JOHN YANG: Tonight on PBS News Weekend, New York City tries to uphold its history of welcoming immigrants as it struggles to deal with a flood of asylum seekers.

Then at the woman's World Cup, the defending champion U.S. team makes its earliest exit ever in a suspense filled shootout and bringing a taste of mom cooking and culture to Minnesota's Twin Cities one bite at a time.

MAN: Our food has always been about people, our cultural DNA, it's intricately woven into the foods that we eat it tells our story.

(BREAK) JOHN YANG: Good evening, I'm John Yang.

Across Ukraine there's been a series of attacks from both sides as the war drags on.

In Western Ukraine, Russia launched a barrage of missile and drone strikes in retaliation for Ukraine's attack on a Russian tanker on the Black Sea.

And in the East Ukraine pressed it's counteroffensive with shelling in Russia unhealed territory, and all officials on both sides said at least six people were killed across the country.

This all comes as a two-day Ukrainian diplomatic push to build support beyond its core Western backers wrapped up in Saudi Arabia.

Russia wasn't invited to participate and to righted the talks as a futile doomed effort.

Former President Donald Trump says he never told his Vice President Mike Pence to put him above the Constitution by overturning the results of the 2020 election.

In a social media post, Trump also said he never called Pence to honest that's an exchange quoted in last week's indictment against the former President.

Trump's set of Pence he's delusional and now he wants to show he's a tough guy.

On CNN State of the Union Pence stuck to his version of events.

MIKE PENCE, Former U.S. Vice President: With regard to being called to honest, Dana, I've been called worse.

And I don't know what was in his heart.

I don't know what his intentions were.

But I do know what he and his lawyers asked me to do.

JOHN YANG: Trump's lawyers have until tomorrow afternoon to tell a federal judge why she should deny the Justice Department's request to limit what Trump can say about the case.

It was a heartbreak down under for the US.

.Women's National Soccer Team and its fans.

The U.S. squad is out of the World Cup after losing to Sweden and imagine Melbourne, Australia.

It's the first time the team has failed to make it even to the quarterfinals.

After struggling in earlier matches the U.S. outshot the Swedes but they couldn't score in either regulation time or overtime which ended in a scoreless draw.

So that meant the winner was determined by penalty kicks.

On the deciding kick, it first appeared that the U.S. goalkeeper had batted away, but a review determined that it had barely crossed the goal line giving Sweden the win.

Sweden now plays Japan in the quarterfinals.

On a happier note, Olympic gold medal gymnast Simone Biles returned to competition after a two year hiatus.

She won a qualifying event for the National Championships.

She entered her routine with a vault so difficult she's the only gymnast to complete it since she introduced it in 2021.

It was her first appearance since withdrawing a quarter of the way through the team final at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.

She said at the time she wanted a break to focus on her mental health.

Still to come on PBS News weekend, knocked out, a heartbreaking loss with the U.S. women's soccer team and a chef embraces his heritage and wins diners tastebuds.

(BREAK) New York City has long been a city of immigrants living up to the words on the Statue of Liberty in the city's harbor.

Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.

Alone among major U.S. cities, New York has a legal obligation to offer shelter to everyone who wants it.

But the current influx of migrants and asylum seekers is putting that to the test.

They came from around the world making often dangerous journeys to a city they hoped would offer them better lives.

What they found is a city whose migrant crisis is at a breaking point and Intake Center at the historic Roosevelt Hotel in midtown Manhattan has been filled overflowing.

Many have been sleeping shoulder to shoulder on concrete sidewalks.

Mayor Eric Adams has called for federal assistance.

MAYOR ERIC ADAMS, New York City: We need help.

We need we need help and it's not going to get any better.

We put buses there too for cooling systems.

But it's just not sustainable.

JOHN YANG: City officials say the shelter system has been overwhelmed by the nearly 100,000 migrants and asylum seekers who have arrived in New York since spring 2022.

Further complicating things, Republican governors like Greg Abbott of Texas have been sending thousands of migrants to New York City and other so called sanctuary cities.

In addition to financial help, Adams is asking the federal government to expedite work permits.

But some advocates say a longer term solution is needed.

MURAD AWAWDEH, Executive Director, New York Immigration Coalition: We need to actually stop doubling and tripling down on broken systems like our emergency shelter system and actually invest in getting people out of emergency shelter and into permanent housing.

JOHN YANG: New York's guarantee of housing is the result of a lawsuit from the Legal Aid Society more than 40 years ago.

This week, Legal Aid threatened to take the city back to court.

Jasmine Garza is a New York based correspondent for NPR, her work is focused on immigrant communities.

Jasmine, we've seen pictures.

We're able to show pictures of what a television camera can see.

But it can't see everything you've been there.

You've been to the centers.

You've been to the sidewalks around these centers.

What have you seen what have people told you down there?

JASMINE GARSD, NPR: What we've seen is that the shelter system is overwhelmed and fed they're at capacity when I was at the Roosevelt Hotel, which served as Intake Center.

There were people who were sleeping outside had been sleeping outside for four, five, six days during a heatwave.

And they were just waiting for intake.

JOHN YANG: Is this just an issue of volume?

Or is there another problem going on here?

JASMINE GARSD: Well, New York City is undergoing a housing crisis.

That's one problem compounding with another.

I have been quite a bit of time with homeless encampments of migrants and asylum seekers, many of whom told me they do not want to be inside of those shelters, that the overcrowding, the food that sometimes is in bad condition and gets people sick.

I've heard widespread accounts of 80 or 90 people having to share one or two bathroom.

It is really, really a bad situation for migrants and asylum seekers here in the States.

JOHN YANG: You spoken to asylum seekers and migrants there.

How many of them said that they intended to go to New York from the beginning and how many just ended up there by other means?

JASMINE GARSD: Absolutely nobody that I have spoken to chose New York City.

Everyone I've spoken to told me I did got bused here.

You know, one of the new policies that Mayor Eric Adams has announced is to hand out flyers that the border, urging people to find somewhere else to go that isn't New York, it's unusual.

However, every single person that I have spoken to had no idea that New York was at capacity, that the situation in the shelters was as it is, and that they wouldn't be having to wait on the street for days on end.

JOHN YANG: You said a lot of these people were most of all the people you talk to just got bused to New York, and now New York is busing them upstate, where are they ending up and what conditions are they seeing with that when they get there?

JASMINE GARSD: Yeah, people have been bused to areas of state that are in places like Yonkers and Albany have said this is a lot for us to handle, but we will do it.

And then the other areas of state that have really bulked.

I mean, there's even been lawsuits, there has been restraining orders.

There's parts of upstate New York that have told the city you are a sanctuary city.

We are not.

We do not want people here and that has caused a lot of concern among activists and advocate.

JOHN YANG: I know you went down to the border on a reporting trip, is there any connection between what you saw at the border and what you're seeing in New York City?

JASMINE GARSD: Yeah, absolutely.

I mean, the Biden administration has had a policy of determine, saying, you know, do not just cross the border and expect to get asylum.

If we catch you crossing the border without papers, you will be deported in an expedited way, and there will be a harsher punishment.

And it's also encouraged people to use the CBP One app, in other words to apply for asylum online.

I met so many migrants that their daily routine is basically wake up at 6:00 a.m. and try to get on that CBP One app so that they can do the asylum process.

I did also meet people that were completely deaf for it.

And they didn't want to wait in Mexico because their lives were in danger because they had suffered exploitation or abuse or harassment or worse in Mexico.

And they were just going to go for it and cross because they felt that their lives were in danger.

JOHN YANG: Jasmine Garsd of NPR.

Thank you very much.

JASMINE GARSD: Thank you.

JOHN YANG: Going into the World Cup, few would have predicted what's happened to the U.S. women's team.

Their earliest departure ever from the tournament after today is lost to Sweden on penalty kicks in the round of 16.

Christine Brennan is a sports columnist for USA Today.

Christine, you have a little time now to sort of digest the game, what do you what's your biggest takeaway from the game?

CHRISTINE BRENNAN, Sports Columnist, USDA Today: Certainly, it's historic John in the sense that the U.S. team as we know, if they don't win these tournaments, they are in the final or for sure the semifinal and this is the first time of course the U.S. will not be in the Final Four.

And not only that, they're knocked out the round of 16.

So that is really the shock, just the momentous nature of this team, which is much more than just a soccer team.

I think the U.S. Women's National Team is the most famous team in any sport from any nation in terms of women's sports.

And so they've done so much off the field in terms of working for equal pay, and putting their hand out to others from other nations to encourage them to start playing soccer, especially some of those nations that did not want to have women play soccer.

So they've been really an amazing story over all these years, going all the way back to '91, the first Women's World Cup, and to see them go out like this shocking, obviously shows the world has caught up in some ways.

Nonetheless, I'm going to guess that we won't see this happen again for a long time, the fact that they've gone out so soon, with almost two weeks left in the tournament.

JOHN YANG: There's been a lot of criticism about the coaching, there's criticism about the attitude of the players, is this a team that failed to live up to its potential or was just -- this just not the squad that was going to win the third, third consecutive championship?

CHRISTINE BRENNAN: John, I think they failed to live up to their potential.

One would think with all of the young women playing soccer in the United States that we could put together kind of any collection of talent.

And they should be able to score more than one goal over the last three games, and only three against Vietnam in the opening game, and they should be able to figure it out and work together.

I think I'm going to guess that the coach Vlatko andonovski will be fired.

I have no reporting on that.

But that seems to be what we're hearing.

And that seems to be the logical step.

And it's stunning when you think of the feeder system in the United States and U.S. Soccer.

Where's the failure here?

I think there should be top to bottom, a look at what went wrong.

But the fact that for several games, they looked so disjointed and like they didn't even know each other.

Shocking, even though we must say that there were 14 new faces out of the 23 members of the team, 14 young women who had not ever been in a World Cup before.

Although again, with U.S. system that shouldn't matter.

And so something clearly did not go as expected.

JOHN YANG: You're talking about the use of this team.

I think a number of the starters and those who got a lot of playing time were under 30, younger than 30.

Should we be optimistic about that about the team because of that?

CHRISTINE BRENNAN: I think so and a couple of the players who were injured should be back.

There is less than yours a year from now John of course the Olympic Games and that's a very big tournament for women's soccer and the U.S. should be able to come right back and have that chance.

It's good that they can do that.

But I think also just we're the finishers.

You know, when we think of the great names and U.S. Women's Soccer from Mia Hamm to Brandi Chastain and her penalty kick that was so instrumental back in '99 in the Rose Bowl, and Abby Wamback and Megan Rapinoe, even four years ago.

This team just didn't have the wherewithal to get the ball in the back of the net.

They had 11 shots on goal.

And the Swedish goalkeeper was terrific, absolutely great.

But the Swedes only had one shot on goal.

And U.S. actually outshot Sweden overall 21 to seven.

So there were so many opportunities.

And you wonder, where was that, that, you know, putting down the hammer and just making that final move.

And even in the penalty kicks, of course, missing three of the last four penalty kicks, that is just unheard of.

And so is that a mindset issue?

Is that nerves?

Is that too many expectations for this team, and some of its young players like Sophia Smith, who missed one of the penalty kicks, although two veterans were the others Megan Rapinoe and Kelly O'Hara who also missed.

You know, you've got to put that on goal.

You've got to make the goalkeeper make the save there.

So, so many questions, and obviously, so few answers right now.

JOHN YANG: Christine, you mentioned Megan Rapinoe, who's already announced her retirement.

Kelly O'Hara other veteran players on his squad, Alex Morgan, they may have seen their last World Cup game.

What legacy do they leave?

CHRISTINE BRENNAN: I think that 50, maybe 25, 50 years from now what we'll be talking about equal pay, the way they fought to have equal pay with the men, and they won.

And that is a legacy that that travels far and wide around the globe, and what is still a very misogynistic world of soccer.

And the thought that those nations that haven't cared at all about women's soccer, knowing the U.S. is paying them equally other nations have now had those battles, because they've looked to the US.

I think that's it.

I mean, on the field of play, no doubt about it.

Four World Cups, four Olympic gold medals.

They're still the gold standard, even though obviously today they are not.

But in terms of history, but I think that off the field.

And we've talked about it that Johnny Appleseed sowing the seeds for this board around the world fighting for girls and women all over the world, not just the United States to have the opportunities that women have here because of Title Nine.

JOHN YANG: Christine Brennan of USA Today.

Thanks so much.

CHRISTINE BRENNAN: John, thank you.

JOHN YANG: St Paul, Minnesota is home to the nation's largest population of Hmong, and indigenous nomadic people from Southeast Asia.

Thousands of Hmong refugees ended up in the upper Midwest after the Vietnam War.

They've called the area home for nearly 50 years, but their cooking hadn't quite found a home their special correspondent Megan Thompson tells us about a chef who seems to be changing that.

YIA VANG, Hmong Chef: So this is the rice and here's our big rice steamer, that is hot.

To be completely honest, I never wanted to do this.

I tried my hardest to get out of it.

MEGAN THOMPSON: Why?

YIA VANG: In our culture in the old school way of looking at it is like to be a cook meant, like you would just be, you know, sloshing it in the back.

You're dirty all the time.

MEGAN THOMPSON: Yia Vang may have failed to avoid cooking for a living, but he's doing much more than getting dirty in the kitchen.

YIA VANG: In the Hmong way of saying is (inaudible) come and eat.

MEGAN THOMPSON: The Minneapolis chef is at the forefront of introducing the Twin Cities and the nation to the food of the Hmong and ethnic group from Southeast Asia.

YIA YANG: Obviously Hmong food consists of four elements a meat, a rice, a vegetable and a hot sauce.

MEGAN THOMPSON: Vang's Union Hmong Kitchen started in 2016 as a pop up then a food trailer outside a local cidery.

Now it's a popular counter inside a trendy food hall.

Vang also launches new menu concepts every few months at Hilltribe.

His kitchen and event space.

He's been a James Beard Award finalist or semifinalists for the last two years.

YIA YANG: We have our pork belly.

We have our Hmong sausage of Kelsang, which is our noodles and then we have our purple sticky rice here because if everything is too flavorful, it's too big for you.

The purple sticky rice helps balance everything out.

JOE DOERRER: I've actually never had Hmong food and this is my first time and it's phenomenal.

MEGAN THOMPSON: In the cities with the largest Hmong population in the nation, Vang is hailed as the first to bring his native food to the masses.

In April, he opened a stand at the Twins baseball stadium and last summer fans lined up for his booth at Minnesota's legendary state fair the first time Hmong food had been served at either place.

Lee Pao Xiong is the director of the Center for Hmong studies at Concordia University in St. Paul.

LEE PAO XIONG, Director, Center for Hmong Studies, Concordia University St. Paul: I think that what's unique about year is the ability to communicate and to correct to younger generations, right.

I mean, they they've seen the Hmong people, but they've never been invited to the kitchen.

YIA VANG: Our food has always been about people, our cultural DNA, it's intricately woven into the foods that we eat.

It tells our story.

MEGAN THOMPSON: That story begins around 5,000 years ago in China where Hmong originated.

They're thought to be among the first in the world to cultivate rice and are known for their colorful dress and embroidery.

Conflict eventually pushed them on south into the mountains of Burma, Thailand, Vietnam and Laos.

It was in Laos during the Vietnam War that the CIA recruited the Hmong for covert missions.

LEE PAO XIONG: Our task was to rescue American pilots who were shut down to also engage the North Vietnamese in combats, preventing them from going down to southern part of Laos and then going across to fight against the Americans in South Vietnam.

YIA VANG: They painted his whole mural around this area.

MEGAN THOMPSON: The conflict is so central to the Hmong story, that an expensive mural of Long Tieng a secret CIA base in Laos covers a wall of the Hmong village market in St. Paul.

YIA VANG: And actually Long Tieng is a place where a father at a young age him and his brothers they joined up with SGU, the Special Guerilla Unit, and their mission were Long Tieng of this area.

MEGAN THOMPSON: The conflict killed and estimated 30 to 40,000 Hmong soldiers, about a quarter of all Hmong men and boys in Laos.

Tens of thousands of civilians also died during the war and after the American forces withdrew.

LEE PAO XIONG: So after the United States pulled out in 1975, guess what the Vietnamese came after us.

So we fly to Thailand.

MEGAN THOMPSON: Yia Vang's father led a group through the jungle and across the Mekong River to safety in Thailand.

In 1984, Vang was born there inside a refugee camp.

Many Hmong emigrated to Minnesota after the war, thanks to an active group of church based aid organizations.

Today the state is home to close to 100,000 Hmong.

Vang's family ended up next door and Wisconsin where food was a way to maintain the Hmong culture.

YIA VANG: Learning how to cook in a Hmong house hold is not an option.

It's not like hey, do I want to like cook?

No, it's like no, you're going to cook.

PANG HER VANG, Yia's Mother (through translator): We want all our children to learn to work with us.

Washing dishes, prepping vegetables, chopping meat together, making food together.

NNHIA LOR VANG, Yia's Father (through translator): I taught you that when grilling you need to season the meat very well and don't allow it to burn.

MEGAN THOMPSON: But Vang says as a child, he wasn't necessarily proud of his heritage.

YIA VANG: I was always a shame that my parents couldn't come to school for like, you know, Career Day.

Because my parents couldn't speak English and I was a kid I was always very embarrassed.

MEGAN THOMPSON: They worked in restaurants to help pay the bills after college and launched his Hmong food trailer but wasn't sure of its future.

Then in 2017, his father suffered a head injury.

YIA VANG: Like my dad's, he's a warrior, right?

He fought a war.

He survived the odds he got us to this country, if he dies on that bed.

Like his whole legacy goes with him.

And so it changed for me.

It was not about this telling the story of our people.

It was the solidification of the legacy of mom and dad.

MEGAN THOMPSON: And so today, Vang uses his popular eateries to tell his parents story.

YIA VANG: Hmong sausage is something that my dad has taught us growing up.

It's very aromatic.

So it's lemongrass, ginger, garlic, shallots, fish sauce, Thai chilies.

We won an award with this recipe.

And I told my father about it.

And he was just like, oh, really, that's simple thing.

Like people like that.

MEGAN THOMPSON: And the hot sauce.

It's his mom's famous recipe.

YIA VANG: We have Mama Vang hot sauce.

It looks like that dark crimson paste.

MEGAN THOMPSON: Vang's parents even supplies some of his ingredients grown on their small farm north of St. Paul.

GUSTAVO ROMERO: Every time that I faced his food, there's always something different.

KATE LYNNE SYNDER: The spicy red sauce that that thick paste.

You can just dip it on anything.

I could picture having an ice cream and that being good.

YIA VANG: I'm like America.

MEGAN THOMPSON: But it's not the food that's brought back success.

YIA VANG: Nice to meet you for sure.

MEGAN THOMPSON: It's also his sense of humor and big personality.

Vang has a podcast about Hmong culture.

YIA VANG: Manny, I love your tortillas.

MEGAN THOMPSON: And he hosts two TV shows.

CLOUA YANG: He's kind of like a trailblazer, especially for the Hmong people.

You know, we don't have a country to call our own.

No one really understands our cuisine and he's been able to introduce it to the world.

PEGGY FLANAGAN, Lieutenant Governor of Minnesota: Chef, you really embody how we should celebrate our community and things -- MEGAN THOMPSON: Vang's are in some high profile fans too, like Peggy Flanagan, Lieutenant Governor of Minnesota, who stopped by our recent event celebrating Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month YIA VANG: Lieutenant Governor.

And this is my mom Pang.

PEGGY FLANAGAN: So nice to me you.

MEGAN THOMPSON: Vang cooked all the food with his parents, of course.

YIA VANG: Those egg rolls or mom's famous egg rolls ever since we were little kids.

We would do egg roll sales.

It came to a point where the health department at our little Wisconsin town came out and they're like what's going on?

MEGAN THOMPSON: Vang's hoping to launch his first formal brick and mortar restaurant soon calling it Vinai after the run refugee camp where he was born and where his parents first met, embracing his heritage no longer ashamed.

YIA VANG: Fast forward 30 years, hoping that people would talk to me about my parents.

30 years later, I cannot not, not talk about them.

So I say I've run so far try so hard to run from who I am that it becomes a circle to running to back to who you were meant to be.

MEGAN THOMPSON: For PBS News Weekend, I'm Megan Thompson in Minneapolis.

JOHN YANG: And that is PBS News Weekend for this Sunday.

I'm John Yang.

For all of my colleagues, thanks for joining us.

Have a good week.