The freeman foundation. By judy and Peter Blum Kovler foundation; pursuing solutions for americas neglected needs. And by contributions to this pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. Thisrl is bbc news america. A massive explosion rocks by written. Thousands are injured as the Prime Minister says t responsible must pay the price. We are lower than the world. Lower than europe. And what . E t look. President trumprgues america is handling the coronavirus pandemic better than anyone else. A royal mystery. Spains former king leaves the country. Where is he . For all of you watching, welcome to world news america. Beirut h been rocked by a gigantic explosion on the waterfront. Officials say dozens were killed the cause is underred investigation. State run media says it may have started at a fire at a warehouse that contained explosive materials. It was a massive explosion. Another view. [shouting] from the streets. What happened . Oh myod. [siren it looked as if dozens were dead and several thousand injured. A country already deep in crisis has been hit by a catastrophe. I dont know what happened i was fishing, i h there was a fire. I heard something explode then this happened. This was the fire in a report. They say the flashes were fireworks then something bigger united ignited. Lebanons interior minister told local media it waammonium nitrate that hade been stored since 2014. It can be used as fertilir or to make explosives. This is downtown beirut close to the parliament building. Since the end of last year, lebanon has been paralyzed by econic crisis. Street demonstrations before the country was gripped by the pandemic. City. Amage s spread across the the shock will run much deeper. This tragedy risks pushing the lebanese furthernto despair. The Prime Minister broadcast to the nation. He td them that those responsible would pay the price. Beirut hospital is already pressed hard by covid19. Faced with hundreds of sualties. We were atome, we heard what sounded like fireworks. We thought it was a coniner in the port that was on fire. A you seconds later, we were flying through t. A few seconds later we were far flying through the air. They will get International Help which until now its friends were reluctant to ge because of corruption and incompetence in the wealthy elite. Public anger already strong will demand real change if the rulers cannot heal t wounded, fix the damage, and punish e guilty. There is one big question. Much deadly explosive for so long in a warehlose so c to the city center . We will be live in beirut later in the program. Turning to the coronavirus pandemic, President Trump claims the u. S. Has the outbreak under controlespite 4. 7 million cases here and more than 155,000 dead. His latestefse came during an interview with axios. In july in america, there were 1. 9 million cases of coronavirus. The worst month to date. Thedent repeatedly insists it is all going well. How can that be jusfied . They are dying, that is true. It is what it is. That doesnt mean we arent doing everything we can. Take a look at these charts. He produced a series of graphs the details of which he right here, the United States is lowest in numerous categories. We are lower than the world. Does that mean . He and what . Take a look. The last meeting we are the first. Last week saw the death of the vil Rights Movement whoes of marched on washington wiki martin luthe in 1963. At his funeral, the president predecessors spoke but donald trump chose not to pay his respects. How do you think history will remember john lewis . I dont know. I dont know john lewis. He chose not to come to my inauguration. I never met john lewis. Do you find him impressive . I cant say one where the other. Another moment waubwhen he d down on his support for ghislaine maxwell. Th friend of Prince Andrew and former girlfriend of jeffrey epstein. She is now in prison awaiting trial on t sfficking charges that she denies. You said i just wish her well. Why would you wish such a person well . Parks her friend or boyfriend was either killed or commitd suicide in jail. She is now in jail. I wish her well. I woulwish a lot of people well. Donald trump believes he is his own best salesman. Ivhe will beg a lot more interviews. Whether they will produce the headlines he wants is another matter. Ore on that interview, i f am joined bymer advisor to president george w. Bush a a bbc analyst. What do you make of the claims and that ierview . Gooevening to you. I think to myself one of the most valuable commodities a president has is their time and their ability to communicate with the american people. What we saw here was a rambling bit of discussion. He seemeto dismiss the achievements of the civil rights icon in john lewis. He didnt seem to have a firm grip on what was goihe on here innited states and around the world. Putting that altogether, i would say we cant ever have you go out there and do that again. Meanwhile, what about the 30 million americans whoost their enhanced Unemployment Benefits last week . They f are waiti lawkers to come to a deal. Move is it now is a failure in leadership at all lels. Mitch mcconll and nancy pelosi bear some responsibility. At a time of a pandemic, tto president haead. He has to bring people into a room a say we are going to go out this go at this every day until we have a desion. The president is not carrying on in this manner and he seems almost detached from i a lot of people will remember that in november when 600 per week for 30 million americans means so lot when so ave so little. The election is 91 days away and we are in the middle of a paemic. The president doesnt like its mailin voting unless its in florida. Is there a case to be made for tionwide nail mailin voting . Yes if we dont have voter fraud. There are a number of states that have a mailin ballot syem. I look to utah. It works very effectively. We are talking about a federal election,se maintaining a sf discipline to make sure if there are those who wou seek to disrupt our electoral system, that we have a way to prevent that. Can be done . Yes. Do we have enough time to ensur the safety and veracity of the llot box . I cant say. Meanwhile, the conventions are about to get underway. They are going to look veryen diffbecause of the pandemic. E yes i heen to every Republican Convention since 2004. It is raucous, there are balloons, people make all kind noise. Similar error Athletic Facilities here in the u. K. , you have a jarring silence. It will be interestingo me to see how voterseact to a Virtual Convention to accept the nomination for the presidencof the United States when there is no one there to participate in pomp and circumstance. It will be quite a surreal experience for us all. Can he still reset between now and november, the president . Absolutely. At this point in 2004, psident bush and his senior advisers came to the conclusiothat we were going to lose. President trump has the time, he has the resoces toateframe the nae. The question is, will he be his own worst enemy . Thank you so much for joining us. Ts return to our top story. The enormous explosion and beirut. We can cross live to our correspondent who is live at tht medical. Can you describe the scene at the hospital . Ware standing in front of the emergency gate. Repeopletill coming in either to check on their relatives or to check if their relatives are inside the hospital because there is a large number of people unaccounted for. Is hospital like every other hospital has been completely overwhelmed. They are working to their utmost capacity and are still unable to do with the large number of injured coming in. Every singleace in the been turned into emergency unit. People are treated in corridors. They are even treated inside offices. Not only in the medical rooms because it is impossible to accommodate everyone. The triaging people according to the severity of cases an giving priority to those who are think critical condition. This is the only way to do with the High Pressure they are under. As you can see, this is like a real emergency inside. People are here not only because they are injured. They are in shock and panic. At the moment, it is very hard to say whais the real scale of what happened this afternoon. Beirut has been immensely shattered by this explosion that happened hours ago and up until now, everyone is still looking for answers and tr to understand what really happened. Is there anyway any word on what caused the explosions . There are several narratives being circulated. The Prime Minister addressed the nation. He talked about explosives stored at the port. Theres a lot of confusion and there are so many questions left unanswered about why have these explosions, why are they being kept in the country for such a long time and is this really what caused it or not . People are under so much essure. It is a national trauma. There is so muchat shot probably these problems questions will be saved for later. Everyone right now is checking on their loved ones and your neighbors trying to helps much as possible because we are seeing efforts all over the place. Every Single Person is trying to help as much as they can and every single way they can. People are still trying tose the damage, the situation, and there areo many unknowns that people are trying to figure out. Thank you so much for that update. In other news from around the world, new york citys Health Commissioner has resigned. She cited her deep disappointmentsiayor de s handling of the coronavirus outbreak saying her expertise was not used to the degree it could have been. Feion rates in new york arew w. Tropical storm isaias has brought tornadoes and storms to the east coastf the u. S. After making landfall in north carolina. In virginia, more than 300,000 people are without power. Effect all the weight to main. Invi atlantic filed for bankruptcy protection. The longaul carrier is the second member of the virgin group to file for bankruptcy protection. Airlines around the world have been hammered by the drop in air travel during the pandemic. You are watching bbc world news america. Still toor come, ar fashion his bed for reeducation. Uffed t tens of millions of people around manella havn b told to stayathome after a jump and coronavis cases. Most shops have been ordered to close and public transport has been halted. The latest restrictions which are currently in place for two weeks were inzeoduced after of medical associations warned that the Health Care System wouldollapse. Infections continue to rise. There is cause for concern. Or than 6000 new cases were reported on tuesday. The biggest daily rise so far following a week of record nuers. Thean measures mehe people who are not essential workers will only be allowed out to exercise or purchase vital goods. Domestic flights have been the restrictions are currently in place until the 18th of august. Doctors hope it will give medical workers time to deal with the spike in cases. The bbc has obtained rare footage from china. A former fashion model from the uighur ethnic group can be seen handcuffed to a bed. S his relatiay he was taken away for reeducation and that nothing has been heard from him since. After one million uighurs have been detained in training centers, neither the ministers or authorities have responded to our request for comment. A few years ago, he was a long way from his home in xinjiang. Making good, mons a fashion model in southern china. This is him in february. His camera reveals his clothing and his left arm isandcuffed to a bed. He is now clearly back in xinjiang. Ema propaganda annent drones away l in the uianguage. Despite the risks that it might bring him further punishment relatives includingis uncle who live in amsterdam say they have no choice but to release the video he sent them. Sying silent wont help him either. The only thing i can do is to raise public awareness. It is our only chance to rescue him. The yng model had already served 16 mons in jail having been convicted of a drugs offense in 2018 although his family says he was innocent. Upon completing his sentence, atever relief he may have felt shortlived. After, the police pick cam up again and took him back for a few days eon. We have asked Chinese Government officials whether he was suspected of further offenses and if he was, why he was handcuffed to a bed. We have rec. China has built a vast network of facilies across xinjiang. We were shown this video as proof that they were schools for the texts he sent along with his video clearly suggest otherwise. 5060 people were locked in a small room he writes. All had sacks on their heads and shackles. Elsewhere, he could hear the signs oforture. One time, he said i heard a more man screaming from morning to evening. His firsthand description of the Police Holding cell is very vivid. He writes in good chinese. U it giva lot of detail and a lot of horrific detail about h the way in whthese people are treated. It is a rare source. In the end, it was the virus that allowed him to get a word out from this system. With his slightly high temperature, he was moved to this sale as a precaution and given access to personal belongings which are knowno his guards, contain his phone. A soon as they began, the messages stopped. He has not been heard from since. The plight of chinas uighurs. Th a mystery unfolding in spain, the former king announced he was leaving after being implicated in a corruption investigation. Therere reports that he coul i ben the dominican republic. There has been no official confirmation. In spain that had been brutalized by dictatorship, he became much loved. In recent years, he failed to escape the snch of real corruption. He hoped his abdication to his son six years ago wld help but it did not. Now, he has abandoned his country. Spr ns prime minisid it was for the best. The government i lead fully respects the decisions taken by the palace. We do this in the knowledge of what is behind the palaces decision. It is distancing itself from the royal family. Of and attempted coup in 1991ng was the defini moment of his reign. Police stormed the parliament. He refused to let spain succumb to military rule once more. He was someone to be seen with. It was an elephant hunting holiday in012 a a time when spain was in economic peril the precipitated the fall. His was a family crisis. When the king took the throne in 1975 after the death of general franco,exhere were many ctations. He and his wifeaid three children. Christina became an official suspect in a big Corruption Case involving her husband. She was acquitted what he was jailed. One carlos abdicated in 2014 at the age of 26 76. Now with the Spanish Supreme Court investigating his involvement in a business deal, he says he is leaving the state altogether for the sake of his son. Do you think this is enough for him to restore the credibility ofni the s monarchy . I think it will be a great help, but i fear th e it will not ugh. He needs to do a lot more and cas going to be very difficult e spain has so many other problems. Tonight, it is not clear where he has taken refuge. A king who managed to guide his country frodictatorship to democracy but who failed to control his own destiny a regal mystery and a a massive blast has rocked beirut. Dozens were killed and thousands han bjured. Hospitals are struggling to treat all the casualties. It isot clear what caused the explosion. G accord the minister interior, highly explosive materials we being stored at e port. The u. S. Secretary of state, mike pompeo, has issued a statement offering condolences you can find much more onhat story at our website. Plus to see what we are working on anytime. Thank you so much for watching bbc world news america. Narrator funding for this presentation of this program is provided by. Language specialists teaching spanish, french and more. Raymond james. The freeman foundation. By judy and Peter Blum Kovler foundation; pursuing solutions for americas neglected needs. And by contributions to this pbs station from viewers like thank you. Nat the height of the conflict. F into vietnam he became ngle parent of two young children. We moved a lot. We slept in rest areas. R. We slept in our i didnt realize that we were actually homeless. It makes your world really small. If we happened to stay in a motel that happened to have a tv, it was really special. We loved nova. Especially when it wld be about spac we would talk for hours about the universe. Watching nova, i felt big, like, my mind wabig, my ideas were big. The trajectory of my life changed. I could see a world outside of our poverty and i felt like things were going to get better. Pbs opened up a world i didnt know existed. Judy good evening, i am judy woodruff. The newshour tonight, no progress yet. As the pandemic persists, Congress Struggles to find Common Ground on economic relief. I ask House Speaker nancy pelosi about the state of negotiations. Then, covid crackdowns. The corovirus provides cover for authoritarian leaders worldwide to consolidate their power and stifle dissent. Plus, vote 2020. Jill biden on hernd huss run for the white house and handling of the pandemic. And, rethinking college. While many colleges charge full tuitn, one school plans to keep its drastically reduced costs permanent