songs, so i knew "uptown girl" and "ymca." the others -- >> "ymca" is great. >> 100 weddings, i'm hundred years old. >> the trump rallies. good memories of it. >> repurposed in a good way. >> i end up with the weddings that play a lot of barry manilow "o mandy." "america reports" now. >> sandra: thank you, harris. former vice president mike pence is pushing for parents' rights in iowa. he visited the early caucus state to denounce radical gender ideology in public schools. >> john: pence is calling on conservatives to take a stand and protect american values. they say they have no choice but to fight and win a culture war against the left. the former vice president joins us to talk about this and a whole lot more coming up. >> i worry about down the road

3, 5, 10 years from now, what if there's a cancer outbreak. >> we cannot pick up and move our 15 years of roots overnight. we cannot do that. >> even small doses of chemicals over a long period is ugly. >> sandra: people in east palestine ohio angry and worried about the environmental disaster that is unfolding right now in their communities. hello, welcome everyone, i'm sandra smith in new york. >> john: good to spend thursday with you, i'm john roberts. this is "america reports." head of the e.p.a. is in east palestine assessing the situation following the training derailment nearly two weeks ago. >> sandra: we do expect a briefing from the agency soon. we will certainly get to that when it begins. we are also at this hour awaiting a white house press briefing where we expect reporters to press the administration on their silence on this issue.

>> john: last night hundreds of concerned residents packed a high school gym looking for answers from federal, state and local leaders. one noticeable absence was norfolk southern, cited a potential threat to the employees no one attended. another notable absence, pete buttigieg. >> officials say the air and water are safe but many residents are skeptical. misty allison one of them. she and her family live just over a mile from the crash site. she will be joining us in a moment. but first, fox news team coverage begins now. grady trimble is on capitol hill, lucas tomlinson is on the ground in east palestine, ohio. kick it off for us. >> moments ago the c.e.o. of northern southern railway has written an open letter to the residents here saying they will not walk away from the community and pledge to do more after the

devastating train derailment. e.p.a. was on the ground, and j.d. vance, has he spoken to president biden. >> i have not spoken to president biden. my message is simple. one, department of transportation, your department of transportation has things it can do. stop blaming donald trump, he has not been president for three years, and use the powers of the federal government to do things necessary to help people in this community. >> senator vance wants to see norfolk southern do more, he says they quickly repaired the tracks to get the trains moving again. now wants to see them do more to clean up the toxic chemicals he says are still seeping into the ground water. ohio governor mike dewine's office says they have spoken to the white house about getting federal aid but appears some pushback, fema continues to tell governor dewine ohio is not eligible for assistance at this time. as you mentioned, it was a contentious town hall at the

high school, norfolk southern officials failing to attend out of fear for their own safety. some residents of the town of 5,000 in eastern ohio are nervous about drinking the tap water, and the wanted to see the transportation secretary here last night. >> your guess is as good as me. yesterday was the first time i heard anything from the white house. >> i asked senator vance if he wants to see the e.p.a. chief who says the drinking water is safe actually drink some tap water, he said he welcomed it. john, sandra. >> sandra: keep us posted live from there, we'll get back from there as soon as an update for our viewers. john. >> john: americans still waiting to hear from president biden on the derailment but plenty of lawmakers are speaking out and calling for an investigation. why the train hauling toxic chemicals was not labelled high hazard. grady trimble is live on capitol

hill. what are lawmakers biggest concerns, grady? >> that is the top concern, why wasn't that train labelled as high hazardous, even though it was carrying cancer-causing chemicals and skin and respiratory irritant. that is reserved only for highly flammable materials would have required the train to reduce speed and the state to be alerted it was passing through. senators j.d. vance and marco rubio sent a letter to the transportation secretary asking whether railway company in general are operating trains with too many cars and too few workers. both republican senators are going after secretary pete buttigieg, yet to visit east palestine, for not doing more to help the community. >> i don't know what the guy needs to do to get tired. asleep at the switch, no pun intended, this entire time in areas. feltdowns with the faa,

southwest airlines, and now the toxic chemicals, his job is not to only make sure the system of transportation is reliable but that it is safe. >> for his part, buttigieg is seemingly putting some of the blame on president trump you heard j.d. vance reference. he tweeted he's constrained in certain areas pointing to the previous administration's rolling back of a rule involving train braking systems. no congressional hearings have been scheduled just yet, but that could be the next step, john, as calls are growing for an investigation into this derailment here on capitol hill. >> john: grady, thank you. sandra. >> sandra: misty allison lives in east palestine just over a mile from the accident, this is the giant fire ball her family could see from their home hours after the crash happened. misty, welcome to you, thank you so much for joining us. >> yeah, thank you for having me. >> amazing you can keep a smile on your face through all of

this, about you that's what moms do. you've got a 7-year-old and 16-month-old. what was all of this like for you when it happened? >> yeah, it was really crazy, it really happened during, you know, the whole bedtime hustle, so you know, we heard there was a train derailment, but we were not really sure exactly what that meant, and what it would mean for our family. we had no idea when my husband went outside at 10:00 at night, an hour after the train derailment and snapped the picture, no idea that's what we would see at the bottom of our driveway and so at that time is when we knew like wow, this is something that's a lot more serious than we ever could have imagined. >> sandra: what was the air like? i know you were saying you could smell it almost immediately. what was that like? >> sure. i would say at least from where our house was initially at the time the picture was taken you

could not smell anything but definitely the next morning, like i woke up like at 5:00 in the morning and you could definitely smell it. it didn't smell like campfire or something like that, it smelled really -- i would say more like sweet and like chemical in nature, not smoky like a campfire or something like that. >> sandra: how absolutely scary for you all. there's been obviously a lot of discussion about the state, local and federal response to all this. what has been communicated to you so far about how you should go about your life after this? >> sure. so, i would say for that first, you know, week, we were evacuated, school was closed for that week, and then school was in session on monday, this february 13th, and so we came back, we went to the pittsburgh area the week before when we were told that it was really unsafe to be in the area.

about you now that we are back, what is being communicated is that you know, the air is getting monitored and tested, the ground water and the drinking water is getting monitored and tested, and that it is, you know, being contained and being like constantly evaluated. i would say that's really what we are being communicated. >> sandra: authorities have said the air and the water is safe. do you believe that? >> we would like to believe it's safe. it's probably been tested way more than it's ever been tested ever in the entirety of the time i've been here. i would say the bigger concern i would say is is it going to be continually tested. maybe it's ok today, but is it going to be ok long-term, and how long is this rigorous testing going to be occurring because it might not be ok in

the future, but if nobody is like testing that, then no one is going to know. so i would say as an east palestine mother and concerned mother i'm concerned about the long-term impacts for the community and family. >> did you have some sort of physical reaction you believe to what happened there. when you came back you had some sort of rash on your leg. >> sure. yeah, so that -- that did happen on, you know, sunday night. i did have like some type of rash and i would say, too, our children has been like a little sick, our 16-month-old has had some respiratory symptoms, my son has had some sniffles, but the whole thing that we are wondering is, you know, is it like correlation or is it causation, you know. because it is february in ohio and with the temperatures and the fluctuation in weather and

whatnot. as a mother, you are thinking is this common, we were in the pittsburgh area a week and out in public and restaurants and whatnot since we were evacuated, did we catch a bug there, or is it something that's happening in the environment, or like a trauma response, is the rash because i'm anxious stressed out. a lot of factors to consider, for sure. >> sandra: and you are doing what amazing momgs do, worrying about everything. we completely understand considering your situation. erin brockovich is a bit of an expert in this field, she appeared on the network this morning and made this assessment of what she has learned about the -- about the crash so far. >> they have been reporting since this happened. their lips are turning blue,

their tongues are tingling, sore threats, projectile vomiting, cats are dead, birds are dead, what is happening out there? i have never seen anything like this in my entire career where there's no information -- >> sandra: quite a remarkable characterization of what she has learned about this so far and we also had a resident in the area on the other day who said that he still smells it in the air, they have been coughing, they noticed dead fish in the waterways near them. what is this like as far as what you are hearing from your friends and your neighbors and other school children? what are other people in the community experiencing right now? >> sure. so i would say everything that you are saying is things that we have definitely heard in the community. you can definitely still smell something at times. i would say it ebbs and flows throughout the day. we have seen people pulling the dead fish out of the creeks, for

instance, that is definitely true. and yeah, a lot of people, there's a lot of chatter on social media and you are hearing a lot of definitely a lot of concerns and a lot of people reporting ailments, definitely. >> sandra: one final real quick question. the white house is about to hold a press briefing. what would you like to hear from them or what sort of messaging would you like to hear from the white house on this? >> sure. i definitely think that it's a way bigger problem than just something that's happening in our small village of east palestine, ohio. so i think it does need to be getting national and international attention. it would be great just from a local perspective to know that this is being taken seriously and it is hopefully going to be escalated and definitely in a long-term wait, and not just something that's just going to be a sound bite in the

short-term. and i would say, too -- yeah, and i would just say, too, it would be good to know this is being investigated in a bigger way as well so not just this isolated incident that's happening in east palestine, ohio. >> sandra: a lot of that responsibility would fall in the lap of pete buttigieg, criticized for being slow on the issue. he seems to be blaming the previous administration for relaxing the rules. put out a tweet saying we are constrained by law in some areas of rail regulation like the braking rule because of a law in 15 but using the powers we have to keep people safe. obviously a lot of folks are pressing them on more clarify for what it is. our best to you and your family, neighbors, community, we are thinking of all of you. >> thank you so much. we appreciate it a lot. >> sandra: john. >> john: looks like he was blaming trump and the republican

congress in one tweet there. because there is always breaking news in the afternoon, bring you this breaking news in about 45 minutes or so, we are expected to hear from president biden fresh back from walter reed where he received his annual physical and check-up to give remarks on all of the flying ob corrects that have been dogging the united states and being shot down as well. we may hear more about the chinese balloon and i don't know if we will or not, potentially a chance to ask the president some questions about the ohio train derailment and the slow federal response to it. peter doocy is on the north lawn of the white house. every time we see an afternoon with nothing scheduled, we get suspicious on our suspicions came true. >> and john, just looking at the very little information we have about this so far, they are not using the word balloon, they are saying the president is going to give remarks on the united states response to recent aerial

objects, and over the last week or so a ton of talk in washington, d.c., about these objects. what are they, why did we shoot some down, why did we wait. we have not yet heard from the only person in town who has the authority and used that authority to order fighter jets to carry out a mission over the skies of the united states to eliminate these things that apparently posed a threat to some commercial air traffic at one point. president biden's silence on this is something that democrats and republicans in town have been deeply unsatisfied over the last few days, and it will be interesting to see how far he goes because we have been starting to hear from some of the republicans who are being briefed in a classified setting about these aerial objects. they think the information that's being presented to them classified, a lot could be made

public. the president has the ability to do that here in about 45 minutes we'll find out if he chooses to. but it's going to be very interesting to get into his mind a little bit why -- what exactly did he think was the reason to need to shoot these objects down and also what are you hearing from the pentagon, where did they come from, are there more, how long has this been a problem, and how concerned do people watching this right now at home need to be about something overhead. john. >> sandra: all of this is happening peter as we await news from the briefing, and the president to speak and e.p.a. on the ground, and messaging, we talked to the young mom struggling through this what they are doing about it.

pete buttigieg has been unusually silent on the matter and he's getting a lot of heat to act. >> so far it seems officials are happy to let the e.p.a. administrator be the face of this as opposed to sending out the transportation secretary, pete buttigieg. they see it as an environmental problem, not transportation problem. and including the results of the president's physical, we are expecting something about the president's physical, and that has big personal, but also political implications. president biden has said since he got here that he would only run for re-election if he remained in good health. he had a team of army doctors today trying to see if that is the case. >> john: reports so far looks like he's in good shape, according to his doctors. we'll see if he makes the announcement. >> he was jogging on the white

grass into the oval office. i don't know why he didn't have an umbrella, that's something else. >> john: peter always has the inside from the white house. senator from oklahoma, we expect to hear in about 42 minutes or so from the president about these objects. you've had some classified briefings that might give you the inside track what the president might be telling us. what do you expect he's going to say? >> i'm not sure what he's going to say. during the classified briefing as marco rubio said did not say anything there that couldn't be say publicly. what is unsaid at this point is 250, what they call unidentified aerial phenomena, 250 in the last two years. he shot down three of them in a matter of three days, what made these three different than the previous 247 that had been identified in the past 24 months. i think that's a big issue for us, and just reaction to -- we

had a high altitude aerial balloon do a spy mission across the country and it was embarrassing so now shoot down everything? what's the difference here. a bunch of these three, not the previous 247, who put them up, what do we know about the origins. >> john: mitch mcconnell was on with dana perino, and he said he's never had a briefing in which there was less information shared. is it just this administration doesn't have the information or they are not sharing it? we did have senator kennedy on yesterday who said that he learned from the intelligence community and i guess the pentagon that they have been monitoring this thing before it was even launched, and they watched it go up in the sky, it was headed toward guam and then took a turn to the north and headed toward alaska, and he full he believes that if this had not been spotted by a

civilian on the ground in montana, it would have been tight lips from the intelligence community that they never would have said boo about this thing. >> i completely agree in the sense that they would have never said anything else about it. if it wasn't a civilian that saw it, put it in the local press and then national press picked it up. the big issue on the high altitude balloon, they were keenly aware it was a chinese spy balloon in particular, carrying a heavy spy payload. the president in alaska hesitated and did not take it down, and over alaska, into the united states and apparently across the united states unless it had been called out. so, there are lots of questions related to why did the president hesitate when it came into american waters, everyone knew that's what it was, why would he allow it to come across alaska and the continental united states. >> john: were you given assurances that it was jammed from the moment it got into u.s.

air space? >> there's no way to be able to articulate that. until you start to recover it and find out what it saw and did, there's no way to say. no way to give assurances, they don't know that. >> john: i want to switch gears and talk about the train derailment in east palestine, ohio. we have not seen the transportation secretary, except a couple of tweets. and the mayor was in a town hall, somebody asked him where is pete buttigieg, where is he at? he responded i don't know, your guess is as good as mine. yesterday was the first time i heard anything from the white house. this train derailment was two weeks ago, and yesterday was the first time he heard from the white house? >> yeah, this is a transportation issue and why they are sending out the secretary out the e.p.a. rather

than those in transportation, i have no idea on this. the first accountability is the rail line, notification for the process, the second one is the regulator that handles that, which is the transportation group to be able to engage, did they follow the rules, doing it the right way, do full notifications, what was actually travelling through the state, local fire departments, were they made aware, all those questions are reasonable questions being made but they are made by department of transportation. that's who actually makes that decision on that. so, clearly pete buttigieg should be out there. it's environmental disaster as well, and why he's there alone we don't know. >> john: a lot of talk this was a heavily trump district, 70 plus republican, voted for trump in 2016, but this is not a democrat or republican issue. this is an environmental disaster that's unfolding in slow motion and shouldn't all

hands on deck be the order of the day here? >> 100%. if this administration so petty to say it's a heavy trump district so i'm not going to respond, that's an all new low. they are fellow american, it doesn't matter, republican, democrat, it's a train derailment, environmental disaster, the state is not asking how you voted in the state to be able to take care of them as they are doing in ohio, certainly shouldn't be in the conversation nationally. >> john: senator james lankford, good to catch up with you. >> sandra: answering a question on the train derailment right now. >> on the front lines when there is a hurricane or tornado. as you know, you have seen the president visit devastated areas across the country. this situation is very different. and so that doesn't mean fema is not supporting response, they indeed are. this is a multiple agency response the folks involved as i

just mentioned hhs, cdc, epa as well, and they are coordinating with the emergency department, and each federal agency has its own unique role here and we have mobilized an interagency team to get the people of palestine -- palestine -- east palestine the support they need and look, our priority as i said two days ago is the health and safety of the community. that is indeed our top priority for the moment as we look at what they are dealing with in ohio. >> foreign policy topic. china yesterday warned or threaten counter measures against u.s. entities in response to the shootdown of their spy balloon. today they sanctioned two u.s. defense contractors. any response there, what does it mean for the bilateral relationship? >> the way we see -- the sanctions you just mentioned, these are symbolic and measures and unnecessary, that's how we view them and look, china can

speak to their own actions but again, we see them as symbolic and unnecessary. >> on the train derailment in ohio, secretary buttigieg has gotten some criticism, some -- much in ohio, some from democrats and republicans who argue that he waited too long to respond and seems to be fixated on trying to deflect blame to the previous administration. is the president satisfied with the government's response to the derailment and does he have confidence -- >> i can answer that very quickly and very -- with confidence from here, we have confidence in mayor pete -- i always say, that secretary buttigieg. >> there's been some reporting about this, but great to hear about it from you. when did the u.s. first begin

tracking the balloon? when it first took off from the island? >> that's a good question. i know that the pentagon has answered kind of answered that before, actually laid out a timeline of when that all occurred. i don't have that in front of me to share with all of you, so i would point you to the pentagon and so again, they have had detailed information on the tracking of the balloon and when it was first -- when it was first, i guess, seen or visible to them and also laid out when the president was informed. i just don't have that -- it's in great detail, i just don't have that in front of me at this time. >> has the intelligence community now concluded it likely began heading east but veered off course and that's why it ended up traversing the united states? >> so, look, you know, i want to be really mindful here, i have heard this before. i don't have any specifics to share on that. talking about hawaii and the

guam piece to this. i want to be careful there and refer you to the pentagon and what we think that they are doing is they are deflecting, they are coming up with excuses and trying to spin this and at the end of the day their surveillance balloon was indeed in our air space and they said it was, you all know, they said it was a potential weather balloon, which it was not, and so it's been very clear. all of the american people, the entire world saw what china did and it was irresponsible. >> chinese officials were initially not very responsive, for example, when the secretary of defense tried to get ahold of them. are they being more responsive now? >> our approach to china is calm, resolute and practical, we will continue to keep our airways, communication open and continue to have those

conversations as we have been before the china surveillance balloon and after. but look, again, what they did was irresponsible. it is up to china to decide how they want to move forward with this relationship. the president and president xi met at the g20. they said they would be good actors, a country that we can work with and let's see. are they going to build on that and show that is something they are willing to do, and that's on them. >> picking up the phone, are they communicating? >> i'm not going to go into details on diplomatic conversations or discussions that's currently happening, but i can say the lines of communication have been open. there has been discussions. like i said, days before the balloon went on its path and certainly after. >> thank you so much. the vice president said on china following up on what nancy was asking you, i don't think this

issue with the chinese spy balloon has changed relations with china. does the president agree with that assessment? how is the administration viewing -- >> very much to what i was just saying what our approach to china is going to continue to be, calm, resolute and practical, and we are going to -- the president has been very clear, we will continue to keep open lines of communication with china. that has not changed. and we saw china's behavior, it was irresponsible and visible. >> changed in the wake of this? top officials said clearly it was a violation of the u.s. sovereign air space. >> and from here, too. a violation of u.s. air space and we have been very clear with our communications with china. that has not -- that has not changed. you saw how secretary blinken postponed his trip to china because of their irresponsible behavior, and you know, i don't have a trip to announce from here or when that trip is going

to continue. that is something that the secretary is going to decide with the president. but again, we have been very clear. china -- what china did was irresponsible. irresponsible actions. >> what's the level of expectation that secretary blinken will meet with his chinese counterpart? >> i'm not going to get ahead of that. like i said, the lines of communication has continued to be open and we'll continue to have those discussions. and again, as i mentioned moments ago, you are going to hear from the president, he's going to speak very decisively about our response to china's high altitude surveillance balloon, you'll hear from the president and lay that out. >> one more time, more broadly speaking, if the american public decides or clear there's a broad desire to have a competency test for all of the candidates above the age of 75, would the president submit to that? >> i'm not going to get into the

hypotheticals from here. >> i don't have anything to share on that, let the president do his process and how he's going to move forward, not going to go into details. >> tesla workers in buffalo, new york say a number of employees were terminated after they announced plans to form a union. does the white house have a response for that? >> i'm not going to speak to specific effort from here, but the president supports fundamental rights for workers including the right to organize free from in dimtation or coercion. urged congress to pass the p.r.o. act to strengthen opportunities to make a free and fair choice, i'm not going to speak to the specific actions that have been reported today. >> tesla question, biden has said he's the most pro union president. does he think tesla acted

inappropriately? >> we are not going to speak specifically to those actions but clearly the president supports the rights for workers under nrl act. i'll leave it there. >> and can you say who from the administration will be in attendance of the cast? >> some members of the civil rights, family, something the president and the first lady is very much looking forward to it. we are in black history month and important to screen this movie, a very incredible powerful movie. emmett till was part of the reason the civil rights movement started. we are looking to welcoming the family, civil rights leaders and also the cast here. >> can you give an update on efforts to recover debris from

the three unidentified floating objects? >> because of the weather, because of the weather condition it has been very difficult to get the debris, and so we are, you know, we are allowing the pentagon and the department of defense to do their work in trying to bring the debris that is clearly in the water to the ground and so we just don't have much to share there. but what i can say is when i've been asked what are they exactly, we can't say without analyzing the debris what the objects were. so far, we have not seen indication of anything that points specifically to that idea that these three objects were part of the prc surveillance program or definitively involved in external intelligence collection efforts against the united states. we can also rule out that they were operated by the u.s. government. right now the intelligence community is considering and i have said this before, you have

heard my colleagues from nsc say this before, they could be tied to commercial or research entities and benign. efforts are actively underway at all sites to find what is left of these object so that we can better understand them. the president has directed his team to make sure that we are briefing congress on a regular bases as you have seen us do the last two days. but february, the weather, and very difficult to get the debris from the objects it has taken us some time. >> as the president plans the trip to poland, they indicate public support is shifting away from the war in ukraine, or at least growing public concern that too much is being spent on this war helping ukraine. is part of the goal the president's speech to speak to a domestic audience or primarily about the global meeting leaders? >> more broadly any time the

president speaks, he's speaking as well to the american people, even if he is abroad, that's always important to note. this is the one year, he's going there ahead of the one-year anniversary and sending a strong message of solidarity and the president understands, to reaffirm, right, our support for the ukrainian people as they are fighting back against a brutal war that russia started almost a year ago, and the president believes it's important to show the solidarity, important to show our partnership and that we are indeed supporting our nato allies and so that's what you are going to see, and also the eastern flank, we are going to eastern europe as you just mentioned. and we are going to show the unity, show the support, we are going to show that it is important to be there when a country is fighting for their democracy, their sovereignty and that's what you will see from the president. any time the president speaks he's of course speaking as well to the american people. >> the mayor of east palestine

said yesterday was the first time he had heard anything from the white house about the train derailment. could you talk a little bit about your -- the white house's outreach and what you plan to do in the days ahead and why you did not reach out earlier? >> the health and safety of the community is our top priority. i mentioned on tuesday epa had been on the ground since february 4th, so they have been on the ground for some time, but i can give you a little bit of where we are today. president biden spoke directly to governor dewine to offer federal assistance and the epa administrator is in east palestine, i believe he'll be holding a press conference in 20 minutes or so to talk about the ongoing efforts and what we are doing on the ground. multiple federal agencies have been on the ground, some since february 4th, working hand in glove with the state and local officials leading the emergency response efforts. they are working to get to the bottom of what caused the derailment, monitoring air quality, collecting soil

samples, testing surface and ground water for contaminants and i know we understand the residents are concerned as they should be and they have -- and they have questions, that's all understandable, and we are going to get to the bottom of this. try and figure out an answer what occurred. get through this together, hold norfolk southern accountable, and our message to folks in ohio and that area is to listen to your state and local officials. it is important to listen to them, to allow them to do their work and we are going to do everything that we can to keep that community healthy and safe and get to the bottom of this as well. >> thank you, about the president's health, the doctor's report we are waiting for, can you speak to how confident he is he's going to feel up to it, feel good, getting up in the morning to do this job, very grueling job, not just today or even in two years to finish out

this term but six years from today when he would obviously be 86. >> yes. >> yes what? >> yes, you asked me if he is up to it, yes. >> no, i asked does he, how confident he is, it's not a yes. >> look, you know, we get this question a lot as you all know and here is what i have to say about it. the president always says this, which is watch him, and if you watch him you'll see he has a grueling schedule he keeps up with, sometimes some of us are not able to keep up with. he was state of the union, i believe he spent 90 minutes speaking to the congressional members in front of him, after that he spent an hour shaking hands and saying hello and greeting the congressional members and their guests, and this is a president that works day in and day out, you know, in a grueling fashion, with a grueling schedule and delivers. and let's not forget, it is

interesting that we get this question about this president who has had one of the most historical presidency in his first two years than any other president, almost any other president. and you think about the historic pieces of legislation he's gotten through, many have made jokes about, the bipartisan legislation -- bipartisan infrastructure law that, you know, the last guy joked every week it was infrastructure week, and could not get it done. many presidents tried to get that done and could not get it done, and this president did it in a bipartisan way. i know you don't want to hear me go through them at this time, but we have talked about them over and over and over again and it is surprising we get this question when you look at this record of this president and what he has been able to do and deliver for the american people and he is able to do that because he's clearly capable on so many ways and so many levels and he's going to continue to do that in the years coming.

>> thank you. interagency litigation riyadh, saudi arabia currently, and meeting with high level officials -- counter iran activities in the region, strengthening reallyships with the countries, counter terrorism? >> so, yes, i saw that the delegation -- we have a response for you here, the senior officials of the united states and members of the gulf corporation council, gcc convened a meeting of the working group on iran at the gcc headquarters yesterday as you noted. the working group affirmed the long standing partnership between the united states and the members of the gcc and our shared determination to contribute to regional security and stability. united states and gcc member states condemned iran policies,

including support for terrorism and the use of advanced missiles, cyber weapons and unmanned aircraft systems and around the world. raised grave concern about the iranian military deepening two-way cooperation with state and nonstate actors, including iran's ongoing provision of conventional weapons, advanced missiles and the uas systems to the hutis that have prolonged the conflict in yemen, worsening the humanitarian disaster there. and iran's nuclear advanced do you wanted by the iaea have no civilian purpose and are exacerbating regional and global tensions. called on iran to immediately reverse course, engage in meaningful diplomacy and cooperate with the international

atomic energy agency investigations. united states and gcc members express commitment to expanding defense cooperation and i will leave it there. >> on the settlements, a question. any consequences for israel over this expansion of the outpost and -- >> i'm not going to go beyond the statement we have put out. state department spoke to this as well what, how we see what just occurred with the settlement, i'm not going to go beyond that. >> question for the record -- the last time the president had a physical in november of 2021, he was sedated during a coloscopy, the power was temporarily transferred to the vice president. >> he had a colonoscopy last year, entirely normal, and therefore he did not need a screening this year, so that's why you won't see that occurring once again this year. >> this morning cbs news

reported an unknown number of veterans, service members who were kicked out of the military for being gay or lesbian have tried to get their discharges upgraded from less than honorable. apparently there's a bureaucratic issue, it can take months. is the president aware of the problem, anything he can do about it? >> the president, you've heard him say this before, heard it in statements, and he believes the country and military are stronger when everyone can do it without discrimination, the president's belief, something the president also believes very strongly given his leadership helping repeal, i know you follow this, the terrible policy of don't ask, don't tell, which inflicted great harm on service members and their families. under his leadership. the military does not just welcome lgbtq+ members, it's led by veterans, it's very

concerning that veterans who were unfairly discharged under don't ask, don't tell, has been facing these challenges to upgrade their discharge, denying them benefits they have earned and something we are definitely going to look into. the department of defense has worked to simplify the process to correct past records and conducted outreach campaigns to make sure veterans know how to access this process which is critical because no veteran should feel overlooked or that the process is inaccessible. so, something we are looking towards and we think it's an important issue to make sure we evaluate and assess. >> hi. i just want to ask about the east palestine again. so in the immediate aftermath norfolk southern offered

$25,000, and last night they did not appear at the public meeting. what does the white house make of that response? >> say that one more time. >> public meeting the representatives did not appear having previously said they would. what does the white house make of that? >> i can't speak to the appearance or nonappearance of them. what i can say is what we are focused on. as i mentioned, there is a, you know, a multi-agency response to what is occurring in east palestine, and we take this very seriously. we are going to be committed to making sure that the safety and the health of the community is addressed and as you just heard me say, the epa administrators on the ground currently and the president has been in regular touch with the governor. >> just to follow up with one thing, there was a bipartisan letter one republican and three democrats calling for the epa to

use authority to ensure norfolk southern pays for the clean-up. >> there is an active investigation underway, so the ntsb is on-site and looking at the cause of the derailment. but an active situation. >> congressional budget report, so the president said that he has cut the deficit over the past two years, but isn't that misleading for americans because it was the covid spending that ended that really brought that money down as well as the president signing an increase in ongoing federal spending and now the cbo is saying 1.4 trillion federal deficit, averaging 2 trillion until 2033. >> the president has long made reducing the deficit and being fiscally responsible as a priority. he did that as a president, he believed that as vice president and something he believed as a senator. and i think look no further than his speech yesterday, no further also i guess his speech, state

of the union he said he's going to continue to cut the deficit by $2 trillion in the upcoming fiscal year 2024 budget. and that's something that you all are going to see on march 9th when he puts forth the budget, the president is completely committed to and has proven he can do it just the last two years. here is the thing. you have congressional republicans who want to increase the deficit by $3 trillion. when you think about repealing the inflation reduction act, when you think about extending the trump tax cuts, that is $3 trillion that they are looking to balloon the deficit. so their plan actually does not help what they are listing out they want to do and also want to give tax cuts to the wealthy. 1.7 trillion and see it again when he puts his budget out on march 9th. >> spending cuts as well, tax

increases? >> i'm not going to get ahead of the president. $2 trillion he's going to lower the deficit, that shows fiscal responsibility and something that the president has talked about as vice president, as senator and he showed it, he has the receipts. thank you, everybody. see you tomorrow. >> sandra: so that was interesting, the white house press briefing where on a number of issues where the president has been silent, the press secretary reiterating that he takes these things very seriously without adding further information, particularly on the china unidentified object being taken down, and the unidentified objects on which the president is going to speak top of the hour, we are told, john. but also on that ohio train derailment disaster that is still playing out there for those communities. the press secretary was asked a very specific question by a reporter. the reporter said the mayor of east palestine said yesterday was the first time that he had

heard anything from the white house about the derailment. can you talk about why the white house had not reached out earlier to which she replied, the health and safety of the community is our top priority. so this white house is taking a lot of heat for not getting out there. we have not seen pete buttigieg on the ground in ohio, john. >> john: the epa administrator was there, but the president yesterday tweeted out this, because of our climate investment, our kids will breathe cleaner air, drink safer water and get school powered by clean energy. that's the future we are building. epa administrator michael reagan, let's finish the job. meantime, the people in ohio are concerned they are breathing and drinking poison and have not heard from the president yesterday. >> sandra: and on china, the entire world saw what they did and it was irresponsible.

>> john: and michael will talk at the same time, too, speak to a lack of coordination in messaging. fbi conducting two more searches for classified documents handled by president biden, a source familiar with the investigation telling fox the bureau has searched the university of delaware twice in recent weeks. that's where the sum total of all the documents from president biden's time as a senator are housed. and i hope we have some time left to talk to you, but -- >> long intro, thank you. >> john: you need fewer titles. the fbi has searched the university of delaware a couple times. does it follow, to you, if the president had classified documents from his time as senator in his home, that there just might be some among the 1850 boxes at the university of

delaware? >> not only in his home, i mean, if you are gonna put it in your garage, i guess everything is kind of inbounds in terms of where you want to keep it. what i need to know, john and sandra. and not just with president biden, former president biden, vice president pence, what did you find? if i know the documents, the categories of the documents taken, i have a much better idea of the motive of why you may have taken it. and what i mean by that, if you took a daily briefing that just got shuffled in with some other paperwork, that may tell me that you were careless, but otherwise it's benign. if you took something that wound up in a book, if you took something that helped you with a business deal, then i think people ought to know that, too. so, what did you find and then i can understand the motivation why you may have taken it. >> sandra: trey, it's great to have you on the program. you are jumping in here in the

middle of two big news events that's happening, obviously karine jean-pierre briefing at the white house, not a lot of clarity on a lot of issues the white house has not gotten out in front of. waiting the epa, three events, epa update on the ground in ohio, president on the unidentified objects, those shot down top of the hour. you go to this story now, the document story and sort of taking a back burner to what's going on, especially since the unidentified objects. but the messaging from this white house, just take the documents scandal, for instance, and how many times karine jean-pierre had to walk back things she told the american public that ended up to not be the case. so, what exactly is going on here with the messaging from the white house? >> she has a really, really hard job. i was listening in. if your job is to convince the american people that joe biden is serious about the deficit, you have a really, really hard job. i mean, you could have clarence

darrow and f. lee bailey and they could not convince the jury of that. the media does not press as if it were a "republican" scandal. i have trump, pence and biden, people don't see a clear lane of victory because it may be my guy that's next in the news. they just searched mike pence's house. so, look, i don't care about the politics. i care about the law. you cannot mishandle classified, doesn't mean you are going to go to prison. i was on the house intel committee, we could not leave the room with that stuff, could not leave the room. how does it get into the garage or mar-a-lago, how does that happen? >> john: and the university of delaware collection, not sure

what they are going to do with it, there are a lot of people trying to gain access to that information. again, the sum total of president biden's record in the senate and he was there more than three decades. jonathan turley wrote this about the university of delaware acting like a gatekeeper, rebuffing to gain access to the information, he said the university of delaware has been used for years to shield potentially embarrassing documents for public view from for the biden family, including allegations the president engaged in sexual harassment or assault as a member of the senate. university agreed to serve as a type of lock box for the bidens to prevent review of the senatorial regard as he ran for higher office. it believes people to believe that there could be more there there. >> i try to be fair, even though a small constituency wants me to

be. deal was i'll give you the paperwork but you cannot publish it for two years after i'm out of public office. you know who does not have to wait two years, law enforcement. some of what you described is a crime, no offense to journalists, state and federal prosecutors and agents don't have to wait two years to go look at the stuff that's in the university of delaware. >> sandra: trey gowdy, great to get you on the program. have you back soon. >> john: thank you for hanging through the briefing. appreciate it. >> sandra: we are awaiting the president as we mentioned, announced in the past hour the president will speak on the objects shot down, karine jean-pierre took some questions on that, but set to deliver the most substantial amount on information, relations with china, communications with

china, john, so this is going to be a big moment and especially any details we'll learn about how they were tracking these objects, for how long they were tracking them, hear what the president has to say shortly. >> john: looking forward to that. >> sandra: all right. ok, jack keane is joining us now, retired four star general. general, thank you for jumping on. what would you like to hear from the president on this matter? >> well, certainly that we are hearing from him in and of itself is news worthy, we should have heard from him on february 4th after we shot the chinese spy balloon down. significance, norad was formed in 1958 during the eisenhower administration. every president since that time, only one the united states air space was violated that resulted in the shooting down of that violation and that's president biden. so thankfully we are finally

going to hear about it. he's got to tell us what was the mission of the spy balloon, we think we know, he knows the details. how successful was the mission? the third thing i think, what have we learned about our own surveillance and detection capability, you know, as a result of that incident and certainly the three other incidents that followed it. and i think he's got to be absolutely unequivocal going forward about what is u.s. policy when it comes to air space violations and what actions we will take as a result of that policy. and in dealing with the other issues of the three incidents, he has to tell us whose devices, objects are they, what was their mission, what have we learned about it and would we act the same. if there are literally hundreds of these objects at a lower

altitude, close to 100 a day, what is our policy as we struggle to identify it, take kinetic action against them. a lot of the objects are out there right now and we are not taking kinetic action, even though we did on three successive days over the last weekend. a lot of explanation has to be provided here to get the trust of the american people back. >> john: general, john here. i don't know that we know at this point what the objects were. here is a question that seems to me the president has to answer. he has to answer criticism he allowed this chinese spy flight to transit the entire continental united states, over sensitive military installations, and finally shot down off the coast. senators have told me that they received a briefing which the intelligence community and the pentagon assured them this thing was not getting transmissions

out because it was jammed. are we to believe that this didn't get any communications out back to beijing because it was effectively jammed all the way through by either the intelligence agencies or the military? >> yeah, well, dealing with the first thing, it's obvious, i think, given the action we took against these three unidentified objects, we did not act accordingly when air space was about to be violated by the spy balloon in alaska, did not shoot it down, that reacted in i think what may be an overreaction to the others. he has to be absolutely clear what we are going to do about it. i don't think he's going to fess up to the fact that they may have made a mistake in permitting it to go across the united states. i believe he did, he's going to get questions around that. in terms of what did we learn and did we shut them down, i'm not a technology expert but my gut tells me we would never know