Full Episode: Sunday, September 21, 2025

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Overnight, a stunning development in Washington. A message from President Trump attacking his own attorney general and pressuring her to more aggressively prosecute his political rivals. This week starts right now. I just want people to act. They have to act. And we want to act fast. President Trump nominates one of his former defense lawyers to take over one of the most important U.S. attorney's offices in the country.

And he lashes out at his critics, prompting a national debate over freedom of speech. Trump suggests regulators pull networks off the airwaves over critical coverage. Maybe their license should be taken away. ABC suspends Jimmy Kimmel Live over comments about Charlie Kirk following threats from the chairman of the FCC. Frankly, when you see stuff like this, I mean, look, we can do this the easy way or the hard way. prompting a widespread backlash. That's censorship.

That's state speech control. That's right out of Goodfellas. This morning, Senator Chris Murphy responds to the administration's latest threats. Chris Christie and Stephen A. Smith. And our roundtable on the political fallout. Vaccine confusion. RFK Jr.'s Advisory Committee changes its recommendation for multiple vaccines, drawing bipartisan concern. Vaccines are safe.

and effective. I can promise you there will be some hepatitis B transmission. I'll speak to former CDC director Dr. Richard Besser. From ABC News, it's This Week. Here now, Jonathan Karl. Good morning. Welcome to This Week.

Later today, family, friends, and supporters of Charlie Kirk will gather in Glendale, Arizona for his memorial. The 31-year-old activist's murder shocked the nation. and it was condemned by sensible and compassionate people in and out of politics and across the political spectrum. It has also been senselessly celebrated by some, a small minority who didn't like what Kirk stood for.

and thought it was somehow therefore justified. Celebrating or excusing violence is abhorrent. The murder of Charlie Kirk was not a political act. It was a gruesome crime. His alleged killer now faces the death penalty. Our thoughts this morning are with the Kirk family, especially his two young children who will now grow up without their father.

Whatever you think of his political views, and there are many who were deeply offended by things he said, Charlie Kirk was an unwavering advocate for free speech. On a personal note, he was always willing to engage with me. and answer my questions. He welcomed debate with those he disagreed with. He did not try to silence his critics. He listened to them and tried to change their minds.

As Charlie Kirk's body is laid to rest, that core principle is under attack in America. The very latest, a new policy at the Pentagon that would require reporters to pledge that they won't gather or use information. even unclassified information that hasn't been expressly authorized for release and will revoke the press passes of reporters who do not obey. That's a policy you might expect to see in China, Russia.

or North Korea, but not in the United States. And the move at the Pentagon follows a series of steps by the federal government to silence voices seen as critical of President Trump. President Trump began the week by suing the New York Times for defamation, alleging articles and a book by reporters were, quote, specifically designed to try and damage his business, personal, and political reputation.

That lawsuit was thrown out on Friday by a federal judge who called the complaint, quote, improper and impermissible and said the president's lawsuit attempted to use the courts to rage against an adversary. While President Trump was suing the New York Times, Times, Attorney General Pam Bondi said the Justice Department would crack down on what she called hate speech. We will absolutely target you, go after you, if you are targeting anyone. with hate speech, anything and that's across the aisle.

That comment drew backlash, including from some of Donald Trump's most high profile allies. There's no sentence that Charlie Kirk would have objected to more than that. Any attempt to impose hate speech. laws in this country is a denial of the humanity. of American citizens and cannot be allowed under any circumstances. That's got to be the red line. On Tuesday, I asked the president about the attorney general's comments. What do you make Pam Bondi saying she's going to go after a hate speech?

Is that, I mean, a lot of people, a lot of your allies say hate speech is free speech. I should probably go after people like you because you treat me so unfairly. It's hate. You have a lot of hate in your heart. Maybe they'll come after ABC.

And on Wednesday, it was the chairman of the FCC that threatened to use the power of the government to silence the president's critics. We can do this the easy way or the hard way. These companies can find ways to change conduct to take action. frankly, on Kimmel or, you know, there's going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.

Chairman Brandon Carr was referring to Jimmy Kimmel and these comments he made after the murder of Charlie Kirk. We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize... this kid who murdered charlie kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it shortly after carr's threat

Two of the largest owners of local stations across the country, Nexstar and Sinclair, said they would stop airing Jimmy Kimmel Live. This as Nexstar is in the middle of a merger deal with another media company, a deal that requires cars. FCC approval to move forward. Disney ABC then announced it would indefinitely suspend Jimmy Kimmel Live, sparking an intense debate over free speech. Carr, however, suggested the FCC would continue to put pressure on television stations. We at the FCC...

are going to enforce the public interest obligation. If there's broadcasters out there that don't like it, They can turn their license into the FCC, but that's our job. President Trump praised Disney's decision and targeted NBC late-night hosts Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers as the next that should go. Writing on social media, do it, NBC. Trump suggested the FCC revoke licenses from broadcasters that are critical of him.

Maybe their license should be taken away. It will be up to Brendan Carr. The FCC's actions drew bipartisan criticism. That is censorship. It is disgusting. It is a violation of the First Amendment. I think it is unbelievably dangerous for government to put itself in the position of saying

We're going to decide what speech we like and what we don't, and we're going to threaten to take you off air if we don't like what you're saying. Some legal experts doubt Carr has the right to strip licenses based on political content, but not President Trump. They have to show honesty and integrity. And when they take a good, well, I think the people decide, that's why I'm president. When they take a great success.

like you often do, and you make it into like it's a loser or you put a negative spin on it, I don't think that's right. So I think Brendan Carr is a great American patriot. So I disagree with Ted Cruz on that.

And in another effort to go after his critics this week, the president forced out the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, Eric Siebert, after his office failed to find any incriminating evidence of mortgage fraud against New York Attorney General. Tisha James. James has long been in Trump's crosshairs after she successfully prosecuted the Trump Organization for fraud. After U.S. Attorney Siebert failed to prosecute James, Trump told me he wanted Siebert out.

Hours later he submitted his resignation. And overnight, an extraordinary statement from President Trump. It appeared to be a direct message to his Attorney General, Pam Bondi, but it was posted on Truth Social for the world to see, pressuring her to prosecute. his political enemies. The president wrote in part, Pam, I have reviewed over 30 statements and posts saying that essentially same old story as last time, all talk, no action, nothing is being done.

We can't delay any longer. It's killing our reputation and credibility. They impeached me twice. They indicted me five times over nothing. Justice must be served now.

And I am joined now by Democratic Senator from Connecticut, Chris Murphy. Senator Murphy, let's start right there with those words towards Pam Bondi. The president mentioned some of his enemies, including. James Comey, the former FBI director, Letitia James. It sounds like he is directly ordering his attorney general to prosecute his enemies.

This is one of the most dangerous moments America has ever faced. We are quickly turning into a banana republic. The president of the United States is now employing the full power of the federal government, the FCC, the Department of Justice. in order to punish lock up, take down off the air all of his political enemies. As you know, this is what happens in Iran. This is what happens in Cuba. This is what happens in China and deeply repressive states in which if you have the courage.

to stand up and speak truth to power, you are silenced. I mean, there is no more fundamental right in America than the right to protest your government. And the question today is when is Enough, enough for Republicans. I was very glad to see Ted Cruz stand up and say what is simply true. It is unconstitutional and deeply immoral for the president to jail or to silence his political enemies.

And it will come back and boomerang on conservatives and Republicans at some point if this becomes the norm. But next week, we need every Republican in the Senate.

in the house not only speaking up but going to donald trump and telling him that they are not going to let him get away with this massive new contraction of speech this is a decisive moment for the country it is a decisive moment for republicans who have to decide to preserve this core fundamental american value the freedom of speech okay we'll get to the speech aspect of this in a second but first

What we saw from him overnight with this statement to Pam Bondi and what we saw Friday with the firing, he said it was a firing, of the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia who investigated.

Letitia James on this allegation of mortgage fraud and who found no evidence to move forward with a criminal charge The president believes that he, well he knows, he was targeted for multiple criminal prosecutions, spent most of his time after he left office fending those off, and now he wants to get retribution against those who he believes.

he insists, went after him falsely. Again, it's really important to underscore what happened here, right? This is a Republican U.S. attorney in Virginia who came to the conclusion... that the attorney general of New York did nothing wrong, that there was no evidence of a crime. And so Donald Trump, because he doesn't care about the facts, all he cares about... is the threat of imprisonment for his political enemies so that it suppresses the speech of other people who might speak up.

is now going to put his own political loyalist in charge of that investigation. And again, I think you have to put it in an even broader context because there's two things happening. One, you are going to be prosecuted. for political speech in this country, but you are also going to be excused. You are going to be let off for real, actual criminality.

If you are a supporter of the president, witness what happened to every single violent January 6th protester let out of jail. See what happened to Tom Homan, his border czar, who literally accepted a bag of cash, $50,000, and the investigation. was dropped once Donald Trump became president. So there are just two standards of justice now in this country. If you are a friend of the president, a loyalist of the president, you can get away with nearly anything, including beating the hell out of...

police officers. But if you are an opponent of the president, you may find yourself in jail. Again, that is Cuba. That's Iran. That's Russia. That is not the United States. And this just has to be a moment where...

Leaders come together whether you are a Republican or Democrat and say enough is enough. Let me ask you you I introduced a bill called the No Political Enemies Act. And you say it creates a specific legal defense for those targeted for political reasons. Doesn't the First Amendment... cover that, is it necessary to have another piece of legislation?

I mean, we have a First Amendment. It is the first amendment to the United States Constitution. Yeah, listen, I think what Brendan Carr has done at the FCC is illegal and unconstitutional. And if it's contested in court, I think he will lose.

The problem, though, is that increasingly you have Trump sycophants not just in charge of the DOJ, but sitting in courthouses all over the country. And so you have a legal system that is increasingly... getting rigged against those who are daring to speak up against the president.

Our legislation just simply makes it easier for you to raise First Amendment defenses in court. It doesn't create any new rights, new constitutional rights. It just makes it simpler for people to say when they show up to court, listen. I did nothing wrong here. All I did was speak my mind. It creates an easier avenue for you to contest.

prosecution that's brought against you for just speaking politically about the president. I wish this legislation weren't necessary, but I think we're going to need some exceptional new tools at an exceptional moment. You've probably seen that a lot of people on X and social media are recirculating something that you said back in 2018, arguing that what you said now...

Shows you to be hypocritical in what you're saying now Let me let me just read from this tweet from yours and it was still a tweet back then private companies Deciding not to let their companies be used to spread hate and lies is not the same as government censorship If it feels the same, then we need to ask why a small handful of companies have so much control over the content Americans see.

the president's allies will point to a decision like the one made by ABC Disney regarding Jimmy Kimmel and saying look this is a private company making a decision that a private company has a right to do. Well, I think there's a real difference because these companies made that decision in the context of a threat from the FCC. This is a federal regulator who is using the power of government to coerce.

both Nextar and ABC to take Jimmy Kimmel down off the air. Listen, every single president, every single politician. has drawn issue with something that a media figure has said and may use the power of persuasion to try to get them to change what they say.

That's very different than using the power of government in a coercive way. That's actually illegal. The Supreme Court has said, no, you cannot use the regulatory power of the government to say to a broadcaster, if you don't say what I want you to do. to say, as the President of the United States, there will be an official legal consequence. That's illegal, and that's the fundamental difference here. So I want to...

Turn to another subject in the brief time we have left. There was a poll out about the Democratic Party. There was a poll out earlier this month from Gallup that asked. views of socialism and capitalism. And I want to take a look at this part of that poll. It showed that 66% of Democrats have a favorable view of socialism independence uh 38 just 38 republicans 14 is is that is that the future of the of the of the democratic party is a more favorable view of socialism

No, it is not. But I have seen I think even more interesting polling that shows you. Across party identities, people in this country are sick and tired of corporations having so much control over our lives and are sick and tired of work not paying. So I think the Democratic Party has an opportunity to reach into.

Donald Trump's base to really build upon a potential realignment in this country if we are aggressively talking about deconstructing concentrated corporate power, including in the media, and we are talking about fundamentally increasing.

the amount of money that people make and the protections that they have when they go to work. That's not socialism. That's just right-sizing the economy so that people have power instead of corporations having power. And frankly, I think that's why a candidate like the...

like Mondami in New York is doing so well, because he's talking about transitioning power from people that don't have it to people that have it. So I think that's the message that ultimately has the potential to unite a lot of right and left. We're out of time. Very quickly, is Chuck Schumer making a mistake by not endorsing Momdan? He's like the only major...

Political figure in New York, it seems, it was not endorsed. Yeah, I guess I don't sort of give advice to my colleagues about who they endorse and who they don't endorse. I think the success of his candidacy is a really important signal to Democrats and Republicans about the power of taking on. concentrated corporate power, and I hope that at least my party learns from that.

All right, Senator Chris Murphy, thank you for being with us this morning. Appreciate it. Up next, we go to Glendale, Arizona, where supporters are lining up to pay their respects to Charlie Kirk. We're back in just two minutes.

That's a look at the long lines outside of State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona this morning where Vice President Vance, President Trump, and many others will be attending the memorial service for Charlie Kirk. Let's go to ABC's Matt Rivers in Arizona on the heightened security at the event and what to expect later today. Matt.

Hey, good morning, John. We're just outside the venue here in Glendale, Arizona, where this memorial is set to take place at 11 a.m. Pacific time. You can see it's very early in the morning, and yet there's already hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people lining up to get into the venue.

it's gonna take a long time to get in because of the added security elements that have been put in place. This is the kind of security levels that we see for Super Bowls. I'm talking thousands of law enforcement officers that are gonna be here today to make sure that this

goes smoothly and of course tensions ratcheted up a little bit over the weekend after authorities arrested a man pretending to be law enforcement outside of the venue he was armed according to police so that gives people the sense of the sort of

that we're facing here at this point, and it's just adding to what's been a very tense time in the country, obviously, since Kirk's killing, the threat of violence very much on people's minds, including on the minds of Secret Service, because we know President Donald Trump and J.D. Vance, the vice...

President will be here today among a long list of speakers, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Tucker Carlson, Donald Trump Jr., big names within the conservative politics world. about that there. Kirk, of course, a controversial figure in the country, but people who will be showing up here today, many of them really view him as almost a political martyr of sorts in their continued political movement in their

in this country, John. A very, very big event here in Glendale and a massive security presence to boot. Our thanks to Matt. You can see full coverage of today's memorial service streaming at 2 p.m. Eastern on ABC News Live. The roundtable is next. We are back in a moment. This show is supported by Oracle.

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All right, and now the roundtable is here. Former DNC chair Donna Brazile, Bernie Sanders 2020 campaign manager Fahaz Shakir, and the editor of the SCOTUS blog Sarah Isger. And in a debut here on This Week, executive editor of The Daily Signal, Rob Blewey. All right, Sarah, as a former spokesperson for the Department of Justice, I have to ask you, what is the impact when the president of the United States puts out a message like he did last night?

basically slamming his attorney general for not prosecuting his enemies This is bad for the Department of Justice. It's bad for the country. But I do think we should take a bigger view here. When you look at, during the Obama administration, using the power of the presidency to target Tea Party groups through the IRS. During the Biden administration, using the power of the president.

to target social media companies. Mark Zuckerberg saying they were threatened if they didn't take down information on COVID origins. And now using the power of the presidency, whether through the FCC or the Department of Justice, to limit criticism.

We should be talking about the power of the presidency, because frankly, there is no legislation that is going to prevent abuses of power by the president. We have to take away that power. The FCC shouldn't have this power. The IRS shouldn't have this power. And until we're willing to talk about that.

This is just going to turn into a tit for tat, and it's going nowhere good. So I want to play something that Pam Bondi said at her confirmation hearing. This is when she was asked specifically about whether or not... she would refrain from acting politically in that job. Take a listen. That will not be the case.

If I am Attorney General, I will not politicize that office. I will not target people simply because of their political affiliation. Justice will be administered even handedly throughout this country. All right, Donna, she's now going to have to test that proposition. Absolutely. Look, she's the chief law enforcement officer of the United States of America. That should...

She should hold that position in higher regards. What we're seeing now is a pressure campaign, like we see a pressure campaign across the board in the Trump administration. Do as I say or else. And what I saw last night, I was shocked. And he looked private, but it became a public attack on the attorney general. I want you to, you know, go ahead and prosecute my enemies. Go ahead and find dirt on my enemies.

or else that's what donald trump that's the signal he was sending to pam bondi last night when you pull back out and you look at the politics that the wheels are coming off the trump train a bit and he knows it you see this standing on the economy people are

getting angrier and angrier that he isn't looking out for them health care premiums higher electricity bills higher grocery prices higher he's seeing that in the polls so now a couple of things are happening distraction so hey i gotta get on my front foot i'm gonna go attack my opponents

and he's looking for somebody to blame so if i'm going down instead of being a person a president with honesty and credibility says i want to look out for people i'm going to find somebody else i'm going to say it's john carl's fault that things are going terribly so so rob uh We understand our reporting is that the leadership of the Department of Justice, Pam Bondi, Todd Blanch, opposed what Trump did on Friday, which was fire the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.

Because he would not, he didn't find evidence to prosecute the president's enemies, Letitia James specifically, and James Comey. John, one of the most important roles of a president is obviously picking personnel. And President Trump has been known over the course of his first term and now the second term that he wants people in those positions who are going to move swiftly and get things done. And so if the president is displeased with somebody, it's...

his prerogative to remove them from a position. That's personnel's policy in Washington, D.C. We all know that. And so ultimately, if a cabinet secretary may disagree with the president on that, that's a battle that will obviously play out. But in this particular case, I think what you're seeing is as a frustration by President Trump that things are not moving swiftly enough. Secondly... Swiftly enough on what? Swiftly enough across the board. I think that he... But about... He wants...

These investigations to come to a conclusion. The president said, if they're guilty, let's make sure that we pursue that. If they're not guilty, that's fine, too. I mean, that was what those were the president's words. The timing is that the statute of limitations is about to run in a week. And so they either have to bring charges or.

They don't. And if they don't have evidence to bring to a grand jury, this is going to be incredibly embarrassing for them. But our understanding is they spent five months, that office, this is one of the most important U.S. attorney's offices in the country, spent five months looking into this allegation of mortgage. and found there wasn't evidence to bring a case. In fact, if anything, they found evidence on the opposite. Exonerating her. Yes, correct.

Okay, I want to move to the other part of this, which is the free speech component. An editorial in the Free Press, Barry Weiss, Free Press, about what happened with Disney, ABC. suspending Jimmy Kimmel's show. Take a look at this. They write, the circumstances under which he has been suspended should alarm anyone who cares about free speech. It is now

Trump, is it now Trump administration policy to punish broadcasters for comedy that doesn't conform to its politics? That is censorship. For the MAGA crowd... who might like what they're seeing from Carr, remember that Democrats will wield this power again. And when they do, they will play by new rules that Carr and the Trump administration just established. Rob, let me ask you, we saw very strong words from Ted Cruz. And from Tucker Carlson, highly critical of what the FCC is doing.

Where does MAGA world break down on all of this? John, I do have sympathy for those who have concerns about free speech. I came to Washington, D.C. My first job was to defend reporters who were facing free speech challenges. And we ourselves have suffered under... the Biden administration when the Biden White House revoked the credentials of the Daily Signal and 440 other reporters two years ago in 2023. And so I know what it's like to be on the receiving end.

At the same time, I think we need to take a step back, hopefully, and judge that Brendan Carr was asked his opinion on a podcast. He gave his opinion. He did not.

institute any sort of regulatory action against ABC. It was Nexstar and Sinclair that decided to preempt the show, which is what prompted ABC to do what it did. Well, that's what this editorial is about, jawboning, when an official that has the power... goes out and says that kind of stuff the supreme court has said that can be a form of censorship yeah he sent a message no no question that brendan who in the past has spoken out uh in in terms of free speech he he's been a

advocate of speaking truth to power and when you lose that right when you lose that ability to hold elected leaders and others accountable when a comic cannot make a mistake and then come back and correct his mistake when we've reached this destination country where people cannot criticize

official leaders, then we're losing a key guardrail of our democracy. Yeah, I would just, you know, to my friends on the right, all due respect, I do think we're in a different moment. This isn't tit for tat. This isn't like something in the past. I believe, and you may disagree with me, that this is something very different.

This isn't a person looking out for trying to solve for COVID or some issue that is relevant to the American public. This is a person who's looking out purely for their own self-interest, self-preservation. Me, Trump, my cronyism. Go and defend my personal interests, dear Department of Justice, dear IRS, dear Fed Reserve. Whatever it is I want, you are supposed to do pure, nonstop.

That's what's being governed here. This is the interest of Trump. I actually don't disagree on that, but the mechanisms by which to do it, saying we will take away your Section 230 protection in the Federal Communications Decency Act if you don't take down this speech that we don't...

don't like on your platform is what the Biden administration did, add in more curse words, according to Mark Zuckerberg. Look, I think it's great that we saw so many voices from across the spectrum on the right absolutely going after Pam Bondi for her statements about hate speech. But you know what sort of struck me? Ted Cruz isn't a podcaster. I mean, he said that on a podcast. He's a U.S. senator. The actual...

solve for this is to do something, to actually have political accountability, which is the job of a senator, actually do something to rein in a president. Hey, but before we go, I see that my friend Donna's got a book over there. It's the new Kamala Harris book. It's not autographed, Johnson.

worth a lot right now. So this book has created quite a stir. It's not even out. It comes out on Tuesday, but obviously excerpts out. I want to read from one of the excerpts where she describes a phone call that she got from Joe Biden the day of her debate. with Donald Trump. Joe then rattled on about his own former debate performances. I beat him the other time. I wasn't feeling well the last one. He continued to insist that his debate performance

had not hurt him much with the electorate. I was barely listening. Now, she also says that she was wondering why he was distracting her. on when she had to be concentrating and getting ready for debate. She seems quite upset with her. You know what Doug said to her at that moment? Yeah. Day 56, let it go. Let it go. Focus on what you're about to do. Look, if you've never...

been on a presidential campaign. If you never run for president, this is a great book. It's a promise, a starter for young people who want to figure out what it's like. to be on a campaign trail. From that vantage point of view, I enjoy reading a book. But from the vantage point of myself as somebody who knows what happened in 2024, it doesn't answer a lot of questions that we still need to learn from what happened.

happen when you go from having 20 81 million people in 2020 to a little over 75 million. There are a lot of unanswered questions in this book, but it's a read in terms of what the future might look like for Kamala Harris, not the Democratic Party. What do you think all the score settling here?

And does she have a future? I doubt it, no. I mean, you have to be somebody with, people are looking for people with conviction and integrity and time of corruption, economic corruption, political corruption. Who's going to have the honesty and integrity to stand up to power? And, you know, some of the decisions she's making, she says, I wasn't in control.

It wasn't my fault, somebody else. Then who's in control? You know, you don't listen to consultants in the donor class. If you want to step into the political arena, you stand on your own two feet, you make tough decisions, and you own them, and you have a vision and a strategy, and I don't think...

it came through in this book? It's a testament to the failure of the left on their increasing purity tests. You have Neera Tanden out there now saying they're going to have to start looking at candidates who might not agree with them on everything. Maybe a pro-life Democrat could do more for the party than anything else right now.

All right, we've got to take a quick break. Coming up, our next guests are never afraid to speak their mind. We have Stephen A. Smith and former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie. We will be right back. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. You chose to hit play on this podcast today, Smart Choice. Make another Smart Choice with AutoQuote Explorer to compare rates from multiple car insurance companies all at once. Try it at Progressive.com.

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He asked me to pre-commit to signing off in each and one of the forthcoming ACIP recommendations, regardless of whether or not there was scientific evidence. He just wanted blanket approval. And if I could not commit to approval of each and every one of the recommendations that would be forthcoming, I needed to resign. That was former CDC director Susan Monarez testifying on Capitol Hill this week, giving her account.

of the events that led HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to fire her last month. That testimony came just days before Kennedy's vaccine panel voted to change several vaccine recommendations. I am joined now by the CEO of the...

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and the former acting director of the CDC, Dr. Richard Vesser, to talk about those changes. Before we get to the vaccines, Dr. Vesser, what did you take away from... from Montrez's testimony an account directly contradicting what Bobby Kennedy has said about why she was fired just shortly after she was confirmed, nominated by the President of the United States and confirmed.

Yeah, you know, John, she had told me the same information before she was actually fired. What we saw on display was integrity. That's what integrity looks like. That's what you need to see as the director of CBS. You want someone who has a line that they won't cross and that line has to be science and truth because they're so entrusted in maintaining and protecting the health of people here and around the world.

This CDC panel on vaccines came out at two days of rather confusing... uh discussion and and and some recommendations can you explain to us what they changed and what it means for americans Yeah. I mean, to someone who's not steeped in public health, this whole conversation and process is really confusing. This advisory committee makes the recommendations that affect what takes place when you see your doctor.

this pediatrics for over 30 years. And I looked to the CDC to give me the recommendations that I could then talk to a mom about. as to why we were recommending a vaccine, what the disease was we were trying to prevent, what the risks and benefits were of being exposed to that disease, as well as from the vaccine. What we saw on display Thursday and Friday was... chaos. This is a group of people. There are a few people on there who understand vaccines, understand the process, but largely...

It's a group of people who are steeped in anti-vaccine ideology, who don't understand how to evaluate the key concepts. And we saw them not being exactly sure what they were voting on. And in the end, what they did was they failed to recommend the COVID vaccine to very young children and the elderly, two groups who are at the highest risk of having a bad outcome from COVID. My biggest takeaway...

as a doctor is that I can't look to the CDC anymore for the trusted information. I'm going to need to look to medical societies and other groups to provide that information. But the tragic thing is that this committee determines whether Your insurance is going to pay for this for every child in America. And that is going to cost lives. I mean, so confusing to Americans of all stripes, but especially people with young children wondering what to do.

with their children. Do you listen to the government? Do you listen to expert groups, doctors? What do you listen to? But let me just ask you big picture. Bobby Kennedy came in to office, obviously with a long track record. of raising doubts about vaccines, an anti-vaccine crusade he was on. What kind of a lasting impact is he having on the way Americans perceive vaccines and on the health of the country?

Yeah, I mean, Secretary Kennedy was one of the nation's leading anti-vaccine crusaders, and he came in on a mission, and he is moving forward with that mission. He has stocked this committee with so many people who are... part of the anti-vaccine movement who have an agenda. He is instilling mistrust in vaccines. What you want to do is ensure that people have the information when they're seeing their doctor to make an informed choice.

over these two days did was it instilled doubt in a lot of people who didn't have doubt. And it's going to lead people who are trying to do the right thing for their families, for their children, to make wrong decisions. It's what he was about from the beginning. It's not what he told.

Senator Cassidy he was going to do when he was up for confirmation. But he came in, immediately removed the expert committee, one that we all relied on, and brought in people who would move forward his agenda. And he's not done yet.

I'm very worried that he's going to bring more people on because some of the votes didn't go the way that he would have liked this week. And that is very, very concerning. And let's not forget Operation Warp Speed, which created the COVID vaccine, is something Donald Trump has. I think, rightfully appointed to as one of the real major accomplishments from his first term. Dr. Richard Besser, thank you for helping us understand what went down this week. Really appreciate your time.

When we come back, some powerful words about politics and journalism from the late Robert Redford. We're back in a moment. This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy to see if you could save when you bundle your home and auto policies. Try it at Progressive.com. insurance company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states.

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Before we go, some powerful words from Hollywood legend Robert Redford, who passed away this week. He spoke about journalism in a 2017 interview for the HBO documentary The Newspaperman. Take a listen. I don't have a lot of regard for politics per se, but the relationship between politics and journalism I do have, because journalism is what keeps politics straight, you know.

Is politics telling the truth or not? You know and very often politics doesn't tell the truth It just tells a story that's being told by one side or the other But it's journalism that gets to the bottom line and says wait a minute that we're hearing this wearing that but what's the truth? Wise words, thanks for sharing part of your Sunday with us. Have a great day.

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