--:-- Shamita Basu: Good morning. It's Tuesday, August 3rd. I'm Shamita Basu. And I'm Duarte Giraldino. This is Apple News Today. Each morning, hear about some of the most fascinating stories in the news and how the world's best journalists are covering them.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: There's movement on the Senate infrastructure plan. A bipartisan group of senators have agreed to a $1.2 trillion proposal. Roughly half of that is new federal spending. It basically touches every part of the U.S. economy.
--:-- Tony Romm: That's right. I cover Congress for The Washington Post. We spoke with me about what's included in this nearly 3,000-page bill.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: There are billions of dollars that are set aside to upgrade the country's roads, bridges, and highways. There's the largest investment in transit in the history of the country since Amtrak, basically. There's tens of billions of dollars put aside to help expand high-speed wireless and wired internet and to make those internet connections more affordable. And then there's other money set aside to tackle specific issues such as climate change.
--:-- Tony Romm: Negotiations just to get to this point have taken weeks, and now comes the debate. In terms of the process going forward, we're basically going to have a huge fight over amendments to the legislation over the next couple of days. So lots of Democrats and Republicans have plenty of ideas over what they would like to do in addition to the text that has been written. And that's got to get all hammered out on the Senate floor.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: And normally that's kind of the stuff of boring Washington wonkiness. But in this case, it's really significant because it's only a pretty narrow coalition that's come together to bring this bipartisan deal into fruition. And if lawmakers start putting things into this bill that the other side doesn't like, you could see that this bill starts to lose support among Democrats or Republicans. And that's just in the Senate.
--:-- Tony Romm: Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said the House will only consider the bipartisan infrastructure package if the Senate also moves forward with a separate $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill that includes other key pieces of the Democrats' agenda, like expanded Medicare, prescription drug reform. There's billions and billions of dollars set aside to address issues around climate change, the kinds of things that fell out, actually, of the first bipartisan infrastructure package, because plenty of Democrats feel that more has to be done on the issue of the climate. And then there's just layers and layers of additional spending to grow the federal safety net and provide more money for families and particularly for those with children.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Adding to all this uncertainty is a potential coronavirus outbreak. It's threatening to undercut negotiations. Senator Lindsey Graham reports he is now COVID positive. On Monday, he confirmed his diagnosis after coming down with symptoms on Saturday. Graham was part of a bipartisan group that met over the weekend on Senator Joe Manchin's houseboat. They all say that they're being tested. They think that they're going to be able to proceed. But it certainly is something that was on the back of everybody's mind today.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: You know, what happens if it is the case that other members of Congress do end up getting sick? Is it going to be the case that leaders don't want to move forward because there aren't enough lawmakers in the room? I think it's something that we all kind of still grappling with because the news is so fresh.
--:-- Juliana Jimenez: The state of California sterilized more than 20,000 people before a law that allowed this practice was repealed in 1979. This eugenics law was based on the false idea that the human race would somehow be improved if people with certain traits like mental illness or physical disabilities were not allowed to have kids. Victims of these forced sterilizations, they included children in psychiatric institutions, people in prisons, and a lot of other folks who did not knowingly consent to having their choice to have biological children taken away from them. Latinas were disproportionately targeted.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Today, there are more than 600 living survivors. And now they could be compensated by the state. California recently approved $7.5 million to distribute to people who were forcibly sterilized.
--:-- Juliana Jimenez: This started around 1909 and it went on until about 1979 when the eugenics law was repealed. During a time where that philosophy was more accepted. The height of the program actually was during the 1930s and 1940s, 1950s. And we know that from scholars who have studied eugenics laws around the world that specifically the laws that were in place in California inspired some of the laws in Nazi Germany later.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: And so what kinds of institutions was it applied to? Mostly in mental institutions where this happened a lot because they were trying to, as the eugenics philosophy prophesies, they wanted to clean, so-called clean kind of the people who were deemed mentally weak or had physical disabilities. So their thinking was that by sterilizing these people, then there wouldn't be any more people in these mental institutions or in prisons, for example.
--:-- Juliana Jimenez: And I understand that this was also happening as recently as 2010 in prisons in California, right? How was this practice able to continue into the 21st century? Sometimes these women, they don't have a voice. They think that it's being done for their well-being. And that's how a lot of the people who were carrying out these practices, this is how they defend them, that they were doing it for their well-being. The women were not communicating their rights. Sometimes they're under anesthesia. They're under a lot of duress. They might just have given birth, for example. They're under a lot of pain. And this is like part of the procedure to offer them to be sterilized. And sometimes they sign something that they don't know that that's what they're signing.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Who was being targeted for these forced sterilizations? The sterilizations that California was carrying out, those were done to men and women. But mostly it was done to women of color and Latina women in particular. So in the prison system one of these studies found that it was about 59 of the people who were sterilized were Latina women.
--:-- Juliana Jimenez: There are hundreds of people who are still alive today who were subject to these practices. What do they say about how it's impacted them and their lives? This is what's most heartbreaking about this story. So many parts of it is, but But because it's been around for such a long time, and some of the people that this happened to, a lot of them have died already. One of the women that I talked to, her aunt was a victim of this. And it still affects a lot of the families. It's a lot of trauma.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: In this case, for example, Mary Franco, the woman who was sterilized. Her niece is who I talked to. She was sterilized when she was 13. So this was such a huge trauma for her that she was never able to marry. She wanted to have a family and she couldn't do that. She was put in an institution. It's like this big family secret. They only find out years later that that's what had been done to them. So it's a lifetime of searching for answers.
--:-- Shamita Basu: At a certain age, kids, mostly little girls, start getting into princesses, from books to movies to Halloween costumes. A few years back, a study found preschoolers who watched a lot of Disney princess movies were more stuck on gender stereotypes. But what most people don't know is that study never ended.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Five years later, the researcher behind it, she's changing her tune. Based on more data over time, she's reached a seemingly different conclusion. The Wall Street Journal caught up with Dr. Sarah Coyne.
--:-- Dr. Sarah Coyne: I observed several hundred children over a number of years. In the second wave of this study, when the kids turned 10, I looked at whether watching super feminine, ultra thin Disney princesses had any impact on body image or gender roles by the time the kids reached adolescence. The children were asked to write statements like, it's more important for boys than girls to do well in school, and I love my body.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Coyne says, the responses show children who watched a lot of princess movies when they were younger, ended up caring more about gender equality than those who didn't. They also believed more strongly that men should show emotion. And there was no major difference in body image for most girls and boys.
--:-- Dr. Sarah Coyne: And before you think, well, Disney movies today are different than the old days, today's princesses are more empowered. They're more adventurous. I found it didn't matter whether a kid's favorite was old school Cinderella or more modern Moana, it had the same effect.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: Coint theory is princess movies show women as the protagonists and men as secondary characters. I feel so bad about calling my girl la princesa. No, there were limitations to this study. The kids who took part were not very geographically or racially diverse. And it's not possible to understand the other factors that go into how children develop perspectives on gender norms. But for now, Dr. Coyne's studies suggest just enjoy the princess phase.
--:-- Shamita Basu: Let's end with some Olympics news. Simone Biles is back, and she gave an impressive performance in the women's balance beam final. The event was thrilling to watch all the way through to the very last competitor, who ultimately took home the gold. China's Guan Chen Chen scored highest, followed by her teammate and now silver medalist Tong Shi Jin. And Simone Biles took the bronze.
--:-- Duarte Giraldino: It was a slightly different routine than the one she'd planned. This time, she ended with a double pike dismount. There were no twists. Biles has strongly hinted, this will be her last Olympics. She's going home with her seventh Olympic medal.
--:-- Lee Diffie: You are about to see eight athletes do one lap around the track over 10 hurdles, but the spotlight is firmly on two of the most dynamic runners this event has ever seen. The world record watch is officially on in the men's 400-meter hurdles final as Rye Benjamin and Karsten Warholm get set for the biggest race of their lives here in Tokyo.
--:-- Sonia Richards-Ross: Everyone had their eyes on Benjamin from the U.S. and Warholme from Norway. Soon after the start, it was clear Warholme was pulling into the lead. If you look at who's getting over the hurdles first, it's still Karsten Warholm.
--:-- Lee Diffie: At one point, it looked like Benjamin was gaining on him. That was a great turn from the American. It's Ray Benjamin and his nemesis, Karsten Warholm. But when Benjamin put on the speed, Warholme just got past him. 45-94, it's a world record, an Olympic record. Warhol has just blown the world record apart. The world has never seen a run like that before in 400-meter men's hurdles.
--:-- Sonia Richards-Ross: Incredible! Warhol was running and jumping over hurdles, and still, he was able to run just as fast as some men with no hurdles. The look on Warhol's face when he realized he'd just set a new record. He ripped his singlet, he held his face in his hands, and just looked up at the scoreboards in wonder. He later described it to reporters as that feeling a six-year-old gets on Christmas Eve, a feeling most adults never get to experience.
--:-- Shamita Basu: You can find all these stories and more in the Apple News app. And while you're in the app, keep listening to hear narrated articles from our News Plus partners. We'll talk with you again tomorrow.
