January 26, 2021 - PBS NewsHour full episode

In his first week in office, President Biden has made several moves to address equity in America. White House domestic policy adviser Susan Rice, who has echoed the president’s commitment to expand opportunities for Americans, joins Judy Woodruff to discuss.

In our news wrap Tuesday, a federal judge in Texas temporarily blocked President Biden’s 100-day ban on most deportations, the world reaches 100 million confirmed cases of COVID-19, thousands of farmers in New Delhi, India protest new laws they fear will benefit corporate farms, widespread internet outages hit the Northeast, and baseball legend Hank Aaron was memorialized in Atlanta.

By one count nursing homes and assisted-living facilities account for about 6 percent of COVID cases but 40 percent of virus-related deaths. Now some state officials are worried vaccinations are moving on to other parts of the populations before long-term care residents and staff are inoculated. David Grabowski, health care policy professor at Harvard Medical School, joins John Yang to discuss.

Part of the conversation between President Biden and Russian leader Vladimir Putin on Tuesday centered on Russia's top opposition figure, Alexei Navalny, whose recent arrest is sparking a wave of national protests. Masha Gessen, staff writer for The New Yorker, joins Nick Schifrin to discuss.

The Russian government is believed to be behind the recent cyberattack in the United States. Since it was revealed in December, the number of federal agencies and companies that were victimized by the attack continues to grow. Christopher Krebs, the former top cybersecurity official at the Department of Homeland Security, joins William Brangham to discuss.

President Biden is moving on new fronts in his latest spate of policy actions Tuesday that include boosting COVID vaccine supplies and addressing racial equity. Biden's actions come as the U.S. Senate gears up to put his predecessor on trial. Lisa Desjardins and Yamiche Alcindor report.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on Monday dropped his demand that Democrats guarantee they would keep the filibuster rule, which gives both parties power on most votes. This after two Democrats, Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, stressed they would not vote to dismantle it. Lisa Desjardins joins Judy Woodruff to discuss.

It’s been a brutal academic year for higher education, with enrollment down in the fall more than 560,000 undergraduate students compared to 2019. But there has been at least one area of growth at many schools: short-term programs that help students gain new skills for the workforce quickly. Hari Sreenivasan reports as part of our ongoing series “Rethinking College.”