>> brennan: welcome back to "face the nation." we go now to united airlines c.e.o. scott kirby, who joins you from state college, pennsylvania. good morning to you. >> good morning. >> brennan: united has said 90% of your employees are vaccinated. what about for contractors and someone buying a ticket on your airline, how confident can they be they won't run into someone unvaccinated? >> well, there are a lot of people who work in the airport who don't yet have a vaccine. >> reilrequirement.one of the ts important when you're traveling on an airplane, once you're on the airplane, it is really the safest place you can be because of the air flow on the airplane -- the safest place you can be indoors.

so wear your mask, that's a rule. >> brennan: the delta variant is causing problems in terms of people's willingness to buy tickets to get on planes. your company announced that. are you going to lose money -- you're going to lose money the next two quarters. why aren't people flying? >> well, the delta variant has, obviously, caused a down-turn in travel. a lot of offices were expecting to be open again in september, and the delta variant has pushed those opening dates back a few months. my guess is it will now be january. it appears w cases, and we hope that is the case. and as we continue to get more people vaccinated we can get back to normal. but the demand recovery has probably been(rñd>r=zw

>> brennan: should they do it? >> ith i think the administration's perspective is getting people vaccinated is a one shot. you can get a high percentage of the country, as opposed to making it a burden on people who are vaccinated, any time you get on a plane, to prove that you're vaccinated. so for now, i think their approach of focusing on the employment and focusing on work is probably the right way to go. they have great data and science. if they tell us they want us to check everyone, we're prepared to do that as well. >> brennan: when it comes to data and science, dr. scott gottlieb has argued that the biden administration's travel restrictions on india and china and other countries, they don't really work. have they given you a timeline on when those

restrictions will be lifted? >> they haven't given us a timeline specifically. but they do talk to us a lot. and, you know, i think they're just trying to take a cautious approach and really put safety first as they go through the crisis. given the case rate in europe and the u.s., which are similar, and the vaccination rates are higher in europe, i'm hopeful we'll get the borders, particularly to europe, open soon. they're following the data and the science. we hope as cases come down that is something that will happen soon. >> brennan: do you think that's a political decision? >> i really think they're just focused on trying to do the right thing here. this is a lot of uncertainty around what it means. i think they're just focused on the right thing. >> brennan: i want to ask you about some of what is being debated here on capitol hill. there are two huge bills. one is the $1.2 billion structure plan. it has funding and travel

into the bill. what do you need the money fore? how would you want it to be programmed? >> i'm very supportive of the entire infrastructure package. it is a great opportunity to invest in america coming out of this crisis. it has been a long time since we had real investment in the airport system. air traffic control still flies the same way they did 50 years ago. it is good for the economy and costumers and good for the society. >> brennan: so you're for the 1.2. (drum roll). (dr2 trillion.when it comes to 5 trillion -- for you, in private business, is it just so expensive to make some of these changes on your own that you need american taxpayers to provide tax credits and incentives for private businesses to go green?

>> well, particularly for the climate change initiative, we do need government support really to fund the investment. if you look at solar and wind, 20 years ago they couldn't compete with coal or natural gas, and today it is cheap. that's what we need for things like sustainable aviation fuel. this is really an opportunity to america to drive investment, drive the next generation of great jobs that can be green and great technology we can export around the world. >> brennan: for you, the benefit outweighs the risk of spending that much money? >> well, the climate change elements are part of the $3.5 trillion. so the climate change elements in particular -- and i don't know 100% of what they are, but the ones i do know about, i'm very supportive of and hope they pass either in this bill or somewhere else. >> brennan: we'll watch. and thank you, mr. kirby, for your time this morning. we'll be right back.

the live better u program basically just provides the answer to the question: what if? with live better u, my 'what ifs' were erased. ♪ ♪ [slow electronic notes fade in] [fast upbeat music begins] ♪ [music stops] and release. [deep exhale] [fast upbeat music resumes] [music stops]

well, geico's 85 years isn't just about time, you know. it means experience. i mean, put it this way. if i told you i'd been jarring raspberry preserves for 85 years, what would you think? (humming) well, at first you'd be like, "that has gotta be some scrumptious jam!" (humming) and then you'd think, "he looks fantastic! i must know his skin care routine." geico. saving people money for 85 years. beg your pardon. >> brennan: former f.d.a. commissioner dr. scott gottlieb has been a

valuable resource for this broadcast and our viewers throughout the covid crisis, helping us cut through the confusion to tell you what you need to know. his new book, "uncontrolled spread that's cor,"takes a critical lot the mistakes this administration made in responding to the pandemic. we sat down with him last week. >> doctor: i think that the public health establishment as a whole has taken a hit in the setting of this pandemic. this isn't a republican, democratic, conservative, liberal thing. there are a lot of people around the country that feels like the advice they got from public health officials wasn't precise, changed, wasn't formulated in a way where it was sort of immuteable. it wasn't carefully explained where it could be assimilated into people's lives. how do i wear a mask? when should i wear a mask? and so people were confused and lost

confidence in it. >> brennan: you say the c.d.c., which is supposed tob tto be the gold standard, doesn't have the capability to manage a crisis of this scale. if the c.d.c. doesn't, who does? >> doctor: nobody does. there was a perception that the c.d.c. has this, that they would have the capacity to develop a diagnostic test and deploy it and gather the data we would need to scope out what the contours of the response would be. and they would be able to deploy the diagnostic test and deploy the vaccine. they're not a logistical organization. the c.d.c. is a high-science organization that does deep analytical analysis of date that that is oftentimes out of sync to when the decisions need to get made. they don't serve as realtime information to inform current policy-making -- >> brennan: they're not a quick action maker? >> doctor: right. they like to publish the

data. the idea they would be able to manufacture a diagnostic test -- they contaminated their own test. >> brennan: we needed to turn to private industry earlier in the pandemic? >> doctor: we needed an all of the above approach. certainly by the end of january, we had enough awareness that this could be a global pandemic. someone could have hit the red button. c.d.c. had the ball. they were following their standard blueprint. their blueprint could keep up with a slow-moving outbreak, but in a fast-moving pandemic, it was unmatched. the c.d.c. should have raised their hand and say they don't have this. >> brennan: why didn't they. >> doctor: we needed to get fema and the d.o.d. engaged with the c.d.c. and try to organize a national left response. that was a failure of political leadership and a failure of vision. there were a lot of people who were good political

leaders who wrongly assumed that c.d.c. had this mission. >> brennan: you say the point is they were working with faulty tools and faulty data sets. they didn't know what they didn't know? >> doctor: they didn't understand this wasn't spreading just like flu. if you're just looking for flu symptoms, you would not see coronavirus spread. we should have been doing things differently in anticipation this probably was spreading but we just weren't picking it up. >> brennan: you also say this should have been viewed as a national security threat? >> doctor: at i think the intelligence community has a different sense of lenses. we make preparations for things that are unlikely to happen, but if they happen they're so catastrophic, they have to be prepared. we have to be prepared domestically. internationally, we rely on other nations to tell us when they have an outbreak. that has repeatedly

failed. that failed in this case. china still hasn't shared the source strain. the question becomes: can we still rely on the international health organizations and the w.h.o.? are we all going to hold hands and promise we are going to share information? i think we're going to need to get our clandestine services more engaged in this transmission. there was data available in wuhan that if we were looking for it, we could detected this much sooner. we could have seen the asymptomatic spread. and it could have allowed us with a head start. >> brennan: what did you learn, in the course of your research, about the origins of covid? >> doctor: i learned we're not going to answer this question absent one of two things happening: either we find the intermediate yac host, the animal that spread covid,

or there is a whistle-blower inside china or someone close to this, who knows this came out of the lab, comes forward, defects, goes overseas, or we intercept some communication we shouldn't have access to. this is going to be a battle of competing narratives. i think over time, the side of the ledger that says that this might have come out of a lab has grown more robust, and the side of the leger that says this came out of a natural species has not really moved. >> brennan: when you say "came out of a lab," you're saying through a lab accident -- >> doctor: the administration said this in the intelligence report they put out, they debunked that this is something that was deliberately engineered. >> brennan: why do we need to know who patient zero is? >> doctor: if we assess it came out of a lab, i think it changes how we govern research internationally. the most speculative

research is -- the other thing we're going to need to look at is do we continue to do things like publish the sequences of novel viruses? once you publish that sequence as part of scientific recourse, you basically provide a recipe to anyone who is a rogue actor on how to manufacture that virus. >> brennan: we're going to take a quick break, and we'll be right back with a lot more of our conversation with dr. scott gottlieb. so don't go away.

when you humble yourself under the mighty hand of god, in due time he will exalt you. hi, i'm joel osteen. i'm excited about being with you every week. i hope you'll tune in. you'll be inspired, you'll be encouraged. i'm looking forward to seeing you right here. you are fully loaded and completely equipped for the race that's been designed for you.

>> brennan: we're back with more of our conversation with former f.d.a. commissioner dr. scott gottlieb what is the what is the lesson for the biden administration as they e roll out boosters? >> doctor: i think the logistical lesson is that they need to have in place the infrastructure to actually distribute those vaccines in hard to reach communities and setting. i think what the president biden administration has done by backing into an approximate date, they can start the planning, if the f.d.a. does authorize it and the c.d.c. judges it

to be appropriate for a certain population, they'll be ready to make it available to the nursing homes right away. i don't know that the vaccine boosters are going to be controversial in the right versus left politics. i think where the fault lines will be on some of the mandates that the administration is putting in place. >> brennan: how does it sit with you when you here members of the republican party describe all of this along civil liberties lines? >> doctor: i think it is a misjudgment. there is this argument this is an individual choice. your choice to get vaccinated is an knowledge choice. it is not. this is a decision that affects your community. this is a collective choice. just like with childhood vaccinations. if you go into a school setting and you're not vaccinated for the measles and you introduce it into that setting, you're affecting that community. i don't think governors should tell schools and

businesses that you can't mandate. if the only way i can protect my costumers is by having a fully vaccinated workforce, i should be able to make that decision. >> brennan: and we're not just talking about shots. we're talking about masks? >> doctor: people generally have an apprehension about taking a medical intervention, especially when they're healthy. i understand people'se-general d concerns about a novel medical product. but a mask is such a simple intervention. it is not going to cause any harm. it is an act of community responsibility, an act of respect. the federal government is well within its rid right to mandate vaccinations for. >> gagovernment workers and health care works. workers. when you impose it down to small businesses, now your setting up political fault

lines. you're taking something that is subjectively political. are you going to get enough benefit for the price you pay in terms of hardening those lines, i think that is worth a vigorous debate. >> brennan: which governors handled it the worst? >> doctor: looking at south dakota, where it was allowed to travel largely unfettered. you saw one of the highest deth rates per capita, you have to look back and say that was a bad experience. once re lear we learned how to reduce this, states that were still excessively engulfed by this and had a lot of death and disease, those were, in part, policy decisions. those were, in part, the result of policy decisions those states made. >> brennan: i think about the first few days where this strange virus that was just surfacing started to make headlines here at home. you were starting to see things that weren't yet

really being raised as red flags. how were you, on the outside, seeing things that they weren't seeing on the inside. >> doctor: there was the presumption that the c.d.c. has this, and the secretary of health and human services is in control, so they let that health care apparatus run with the ball. it really wasn't until more like the end of february, the march timeframe, that you saw the white house start to get engaged and pull this away from the secretary of human health services and try to more accurately manage it. >> brennan: it has been reported that you were actually considered to come and run that task force. is that true? >> doctor: i don't know for sure. the president asked me to come in. i met with him and the vice president, and they asked me to take a position as sort of an advisory or helping oversee the task force after the vice president had been put in charge. that felt like it was moving along and more

real. ultimately, it didn't come together. >> brennan: why? >> doctor: i don't know for sure. there were probably people in the white house had wanted to see me in that position, and probably those who didn't. >> brennan: do you regret not being on the inside? >> doctor: i regret not being at the f.d.a. i don't know there was much i could have done dramatically differently inside the white house. eventually i would have worn out my welcome because there would have been people inside the white house who wouldn't have liked what i was preaching. if i had been at f.d.a. with my staff, working with my career staff, i'm pretty confident we would have made a very hard pivot to try to instigate the private industry to start getting engaged in developing diagnostic tests early in january. >> brennan: you wish somebody at the f.d.a. was doing that? >> doctor: it would have had to happen at the commissioner level. if i called any big manufacturer, they would have done it. having been there and made

those calls and known that c.e.o.s responded positively in the face of a health crisis -- that is the one thing i wish i was there for. i was writing articles in january this is what we should do. but writing op-eds and putting things on twitter is not the same as being there. i wish i was there. the f.d.a. and the operatives, the operational divisions of h.h.s. is where the operations happen. that's where you can affect the outcome. >> brennan: did you write in march, when you went into meet the president, that this was serious. >> doctor: they were willing to take dramatic actions, but later on their attitudes really changed. to the point where the president had covid, he ceremoniously took his mask off. what message does that send to the country?

they were sold on the idea that you weren't going to really be able to affect the spread. anything that you did was going to have so many repercussions on children, who might not be in school, and impact on the economy that the costs were worse than the disease. and the school is a perfect example of the lack of affective policy-making. the single reason why most schools remained shut was because the c.d.c. was telling them they had to keep kids six feet apart. if the c.d.c. said you have to keep them three feet apart, then a lot of schools would have been able to open. when the biden streaghts wadministration wanted to open schools in the spring, they got the c.d.c. to change that guidance to three feet. >> brennan: and the six feet was arbitrary? >> doctor: the initial was 10 feet. a political appointee said we can't recommend 10 feet.

it is inoperable. so the compromise was six feet. imagine if that fact leaked out. the c.d.c. said it should be 10 feet. but 10 feet was no more right than six feet, and ultimately became three feet. the decision to ultimately revise it from six to three feet was because of a study they did in the fall. it showed if you have two masked individuals, the risk of transmission is reduced 70% with masks if you're three feet apart. they said on the basis of that, we can make a judgment that three feet wais an appropriate amount. so why didn't they change it in the spring and not the fall? these anecdotes get involved, and that's when the americans start to losing confidence.

>> brennan: do you think, fundamentally, looking at everything you have analyzed, that the outcome of this pandemic would have been different if president trump wasn't in office? >> doctor: it would have been different if we had different political decisions and the white house was exercising different leadership. there is no question about that. there is no question that the white house made mistakes, and the lack of consistency was a mistake, and the fact of using the white house to galvanize the collective difference. allowing this to get to the divided lines, when the temperature was really high, i think really hurt us. but stepping back from that, i think there were fundamental weaknesses with our response, regardless of who was in power, we had an ill-prepared white house.

>> brennan: the full conversation with dr. scott gottlieb about his book "uncontrolled spread" is in two parts on facethenation.com. we'll be right back. [music stops] and release. [deep exhale] [fast upbeat music resumes] [music stops] i'm 53, but in my mind i'm still 35. that's why i take oste bi-flex to keep me moving the way i was made to, it nourishes and strengthens my joints for the long term. osteo bi-flex, plus vitamin d for immune support. the live better u program basically just provides the answer to the question: what if? with live better u, my 'what ifs' were erased. ♪

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>> brennan: that's it for us today. thank you for watching. until next week, for "face the nation," i'm margaret brennan. ♪ ♪ captioning sponsored by cbs captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

it's monday, september 20th, 2021. this is the "cbs morning news." a tragic discovery in the search for gabrielle petito. a body is found in wyoming. now authorities want to know where is her fiance. mass expulsion. the u.s. begins sending back haitians who gathered at the texas border. how plans to move everyone out by the end of the week. the best in television. the biggest stars on the small screen are honored at the emmy awards. why the night belonged to popular streaming services. good morning. i'm diane king hall in for anne-marie green. we begin with a grim discovery

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