AMNA NAWAZ: Good evening.

I'm Amna Nawaz.

Geoff Bennett is away.

On the "NewsHour" tonight: a look at why previous efforts to fund a warning system for floods in Texas failed and if last week's deadly flooding will change that.

Measles cases surge to their highest levels in more than 30 years.

The struggle to get the disease under control.

And a former federal prosecutor led cases against the January 6 rioters speaks out about the shifting priorities at the U.S. Justice Department.

GREG ROSEN, Former Justice Department Official: The perception right now is that, any time you do anything against the president or an ally of the president, that you will be subject to some sort of scrutiny or investigations.

That's a huge problem.

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

The search for bodies continued in South Central Texas today almost a week after torrential rains triggered deadly flash floods; 121 people have been confirmed dead.

At least 161 remain missing.

Now officials are facing scrutiny about whether they gave sufficient notice about the rising waters.

The National Weather Service did issue several watches and warnings starting just before midnight on July 3.

At 1:14 a.m. on July 4, it pushed its first alert to cell phones in the area, warning of -- quote -- "dangerous and life-threatening flash floods."

Several more followed as the river surged over 30 feet in a matter of hours.

In the meantime, local officials appeared unaware of the unfolding catastrophe until later in the morning.

And there are now reports that Kerr County officials waited some 90 minutes to send phone alerts on a private system known as CodeRed after a firefighter requested it.

For a closer look, we're joined now by Neena Satija, an investigative reporter with The Houston Chronicle.

Neena, welcome to the "News Hour."

Thanks for joining us.

NEENA SATIJA, Investigative Reporter, The Houston Chronicle: Thank you for having me.

AMNA NAWAZ: So your reporting found that, nearly a decade before this July 4 flooding, there were local officials in Kerr County pushing to buy a new early flood warning system.

Tell us why they were pushing for that and where those efforts went.

NEENA SATIJA: So, Kerr County started talking about this about a year after there were devastating floods in Wimberley.

That's another town in the heart of the Texas Hill Country.

They had very devastating floods in 2015, killed more than a dozen people, similar kind of situation that we're hearing about right now.

Water rose, I think, 40 feet in just one hour during that flood.

And so the year after, Kerr County said, hey, we have got a similar problem here.

We're also in the Hill Country called Flash Flood Alley.

What can we do?

And what they realized was that the system they had in place was pretty old, pretty outdated.

You really had to go and look online as an emergency management official to see what water levels were.

There were only six gauges on the Guadalupe River in Kerr County, which is not very many.

And there were different low-water crossings, low-level roads and bridges that were monitored by two different agencies.

So they really wanted to update all of that.

And that was their goal as they talked about having a new flood warning system.

AMNA NAWAZ: So what exactly were they asking for from state officials?

And what was the response?

NEENA SATIJA: Well, they wanted help paying a million for this new system.

And so what they did is, they went to state officials and they said, hey, we know there's some federal disaster relief money, first from the floods in 2015, next from Hurricane Harvey.

Can we get a piece of that?

Because we can't fund this million dollar system on their own -- on our own.

And, essentially, they were told no a couple of times.

Then they went to the state for some state funding, and they were told, we can give you a zero percent interest loan, we can pay a small portion of it, but that's about it.

So they really weren't able to get very far in requesting state funding for help on this project.

AMNA NAWAZ: So we should note now, after these last week's deadly floods, that Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick has said in an interview earlier this week on Monday that lives could have been saved had there been a more robust warning system in place.

And he also said that the state will now pay for it.

Take a listen.

LT. GOV.

DAN PATRICK (R-TX): Had we had sirens along this area up and down, the same type of sirens that they have in Israel when there's an attack coming that would have blown very loudly, it's possible that that would have saved some of these lives.

And so if the city can't afford it, then the state will step up.

And we need to have these in place by the next summer.

AMNA NAWAZ: Neena, there is a special legislative session that's coming up later this month in Texas.

Do you see Texas lawmakers making a different decision now than they did the many times before Kerr County officials wanted to put this system into place and asked for that funding?

NEENA SATIJA: I think it's very possible they will.

We have never seen a disaster like this happen so close to a legislative session.

Usually, the session only meets six months out of every two years.

On the other hand, I think the big question is, what is it?

What is the system they're going to pay for?

Is it just sirens?

The experts we have talked to say it's not just about the sirens blaring.

It's about having enough gauges in the river, having enough monitoring stations to inform those sirens to say, this is when you really need to get out, this is how high the water is going to get.

So it's a pretty sophisticated system that you really need.

And the question is, how much are state officials willing to pay?

I would also note that local officials in Kerr County did not want sirens.

They actually decided as part of their plan they were trying to get funding for that they didn't want to include sirens.

So I think a lot of questions -- a lot of unanswered questions about what exactly the state will pay for, what local communities are going to ask, and how much money the state decides they're willing to front for all of this.

It's going to be not just a million for Kerr County, but I think you could get into much higher numbers when you're talking about other communities and having the best system you possibly can.

AMNA NAWAZ: It is worth noting as well that Texas leads the nation when it comes to flood deaths.

That Wimberley flooding you mentioned, some 13 people were killed and that, 89 killed after Hurricane Harvey.

Those are just a few of the deadly floods that you have seen in the last few years in Texas.

In your conversations with officials who were involved in those early asks and people today, what is it that's most needed on the ground?

Is there consensus around that?

NEENA SATIJA: That's a really good question.

I think more data is key, I think having more of these high-tech monitors that can transmit data in real time, and also to -- in a way that the public can understand, that's a huge, huge improvement.

And there are places in Texas that have been able to implement that.

But I also think that it really is time to have a conversation about, should we be in these areas?

Should we be in these floodways and these floodplains?

Do we need to be continuing to develop there?

I think a lot of experts are saying, that's where we need to go.

We need to stop developing in some of these extremely flood-prone areas.

And that's a tough conversation to have.

AMNA NAWAZ: Neena Satija, investigative reporter with The Houston Chronicle, thank you so much for joining us.

We appreciate your time.

NEENA SATIJA: Thank you.

AMNA NAWAZ: We start the day's other headlines with the legal battle over birthright citizenship.

A federal judge today blocked the Trump administration from enforcing an executive order aimed at ending the longstanding law.

New Hampshire Judge Joseph Laplante issued a preliminary injunction and certified a class action lawsuit saying his actions applied to babies nationwide.

That includes the children of undocumented parents and those born to people in the U.S. on student visas.

The class action designation was seen as the only way to impose such a far-reaching measure after the Supreme Court's ruling last month that limited nationwide injunctions.

The judge gave the administration seven days to appeal.

In Ukraine, at least two people have died in an overnight Russian missile and drone attack lasting nearly 10 hours.

Firefighters worked to put out several new flames across Ukraine's capital city of Kyiv.

At least 22 people were wounded and thousands spent the night sheltering in an underground metro station.

It comes a day after Russia launched its largest barrage of the war so far.

Meanwhile, Secretary of State Marco Rubio says the U.S. and Russia have exchanged new ideas for cease-fire talks after meeting with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov.

But speaking to reporters at a foreign ministers meeting in Malaysia, he also described the Trump administration's frustration at the lack of progress towards a deal.

MARCO RUBIO, U.S. Secretary of State: It was a frank conversation.

It was an important one.

Look, the president has been pretty clear.

He's disappointed and frustrated that there's not been more flexibility on the Russian side to bring about an end to this conflict.

We hope that can change.

And we're going to continue to stay involved where we see opportunities to make a difference.

AMNA NAWAZ: Separately, Ukraine's European allies agreed to set up a headquarters in Paris to help deploy troops to maintain the peace after the war ends there.

The announcement came at a meeting in Rome of the so-called coalition of the willing, which was attended for the first time by a U.S. representative, Keith Kellogg.

European officials reached a deal with Israel today to allow more food and fuel into Gaza.

The E.U.

's top diplomat said the agreement could result in more crossings open, aid and food trucks entering Gaza, repair of vital infrastructure and protection of aid workers.

It comes as local hospitals and aid workers say Israeli airstrikes killed at least 36 Palestinians overnight.

That included 15 people waiting outside a medical clinic, many of them children.

Israel says it was targeting a militant when it struck near the facility.

The Secret Service has reportedly suspended six agents over failures related to the attempted assassination of Donald Trump at a rally in Pennsylvania last July.

The agency's deputy director, Matt Quinn, told CBS News that the suspensions range from 10 to 42 days with no pay or benefits during that time.

The shooting exposed serious security failures after a gunman was able to access a nearby rooftop to fire at then-presidential candidate Trump.

He was left with a bloody ear.

A firefighter attending the rally died.

Sunday marks the one-year anniversary of that attack.

Family members of those lost in January's midair collision in Washington, D.C., are criticizing the Army's handling of the disaster.

In an open letter to Army Secretary Dan Driscoll, 168 loved ones say the Army's actions show a -- quote -- "willingness to circumvent official processes and resist oversight when deflecting scrutiny, while persistently refusing to accept responsibility."

They're calling for an independent investigation into the crash; 67 people were killed when a Black Hawk helicopter collided with an American Airlines jet as it approached Reagan National Airport.

President Trump is tapping Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy to serve as interim leader of NASA.

His selection comes after Trump withdrew his initial nominee, Jared Isaacman, back in may.

The billionaire private astronaut is a close associate of Elon Musk, and his selection was seen as a potential boost to Musk's rocket company SpaceX.

Trump's decision to drop Isaacman helped fuel his public split with Musk.

Duffy will hold on to his position as transportation secretary, even as he takes up his NASA duties.

AMNA NAWAZ: In Los Angeles, 31 construction workers are safe and accounted for after a huge wastewater tunnel partially collapsed as they were working underground.

MAN: Tonight, we were lucky at 7.

AMNA NAWAZ: Rescuers feared the worst when they rushed to the scene late last night, but the entire crew was hoisted above ground with no major injuries reported.

They have been operating a boring machine some 400 feet below ground and six miles away from this enormous shaft here, the tunnel's only access point.

The $700 million project has been suspended until authorities can figure out what caused the collapse.

And there's been a major shakeup in the cereal aisle.

W.K.

Kellogg, which makes Frosted Flakes and other morning staples, is being bought out by the Italian company behind Nutella in a deal valued at more than $3 billion.

The Kellogg's brand traces its roots back to its founding in Michigan more than a century ago, but sales of its iconic cereals have struggled recently, as consumers turn to protein bars and other breakfast options.

The deal still needs approval from Kellogg's shareholders.

On Wall Street today, stocks close higher as traders put their tariff concerns to the side.

The Dow Jones industrial average climbed nearly 200 points on the day.

The Nasdaq added nearly 20 points to close at a new all-time high.

The S&P 500 also ended in record territory.

And the world's first Birkin handbag sold for more than $10 million today at an auction in Paris.

(CHEERING) AMNA NAWAZ: The winning price, when counting in fees, drew gasps and applause from the crowd.

The bag itself was the prototype for what later became fashion's must-have accessory.

It was named after the late actor and fashion icon Jane Birkin and traces its origins to a chance encounter she had on a flight in the 1980s with the then-head of Hermes.

Birkin was explaining why she wanted a larger handbag and sketched her own version on an air sickness bag.

The rest, as they say, is fashion history.

Still to come on the "News Hour": the union for government workers responds to the Supreme Court ruling clearing the way for mass firings; an investigation into the private adoption industry; and a new opera gives voice to people with disabilities using artificial intelligence.

2025 is now the worst year for measles cases in this country in more than three decades.

That's according to new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

More than 150 people have been hospitalized due to the growing outbreak, and three have died, including two unvaccinated children in Texas.

To help us break down the new data, we're joined now by Dr. Adam Ratner.

He's a member of the Committee on Infectious Diseases of the American Academy of Pediatrics and the author of "Booster Shots: The Urgent Lessons of Measles and the Uncertain Future of Children's Health."

Dr. Ratner, thanks for joining us.

When we say it's the worst year in all those years, here's a quick look at the numbers.

The national case count reached 1,288 on Wednesday.

That is across 38 states.

There have been 162 hospitalizations.

About half of those are children under the age of 5.

Doctor, put that into context for us.

How do these numbers compare to years past?

DR. ADAM RATNER, American Academy of Pediatrics: Right.

So this is the largest number of cases in more than 30 years.

It goes back to before we had eliminated measles from the United States, which happened in the year 2000.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, we had large outbreaks in a number of cities.

And that's when we had these really high case counts.

And we're rivaling those numbers now.

So this is a really disappointing milestone we have hit.

AMNA NAWAZ: And the year is only half over at this point.

Do you expect this trend to continue?

DR. ADAM RATNER: I mean, I think that the case numbers this year have really been driven by the outbreak in West Texas and New Mexico.

That appears to be slowing down.

But I think it's alarming that we have measles in many states now.

And I'm concerned that there will be other unvaccinated communities where measles gets in and starts to spread.

AMNA NAWAZ: You mentioned the number of active outbreaks in states, but the largest outbreak, as you pointed out, starting a few months ago in an undervaccinated community in West Texas.

You described outbreaks like that as the canary in the coal mine.

Why?

DR. ADAM RATNER: Because measles is our most contagious disease.

It is more contagious than flu or COVID or polio or Ebola or anything else that you can think of.

And so, when we start to see vaccination rates drop, when we start to see local public health departments struggle to maintain funding and personnel, the first thing that we see are measles outbreaks.

Measles outbreaks are important, in and of themselves, as we have seen in West Texas this year.

We have had a couple of children die there.

They can be very serious.

But it's also a warning sign that other things are coming.

And we're already starting to see some of these other vaccine-preventable diseases like whooping cough coming back this year as well.

AMNA NAWAZ: What role do medical and religious exemptions play in all of this?

And how do you look at that balance between public health and personal freedom?

So vaccine mandates, meaning school-based vaccine requirements, were an integral part of getting to measles elimination.

And I think that, without those sorts of mandates, we don't get to the levels of vaccination that we need to control a disease as contagious as measles.

There will always be, there have to be medical exemptions to vaccine mandates for the very rare children that have an allergy to something that's in one of the vaccines.

Clearly, you don't require that child to get that vaccine.

But it's the non-medical exemptions that have grown over the last decade or so and that really put some of these communities at much higher risk.

AMNA NAWAZ: This is all, of course, happening in the context of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. last month firing all 17 members of the CDC's vaccine advisory committee.

He replaced them with his own choices.

Kennedy, of course, as we know has expressed anti-vaccine views in the past.

But he argues, Dr. Ratner, that this will help to restore public trust in vaccines.

How do you look at these changes?

DR. ADAM RATNER: I think that these changes are alarming and that this is the least qualified and least transparent Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices that we have ever seen.

It's -- the meeting that happened last month of that committee was alarming, because they talked about revisiting the entire vaccine schedule.

There were presentations from anti-vaccine groups.

And I think that we're in a very dangerous place with measles and other vaccine-preventable diseases spreading and with the HHS secretary and now the ACIP seemingly working against vaccination.

AMNA NAWAZ: Dr. Adam Ratner, a member of the Committee on Infectious Diseases at the American Academy of Pediatrics, thank you so much for your time.

We appreciate it.

DR. ADAM RATNER: My pleasure.

Thank you.

AMNA NAWAZ: The Supreme Court this week gave the Trump administration the green light to reorganize government agencies and begin the process of mass firings of federal workers.

Tens of thousands of employees at nearly 20 federal agencies could be out of work, with layoffs expected at the State Department as soon as tomorrow morning.

As Lisa Desjardins explains, that's happening even as court challenges will likely continue.

LISA DESJARDINS: The reductions in force, known as RIFs, led by the DOGE team had been on hold for months.

A lower court judge ordered a pause because the Trump administration did not consult Congress first.

But the majority of the Supreme Court ruled that the planning for mass firings can move forward.

The justices wrote that the court is not ruling on the future firings, but only on the president's order that agencies start planning them.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented, writing sharply that the court is "green-lighting the president's legally dubious actions in an emergency posture."

To discuss where things stand and how federal workers are responding, I'm joined by Everett Kelley, the president of the American Federation of Government Employees, which represents more than 800,000 people.

Everett, a lot of people want to know what this means for federal workers.

What are you hearing from them?

EVERETT KELLEY, National President, American Federation of Government Employees: Well, thank you for having me, first of all, Lisa.

Federal employees are just at a disarray, if you will.

They are so confused.

In one minute, they have been told, you're going to get RIFed.

The next minute, it's put on hold, and then you're going to be RIFed again.

So people are confused.

But, at the same time, they are more determined now than ever to fight these unjust actions.

LISA DESJARDINS: We are trying to get a hold of what's happening in this exact moment.

Our Nick Schifrin and others are reporting that the State Department may announce RIFs, those reductions in force, tomorrow, even though we didn't expect them to start until next week.

Are you hearing of firings starting now?

EVERETT KELLEY: You know, I have, in the last few moments, heard of such an action, but this is the thing.

There should not be a rush to implement these extreme layoff plans that was created by Elon Musk before there's been time to review and evaluate the consequences.

Now, we saw what happened when the VA did just that.

The secretary drastically scaled back Musk's plan.

Secretary Rubio should engage in the same kind of careful analysis so that they can analyze every aspect of these actions.

LISA DESJARDINS: This is a court victory for President Trump at this point, and the White House did send us a statement saying, in their view, this court decision "clearly rebukes leftist judges trying to prevent the president from achieving government efficiency."

You obviously represent federal workers, but I wonder how you see that argument about efficiency.

Do you think there is any bloat in the federal government?

Should there be any jobs cut?

EVERETT KELLEY: You know, I'm going to say this.

I don't think that this -- these actions is about efficiency.

I clearly think that it's about retaliation for the members of AFGE and for the work force standing up and calling out these unjust actions.

Now, if they want -- if the administration want to really talk about efficiency, want to talk about should there be RIFs, you know, talk to the people that do these jobs every single day.

And let's look at that.

Let's analyze and see if it's necessary, because the services that the American people deserve, they should get it.

And it's the American work force that's providing these services.

I mean, just imagine, if you just go in and blanketly start RIFing people, who's going to be affected by that?

It's the American people.

It's the American people that are depending on the Veterans Administration to provide care for the veterans.

It's going to be the people that provide food safety, air safety, air travel safety, all of these types of things that the American people are going to be affected by.

So there should be careful analysis of these things before we just blanketly start doing reductions in forces.

LISA DESJARDINS: I know you mentioned this is confusing for federal workers.

I think it's confusing for most Americans as well, all of the back-and-forth here.

So I want to do a quick reset on a little bit of where we are with the actions in the past 5.5 months.

We know that somewhere around 75,000 federal workers took that fork offer for those early retirements or deferred resignations.

There's a lawsuit that estimates that some 24,000 probationary -- that's newer workers mostly -- have been fired.

But, overall, we still don't really know how many federal workers have been RIFed or fired, how many may have been reinstated after they were fired.

But to -- getting to your point, through all of this, what services do you think have been affected?

What has affected American lives so far and what specifically do you think could be affected next?

EVERETT KELLEY: Well, it's -- when you look at what's happening across this country.

I mean, just when you look at Texas, for instance, and the rainstorms and the flooding there, those FEMA employees are not readily available as they could be.

You know, they were warned, if you lay off these employees, you're going to suffer loss.

And in many instances, it could be people's lives as a state.

And you're seeing that happen across the board.

And it's going to be more and more of it if we are not careful and think about how we are addressing these issues and how we're tackling these issues, especially without good analysis.

LISA DESJARDINS: I know Secretary Noem has said that she thinks localities on the ground are getting everything they need, but it -- there is reporting that we will follow up on, on what happened with FEMA exactly in Texas.

But I want to ask you as we wrap up, you mentioned that the Veterans Administration, for example, did announce that they have cut back on their plans for firings.

As these workers may get firing notices, do you think they should take that as an absolute firing?

Or is it possible that courts will reverse this or the administration will?

What happens next?

EVERETT KELLEY: Well, to be honest with you, I think that AFGE has a very strong case against the legality of these actions.

So I encourage people to hang in there.

These people want to do that job.

They just want the opportunity to do it.

LISA DESJARDINS: Everett Kelley, thank you so much for talking with us.

EVERETT KELLEY: Thank you.

AMNA NAWAZ: As more states limit or ban access to abortion, some are beginning to push adoption as an alternative for women facing unplanned pregnancies.

But when do laws go from accommodating to exploitative?

From the Center for Investigative Reporting, Julia Lurie examines the consequences in one of the most adoption-friendly states in the country.

JULIA LURIE: Tia Goins and her partner Dominique Stanley (ph) recently welcomed a baby girl.

But it's their first child, Tiona, whose photos blanket their Detroit apartment.

TIA GOINS, Birth Mother: I kind of find myself, like, feeling like she's here, but she's not here, you know?

JULIA LURIE: After Goins gave birth in 2018, she was in crisis, facing eviction and unable to find room in a shelter.

TIA GOINS: Cold outside, had a whole 3-month-old baby.

Where do we possibly go?

JULIA LURIE: Desperate, she looked up adoption agencies and found Utah-based Brighter Adoptions.

SANDI QUICK, Owner, Founder and Director, Brighter Adoptions: Hi.

My name's Sandi Quick.

I am the owner, founder and director of Brighter Adoptions.

We are... JULIA LURIE: A representative for Brighter Adoptions offered to fly Goins from Michigan all the way to Utah and said that they would pay her cash after she gave up her child.

Online, Sandi Quick's agency, like many in Utah, offers housing and cash stipends targeting struggling expecting mothers across the country.

Quick has said that over 95 percent of her birth mothers come from out of state.

TIA GOINS: The lady just kept calling, kept calling, we're pushing for time.

This is what she wanted to do, she wanted to do.

So, in my head, it's like, OK, winter is coming around.

I don't want to be outside with her.

JULIA LURIE: Now facing homelessness, Goins and her 3-month-old baby on the same day they were evicted boarded a flight to Utah paid for by Brighter Adoptions.

MALINDA SEYMORE, Texas A&M University School of Law: The babies that adoptive parents most want to adopt are a rare commodity.

There's actually an acronym for it, AYAP, as young as possible.

JULIA LURIE: Malinda Seymore, a law professor at Texas A&M who studies adoption, estimates there are as many as two million hopeful adoptive parents competing for just 20,000 newborns every year.

MALINDA SEYMORE: Just moving her away from her support system is a great way to make a birth mother feel isolated and alone and helpless, all of which are a great mind-set for the adoption agency to get a consent form.

JULIA LURIE: Each state regulates adoption differently.

States like New York and California give birth mothers 30 days after signing adoption papers to reconsider their decision.

But states that are known as adoption-friendly like Utah expedite the process by, for example, making adoption irreversible as soon as the birth mother signs.

MALINDA SEYMORE: When states decide that they are going to be adoption-friendly, they're trying to make adoptions as quick as possible, as inexpensive as possible, as soon as possible.

JULIA LURIE: As a result of these laws, a cottage industry has emerged to fly in potential birth mothers to adoption-friendly states and charge a premium to adoptive parents.

STATE REP. CHRISTINE WATKINS (R-UT): There's a lot of money to be had in adoption.

And money can trump everything.

JULIA LURIE: Christine Watkins, a Utah state representative, tried and failed to pass adoption reform to protect birth parents.

So many people's understanding of adoption is, it's just this beautiful, benevolent thing.

And, of course, it can be that, but people don't necessarily think about it an industry.

STATE REP. CHRISTINE WATKINS: It is an industry, yes, basically because the state allows it.

We don't -- we don't have any laws that prohibit it.

JULIA LURIE: Over the past decade, dozens of states have introduced adoption-friendly legislation.

Georgia, Kentucky and Indiana have all shortened the period during which a birth mother can change her mind.

In Goins' case, things were moving fast.

Soon after landing in Utah, she met the people who wanted to adopt her daughter, a white couple from Mississippi.

But, immediately, she had second thoughts.

TIA GOINS: I text Sandi and told her, like, I'm kind of starting to change my mind a little bit.

This might not be something I want to do.

JULIA LURIE: But, the morning after Brighter Adoptions staff showed up at her hotel with the final paperwork.

TIA GOINS: It all was just happening so fast.

It's not something I wanted to do.

Why are they still wanting me to sign?

Then I'm like, if I don't do this, where am I going to end up?

JULIA LURIE: The forms waived her rights to protections in Michigan, where Goins would have had up to five days to change her mind.

TIA GOINS: So it was like, what do I do?

What do I do?

So, I just -- I just didn't want her to be homeless with me.

JULIA LURIE: Just two days after landing in Utah, Goins reluctantly signed her baby over to the adoptive parents.

TIA GOINS: I didn't really hold her.

I didn't really tell her goodbye.

I didn't kiss her.

They didn't gave me a chance to talk to her.

So they just came, just came and got her.

JULIA LURIE: On the way to the airport, Quick handed Goins $4,000 in cash.

Quick said the money was for Goins' future expenses, but Goins wasn't expecting that much.

And the whole process doesn't sit well with her.

TIA GOINS: A lot of people say it's like you sold your baby.

I did not sell my baby.

I think I took -- that people took advantage of me for my baby.

JULIA LURIE: Sandi Quick did not respond to multiple interview requests, but did send an e-mail saying the agency makes sure that birth mothers "fully understand the implications of adoption."

She added: "I am someone who ends up filling these gaps where our social safety nets fall short."

Now back home, Goins said she immediately regretted her decision, but Michigan officials could do nothing to help since the adoption was in Utah.

SUSAN DUSZA GUERRA LEKSANDER, Clinical Director, Pact: If she'd been able to slow things down, she'd probably still have her child with her.

JULIA LURIE: Susan Dusza Guerra Leksander is the clinical director at Pact, a California nonprofit that provides abortion, adoption, and parenting resources to pregnant women.

She says women in crisis become much more vulnerable in unfamiliar surroundings.

SUSAN DUSZA GUERRA LEKSANDER: The minute she said, I'm not sure that I want to do this, I'm not sure that I can do this, I mean, that should just call a full stop, full halt.

ASHLEY MITCHELL, Director, Knee to Knee: Domestic private infant adoption in America toes that line of legalized trafficking anyway.

It would be very easy to cross over that line.

JULIA LURIE: Ashley Mitchell is the director of Knee to Knee, which runs support groups for birth parents.

ASHLEY MITCHELL: Because the agencies are watching us, we try and be as quick and discreet as possible.

JULIA LURIE: Her family spends some Sundays at the apartment complexes in Utah, where adoption agencies house birth mothers, passing out leaflets to ensure that the women know their rights.

ASHLEY MITCHELL: We want them to know that they have the right to change their minds, that they have the right to go home if they want to go home.

I think we got them all.

The professionals that fly the women here 100 percent count on them not knowing what's available to them.

MALINDA SEYMORE: In confusion, there is profit.

If you can move a birth mother to a different state and take advantage of more favorable laws for your client, why wouldn't you?

JULIA LURIE: Seymore, an adoptive parent herself, emphasizes the good that adoption can do, if it's done ethically.

MALINDA SEYMORE: I'm not anti-adoption by any stretch of the imagination.

Adoption has a function to play for the benefit of children, and we are failing in that endeavor.

JULIA LURIE: She says Congress has done little to regulate adoption because it's been seen as a personal family matter, rather than as an industry.

MALINDA SEYMORE: If you classified adoption as commerce, then Congress would have the power to regulate it as it goes across state lines.

JULIA LURIE: Goins has not seen her daughter for more than six years, but she still regularly sends her packages.

She doesn't know if her daughter receives them, but she keeps a record of the gifts, so that, one day, her daughter will know she was thinking of her.

For "PBS News Hour" and the Center for Investigative Reporting, I'm Julia Lurie in Detroit.

AMNA NAWAZ: Late last month, the Justice Department fired several officials involved in the January 6 criminal prosecution, while others have been demoted to low-level positions.

They're just the latest moves that some say are part of a retribution campaign against anyone who worked on the January 6 investigation.

White House correspondent Laura Barron-Lopez spoke with one of the prosecutors who led that case.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Greg Rosen is the former chief of the Justice Department's Capitol Siege Section, where he helped lead the largest federal criminal case in U.S. history after the violent January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Last month, he left the Justice Department in the wake of President Trump's decision to pardon or commute the sentences of more than 1,500 January 6 defendants.

Greg Rosen joins me now.

Greg, thank you so much for being here.

GREG ROSEN, Former Justice Department Official: Thanks for having me.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: You were a long time assistant U.S. attorney at the Justice Department.

You served there during the first Trump administration.

Did the January 6 pardons play a role at all in your resignation?

GREG ROSEN: Watching a case like the prosecution of the riot at the U.S. Capitol in January 6, 2021, was a culmination of efforts over the course of four years.

And watching it end in the way it did, not just with the pardons, but with the firings and arguably the dismantling of certain aspects of the Department of Justice, was incredibly disheartening.

And so did it play a role?

Sure, it played a role.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: As you mentioned, there were so many people that worked on those January 6 cases.

There were thousands that worked on it across federal law enforcement.

And many of them were either fired or have resigned since then.

What do you think this says about the future of the Justice Department or the way the Trump administration is handling the Justice Department?

GREG ROSEN: I mean, I hope it's just a blip on the long record of an esteemed Department of Justice.

I mean, the Justice Department is named for virtue.

It means something.

And to have individuals leave the Department of Justice because not only the priorities of the department have changed, which is totally permissible from one administration to the other, but to see it done in this fashion is incredibly, to say the least, disappointing.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: I want to ask you about a recent Trump administration hire, Jared Wise.

He's a former FBI agent who participated in the January 6 attack on the Capitol.

He was charged by the Justice Department for encouraging the mob to kill police officers.

He was subsequently pardoned by President Trump.

But now he's an adviser to Trump's Justice Department working on what's called the Weaponization Working Group.

What kind of message does it send that this person who participated in the January 6 attack is now inside the Justice Department?

GREG ROSEN: Political views are now something that are subject to attack in our republic.

And part of America is having that ability to dissent, having that ability to sort of freely speak on these issues.

So I think it sends an incredibly dangerous message.

I think it's also incredibly hypocritical.

This administration has consistently talked about backing the blue and ensuring the protection of law enforcement.

So to hire somebody who was accused -- and, at the time, remember this was a public trial with public exhibits that was vetted by a federal judge -- at the time having an individual who is alleged to have said, "Kill him, kill him, kill him," and encouraged political violence against police officers, to hire that person to the department sends exactly the opposite message that I think the department was trying to convey.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: This week, the Justice Department announced that it's investigating former FBI Director James Comey and former CIA Director John Brennan.

The president was asked if he wanted to see both of these men -- quote -- "behind bars."

And here's what he said: DONALD TRUMP, President of the United States: I will tell you, I think they're very dishonest people.

I think they're crooked as hell.

And maybe they have to pay a price for that.

I believe they are truly bad people and dishonest people.

So, whatever happens, happens.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: What do you think these probes into Comey, into Brennan say about how the Justice Department's powers are being used against the president's perceived enemies?

GREG ROSEN: So, perception is reality.

And the perception right now is that, any time you do anything against the president or an ally of the president, that you will be subject to some sort of scrutiny or investigation simply for having the audacity to speak out or to say something that is different.

And that's a huge problem.

It's a huge problem in this country that is something that everyday Americans do not want.

You do not want these investigations being driven by the Twittersphere or being driven by sort of inklings that happen.

You want it to be done carefully.

You want it to be done thoughtfully.

I don't know anything about these probes, but if a career prosecutor or an agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation or anybody looks at it, they're going to want to do so carefully and with the appropriate guardrails to make sure that it's not being abused.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: When you look back at the prosecution that you led into the Capitol riot and all of the work that you, as well as other FBI -- DOJ and FBI officials did, what do you want the public to understand about this investigation and those prosecutions?

GREG ROSEN: What happened on that day was horrific on a number of levels.

And one of the takeaways of what happened on January 6, 2021, was not simply that there was violence.

It was not simply that it was a protest rung amuck, which is something I have heard.

It was a full-blown, full-scale riot, which happened to coincide, intentionally so, with the peaceful or what was supposed to be the peaceful transfer of power from one administration to the next.

It had nothing to do with who the incumbent was.

It had nothing to do with who the incoming president was.

It had to do with the use of force against the United States government and a mob that assaulted what is arguably the most important legislature in the history of the world.

So my takeaway is, that type of political violence just cannot occur in this country.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: President Trump is now comparing ongoing protests against ICE, against the deportation actions he's taken to insurrections, to the January 6 insurrection.

Does that undermine at all the work that you did, the convictions that you and your team sought?

GREG ROSEN: I don't know if it undermines it.

I don't think they're comparable.

The -- what happened on January 6, as we described it in briefings and argued before courts, was sui generis.

It was unique.

It was one of a kind.

And it was one of a kind because of not just the sheer violence we saw and the amount of people that were there and the amount of officers that were hurt, but it was also because of when it was occurring, which was during the Electoral College certification.

Other protests have and unfortunately perhaps will devolve into violence, depending on what the issue is.

That is also deplorable.

You cannot have circumstances where people are using force against police officers who are doing their job.

That is a consistent drumbeat, and I will be consistent about that.

But protests in isolation or violence in isolation is not what we saw on January 6, 2021.

LAURA BARRON-LOPEZ: Greg Rosen, thank you for your time.

GREG ROSEN: Thanks for having me.

AMNA NAWAZ: At an Omaha, Nebraska festival this summer, new work explores the intersection of art, disability, and technology, asking questions like, who has a voice and who gets to be heard?

Senior arts correspondent Jeffrey Brown reports on this unusual undertaking for our arts and culture series, Canvas.

(SINGING) JEFFREY BROWN: A mother sings to her disabled son of her love and hopes for him, but there is danger threatening.

(SINGING) JEFFREY BROWN: And, together, they decide to flee.

We're in a dystopian future world, though perhaps not so very different from our own, in which artificial intelligence is being used to create what?

Some new kind of life.

The opera titled "Sensorium Ex" is both art and advocacy, aimed at giving new voice and opportunities to the disabled, using A.I.

to benefit, rather than harm, and changing the world of opera itself.

Composer Paola Prestini: PAOLA PRESTINI, Composer, "Sensorium Ex": I'm very interested in how art can open up new avenues, and that's what I felt like "Sensorium" did.

JEFFREY BROWN: In this case new avenues to?

PAOLA PRESTINI: To listen more deeply and to create more welcoming spaces for folks who express themselves differently and who have different disabilities.

BRENDA SHAUGHNESSY, Librettist, "Sensorium Ex": Say Paola.

JEFFREY BROWN: Prestini's collaborator, poet Brenda Shaughnessy, wrote the libretto and grounded it in her lived experience as the mother of a disabled child.

BRENDA SHAUGHNESSY: What do you hear?

JEFFREY BROWN: Her son, Cal, now age 18, seen here at 12 listening to music by Prestini played by her husband cellist Jeffrey Zeigler.

Shaughnessy, who'd never written for an opera before, says this work was deeply personal and often painful, but, for her, necessary.

BRENDA SHAUGHNESSY: Nonverbal, nonambulatory.

Kids like him don't get to be part of anything.

In a way, I wrote him into the opera because I wanted him to get to be part of the mix, get to be -- get to do something, get to be the hero of a story, get to be -- be heard.

JEFFREY BROWN: And that became the essence of this project, who has a voice and who is heard.

Prestini and Shaughnessy were determined to make the answer everyone by creating a work for a cast and crew that included some with disabilities such as cerebral palsy, autism, and blindness, writing and composing a story of a mother called Mem, sung by Hailey McAvoy, and her disabled son named Kitsune.

BRENDA SHAUGHNESSY: Kitsune's voice is central to the opera.

You can't -- it can't be sidelined.

It's in the score.

It's the music.

It's in the tech.

It's in the plot.

JEFFREY BROWN: But if opera is all about the voice, how to write for those thought to have none?

PAOLA PRESTINI: It's like writing for a person who you love, but the instrument doesn't exist yet.

And so the challenge that we had was, well, how do we amplify the voice that this person does have?

Because there are nonverbal ways in which you communicate.

And then how do we find, if you will, a deeper expression to the communication device that this actor would use?

JEFFREY BROWN: One of the two actors playing Kitsune, 23-year-old Jakob Jordan, who is himself nonverbal, but has a new way of communicating.

JAKOB JORDAN, Actor (through A.I.

voice): For the first 22 years of my life, I felt like a witness to a crime that would happen over and over again.

My thoughts were being held hostage inside my head while the wrong words were impersonating me, tricking everyone to believe I was much simpler than I am.

JEFFREY BROWN: Jakob was diagnosed as a toddler with autism and apraxia, a neurological condition in which his body and speech don't respond to the signals sent from his brain.

Here's how he puts it, along with a bit of his characteristic sense of humor.

JAKOB JORDAN (through A.I.

voice): Basically, my body does not listen to the commands I give it.

I may want to ask my friend if he saw that cute girl walk by, but my speaking voice gets stuck in loops, talking about airports or dumb songs and a small variety of other repetitive topics.

It also affects my whole body.

JEFFREY BROWN: Only in the last two years came a breakthrough, when he learned to type words with a trained communication partner.

When he finishes his sentence, it comes out in an electronic voice.

JAKOB JORDAN (through electronic voice): I caught the acting bug.

JEFFREY BROWN: But in our interview, for which we sent questions ahead of time so he could consider and type responses, we heard more of Jakob's actual voice.

JAKOB JORDAN (through A.I.

voice): Nothing compares to getting to express myself purposefully with the voice I was born with.

JEFFREY BROWN: Brought to life through Sensorium A.I., a partnership between the opera's creative team and NYU's Ability Project, a research lab in Brooklyn, New York, dedicated to the intersection of disability and technology.

Luke DuBois is an NYU professor, engineer and researcher and himself a composer and musician.

He first recorded the sounds Jakob can and does make.

R. LUKE DUBOIS, NYU Professor: So we have got recordings of Jakob just doing his thing.

JAKOB JORDAN: (INAUDIBLE) R. LUKE DUBOIS: Right?

So he's very expressive.

Some of it is whistles.

Some of it is singing.

Some of it is speech like that.

And what the system does is, it takes that recording and infers from it the physical body that made it.

JEFFREY BROWN: Infers... R. LUKE DUBOIS: Yes.

JEFFREY BROWN: ... means you're creating his -- sense of his body and therefore sense of his voice.

R. LUKE DUBOIS: Exactly.

And so what I can do is, I can take a phrase like, "I would like to go sailing tomorrow," have it cranked through.

And then what you would end up with is, you would end up with a recording.

JAKOB JORDAN (through A.I.

voice): I would like to go sailing tomorrow.

R. LUKE DUBOIS: Right?

And it sounds like Jakob.

JEFFREY BROWN: DuBois and the team use sensors that allow Jakob to control his speech... JAKOB JORDAN (through A.I.

voice): I would like to go sailing tomorrow.

JEFFREY BROWN: ... and, depending on how he moves his hand, give it a kind of expressiveness of pitch and pace.

JAKOB JORDAN (through A.I.

voice): I was never lost.

JEFFREY BROWN: Amazing stuff.

And it was created specially for and incorporated into the opera, making this a story about the potential evils of A.I., while using its benefits.

And this is open-source technology, publicly available for anyone to take to the next step.

R. LUKE DUBOIS: I want this in the hands of everyone who needs it.

I have been talking to all sorts of speech researchers all over the country in the last couple years.

And they're all looking at really interesting different angles on this thing.

So it's going to be cool, man.

It's going to be cool what happens next.

JEFFREY BROWN: Composer Paola Prestini hopes her work will receive more productions and, offering a blueprint for the future, give new opportunities to those with disabilities wanting to be part of her art form.

PAOLA PRESTINI: Create the system and understanding that, yes, it's a challenge, but these are the ways.

And you just do it one step at a time and you get there.

All of a sudden, you get the complexity of human life represented on stage.

And that's why we do what we do.

It's not just a mirror to society.

It's also a pathway to a better way.

JEFFREY BROWN: And poet and librettist Brenda Shaughnessy sees the opera and its technology opening avenues for many, including her son.

BRENDA SHAUGHNESSY: It's not enough, in my opinion, for Cal to just sort of sit there on the sidelines not getting to participate in anything.

It's not enough for anybody to just sort of be there disconnected.

What I want is for a kid, a disabled kid, a nonverbal kid, to see this and suddenly say, not just, oh, I could be in an opera, I could maybe be an actor, maybe I could play Kitsune one day.

But I also want that kid to say, there I am.

I exist.

JAKOB JORDAN (through electronic voice): (INAUDIBLE) JEFFREY BROWN: It took Jakob Jordan about a minute to type his answer when I asked what it was like to perform on stage in Omaha earlier this summer.

His answer was worth any wait.

JAKOB JORDAN (through electronic voice): It was the most fulfilling experience of my life.

(CHEERING) JEFFREY BROWN: For the "PBS News Hour," I'm Jeffrey Brown in Brooklyn, New York.

AMNA NAWAZ: Remember, there's always a lot more online, including what health experts say about the $50 billion rural health fund in President Trump's budget bill.

That is at PBS.org/NewsHour.

And that is the "News Hour" for tonight.

I'm Amna Nawaz.

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