AMNA NAWAZ: Good evening.

I'm Amna Nawaz.

GEOFF BENNETT: And I'm Geoff Bennett.

On the "News Hour" tonight: the potential impact of President Trump's reported plan to take control of the U.S.

Postal Service.

AMNA NAWAZ: A fired park ranger weighs in on the major impacts of the president's cuts to government services.

®MD-ILYDIA JONES, Former National Park Ranger: All these large-scale terminations definitely will have a direct safety impact on national parks around the country.

GEOFF BENNETT: And a preview of national elections in Germany on Sunday, where immigration has been the key issue.

AMNA NAWAZ: Welcome to the "News Hour."

President Trump levied new shots against Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy today.

GEOFF BENNETT: First, he told a radio interviewer that he didn't think it's very important that Zelenskyy attend meetings aimed at bringing the war to an end.

Then, President Trump stepped up his criticism while speaking to a group of governors gathered at the White House.

DONALD TRUMP, President of the United States: I have had very good talks with Putin and I have had not such good talks with Ukraine.

They don't have any cards, but they play it tough.

But we're not going to let this continue.

This war is terrible.

GEOFF BENNETT: These latest comments follow a week of escalating tensions between Trump and Zelenskyy, which has seen the president refer to Zelenskyy as a dictator and falsely claim that Ukraine started the war.

A federal judge in Manhattan adjourned the corruption case against New York City Mayor Eric Adams today.

But Judge Dale Ho left the charges against him in place for now.

The judge also appointed an outside lawyer, Paul Clement, to present independent arguments on the DOJ's motion to drop the case.

He was solicitor general under former President George W. Bush.

The push to dismiss Adams' case led to a wave of resignations by federal prosecutors.

This week, New York Governor Kathy Hochul said she would not use her legal authority to remove him from office, for now.

Also in New York, Luigi Mangione, the man accused of killing UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, appeared in court today for the first time since his arraignment on state murder and terror charges two months ago.

His attorney said there were search and seizure issues during Mangione's arrest.

Outside the courthouse, she said a number of factors are complicating his right to a fair trial.

KAREN FRIEDMAN AGNIFILO, Attorney For Luigi Mangione: He is being publicly treated as guilty and as having the presumption of guilt, as opposed to the presumption of innocence, which is what he is entitled to.

GEOFF BENNETT: Mangione has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

He faces a separate federal case that could carry the death penalty.

A jury in Western New York found Hadi Matar, the man who stabbed author Salman Rushdie, guilty of attempted murder today.

The 27-year-old from New Jersey gave no obvious reaction as he heard the verdict this afternoon.

Jurors deliberated for less than two hours.

In 2022, Matar ran onto a stage where Rushdie was speaking and stabbed him more than a dozen times, leaving him blind in one eye.

The 77-year-old award-winning novelist served as the key witness in the trial.

Matar faces up to 25 years in prison.

Sentencing is set for April.

The mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, dismissed the city's fire chief today over her handling of last month's deadly wildfires.

In a statement, Bass said she's removing Chief Kristin Crowley effective immediately, adding that 1,000 firefighters that could have been on duty on the morning of the fires broke out were instead sent home on Chief Crowley's watch.

The Palisades Fire erupted in early January and went on to destroy or damage 8,000 homes and other structures.

At least 12 people were killed.

In the Middle East, Hamas says it released another body to Israeli officials today after confusion over yesterday's transfer of hostage remains led to concerns about the fragile cease-fire.

Forensic evidence found that one of the four bodies transferred yesterday was not that of Shiri Bibas, as had been promised.

Her remains were due to be returned along with those of her two young sons.

Hamas claims they were all killed during an Israeli airstrike alongside Palestinians.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said today that Hamas is to blame for their deaths.

BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, Israeli Prime Minister: Who kidnaps a little boy and a baby and murders them?

Monsters, that's who.

I vow that I will not rest until the savages who executed our hostages are brought to justice.

GEOFF BENNETT: Meantime, both sides say the release of six living hostages ranging from 22 to 40 years old will proceed tomorrow as planned.

They're expected to be exchanged for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners.

Israel also said today that it's surging troops to the Israeli occupied West Bank after three empty buses exploded near Tel Aviv yesterday in an apparent attempted terrorist attack.

No injuries were reported.

Doctors in Rome say Pope Francis is not out of danger, but that his medical condition is not life-threatening.

That assessment came in their first in-person update since the 88-year-old pontiff was admitted to the hospital a week ago with bronchitis.

The pope's continued stay has raised questions about whether he would resign.

Doctors say Pope Francis will remain hospitalized at least through next week.

On Wall Street today, markets plunged to end the week amid worries over a slowing economy.

The Dow Jones industrial average sank nearly 750 points for its worst fall of the year.

The Nasdaq dropped more than 400 points.

The S&P 500 also ended sharply lower on the day.

And they say revenge is a dish best served cold.

Last night, though, it was served on ice.

Canada beat the U.S. 3-2 in an overtime thriller to win the inaugural 4 Nations Face-Off hockey tournament.

The victory comes as relations between the two countries remains frosty amid Donald Trump's tariff plan and comments about making Canada the 51st state.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau after the game wrote: "You can't take our country and you can't take our game."

Team USA has not beaten Canada in an international final or championship series since 1996.

And the New York Yankees are ditching a nearly-five-decade rule on facial hair.

Owner Hal Steinbrenner announced today that players can now sport beards so long as they are -- quote -- "well-groomed."

Steinbrenner is the son of the late George Steinbrenner, who banned long hair and beards back in 1976, though mustaches were still OK.

The younger Steinbrenner today admitted that the policy for today's generation is outdated, adding that he'd hate to lose out on good players because they didn't want to play under such restrictions.

Still to come on the "News Hour": a fired park ranger weighs in on the president's cuts to government services; David Brooks and Jonathan Capehart discuss the week's political headlines; and a D.C. exhibit showcases the history struggles and triumphs of Black travel in the U.S. President Trump reportedly plans to fire the governing board of the U.S.

Postal Service and place the independent agency under the control of the Commerce Department, a move that could be the first step in privatizing a service established 250 years ago.

The White House initially denied that an executive order to make that change is in the works, but late today President Trump admitted that he's considering it.

Jacob Bogage broke the story for The Washington Post, and he joins us now.

Thanks for being with us.

JACOB BOGAGE, The Washington Post: Hey.

Great to hear from you, Geoff.

Thanks for having me.

GEOFF BENNETT: So what are your sources telling you about what the administration is planning and what it could ultimately mean for the U.S.

Postal Service?

JACOB BOGAGE: Well, step one here would be to place the Postal Service, take it out of independent status, and embed it inside the Commerce Department.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick was just sworn in today.

And we have reported over the course of months that he's been engaging with then-president-elect and now-President Trump about privatizing this agency.

So taking it out of that independent status would be step one.

And step two would be leadership changes.

Postmaster General Louis DeJoy announced he plans to retire soon.

And the Board of Governors can be fired for cause by the president.

That could be another step.

GEOFF BENNETT: Well, this will certainly lead to legal challenges.

What have experts been telling you about the authority the president would have to dissolve the Postal Service leadership and then effectively move it to the Commerce Department?

JACOB BOGAGE: So, the Postal Service has to have a Board of Governors.

These are bipartisan individuals appointed by the president, confirmed by the Senate, and then they together select or can remove the postmaster general.

There are powers that the Postal Service has on things like service, on things like rates and prices, on major investments that can only be made by the governors.

So you have to have a board in place.

And that's kind of what's complicating this for the White House a little bit.

How do you take these individuals who can only be removed for cause from an agency that by law is independent?

You can't legally move it into the Commerce Department.

How do you bring that under the control of the White House?

That's a legally dubious question.

GEOFF BENNETT: Well, President Trump, as you well know, he's long mused about privatizing the Postal Service.

And as you mentioned, the commerce secretary was sworn in today, and here's what the president had to say about USPS during that ceremony.

DONALD TRUMP, President of the United States: Well, we want to have a post office that works well and doesn't lose massive amounts of money.

And we're thinking about doing that.

And it'll be a form of a merger.

But it'll remain the Postal Service.

And I think it'll operate a lot better than it has been over the years.

It's been just a tremendous loser for this country.

Tremendous amounts of money are being lost.

GEOFF BENNETT: It's undeniable that the Postal Service has been losing money.

It had a lot to do with the way its pensions were organized.

It's lost more than $9 billion in the most recent fiscal year.

Does that strengthen the case for privatization?

JACOB BOGAGE: That's a difficult question because it's an ideological question.

So let's look at this from the big picture.

The United States has had a Postal Service longer than we have been a country.

It was founded in 1775.

Obviously, the country was founded in 1776.

For -- until 1970, the Postal Service didn't have a profit motive.

Its motive was to serve people all across the country with equal and reliable service.

We changed that in 1970 for -- it's a long story we don't need to get into it right now.

But we changed that to be more of like a crown corporation or a government-sponsored corporation.

So what do we lose without an independent Postal Service?

Well, this is an agency that belongs to all of us.

It doesn't belong to the White House.

Because it's independent, it has an obligation to serve all of us equally, reach everybody's address with the same service and the same pricing.

A privatized Postal Service or one in which mail delivery becomes political will not have those same motivations.

GEOFF BENNETT: And, to your point, in many cases in parts of the country, it's the only mail carrier, the only mail service.

JACOB BOGAGE: Right.

GEOFF BENNETT: And e-commerce giants like Amazon rely on the Postal Service for those last-mile deliveries.

So how could that affect the mail and packages that Americans get?

JACOB BOGAGE: This is a story that is obviously not going away.

And, Geoff, you and I know that really well from having covered it for so long.

So there's a term that folks should get to know right now, and that's coopetition, cooperation and competition.

Private express carriers like Amazon FedEx, UPS, use the Postal Service to carry their least profitable packages.

The Postal Service has to go to everyone's address six, sometimes seven days a week.

They have got to go over the hill and around the bend, even if it doesn't make money.

Amazon FedEx, UPS don't have to do that.

So they give these packages to the Postal Service.

They're competitors, but they leverage each other for business.

That is extremely, extremely profitable for the Postal Service.

They can't survive without that coopetition.

GEOFF BENNETT: And final question, Jake.

you Mentioned the postmaster general, Louis DeJoy, is stepping down.

He's halfway into his 10-year term.

Based on your reporting, do you know why he's stepping down now?

JACOB BOGAGE: Not precisely.

I mean, we look at the last fiscal quarter, it's the first time The Postal Service has been in the black, except for something like mandatory pension and health care costs, since the height of the COVID crisis.

It's a big win for his 10-year plan.

A lot of this -- the stuff that he has in the works, has been moving rather successfully, a bumpy rollout, but it's been rolling out nonetheless and being implemented.

Louis DeJoy, and I have spoken to him numerous times, he's a really successful businessman.

He's in his late 60s.

He has adult children.

He's retired from businesses that he ran or helped lead multiple times.

And running the Postal Service, believe it or not, was a retirement gig for him.

He's five years into this job, and that's about the time frame he promised when he took it.

So, there -- look, is there more to this story about why he's stepping down?

I would be willing to bet on that.

And that's something that I will keep reporting on.

But I also know that this is around the time frame that he was looking to leave anyway.

GEOFF BENNETT: Jacob Bogage of The Washington Post, thanks for being with us.

JACOB BOGAGE: Thanks, Geoff.

AMNA NAWAZ: At the direction of President Trump, Elon Musk and his team are firing workers across the federal government at a breakneck pace.

This week, some 6,000 employees are expecting termination notices at the IRS, along with more than 5,000 across the Department of Health and Human Services.

Already, more than 200 have been fired from FEMA, around 400 from the Federal Aviation Administration, and more than 1,000 from the Department of Veterans Affairs.

Our White House correspondent, Laura Barron-Lopez, spoke with one former federal worker who was among those recently let go.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: The Trump administration has fired more than 20,000 federal workers and contractors.

The effort to dramatically cut the federal work force led by Elon Musk's team has been chaotic and sweeping, and in some instances the administration has scrambled to reverse the firings.

The terminations are ongoing, and they include 1,000 National Parks employees, employees like former Park Ranger Lydia Jones, who worked at Badlands National Park in South Dakota.

She joins me now.

Lydia, thank you so much for talking to us.

You were fired on Valentine's Day.

What went through your mind when you got the news?

LYDIA JONES, Former National Park Ranger: I was heartbroken when I initially got the news.

It was definitely unexpected.

It was something that I was planning on potentially making a lifelong career, so it was quite the surprise.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: You were one of three EMTs at your park, at Badlands National Park, which stretches over 244,000 acres.

You welcome more than one million visitors a year.

What did your job require, and why did you become an EMT?

LYDIA JONES: My official main job was as an interpretive park ranger.

A lot of my duties were related to visitor services, working in the visitor center, providing visitors with information and directions, doing educational programs, guided hikes, things like that.

But I was also one of the three EMTs in the park and was a member of our search-and-rescue team and responded to emergencies throughout the park.

And that was something that I chose kind of on my own to pursue, because being in such a rural area with a lack of first responders and an increase in visitation and increase in incidents, I thought that there was a need for more EMTs in the park.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Do you think that your firing could make the park less safe?

LYDIA JONES: All these large-scale terminations definitely will have a direct safety impact on National Parks around the country, including Badlands National Park.

We're talking about very rural areas that are typically very far away from major hospitals or trauma centers.

And a lot of times, the park staff there are going to be the first people to be on scene to provide sometimes lifesaving care to these patients and these visitors.

So I absolutely think that this will have an impact, yes.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Lydia, you have talked about some of the sacrifices that you have to make to become a park ranger.

Can you tell us a little bit more about that?

LYDIA JONES: When you first start out, you have to work as what's called a seasonal employee.

I generally worked in Badlands National Park every summer season for six months, and then I would apply and go to -- I went to two other National Parks during the winter seasons.

So you're kind of constantly moving around.

You're typically away from family, friends, loved ones, and it can be quite hard.

But a lot of people, including myself, are willing to make those sacrifices, with the hopes of getting a permanent position, and mostly because we truly care about our jobs and truly believe in providing that service to the American people.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Do you plan on joining any of the lawsuits in the hopes of getting your job back?

And, if not, what's next for you?

LYDIA JONES: I'm still kind of debating how to proceed with all of that.

I would absolutely love to go back to my job.

I would go back in a heartbeat if I had the opportunity to.

But, if not, I will pursue other options.

I do plan on joining the local volunteer fire department at this time, so I can still provide service as an EMT to the local area and community.

Even though I may not be in the Park Service anymore for right now, I still believe in service and I still want to make that a part of my life.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Lydia Jones, thank you so much for your time.

LYDIA JONES: Thank you.

GEOFF BENNETT: In the German capital of Berlin today, a man was critically wounded in a knife attack at the city's Holocaust memorial.

And the suspected attacker was arrested hours later near the scene with blood on his hands.

All this just two days before voters go to the polls in an election dominated by concerns about immigration.

The country is expected to reject the incumbent left-leaning Chancellor Olaf Scholz in favor of a center-right candidate, followed closely by an anti-immigration party that has the backing of the Trump administration.

Special correspondent Malcolm Brabant reports now from Germany.

MALCOLM BRABANT: Magdeburg in former East Germany.

Two months have passed since the terror attack by a Saudi Arabian doctor who drove his car into a packed Christmas market, killing a 9-year-old boy, five women, and injuring 300.

The tributes have diminished, but not the grief of Elke Pesch.

ELKE PESCH, Magdeburg, Germany, Resident: I am so sad.

This should never have happened, absolutely not, never for anyone.

Never.

MALCOLM BRABANT: There have since been two more Islamist attacks in Southern Germany that have claimed four lives and driven Magdeburg street food vendor Diana Daum to despair.

DIANA DAUM, Street Food Vendor: One attack after another happens.

How far does it have to go?

MALCOLM BRABANT: The attacks have galvanized support for the anti-immigrant AfD, the Alternative for Germany Party.

"Now is the time for our security," says leader Alice Weidel.

"Now is the time for a new beginning."

While the AfD has doubled its popularity since the last election, it's expected to come second, but barred from joining the next governing coalition.

All the opinion polls suggest that the center-right Christian Democrats, the CDU, will win the election and lead Germany's next government.

They have accused the outgoing left-leaning coalition of being soft on immigration.

The CDU is promising to restore law and order and make the country safe again.

Unless there's a major upset, Germany's next chancellor will be Friedrich Merz, a pro-business lawyer.

During a debate with Social Democrat rival Olaf Scholz, Merz warned of the consequences of failing to tackle migration on Germany's flagging economy.

FRIEDRICH MERZ, Leader, Christian Democratic Union of Germany: Then we will finally slide into right-wing populism, and I am standing here to avoid exactly that.

I will only sign a coalition agreement that includes a turnaround on migration and a turnaround on the economy.

MALCOLM BRABANT: Scholz, the outgoing chancellor, also signaled his willingness to get tough on immigration.

OLAF SCHOLZ, German Chancellor: Perpetrators must be severely punished, and if they have committed such offenses and do not have German citizenship, then they must certainly expect that we will return them to their country of origin.

MALCOLM BRABANT: Despite its popular support, the AfD is regarded as beyond the pale by all the mainstream parties, and they have agreed a so-called firewall to keep the far right out of office.

But can Merz create a stable coalition government without the support of the AfD?

Cathryn Cluver Ashbrook is a German-American political scientist.

CATHRYN CLUVER ASHBROOK, Bertelsmann Stiftung: If that coalition holds is strong enough in terms of its majority, then he can absolutely push out and sideline the AfD.

Now, is that majority going to be stable enough for the AfD to not hit the coalition with a lot of obstructionism and make their life very hard?

Those are what the numbers on Sunday will show.

Right now, those numbers are very, very tight.

MALCOLM BRABANT: Helped, controversially, by Elon Musk, who declared his support for the AfD when he interviewed Alice Weidel on X. ELON MUSK, Department of Government Efficiency: Only AfD can save Germany, end of story.

ALICE WEIDEL, Leader, AfD Party: Yes, because you rightly said there is a difference of making a law and then enforcing it.

MALCOLM BRABANT: Then Vice President J.D.

Vance entered the fray at the Munich Security Conference.

J.D.

VANCE, Vice President of the United States: What German democracy, what no democracy, American, German or European, will survive is telling millions of voters that their thoughts and concerns, their aspirations, their pleas for relief are invalid or unworthy of even being considered.

MALCOLM BRABANT: Vance's intervention played well in Magdeburg.

DIANA DAUM: We want to be heard, but we're not being listened to.

The politicians up there do whatever they want.

They lie to us and serve only themselves, instead of serving the people.

ELKE PESCH: They call themselves Democrats, but behave in a way that is far from democratic in my eyes, especially because they always refer to German history.

This exclusion and marginalization, we have seen that before.

And it must never happen again to anyone, not even to the AfD.

MALCOLM BRABANT: But there was outrage elsewhere.

FRIEDRICH MERZ: We respect the presidential elections and the congressional elections in the U.S., and we expect the U.S. to do the same here.

CATHRYN CLUVER ASHBROOK: Whether it's the defense minister or the chancellor or the president, but also average people feel highly offended by the fact that somebody would attempt to officially meddle in the way that they perceive the functionality of their democracy.

MALCOLM BRABANT: But the AfD's deputy leader, Beatrix von Storch, couldn't be happier.

How important is the endorsement of the United States' vice president?

BEATRIX VON STORCH, Deputy Leader, AfD Party: I don't think that this shifts numbers, but it shows to our enemies that they maybe should be a bit careful and that we have got strong allies.

We have got strong connections towards the United States and towards Russia.

WOMAN: Show me what democracy looks like!

MALCOLM BRABANT: In recent weeks, there have been large protests against Germany's lean to the right.

Actor and musician Herbert Groenemeyer: HERBERT GROENEMEYER, Actor and Musician: Our democracy is under fierce attack, be it from smear campaigns, disinformation, fake news trolls, or from enemies of democracy and the parties and in the media, who do not just want to jeopardize our peaceful liberal coexistence, but destroy it.

MALCOLM BRABANT: Growing anti-immigrant sentiment worries 27-year-old Syrian refugee Ihab Sukkariya, who fled Damascus 10 years ago to avoid being drafted.

IHAB SUKKARIYA, Syrian Refugee: So I have temporary status here in Germany.

And once the war has ended, which has now ended, I might be sent back to Syria any time.

MALCOLM BRABANT: Sukkariya was one of a million Syrians who followed the migrant trail to Germany nearly 10 years ago, when the then-chancellor, Angela Merkel, threw open the borders.

A fluent German speaker, and he says, fully integrated, Sukkariya is currently unemployed and desperately looking for work to try to secure his future.

IHAB SUKKARIYA: I'm very scared to go back to Syria because Berlin is definitely my home, and I love it here.

I feel comfortable.

I feel accepted, and I blend in.

MALCOLM BRABANT: But German tolerance is no longer guaranteed as this landmark election approaches, with an agenda driven by the buoyant AfD, supported by an unpredictable American administration.

CATHRYN CLUVER ASHBROOK: There's a trust chasm right now between the two sides of the Atlantic that is as deep as it ever was in the history of this relationship over 80 years.

MALCOLM BRABANT: Come Sunday, victory may taste sweet, but, given the current climate, it could ultimately be a poisoned chalice.

For the "PBS News Hour," I'm Malcolm Brabant in Berlin.

AMNA NAWAZ: When Sunni rebels toppled the regime of Bashar al-Assad last December, they vowed to form an inclusive government by March.

As that deadline inches closer, there is growing pressure to make good on that promise.

Sunnis comprise around 75 percent of Syrians, with the remaining 25 percent made up of minorities like the Alawites, Christians, Shiite Muslims, Kurds and the Druze.

Special correspondent Simona Foltyn met with members of some of these communities and has this report from Damascus.

SIMONA FOLTYN: On the outskirts of Damascus lies one of the holiest sites of Shia Islam.

This shrine is said to be the burial site of Prophet Mohammed's granddaughter, Zaynab.

On a normal day, it's bustling with Shiite pilgrims and worshipers.

When the Sunni opposition toppled Bashar al-Assad's government in December, some of Syria's tiny Shiite minority feared that they and their places of worship would come under attack.

Sheik Akram Mustafa was here when the rebels took over.

SHEIK AKRAM MUSTAFA KARAWEEJ, Shiite Religious Leader: When they advanced on Damascus, there was chaos, and some people, through their individual behavior, threatened some of the sects.

So fear followed.

SIMONA FOLTYN: A video circulated of armed Sunni fighters attempting to storm the shrine, spreading panic, and prompting some Shia to flee to neighboring Lebanon.

SHEIK AKRAM MUSTAFA KARAWEEJ: We didn't know what their agenda was, what their direction and thinking would be.

Really, people were afraid.

SIMONA FOLTYN: Syria's new president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, has since made reassuring statements.

AHMED AL-SHARAA, Interim Syrian President: We are working on protecting sex and minorities from any attacks.

Syria is a country for all, and we can coexist together, and we have a close relationship with all segments of Syrian society.

SIMONA FOLTYN: An uneasy calm has settled over the shrine, but visitors remained few and far between.

Stability appears to have returned, at least for now, but there is an overall question about the role minorities like the Shia will play in the future of Syria.

Religious leaders like Sheik Akram hope for an end to sectarian strife.

SHEIK AKRAM MUSTAFA KARAWEEJ: God willing, it's in anyone's interest to sabotage this country.

Syria's ethno-religious groups should extend their hands to each other, rebuild and live in peace so that this country can return to the way we were before.

SIMONA FOLTYN: But the way things were before is a controversial topic.

During the war, this area saw an influx in Shiite inhabitants.

The Sunni fighters who are now in charge think it's only right that these demographic changes be reversed.

ABU BAQR MOHAMMED AHMED, Commander: The original inhabitants of this area are Sunni, though there were some people from the Shia sect.

The Iranian government and the regime of the criminal Bashar al-Assad worked on igniting sectarian flames.

It brought Shia from other countries who came to our area to kill our people.

SIMONA FOLTYN: Abu Baqr is the military commander responsible for the area.

He denied that Shiite civilians have fled in the wake of the rebels' arrival.

ABU BAQR MOHAMMED AHMED: Some people have fled the area because they are war criminals, whereas the people who did not bear weapons are here, and we are living together with them, and the situation is excellent.

SIMONA FOLTYN: The shrine used to be guarded by the Shiite paramilitary group Hezbollah, which came to Syria in 2012 to fight alongside Bashar al-Assad's government.

For local Sunnis, Hezbollah was not the shrine's protector, but an invading force.

Now the checkpoint Hezbollah manned together with Syrian and Iranian troops stands deserted, posters of its late leader, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, have been torn down.

Meanwhile, local Sunni men have joined the rebel army to fill the security vacuum.

SAMER MOHAMMED, Fighter: I joined to protect the area until stability returns, God willing.

SIMONA FOLTYN: The fighter says that these forces are here to protect all Syrians, Sunni or Shia.

SAMER MOHAMMED: There are rumors that we are killing Shia.

It's all lies.

We are not encroaching on them.

We are one hand.

The only thing we did is to finish the criminal regime.

SIMONA FOLTYN: With Assad's overthrow, Syria is under Sunni majority rule, the very scenario Assad portrayed as an existential threat to garner support among his own minority sect, the Alawites.

They're an offshoot of Shia Islam and comprise about 10 percent of the country's population.

Many Alawites who joined Assad's security forces did so for the sake of survival, rather than fierce loyalty.

They got little in return.

In this dilapidated Alawite neighborhood of Damascus, I sat down with a group of young men who were happy to see Assad gone.

TAREQ KHATEEB, Mezzeh 86 Neighborhood Resident: Many people misunderstood this matter.

That's because we were from the same sect as the former president.

This area was better off.

We lived in great poverty.

SIMONA FOLTYN: Under Assad's rule, they could barely scrape a living, nowhere near enough to own a car, buy a house, or get married.

WASSIM JALOUL, Mezzeh 86 Neighborhood Resident: We lived from day-to-day, from hour to hour that you can get work so you can eat.

SIMONA FOLTYN: Poverty left many Alawites with little choice but to join the army.

TAREQ KHATEEB: The options for the Alawites were known.

It was the army.

They didn't give us opportunities to study or become anything else.

The instructions were that this sect should go to the army.

SIMONA FOLTYN: The Alawites' disproportionate share in the security forces has sparked calls for revenge.

TAREQ KHATEEB: Who do you want to take revenge on?

The people who lived in poverty, who had nothing to do with anything?

The revenge shouldn't be against a specific sect.

The army included Sunnis, Alawites, Druze.

All of them were involved in hurting the Syrian people.

SIMONA FOLTYN: The new government has offered a general amnesty to soldiers who weren't implicated in crimes and has promised to protect minorities, including the Alawites.

But ensuring the protection of minorities isn't quite the same as granting them equal rights.

In the Christian neighborhood of Bab Touma, some worry that Christians could be relegated to second-class citizens.

Rimon Salloum is a member of the Syriac Orthodox Church.

RIMON SALLOUM, Member, Syriac Orthodox Church: We aspire to be equal in our rights and our duties.

We will not accept for the media or the new government to refer to us as minorities.

SIMONA FOLTYN: In a bid to bridge the divide, Sharaa recently met with church leaders.

But there's skepticism that these gatherings are more show than substance.

In the meantime, the transitional government has made unilateral decisions on vital issues.

The school curriculum has been revised from a largely secular to a more Islamic one, raising worries that planned amendments to the Constitution will also take on an Islamic slant.

Christians and other segments of Syrian society are sounding the alarm over not being included.

RIMON SALLOUM: We want to play a greater role in the political process.

We want to have a clear role and voice in building modern Syria.

We want to start working on the Constitution, which should be done in cooperation of all the sects in Syrian society and not limited to just one group.

SIMONA FOLTYN: On the face of it, Syria's new rulers have said the right things.

But to earn the trust of Syria's people, including its many minorities, actions must follow suit.

For the "PBS News Hour," I'm Simona Foltyn in Damascus, Syria.

GEOFF BENNETT: From fresh tensions between the U.S. and Ukraine, to town hall backlash, to major cuts to the federal work force, we turn now to the analysis of Brooks and Capehart.

That's New York Times columnist David Brooks, and Jonathan Capehart, associate editor for The Washington Post.

It's great to have you here, as always.

So let's start with Ukraine.

No one expected Donald Trump to handle global affairs like his predecessors, but he has fully adopted Russia's false propaganda on Ukraine, calling Zelenskyy a dictator, falsely stating that it was Ukraine that started the war, rhetorically turning against a democracy that was invaded in favor of the invader.

What are the implications, David?

DAVID BROOKS: Yes, it's pretty revolutionary.

I mean, I think, first, you can say goodbye to NATO.

NATO is really built around Article V, the promise we make to each other that we will defend each other, and I don't think Trump is going to defend anybody else.

But I think the bigger story is a shift in values, that American foreign policy and Western foreign policy has been built around democracy promotion, human dignity, human rights.

And so we banded together to sort of promote those causes.

Donald Trump doesn't see that world that way.

He sees the world as a place where ruthless mafiosos get to do what they can.

There's a famous line from the Peloponnesian Wars that strong do what they can, the weak suffer what they must.

And so I think, in Donald Trump's world there are three ruthless mafioso countries.

Russia will have hegemony over its region, we will have hegemony over our region, and China will have hegemony over their region.

And so anything that gets in the way of ruthless mafioso is being eliminated.

And some of that is international alliances, but some of this is just the idea that you shouldn't interfere into other people's elections, and some of it is the idea that you shouldn't be able to invade neighboring countries.

And so all those rules are being rewritten by a -- somebody who wants to turn all of global affairs into survival of the fittest.

GEOFF BENNETT: What about that?

Are we on the precipice of the end of the alliance as we know it?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: I don't -- there's nothing David said that I disagree with.

The language that we heard from Donald Trump in the first term was already alarming.

I'm thinking specifically of the Helsinki press conference, which -- I think it was in 2017, where he said to Vladimir Putin -- he told me he didn't do anything to our elections.

I don't see any reason not to believe him.

Now he's ratcheted that up with calling Zelenskyy a dictator.

If you are the leader of a Baltic nation, if you are the leader of Poland if you're the leader of Germany, France, you must be scared out of your mind about what this means, the rhetoric about Ukraine means for Europe.

And if you are in Taiwan, you better be prepared for what China could do.

GEOFF BENNETT: What about this idea -- and I have heard this from some Trump allies -- that it's high time we had an American leader who acted in such a way that effectively forces Europe to take control of their own security, that you could point to Dwight Eisenhower back in the 1950s, who raised concerns about Europe's sort of lackadaisical approach to their own security?

DAVID BROOKS: Yes, that's a valid point.

I mean, they haven't been paying any -- as long as the Cold War was going on, they didn't have to pay their dues.

And so now they have to because the Cold War is over, so that was -- that arrangement was bound to end.

But they have upped their spending.

The amount of spending that Donald Trump wants Europe to pay as a percentage GDP, we don't even do that.

So it's an act of hypocrisy to say they're totally at the wrong.

They're somewhat at the wrong.

But that's not really what the core is here.

Look, look at what Donald Trump has been doing to Ukraine over the last week.

He sends the Treasury secretary in there, and he hands him a piece of paper said, basically, hand us over 50 percent of your mineral rights.

That is, I'm making you an author you can't refuse.

That is what -- in ancient Rome, they would go into a little country and say, give us all your money or we will kill your women.

Like, that was like an imperial power saying, tribute.

Give us tribute.

That's essentially what Donald Trump just did to Vladimir Putin (sic).

And, initially, Putin (sic) said, hell no.

But now it could be an offer he can't refuse because he needs the Americans.

And so now they're, I guess, coming close to a deal because we're taking a country that was invaded, that bravely resisted on the behalf of the Western alliance.

We're saying, pay up.

And it's -- I don't have words to describe.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: And just want to jump in on something David was saying about defense expenditures.

The way Donald Trump talks about it, he says, these countries are ripping us off, as if they're paying the United States money in a protection racket.

And that's not what's happening at all.

To amplify David's point, it's just spend more of your GDP on your own defense, rise up to the level of where the United States is, relatively speaking, so that it's -- the burden is more fairly shared.

And so the way the president talks about it, it's not the real world.

And yet, to your point where people say, well, maybe we should start caring about America, those folks, I don't think, fully understand what a peaceful world with the NATO alliance, what American leadership on the global stage has meant for their own peace and prosperity here at home.

GEOFF BENNETT: Well, meantime, President Trump's poll numbers appear to be falling.

New polls from CNN and The Washington Post show a majority of Americans say he's overstepped his presidential authority and hasn't done enough to address high prices.

David, when you look at these numbers more closely, what do you see?

DAVID BROOKS: Well, hey, people don't like chaos.

I mean, we saw that when Biden withdrew from Afghanistan.

People just don't like chaos.

And, second, people do rely on government, like, Postal Service, SNAP benefits, go to the National Park Service, try to get a passport renewed.

Like, if there's nobody in the office, you're going to be upset.

Finally, I think the big thing is the inflation, that inflation was -- has begun to tick up again.

If we have tariffs, it'll tick up more.

If we pass a $4 trillion unpaid-for tax cut, we will overstimulate the economy.

Inflation will tick up more.

And so the very thing that took down the Biden administration could, in turn, take down the Trump administration if inflation kicks up after his explicit promise, I'm going to bring it down.

He swore to us that interest rates would go down immediately when he was elected, and the reverse has happened.

GEOFF BENNETT: Well, this seems to have come to a head last night.

Georgia Republican Congressman Rich McCormick held a town hall, and he faced an angry crowd.

And the folks there, his constituents, were upset over the steep cuts to the federal work force that had been instituted by Elon Musk and his DOGE aides.

Take a listen.

WOMAN: I would like to know, rather, the people would like to know, what you, Congressman, and your fellow congressmen are going to do to rein in the megalomaniac in the White House.

REP. RICH MCCORMICK (R-GA): When you talk about tyranny, when you talk about presidential power, I remember having the same discussion with Republicans when Biden was elected.

GEOFF BENNETT: So this is a deep red district.

Donald Trump won this district by more than 20 points.

I mean, what do you see happening here, Jonathan?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: To me, it's -- you have people in a district who voted, as you said, deep Republican district, but they didn't vote for Elon Musk.

They didn't vote for the chaos.

They don't like the fact that someone who is unelected and unaccountable is wreaking havoc on the federal government.

But, more importantly, the congressmen is from a co-equal branch of government.

The woman who was asking the question, like, what are you going to do?

You are Congress.

Why aren't you stepping in to push back against the president?

And what we saw there is that they're not willing.

I mean, you can't have guardrails if the guardrail doesn't want to guard, if Congress doesn't want to step in.

GEOFF BENNETT: And you wrote about this your -- past week in a column, where you said that it's the working-class communities that will continue to languish because Trump ignores their main challenges and focuses instead on culture war distractions, that people who voted for change want to see that change.

DAVID BROOKS: Yes, the people who voted for Trump had a good reason to.

Like, high school-educated people die eight years sooner than college-educated people.

High school-educated people, their kids by sixth grade are four grade levels below college-educated people.

They're much more likely to say they're lonely.

They're much more likely to live in devastated communities without social capital.

So, if you had a populist government, they would have policies to address these serious issues.

The Trump administration is not leading with that.

They really don't have plans for any of this.

And when you look at who's in the administration, it's obvious why.

The president and Elon Musk are University of Pennsylvania graduates who are billionaires.

Pete Hegseth went to Princeton and Yale.

J.D.

Vance went to Yale.

Stephen Miller went to Duke.

These are the highly educated right-wingers.

And I have been around these -- all these people all my life.

I used to be one.

And there are two types.

There are, one, people who believe in conservative governance.

And then there's the other type.

They're just anti-left.

They don't have a positive vision for conservative governments.

They want to tear down the institutions that they believe the left controls.

And so that's what they're doing.

That's what Bush -- that's what Trump goes after.

He goes after USAID.

He goes after the Forest Service.

He goes after the Department of Education.

And so it's all tearing down institutions that they believe the left controls.

And the problem with that is that the pain is born by the woman in Namibia who's going to die of AIDS, the kid in Ohio who's going to die of cancer because NIH, medical research has been gutted.

And so it's -- F. Scott Fitzgerald put it well.

Rich people are careless.

They break things.

And I think that's what's happening here.

GEOFF BENNETT: The other thing that was clear in that town hall last night is that it's one thing to campaign against a faceless bureaucracy.

It's very different when people's friends and neighbors start to lose their jobs with little to no warning, and veterans too who are losing their jobs.

How do you see it?

JONATHAN CAPEHART: There's that.

But there's also -- let's not forget the funding freeze, that you have got farmers who were depending on funding coming from the federal government.

They took out loans to buy equipment to get their products from the farm that are -- some are sitting in silos rotting.

They were due to go overseas to feed people as part of USAID.

This isn't just faceless bureaucrats being fired here in Washington.

And I think that's - - that is the chaos that people are seeing.

Wait, what?

The federal government just isn't in Washington?

It's my neighbor?

It's the clinic down the street where my child is getting treatment?

That, I don't think -- we are just one month in to this administration, and we have yet to see just how damaging this one month has been.

There's still more time to go.

GEOFF BENNETT: Indeed.

Jonathan Capehart, David Brooks, thank you both.

JONATHAN CAPEHART: Thanks, Geoff.

DAVID BROOKS: Thank you.

AMNA NAWAZ: A once valuable resource for Black travelers is now the subject of an exhibit in Washington, D.C. "News Hour" community correspondent Gabrielle Hays has the story, part of our ongoing series Race Matters.

CANDACY TAYLOR, Author, "Overground Railroad: The Green Book and the Roots of Black Travel in America": Those were all in "The Green Book."

GABRIELLE HAYS: "The Negro Motorist Green Book," a guide for African Americans first published in 1936, was a valued resource at a time when travel held the promise of adventure, but was also perilous.

It is now the subject of an exhibit here at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library in Washington, D.C., Candacy Taylor, who wrote "Overground Railroad: The Green Book and the Roots of Black Travel in America," helped pull the exhibit together with the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service and the D.C. public library system.

The exhibit tells the history of the guide named after its creators, Victor Hugo Green and his wife, Alma.

CANDACY TAYLOR: We wanted to show people who were living their best lives in spite of what was happening around them.

GABRIELLE HAYS: It served as a catalog of hotels, restaurants and other businesses that would serve Black people when racial segregation was legal.

It was published annually until 1967.

At the exhibit center, a compass.

CANDACY TAYLOR: It helps kind of orient you in this place, because, again, it wasn't just the south that had racism.

Jim Crow had no borders.

GABRIELLE HAYS: Sundown towns, communities that excluded nonwhite residents by law, intimidation or violence after dark, were especially dangerous.

For Black Americans who used it, going the wrong direction could mean life or death?

CANDACY TAYLOR: Some sundown towns had a bell that would ring at 6:00, telling the local laborers who were Black and the domestic workers that was their cue to get out of town.

The consequences of you being in a sundown town were everything from harassment to death to lynchings.

There were no sundown town maps, so for travelers you wouldn't know where the minefields were.

GABRIELLE HAYS: Taylor, a photographer and cultural documentarian, spent years researching sites in the guide, driving more than 110,000 miles and photographing nearly 300 sites in 48 states.

CANDACY TAYLOR: This guide was a license to leave.

It was a way for people to find sanctuary and safety on the road.

GABRIELLE HAYS: Some of what she found surprised her, including hundreds of women-owned businesses from hair salons to boarding houses.

We're talking about periods where women couldn't even have bank accounts on their own, but we're seeing them listed in this book, and that seems pretty powerful.

CANDACY TAYLOR: I thought I knew a lot about Black history, and I came across all these women-owned businesses in "The Green Book."

And there were things called tourist tomes, which were kind of like -- not quite boarding houses.

Most of these tourist tomes were run by widowed women who had an extra bedroom and knew how to cook.

And then, when I dug deeper and found the personalities of these women and interviewed some of the relatives of these women, they were fierce, and they were not just independent.

I mean, they had real courage and skills in how to survive.

GABRIELLE HAYS: Through her research, Taylor found some family history, remembered by her stepfather, Ron Burford.

CANDACY TAYLOR: But, yes, now we're in front of Ron's quote and chauffeur's hat here, and he says: "Everybody had one, and you always kept it in the car."

GABRIELLE HAYS: It was safer to claim to be working for a white family than to be driving your own family anywhere.

CANDACY TAYLOR: When the sheriff was walking towards the passenger door, his father turned around and said: "Shh.

Don't say anything."

And the sheriff says: "Where are you going?

Whose car is this?

And who are these people with you?"

His father said: "I'm -- this is my employer's car."

He looked at his wife and pretended he didn't know her and said: "This is the maid, and that's her son in the back and I'm driving them home."

And the police officer said: "Well, where's your hat?

His father said, I'm -- it's hanging in the back, Officer."

And Ron looked and there was a chauffeur's hat hanging there, and it had always been there.

GABRIELLE HAYS: Sharing his stories brought them closer.

CANDACY TAYLOR: It was almost as though, when I did this project, he could trust me with his trauma.

And it really gave me a different perspective and a lens to look at not only our history as Black people, but as his particular history as a dark-skinned Black man growing up in the South.

GABRIELLE HAYS: Even though the days of "The Green Book" are long past, Taylor says the struggle for justice is far from over.

CANDACY TAYLOR: The idea that just because time moves on that we get better as a country is not true.

When people say, oh, it's 2025, why are we still dealing with this, or how could this be happening now, and when you learn about history, you will see that things don't just march forward.

GABRIELLE HAYS: But she points to what Victor Green accomplished.

CANDACY TAYLOR: It doesn't take a lot to make change.

He did this simple thing.

He was a postal worker.

He didn't have up to an eighth grade education.

He had no resources.

There were no computers.

There was no Internet.

And all of this happened with an idea.

So, you don't need to be rich, you don't need a business degree, you don't need all this stuff to make change.

GABRIELLE HAYS: The exhibit is on display through March 2 and also online.

For the "PBS News Hour," I'm Gabrielle Hays in Washington.

AMNA NAWAZ: Remember, there's always a lot more online, including our digital weekly show.

This week, we go behind the scenes with some of this year's top Oscar contenders.

That is on our YouTube page.

GEOFF BENNETT: And be sure to watch "Washington Week With The Atlantic" later this evening here on PBS.

Moderator Jeffrey Goldberg and his panel discuss President Trump's pivot towards Russia and America's role in the world.

AMNA NAWAZ: And on "PBS News Weekend," we examine which parts of the Project 2025 blueprint the Trump administration is already implementing and what that could mean for the country.

And that is the "News Hour" for tonight.

I'm Amna Nawaz.

GEOFF BENNETT: And I'm Geoff Bennett.

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

Have a great weekend.