we tell.

We're buttressed in this effort by the fact that we have 200 local newsrooms across the country.

So a significant portion of the reporting that you hear on NPR is not coming out of D.C.

It's coming out of smaller stations in a rural area.

It's coming out of the Midwest, the Southwest -- you know, the Pacific Northwest - - lots of wests in there.

Sorry about that.

My view is that that is a mischaracterization of our work.

We do not seek to favor any political party at all.

We seek to ensure that Americans have a wide range of perspectives available to them.

GEOFF BENNETT: There's also this argument that, with the proliferation of news and media outlets these days, there's no real reason, there's no real need for the federal government to be in the business of funding NPR and PBS.

There's so many options out there, even in rural areas that might be less served.

How do you respond to that?

KATHERINE MAHER: Well, it's simply not true.

Twenty percent of Americans today do not have access to a local newspaper or source of news other than public media.

There has been a significant contraction in local news across the country.

That means that there are people who rely on public media to be able to cover what's going on, not just in their statehouse, but in their municipal area, to be able to understand the changes or needs of their community and have access to information that they might otherwise not have.

I think that's really important, because private media doesn't go into rural communities.

Private media doesn't spend the time, the effort and the resources to ensure the broadcast infrastructure reaches across our varied topography in this nation.

We fill a gap that other organizations can't or won't, and that is critical to our civic infrastructure.

GEOFF BENNETT: If just 1 percent of NPR's budget comes from the federal government through CPB grants, why not offset that funding with other revenue streams, with fund-raising, and say, you know what, we can do it, we will cut our losses?

KATHERINE MAHER: Of course, public media for a long time has had a public-private partnership.

That is true for public television, and it is true for public radio.

We take federal dollars very seriously, and we seek to maximize them by raising additional funds from private philanthropies, from individual viewers and listeners.

That's tremendously important to that promise that we have.

But it is also the case that, without federal funding, we would not have the universal access that public media affords today.

We are free in every household in the nation, or 99.7 percent, which rounds up to 100 percent.

That is something that nobody else offers, and we view that as a critical part of a functioning democracy for people to have access to news, information, educational, and cultural programming.

That's why.

GEOFF BENNETT: So, in your view, there is a public right and a democratic imperative to government-funded journalism and media?

KATHERINE MAHER: I believe that there is a clear democratic imperative.

We know that when communities lack local media, when they lack access to a broadcaster or an outlet, you see higher rates of polarization, lower rates of civic engagement, lower rates of voter turnout.

Where you have local media, there is higher confidence and trust in democratic institutions and less suspicion of one another as citizens.

So, as we talk about the fractures in the nation, part of what allows us to be in conversation with each other is not necessarily national news, but really starting at the basics, the local conversations that matter to our communities, and that's what public media serves and does.

GEOFF BENNETT: Katherine Maher, president and CEO of NPR, thanks for being here.

KATHERINE MAHER: Thank you.

AMNA NAWAZ: The cost and value of a college education have been under scrutiny amid what can be crippling levels of student debt.

That's also been true in some cases for online university degrees of dubious quality and outcomes.

Special correspondent Fred de Sam Lazaro reports on one effort to create an accessible, affordable and global university, one that's getting attention as an online alternative.

It's part of our series Rethinking College.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: For millions of would-be students just about anywhere in the world, higher education feels out of reach.

CHRIS BURGESS, Student, University of the People: It is very upsetting to see how much college costs.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Too expensive or scarce.

MAUNG SAWYEDDOLLAH, Student, University of the People: I was in the refugee camp.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Even forbidden.

MALIHA, Graduate Student: I was trying to hide it to keep myself safe.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: From very different worlds, all three of these young and younger people attend or attended the University of the People, an accredited institution nominally based in California, but fully online, with more than 150,000 students in 200 countries and territories, about 20,000 of them in the U.S. SHAI RESHEF, President, University of the People: We are the best alternative, because there's no other alternative.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Shai Reshef founded the nonprofit in 2009, a time when the online education industry was dominated by for-profit schools.

NARRATOR: Technical Institute can help graduates prepare for careers.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Several were sanctioned or forced out of business for deceptive advertising and substandard academics that also saddled students with crippling debt.

Shai Reshef himself founded and later sold an international online education firm, one not mired in controversy, he notes.

He says he wanted to use his experience to give back.

SHAI RESHEF: Open-source technology, open educational resources, professors who put their content on the net for the rest of the world to use for free, and the new phenomena where people were willing, and especially professors, to help students with their homework for free.

That's a university.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: The University of the People is tuition-free, but it's not totally free.

A variety of fees can add up to about $5,000 for a bachelor's degree.

But that, the university says, makes it accessible to millions of prospective students who could not otherwise afford a college education.

And, besides, they have up to 10 years to complete their degree.

MAUNG SAWYEDDOLLAH: The very first time, my impression was, like, just like an online scam, something like that.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: You thought it was a scam.

MAUNG SAWYEDDOLLAH: Yes.

Hi, everyone.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Twenty-two-year-old Maung Sawyeddollah fled Myanmar amid ethnic cleansing campaigns against that country's Rohingya minority.

With his parents and five siblings, he found safety in neighboring Bangladesh, but in a refugee camp, not much more.

MAUNG SAWYEDDOLLAH: Now I'm a student at University of the People students.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Like more than half the University of the People students, Maung received a scholarship, though attending was not easy.

MAUNG SAWYEDDOLLAH: I do not have access to Internet in my home, so I needed to go to a top of a mountain.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: So you had to go up to this higher level to get a signal, basically?

MAUNG SAWYEDDOLLAH: Yes, the Internet connection.

SHAI RESHEF: If we can raise $100 million, we can educate one million students.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Reshef has relied largely on philanthropic funding and an occasional surprise, like the $3.8 million Yidan Prize awarded annually in Hong Kong for innovation in education.

But principally, he's counted on volunteers.

SHAI RESHEF: I'm a volunteer.

I did not know how well it would work.

I was shocked.

There is a lot of good will out there.

DALTON CONLEY, Dean of Health Science, University of the People: I wanted to reach a population that I wasn't reaching in my day job, so to speak.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Dalton Conley is a professor at Princeton University and leader in the emerging field of social genomics.

Audra Watson works at a civic engagement institute in Princeton, New Jersey.

Both are deans at the University of the People, among some 47,000 academics who volunteer to help students enable otherwise to afford college.

AUDRA WATSON, Dean of Education, University of the People: I went to teachers college, and, at that time, years ago, it was at least 40,000 dollars.

I'm still paying off my student loans.

There are so many people that feel like they can't afford it.

DALTON CONLEY: Students get a great education, but it's a very different experience than going to a brick-and-mortar institution, where you get to have a lot more face-to-face interaction.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: But offerings are limited, focused on degrees with strong job markets, associate and bachelor's in business administration, computer science and health science, master's in business administration, information technology and education.

SHAI RESHEF: We have a very lean budget, so we give the students everything that is a must for them to have great education, very little beyond that.

So, extracurricular activity, football teams, we don't have all these.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Students must pass an entrance exam to assess their readiness.

Classes are taught in English and, for Middle Eastern students, Arabic.

They're small, 20 to 30 students, and demand a 20-hour weekly commitment per course.

It's rigorous, but students can adjust their course load to fit their varied circumstances.

MALIHA: I was in my sixth semester at the university when the Taliban came to power.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Twenty-three-old Maliha was studying civil engineering at the University of Kabul, Afghanistan, when everything changed.

MALIHA: The first thing that they did was that they said that women are not allowed to go to schools and universities.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: To continue their education, she and more than 4,000 other women began studying in secret with the University of the People.

MALIHA: On those dark days that I was at home and couldn't do anything for my future, University of the People was like a light in my darkest days.

SHAI RESHEF: If we have this online education that can reach people wherever they are, we should embrace it and bring the education to them, because they cannot afford higher education.

The U.S. is the best example.

PAUL LEBLANC, Former President, Southern New Hampshire University: Tens of thousands of Americans every year take the GED.

Half of them go on to some kind of post-secondary.

And price is really powerful.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Paul LeBlanc recently retired as president of Southern New Hampshire University, a traditional school that has also become a leading provider of online education.

The business has come a long way, he says, with improved academic rigor and standards.

University of the People fills an important void, he says.

PAUL LEBLANC: These are some of the least well-served learners on the globe, and they don't have another choice.

And Shai came up with a model that may not look like a traditional university, but gives them the essential piece of what they need, which is an educational pathway.

CHRIS BURGESS: It's really upsetting to see that education is kept behind a pay wall.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Chris Burgess grew up in a poverty-stricken home where survival took priority over education.

Years later, he opened a health food restaurant in Asbury Park, New Jersey, but struggled during and after the pandemic.

CHRIS BURGESS: We weren't receiving results.

We had no way to understand why.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Two years into a business administration degree at the University of the People, he says he's already gained insight into who and where exactly his customers are and market accordingly, in doctor's offices treating diabetics, for example.

CHRIS BURGESS: We partnered with local doctors and created specific fliers for them to show them, if your client has bad news, if they can order online.

You just hone in on the people who are actually going to contribute back to the business and create a relationship.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: And you can track this to your education at the University of the People?

CHRIS BURGESS: A hundred percent.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: Maliha and Maung Sawyeddollah also credit their University of the People credentials for a huge boost to their aspirations.

Maliha was able to flee Afghanistan last fall and on scholarship now attends graduate school in the U.S.

So does Sawyeddollah, who arrived last August and is now enrolled in a second bachelor's program at New York University.

Both hope to return someday to help bring stability to their distressed homelands.

SHAI RESHEF: I saw that you actually take people and give them their education, their future is totally different.

CEDRIC NETTEY, Graduate: It's a true honor to address this graduating class.

FRED DE SAM LAZARO: His university's degree completion rate is around 25 percent and rising, he says, tracking with online universities overall, lower in part because students, many in difficult circumstances, have up to 10 years to finish.

So far, about 18,000 have graduated, 80 percent of them employed in fields related to their degrees.

For the "PBS News Hour," I'm Fred de Sam Lazaro in New York City.

GEOFF BENNETT: Ensuring the safety of federal judges falls to the U.S.

Marshals Service, an agency within the Justice Department.

But, as President Trump increasingly lashes out at the courts, an idea is gaining traction, empowering judges to oversee their own dedicated security force.

Jeremy Fogel joins us now.

He's a former federal judge in California and now executive director of the Berkeley Judicial Institute at the U.C.

Berkeley School of Law.

Thanks for being here.

JEREMY FOGEL, Berkeley Judicial Institute Executive Director, Berkeley Law School: Thank you very much for having me.

GEOFF BENNETT: As we have reported on this program, threats against federal judges have surged in recent months, including bomb threats, swatting incidents.

What kind of strain does that place on the judiciary and on the judges themselves?

JEREMY FOGEL: It's an enormous strain.

We're very fortunate that there haven't been any recent actual attacks.

I mean, there have been a lot of threats, but they haven't actually been carried out.

There have been situations in the past where judges were attacked or their families were attacked, but nothing on the order of magnitude that we're talking about here, where there's literally dozens of threats against people.

The rhetoric that's used is unprecedented in my experience.

I was a judge for 37 years.

I don't recall ever hearing rhetoric like we're hearing now.

And so it's a very toxic atmosphere.

And I think it affects judges, even if you're not directly one of the people in the crosshairs.

You see it happening to your colleagues.

You see it happening to judges in other parts of the country.

I get around a lot.

I used to run the Federal Judicial Center here in D.C.

I know hundreds of judges.

And I'm happy about those relationships.

People are stressed out.

People are really feeling the pressure of the environment that we're in.

GEOFF BENNETT: You mentioned the toxic rhetoric.

President Trump has stepped up his criticism of judges, especially those who have ruled against his policies.

He's called them radical left.

He says they're absolutely out of control.

Just yesterday in a post, he called federal judges monsters who want our country to -- quote -- "go to hell."

What's the practical impact of that?

JEREMY FOGEL: Well, I think people on one hand look at it and say, well, that's not to be taken seriously.

And, on the other hand, it does create an environment where you say we have the president of the United States saying things like that.

It's unprecedented.

There are people who follow his leadership who are affected by the things that he says.

And I don't think judges -- certainly, sitting judges can't be in a position where they want to -- they can't really engage with that because they're not allowed to comment on cases.

They have to stay silent about that.

But it just creates an atmosphere where you can't talk about what really matters.

This rhetoric is really quite at odds with that.

GEOFF BENNETT: On the matter I mentioned in the introduction to this segment, Democrats in Congress, as you know, they introduced a bill last week to shift control of the U.S.

Marshals Service to the judiciary.

The idea is to prevent political interference, to ensure strong security.

Is that a good idea or a realistic one?

JEREMY FOGEL: Well, it's two different questions.

I mean, it's probably not realistic at the moment because I'm not sure there's the political consensus to make it happen, and Congress obviously is very divided.

Whether it's a good idea is a delicate question.

It certainly makes sense in the way that judges would be responsible for things that directly affect them.

I think it's an idea that should be seriously studied.

It's very delicate, though.

And I just want to emphasize that -- the relationship between the judiciary and Congress now.

I don't think the judiciary wants to do anything to upset such communication as exists.

And I have to say, I was -- when I was a federal judge, I had great confidence in the Marshals Service.

I still have great confidence in the Marshals Service.

Nothing has happened that would cause one to think that the Marshals Service on its own is going to abandon the judges that they provide security for.

I think it's the political environment.

It's the toxicity I was referring to before that makes people worry about it.

And I think people have to have serious and honest discussions about that.

GEOFF BENNETT: President Trump has removed security details from some of his political adversaries, his perceived political adversaries.

How real is the concern that he might do the same, either reduce or limit the security for judges who've ruled against him?

JEREMY FOGEL: Well, that concern exists.

And it exists for the reason you said, because he's done it with other people.

It hasn't happened yet.

There's been assurances given by people in the administration that they have no intention of doing it.

I am an optimist by nature, I don't think it's going to happen, but I'd hate to be wrong about that.

And when you have a very controversial case or a judge who does something that really gets crosswise with the administration, that is one of the thoughts that comes to mind for people, is, well, the next thing he will do is pull security or pull funding or something like that.

And this is what I mean about a toxic environment.

It's, we shouldn't be thinking and worrying about things like that.

We should be thinking and worrying about, did the judge get the law right, did the judge get the facts right, what does the evidence in the case show, did everybody have a chance to be heard?

These are the things that we ought to care about.

These are the things that are embedded in our Constitution.

And we're spending time kind of dealing with the emotional strain, the mental strain that comes from this kind of rhetoric that we're seeing.

GEOFF BENNETT: In the time that remains, I want to draw on your legal knowledge and ask you about the Trump administration freezing what is now more than $2.5 billion to Harvard University over that institution's refusal to agree to President Trump's wish list of reforms.

How will the courts view this?

Because the law is clear that only Congress has the power of the purse.

JEREMY FOGEL: Right.

Well, there's the Impoundment Act, which is an act of Congress that will have to be dealt with by the courts that hear this matter.

There's also a claim that what's happening is retaliation for exercise of First Amendment rights and other constitutional rights.

So there are some pretty robust claims that Harvard can make in the legal actions that it's taken.

I have no idea how those are going to turn out.

Remember, the first thing that's going to happen is, a district court's going to weigh in.

And the district court in Boston already has.

It's issued temporary relief to Harvard on certain aspects of this.

But it's going to work its way up through the appellate courts.

The Supreme Court's going to have the final word about it.

They in some recent rulings have indicated some openness to the idea of what is known in the legal world as unitary executive, this sort of increased powers of the president.

How that's going to cut in a situation like this is something I really don't know.

And we will see how the case gets litigated.

GEOFF BENNETT: Jeremy Fogel, thanks so much for your insights and for being here.

Appreciate it.

JEREMY FOGEL: Thanks so much.

Thanks for having me.

AMNA NAWAZ: It's been 100 years since Malcolm Little, who went on to become civil rights activist Malcolm X, was born in Omaha, Nebraska.

It's also been 60 years since he was assassinated at just 39 years old.

His expansive legacy is the focus of a new book written by journalist Mark Whitaker.

And I spoke with him recently about "The Afterlife of Malcolm X: An Outcast Turned Icon's Enduring Impact on America."

Mark Whitaker, welcome back to the "News Hour."

Thanks for being here.

MARK WHITAKER, Author, "The Afterlife of Malcolm X: An Outcast Turned Icon's Enduring Impact on America": Thanks for having me.

AMNA NAWAZ: So this is a book about Malcolm X, but it really begins with his death.

You lay out in your own words how the impact on the 60 years since his assassination, as you say, arguably far surpassed what he was able to achieve in less than 40 years of life, which is a really interesting lens.

How did you arrive at that?

MARK WHITAKER: Well I have written about the Black power movement and its origins in 1966 from my last book.

And the interesting thing is that, even in 1966, he had been dead for a year, and yet he loomed over that year... over Black power, the Black arts movement, athletes like Muhammad Ali, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, and of course, the autobiography, which is how most Americans first encounter Malcolm to this day, one of the great books of the last half-century, which only came out nine months after he was assassinated... and then came out in paperback a year later, when it really became a bestseller.

AMNA NAWAZ: You talk about the autobiography and the pivotal role it played in sort of calcifying his place in the American narrative, also the story about ghostwriter Alex Haley at the time, later of "Roots" fame, but of course, he was a young journalist who befriended him and gained his trust.

Why was the autobiography so pivotal for his story?

MARK WHITAKER: Because he told his personal story, right?

So, even if you don't believe his politics or you don't know that much about what he stood for, just his remarkable evolution, losing his parents at a young age, leaving school, becoming a street hustler, going to prison, then embracing the Nation of Islam, becoming this very controversial figure, but then, in the last year of his life, leaving the Nation of Islam, changing a lot of his views about white people and separatism and so forth, traveling the world, reaching out, becoming more of sort of a global figure.

When you think about it, there aren't a lot of men of his historical stature where you get that intimate portrait of them that you do in that book.

AMNA NAWAZ: The reach that he had after his passing in terms of who his message resonated with, you have laid this out so well about how someone like Malcolm was able to appeal both to Stokely Carmichael, right, the Black power firebrand, but also conservatives... like Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

MARK WHITAKER: Right.

AMNA NAWAZ: How does that work?

MARK WHITAKER: Well, I think it's partly because, before you get to his politics, which did evolve and were complicated, what Malcolm stood for was pride, self-belief, dignity, and embracing Black culture and Black history and so forth.

Now, today, we think that's commonplace, but that was actually in its own way sort of a revolutionary message in his day.

And I think that part of his message has, over the decades, appealed to people of very different political views.

AMNA NAWAZ: You mentioned his impact on athletes, and there's a moment forever seared in global memory at the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City.

John Carlos and Tommie Smith stand on the metal podium and raise their fists in the air.

What's the connection to Malcolm X?

How did that happen?

MARK WHITAKER: Well, there are two connections.

First of all, Harry Edwards, who was a Black sociologist who organized that protest, was a follower of Malcolm's and had met him and viewed him as an inspiration.

But also John Carlos, who was one of those sprinters who raised his fist, had grown up in Harlem and as a teenager would follow Malcolm around like a puppy... like an eager puppy, just to absorb his message and to learn from him.

AMNA NAWAZ: Yes.

MARK WHITAKER: And so that got carried on.

And, later, there was a lot of controversy over that.

AMNA NAWAZ: Yes.

MARK WHITAKER: They got kicked out of Mexico City.

They suffered professional consequences and so forth.

But John Carlos wrote his own autobiography where he said he didn't regret any of that and that he felt prouder of taking those political stands than anything else he had done as an athlete, and that it was Malcolm who had inspired him to do that.

AMNA NAWAZ: There's also this idea of Malcolm as like pop culture muse decades after his passing.

You talk about his impact on music, on hip-hop.

It's the film a lot of people will remember... Spike Lee's film, "Malcolm X," played by Denzel Washington in there, which suddenly sparked a whole new awareness of his life.

Did that surprise you as someone who read his autobiography as a teen to see that kind of resurgence?

MARK WHITAKER: Well, I actually wrote a -- I worked for many years at "Newsweek" magazine, and I wrote a cover story when that film came out in 1992.

And that was a generation that was rediscovering Malcolm, right?

His memory had started to fade a little bit in the '70s and early '80s.

And then the early pioneers of hip-hop groups like Public Enemy, KRS-One, Tupac Shakur on their own sort of embraced him as a hero.

And then, of course, the movies came along and, of course, all the hats, the X hats that we all remember.

So one of the things that's really interesting about this book is, generation after generation, without there being a national holiday named after him, still young people relate to him over and over again in different phases of that period.

AMNA NAWAZ: So Malcolm X would be 100 if he'd lived and survived to today.

As you were writing this book, do you think about that, about what he would have thought about this time we're living in now?

MARK WHITAKER: So I don't think he would have -- we're living -- in our history of race in this country, we have periods of progress and then we have periods of backlash.

I think we could all agree that we're living in a period of backlash right now.

That would not have surprised him.

But what I think about a lot is, there's a lot of discussion these days about communication in politics and in activism and what kind of communication is effective and the need for people who can be authentic and can talk directly and so forth, talk with humor, talk to people of all backgrounds.

That was Malcolm while he was alive, but it's still why people relate to him.

You can go on YouTube to this day and listen to his speeches, and it feels like he's still talking directly to you.

AMNA NAWAZ: The book is "The Afterlife of Malcolm X."

The author is Mark Whitaker.

Mark, thank you so much.

Such a pleasure.

MARK WHITAKER: Always a pleasure.

Thank you so much.

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

I'm Geoff Bennett.

AMNA NAWAZ: And I'm Amna Nawaz.

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