Sen. Mark Warner, Rep. Tony Gonzales, Scott Gottlieb 

12:22Margaret Brennan:Will you be able to view the intelligence, the intercept itself that she's accused of not sharing? We are trying to get both the redactions and the underlying intelligence.

12:31Scott Gottlieb:And that's that is in process. I'm not going to talk to the content itself. But this whole question, remember, this whistleblower came forward in May. It's now February of the following year.

12:46Margaret Brennan:Well, and we're still asking questions. Tom Cotton, the chair, says he's he's comfortable with with the process to date.

12:52Scott Gottlieb:But on the I am not comfortable with the process. the timing. And I can't make a judgment about the credibility or the veracity because it's been so heavily redacted.

13:03Margaret Brennan:Well, the director is frustrated with you personally and issued this really long blistering statement saying you have repeatedly lied to the American people, that the media also lies, and that she never had the whistleblower complaint in her possession and saw it for the first time two weeks ago, I guess the actual hard copy. So do you care to respond to this accusation that you are lying?

13:27Scott Gottlieb:I would respond that I do not believe that Director Gabbard is competent for her position. I don't believe that she is making America safer by not following the rules and procedures on getting whistleblower complaints to the Congress in a timely fashion. I believe she has been totally inappropriate showing up on a domestic criminal investigation in Georgia around voting machines. I think she has not been appropriate or competent in terms of, frankly, cutting back on investigations into foreign malign influence, literally dismembering the foreign malign influence center that's at the director of national intelligence.

14:06Scott Gottlieb:And, you know, we are going to agree to disagree about who's telling the truth. And I believe her own general counsel, who's now her deputy general counsel, testified this week that he shared with Director Gabbard in June her legal obligations.

14:23Margaret Brennan:Well, the NSA has released a statement saying that they are abiding by the law. We do invite Director Gabbard on this program. Before I let you go, I have to ask you about Iran. There have been a number of think tanks who have published photos of what they believe is evidence of Iran reconstituting and rebuilding its nuclear program that the U.S. bombed eight months ago. Are they rebuilding?

14:46Scott Gottlieb:When we struck Iran, Iranians nuclear capabilities, our military did a great job. It was not totally obliterated. So that standard of the president himself set, and Iran has been indicated in public documents, is trying to reconstitute. What I fear is that we don't have the ability to bring the full power of pressure against Iran. A few weeks back when the Iranian people bravely were in the streets and there might have been a moment we couldn't strike because the aircraft carrier that was usually in the Mediterranean was off the coast of Venezuela doing the blockade there. On top of that, on top of that, on top of that as well, we were unable to bring the full force of pressure of our allies in Europe against Iran, because at that very same moment, President Trump was disrupting NATO with his Greenland play.

15:40Scott Gottlieb:We are stronger when we use our allies, when we have our full military capabilities in region, and that military is getting stretched as good as we are as the president gets engaged in activities all over the world.

15:55Margaret Brennan:You support the diplomacy underway now?

15:57Scott Gottlieb:I support diplomacy. Absolutely.

15:59Margaret Brennan:All right. Senator Mark Warner, thank you for your time today. FACE Nation will be back in one minute. Stay with us.

16:30Margaret Brennan:Amplify your future at Monmouth University. Learn more at monmouth.edu forward slash amplified.

16:37Tony Gonzales:Parle-tu français? Hablas espanol? Parle italiano.

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17:09Margaret Brennan:There is some devastating news out of the Winter Olympics in Cortina, Italy. Legendary downhill skier Lindsay Vaughn racing on a badly injured knee crashed just seconds into her race this morning. The 41-year-old Vaughn lost control while taking a turn and then spun briefly in the air. She was airlifted off the race course to a nearby hospital. Just nine days ago, Vaughn ruptured her ACL in a training race in Switzerland. Some good news for Team USA, though. Teammate Breezy Johnson won the gold medal for that race, becoming the first American to win gold in this year's games. And we turn now to Texas Republican Congressman Tony Gonzalez.

17:49Margaret Brennan:Good morning.

17:49Mark Warner:Good morning. Thanks, Margaret, for having me on.

17:51Margaret Brennan:Let's talk about immigration. We've spoken before. You have this border district. You know a lot of Border Patrol agents personally, your constituents. So Friday, Homeland Security funding is going to expire. And there's this standoff in the Senate in particular. Democrats are demanding a number of reforms, and I want to lay them out here. And this is sort of the cost of their vote. Democrats want to require a judicial warrant, not just an administrative one, to enter private property. They want federal law enforcement agents to show ID, wear body cameras, standard uniforms, no masks, protect sensitive locations like schools and churches, stop racial profiling, coordinate with local jurisdictions to prosecute crimes.

18:31Margaret Brennan:Are you on board with any of these demands? Do you see a deal?

18:36Mark Warner:I think we need to work through it. There are some things that make sense and a lot of things that don't. Just a few days ago, this was a bipartisan vote and all of a sudden now the Democrats are trying to hold the country hostage. I'll tell you what's not going to be in there. Amnesty for illegal aliens. I'll tell you what's not going to be there. Stripping away protections for law enforcement officers that are trying to protect themselves. If rioters get to wear a mask, then then law enforcement gets to wear a mask as well. What can be in there? I think the body cameras make a lot of sense. I was really encouraged to see Secretary Noem and Tom Homan execute that.

19:08Mark Warner:I think those are those are good parts of it. And another another thing that works going back to my district. Another thing that works is communication. I think it'd be very, very key if there were communication liaisons in all the communities that ICE has, meaning not changing policy, just sharing communication from the community. Let's say the city manager, let's say city council, community leaders up to the administration and back down. I saw the Biden administration do this with ranch liaisons when the ranchers were really upset. And once again, that helped. These are a couple of things that I think could make it could could be could be the glue that gets this package going.

19:40Margaret Brennan:If the administration will go along with that coordination with local officials.

19:45Mark Warner:Yeah, absolutely. The liaison piece makes a lot of sense to me. I mean, that one, once again, you're not. Yeah. Ice is not going to stop going to these communities. It would be helpful if we had many Tom Homans all throughout the country basically saying this is what we're doing, not leaving things to what ifs and letting other people fill that void, but an actual sharing up and down the chain of command.

20:04Margaret Brennan:Let me ask you about the warrants here. The Trump administration has changed how to use warrants and arrests. They permit warrantless arrests as well. This wasn't done even during the first Trump administration. Leader Jeffries was on another network this morning and said judicial warrants should absolutely be required before ICE agents can storm private property. It should not be controversial, this demand. They just want adherence to Fourth Amendment constitutional protections. As a conservative, shouldn't a judge be consulted?

20:36Mark Warner:Of course, I believe in the Fourth Amendment. But what worries me is a judge should not hold up everything. We're seeing judges all over the country go beyond their level of authority. And so if a law enforcement officer, let's just say, for example, sees a crime that's being committed or has due cause, then why can't they go in there? These administrative warrants, they aren't new. All of a sudden, the left is -

20:59Margaret Brennan:There's new interpretation of them. And the ICE director has disclosed that.

21:02Mark Warner:Well, they're complaining about the use of them. But if you're an ICE agent and you don't have cooperation from local or local officials, how are you supposed to get that criminal that's in somebody's community? How are you supposed to remove them? That's what worries me. If we allow judges to be the roadblock, it doesn't keep our community safe.

21:20Margaret Brennan:So that's a hard line for you in terms of you would never get on board with requiring that a judicial warrant be required to enter private property?

21:31Mark Warner:Administrative warrants work. I want to give law enforcement every tool they need to go out and apprehend these convicted criminals that are loose in our community. To me, that makes a lot of sense. Why you would want to shackle your own law enforcement from keeping our community safe makes no sense to me.

21:46Margaret Brennan:Well, the Fourth Amendment protects all people, regardless of citizenship or national origin, from unreasonable search and seizure. So some of those collateral arrests are warrantless. But that's the politics of this funding bill. I'll put the policy aside for a second because I want to ask you about the cross-examination you're going to have the opportunity to make this week. Because you have the head of ICE, CBP, and another agency come before the Homeland Security Committee. The Republican chair said he has questions about training of immigration agents and their use of force. Are you comfortable with what you saw happen in Minneapolis?

22:20Margaret Brennan:I mean, are Republicans going to approach this in a partisan way or hold them to account?

22:25Mark Warner:What happened in Minneapolis, nobody in this country should want. We should all strive not to be Minneapolis. We don't want to see local communities not work with federal government.

22:35Margaret Brennan:And we want the leaders of the agencies are the ones you're going to be questioning now.

22:38Mark Warner:Of course. And I want I want to know, hey, what are you doing to work with others within the community? So that way it's not just the ICE going it alone. It shouldn't be that way. And this is what we're seeing. Secretary Noem has been very clear, very clear on trying to build these relationships out. And Tom Holman is delivering on this by going in there. 80 counties are now all of a sudden working with ICE, allowing us in their jails.

22:58Margaret Brennan:That was a choice by the administration to start working with locals.

23:02Mark Warner:That was a change. They've been trying to do this. The problem is, is you've got so many local municipalities that don't want to work together. And when that happens, your city burns. We don't want Los Angeles. We shouldn't want Minneapolis. People can protest. People can be able to say, hey, we won't agree with certain policy, but there needs to be more collaboration at the local, state, and federal level.

23:24Margaret Brennan:Well, we're going to have to take a break here, but I have more questions for you on the other side of it. So if you would stay with us, we'll be right back with more Face the Nation.

23:33Scott Gottlieb:I'm one of those people who will happily eat steak and eggs any time of the day. Breakfast, dinner, it's technically midnight, but I'm still hungry. Doesn't matter. There's just something unbeatable about a good steak hitting a hot pan. That immediate sizzle, the smell filling the kitchen, and then topping it with a fried egg where the yolk is deep yellow and just barely runny. Unreal. Pure protein heaven.

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24:35Tony Gonzales:Ladies and gentlemen, welcome aboard Air France Business Cabin. Here, every detail matters in elevating your journey. From priority access to your arrival to menus created by Michelin Star Chefs, high-speed Wi-Fi powered by Starlink, or a mattress topper designed by a leading luxury hotel. Thoughtful touches, in the air and on the ground, all crafted with your well-being in mind. Air France Business Cabin, the art of travel elevated. Elegance is a journey. Air France. See conditions at airfrance.us. Are you really buying a car online on AutoTrader right now? Really? At a playground?

25:10Margaret Brennan:Yeah, really. Look at these listings from dealers.

25:13Tony Gonzales:Wow, your search can really get that specific. Really? And you just put in your info and boom, car's in your budget.

25:19Mark Warner:Mom needs a second, honey.

25:21Tony Gonzales:You can really have it delivered?

25:23Margaret Brennan:Really. Or I can pick it up at the dealership.

25:25Mark Warner:One sec, sweetie.

25:27Margaret Brennan:Mommy's buying a car.

25:28Mark Warner:Mommy, look. Uh, I think your kid is walking up the slide. Kyle, again? Really?

25:33Margaret Brennan:Auto Trader. Buy your car online. Really? As Americans struggle with the heated debate about immigration enforcement tactics and public safety here at home. Some of the U.S. athletes competing in the Winter Olympics in Milan have acknowledged the complicated feelings they're navigating as they represent their country on the biggest stage in global sports.

25:55Tony Gonzales:It brings up mixed emotions to represent the U.S. right now, I think. It's a little hard. There's obviously a lot going on that I'm not the biggest fan of, and I think a lot of people aren't. Just because I'm wearing the flag doesn't mean I represent everything that's going on in the U.S.? I love the USA, and I think I would never want to represent a different country in the Olympics. With that being said, you know, a lot of times athletes are hesitant to talk about political views and how we feel about things. I feel heartbroken about what's happened in the United States. I think that as a country, we need to focus on respecting everybody's rights and making sure that we're treating our citizens as well as anybody with love and respect.

26:40Tony Gonzales:And I hope that when people look at athletes competing in the Olympics, they realize that that's the America that we're trying to represent.

26:47Margaret Brennan:Those comments have drawn criticism from some congressional Republicans and Trump administration officials. We'll be right back with a lot more Face the Nation. More from Congressman Gonzalez and CBS News election law contributor David Becker and Dr. Scott Gottlieb. Stay with us.

27:10Margaret Brennan:Welcome back to Face the Nation. We return now to our conversation with Republican Congressman Tony Gonzalez of Texas. On the Homeland Security front, we see in our CBS polling that the credibility of the president's deportation policy is in question. You can see it right there. A lot of the American public just doesn't support the methods used for mass deportation, even though they like the idea of mass deportation. In the past, you've you've questioned whether the administration was really focusing on the worst of the worst. You said don't deport Abuelita. Do you think that they are actually hearing the concern that people like you have raised?

27:47Margaret Brennan:And do you think there's any improvement?

27:49Mark Warner:Very early on, I mentioned, hey, if we go down this route as a party, we're not going to be successful. And we're seeing some of that with some of these special elections that are happening. I am encouraged. I've seen the administration highlight more on convicted criminal aliens. I'm seeing Secretary Noem and Tom Homan. In their messaging or in their arrests? In their arrests and in their focus of going into the jails. If you go into a jail and you go cell by cell, that makes a lot more sense to American people than going house by house, going, are you American a citizen or not? And it's safer.

28:17Mark Warner:It's safer for the agents as well. So I think if we go down that route, we will, we as a Republican Party will be successful. The other part of it, too, is to talk about legal immigration. The president has mentioned this many times. Last week, there was 65 ,000 work visas that he signed off on where he goes, you're not invited to this country if you come in illegally. But if you're here legal, we encourage you to come, you know, do it the right way.

28:41Margaret Brennan:Well, I want to talk about that again in a moment. But just to pick up on what you mentioned in your home state, you saw this stunning win by Democrat Taylor Ramet in what had been a reliably red district. and, in fact, one of 26 state House seats that have flipped from Republican to Democrat nationally since President Trump took office. This wasn't a one-off, in other words. And in the Texas press, there's a lot of focus on the Latino voters as having really swung back or swung to the Democratic Party. Why? What's happening?

29:15Mark Warner:People are anxious.

29:16Margaret Brennan:Is it the deportation policy?

29:18Mark Warner:It's some of what's being portrayed. And one of the things I think is very effective for the administration is for them to highlight the people that they're deporting. Put them on the website. Show them and go, these are the folks that we're coming after. I would argue the Hispanic vote is what gave us the Republicans, the House, the Senate, and the White House. And if we want to keep that long term, we do have to make a shift, not necessarily in policy, but in communication. I mentioned this earlier, a communication liaison of someone saying, hey, this is what we're doing, working with others.

29:49Mark Warner:So it's not just a surprise. Prime example, San Antonio. We have a new ICE facility built in San Antonio. A lot of people are anxious. They don't know what's happening. This is$125 million that's coming to the community, have 1 ,200 jobs. And after it gets established, there'll be another$125 million with 325 good paying jobs for our local community.

30:08Margaret Brennan:But respectfully, in the past, you have said this isn't just a PR problem. You actually looked at the numbers and found that it was not the worst of the worst in those detention facilities.

30:18Mark Warner:Right. It's not a PR problem. It has to be.

30:20Margaret Brennan:It is a policy.

30:21Mark Warner:It has to be a policy. And what I am seeing is they are going after the worst of the worst. They're talking about we're going after the worst of the worst. The part I think we can we can improve on is communicating with the local municipalities, those that don't have an idea and be able to go know that you have a seat at the table. We want you to have a seat at the table, even if it's different, even if it's a different conversation or a different ideology. You should have a seat at the table. So that way your citizens know what's happening in your community.

30:48Margaret Brennan:So Trump Trump was not the first president of the United States to detain children.

30:52Mark Warner:Sure.

30:53Margaret Brennan:You have this facility, though, in your district, Dilley, and that is for family detentions. That's where little five year old Liam Ramos from Minnesota was held before a judge. That's the picture of him there. Ordered him released. He was ordered released because his family is a pending asylum claim, a legal process. He had entered with U.S. government permission through a process that the Biden administration had deemed legal. The current administration does not. The CBP won out. Liam's father gave an interview to Telemundo. And you read the transcript. He's talking about this five-year-old.

31:28Margaret Brennan:He's not OK. He's waking up at night crying. He's worried he's going to be taken again. And it's psychological trauma, according to the father. And the administration is still trying to deport him. Do you understand why they are so focused on this five-year-old and his dad if they did come in through the front door with U.S. government permission?

31:49Mark Warner:Well, the front door was via an app that Biden knew exactly what he was doing. And he created this huge mess that now President Trump is there to clean up. But he came in the front door.

31:58Margaret Brennan:He wasn't sticking across the border.

32:00Mark Warner:Through an app that wasn't vetted. And the bottom line is that he's likely they're not going to qualify for asylum. So what do you do with all the people that go through the process and do not qualify for asylum? You deport them. I understand the five year old. And, you know, it breaks my heart. I have a five year old at home. I also think, what about that five year old U.S. citizen? You feel comfortable defending that? I feel comfortable. We have to have a nation of laws. If we don't have a nation of laws.

32:25Margaret Brennan:They were following the law. I don't say this. That's the wrong. It's that a new administration deemed the last administration's regulation not to be legal.

32:33Mark Warner:We can be compassionate and we can also we can also enforce our laws. And I think that's the secret sauce that the administration and Congress must do. Let's enforce our laws, but let's do it in a humane way. The facility in Dilley, I've visited there many times. I've visited dozens of different facilities. It is a nice facility. It's a detention facility for people that are in the country illegally that are about to be deported. But it is a nice facility, nicer than some elementary schools in San Antonio.

33:00Margaret Brennan:Advocates have said otherwise. But quickly, before I let you go, a number of Republican lawmakers have objected to the video that the president and his staff posted to a social media account, the one of President Obama, the former first lady. Do you think he needs to apologize for it?

33:15Mark Warner:There's it's up to the president. There's no room in this country for racism, anti-Semitism, socialism. All the isms need to go.

33:22Margaret Brennan:But what I think it was that at the end.

33:24Mark Warner:I mean, I think it was very upsetting to a lot of people. What the part of the, no one's talking about that video, is about election integrity. And so the bulk of it was on election integrity, which is a very important topic. What I suspect is going to happen is the White House is going to, in the coming days, issue a memo on their policy for this upcoming election. And I suspect Director of National Intelligence is going to be at the center part of building that out and making sure our midterm elections are safe and secure.

33:53Margaret Brennan:And I know the president claimed the video was credible, also claimed he had watched it, but then not seen that part of it with the racist. It was at the very end.

34:00Mark Warner:It was at the very end for one second. It was really weird.

34:02Margaret Brennan:The president of the United States and his staff, wouldn't you expect that they actually look at what they do before they do it?

34:09Mark Warner:The president of the United States should not be worrying about all the people that are upset with him. If he's doing that, he's not keeping our country safe. I did appreciate them taking it down. I did appreciate him saying, hey, look, you know, that shouldn't have been on there.

34:20Margaret Brennan:Should the staffer who allegedly did it be fired? Should there be consequences for something like that?

34:24Mark Warner:Do you think that video is actually credible? The president can make that decision. We just had Hakeem Jeffries get up there and say the F word to the president. I mean, the direction our politics is going is not the right way. We need to pull it back and we need to go, wait a second here. How do we make sure we're safe? How do we make sure our economy is thriving? How do we make sure Americans are better off today than they were yesterday?

34:45Margaret Brennan:All right, Congressman Gonzalez, thank you for your time. And we'll have David Becker ahead. We'll talk about that video in a moment.

35:20Scott Gottlieb:Rules and restrictions may apply.

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35:54Margaret Brennan:We're joined now by David Becker. He is the executive director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research and a CBS News election law contributor. Always good to have you here, David.

36:04Tony Gonzales:Great to be back with you, Margaret.

36:06Margaret Brennan:I want to pick up on a few things that have come up in the program. Senator Warner voiced what some Democrats are concerned about, arguing that President Trump is laying the groundwork to undermine the upcoming election or interfere in it in some way. And in fact, during the program, the president is tweeting about American elections being rigged, stolen and a laughingstock all around the world. what do you think of these statements here are both parties undermining confidence in our election um what do election officials that you speak to feel and think right now yeah um it's very hard

36:46Tony Gonzales:to predict where this is going but we can look at what's happened already the president has signed an unprecedented executive order regarding elections trying to dictate policy to the states That's now been enjoined, blocked by three different federal courts. His Department of Justice is seeking highly sensitive data on hundreds of millions of American voters, is suing 24 states and D.C. Two federal courts just in the past few weeks have blocked that. The remainder are still to be heard. The cybersecurity apparatus that Senator Warner talked about that had been built up under the first Trump administration to assist election officials has been dismantled.

37:22Tony Gonzales:So when I talk to election officials, they're very concerned about this. I think it's safe to say this is unprecedented. We have never seen a president try to exert executive authority over elections in the states like we have. And of course, this is contrary to the Constitution, which specifically grants states the authority to run elections under Article 1, Section 4, the Elections Clause. Congress can also act. And if Congress does, of course, those laws will be followed. But both parties have tried to pass sweeping bills in the last five or six years and have failed.

37:52Margaret Brennan:So the Constitution, as you just point out, states, it is the states who are going to run these elections. But the president, I want to play what he said so the public hears it. He has at least three times in the past week said he wants the Republican Party to nationalize voting and take over voting procedures in 15 states. Take a listen.

38:13Scott Gottlieb:Take a look at Detroit. Take a look at Pennsylvania. Take a look at Philadelphia. You go take a look at Atlanta. Look at some of the places that horrible corruption on elections and the federal government should not allow that. The federal government should get involved. These are agents of the federal government to count the votes. If they can't count the votes legally and honestly, then somebody else should take over.

38:40Margaret Brennan:So what would prevent the president from doing something you just told us is unconstitutional?

38:45Tony Gonzales:Well, the president might try to act, and that's why it's so hard to predict exactly what's going to happen. But the courts have been very firm on holding the limits of executive power under the Constitution. There was just a court decision a couple of days ago from the state of Oregon, a district court there, that denied DOJ access to this highly sensitive voter data that they were seeking from Oregon. And specifically said, again, that the Constitution is clear. The founders carved out elections specially to say the federal government can only act of Congress acts. The states have the authority.

39:18Tony Gonzales:And they expressly excluded the executive from that at all. They were very concerned about the excesses of an executive, a president who would seek to consolidate more power than the Constitution granted by seizing the mechanisms of elections.

39:32Margaret Brennan:So two other things I want to run through with you. The White House took down that video that we were just discussing with Congressman Gonzalez. The focus has been on the racist portion of it, which was widely condemned. The video leading up to it that Congressman Gonzalez defended was about election software and security. in that when you listen to it, you hear descriptions of problems with technology and things that the speaker says were anomalies, like in 2025, key states stopped counting at a certain time. Can you fact check some of this for us?

40:10Tony Gonzales:Yeah, this is a very common methodology for those that are spreading lies about the elections to find, just throw everything against the wall and see what sticks. And the rest of that video, in addition to the ending, was also troubling because it was a lot of disinformation just blatantly false. We have paper ballots in the United States. 98 % of all Americans vote on paper ballots. The only exclusion is the state of Louisiana, which is moving to paper ballots. That means those paper ballots can be checked against whatever the machines tally, and they are checked. Famously in Georgia, those paper ballots in 2020 were counted three times, three different ways, once entirely by hand, over 5 million ballots counted by hand in five days with observation from both campaigns and observers.

40:55Tony Gonzales:There's no way to get around the fact that this is the 2020 was the most scrutinized election in American history. And every time when courts reviewed it, when people who lied about the election were taken to court, the work of election officials withstood that scrutiny. It's really remarkable. We're not only are our elections not rigged. They're as transparent and verifiable and as secure as they've ever been, no matter whether you like the outcome or not. And we're seeing disinformation being spread, in this case by the president of the United States, targeted at his own supporters, at others who might not like the outcome of elections.

41:27Tony Gonzales:And unfortunately, some are believing it.

41:28Margaret Brennan:Well, it's unusual because the president won the election and Republicans won the last election. So when he is saying now that suddenly the system is broken. It seemed to work when it elected him, but it didn't work when he lost in 2020. That is what is contradictory in sort of just the common sense version. That's exactly right. But on the facts of it, you're saying this has actually been verified time and time again. But those ballots you just talked about from Fulton County, we have body camera footage of these FBI agents going and taking the ballots. Why would the FBI now be taking the ballots?

42:08Margaret Brennan:Why was the director of national intelligence there? And what would they do with these ballots?

42:11Tony Gonzales:This is a great question, and it still has not been answered. First of all, there was no crime committed in 2020. Those ballots have been counted and reviewed so many times. We know exactly what happened in Georgia in 2020. Joe Biden won that state by a relatively narrow margin of 11 ,779 votes. In 2024, Donald Trump won that state. Democrats didn't somehow have the magical ability while out of the White House to steal an election in 2020 and then forget to use that power in 2024 when they had the White House. So we know exactly what happened. If there was a true, honest review of those ballots, it'll confirm exactly what the result was, just as when the cyber ninjas reviewed the Maricopa County ballots in Arizona, they found the same exact outcome.

42:53Tony Gonzales:As for the director of national intelligence being in Fulton County, there is no viable reason to have a high level political appointee during the execution of a search warrant. That search warrant is as many defects as the body cam footage showed. There was a defect in the address when they first showed up. They had to go back and get a corrected search warrant. And there's also this this issue of the statute of statute of limitations. There's a five-year statute of limitations under federal law for any of the crimes that they mentioned in the warrant. There were two specific statutes. That five-year statute has expired by any measure.

43:29Tony Gonzales:And so I'm not sure why a magistrate signed off on it. We're not sure why the DNI was in Fulton County inside a local election warehouse. We've heard shifting explanations first. The deputy attorney general said she happened to be in Atlanta. I don't know that that's particularly credible. And then we heard the president directed her, and then Attorney General Bondi directed her. We have no idea what actually happened.

43:49Margaret Brennan:Well, we checked and at least nine top Trump administration officials by CBS criteria raised out about the validity or integrity of the 2020 election. That count does not include the president of the United States himself. David Becker. Thank you. We'll be back in a moment. We turn now to former FDA commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb. He is also on the board of Pfizer and UnitedHealthcare. Dr. Gottlieb, welcome back.

44:12Tony Gonzales:Thank you.

44:13Margaret Brennan:You have a history of making accurate predictions that are also terrifying on this program. And it was around this time last year that you said you were very concerned about the measles outbreak and that it would spread. You're right. In South Carolina, about 900 reported cases. Largest outbreak since measles was declared eliminated. You got out in Disneyland in California, two cases here in D.C., cases detected. Should we avoid mass gatherings? How concerned should we be?

44:45Tony Gonzales:Look, I don't think we should be worried about mass gatherings at this point. I think that this is going to get worse, unfortunately, before it resolves. Last year, we had 2 ,000 cases this year. So far, we have 750 cases reported. It's going to be a lot higher by the end of the year. I think this is going to be a long cycle. Right now, if you look at the people who are getting infected with measles, the majority of people are between the ages of 5 and 17. They're not toddlers. And we're seeing vaccination rates decline among toddlers, really as part of a broader movement away from pediatric vaccines in this country.

45:15Tony Gonzales:As those toddlers age into school age settings, the scope of the measles outbreaks are going to continue to escalate in this country. If you think back to the early 1990s, 1991, there were about 25 ,000 cases of measles. 1992, we had about 10 ,000. Vaccination rates had declined in the 1990s. Only about 88 % of Americans' children were vaccinated for measles, mumps, and rubella. Right now, it's about 90 percent. But in some of the states where you're seeing these outbreaks, the rate is as low as 81 percent in Alaska, 88 percent in a number of states that are having outbreaks right now. So we're starting to get down to lower levels.

45:47Tony Gonzales:And I think that's going to continue to decline. And again, as these children who aren't getting vaccinated age into school age settings, they're going to start spreading broader and larger outbreaks. So I think this is a long cycle, especially now that this has gotten embedded in political psyche in this country. I think this is a generational change.

46:05Margaret Brennan:Yeah. Yeah. Well, and those those percentages you point out are important because we're below herd immunity. And as I understand it, it's not just the United States. Britain, Canada, Spain, a number of European and Central Asian countries lost their measles elimination status. This is a global anti-vaccine movement, it would seem.

46:25Tony Gonzales:Yeah, look, I think that that's right. And I think a lot of this comes out of the covid pandemic where people felt compelled to take vaccines that they had hesitations around through state action. I thought that was a mistake at the time. I still think it was a mistake. We talked about in this show that would breed an anti-vaccine backlash, and I think that's what we're seeing. And it's given voice to a lot of people who are anti-vax from the outset who are now gaining political resonance and starting to drive a lot of the policy agenda, including at the Department of Health and Human Services.

46:52Tony Gonzales:So the scope of these is going to continue to grow. It's not just MMR. It's diphtheria, tetanus, and pertussis as well. We're seeing pertussis outbreaks in this country. Those are going to continue to grow. So we're in a long cycle right now. And I think it's important that we continue to educate people about the importance of these vaccines, especially the MMR vaccines. Measles is very contagious. And as you said, the herd immunity rate is about 95 percent vaccination in a community. In certain pockets of this country, we're well below that. You look at some states, there's pockets, there's communities where their vaccination rate is about 70 percent.

47:24Tony Gonzales:And so that's where you're seeing the outbreaks, particularly in South Carolina, Texas. Florida has an outbreak right now. There's been big outbreaks in Utah and Arizona as well. Arizona had 250 cases. Utah, about the same.

47:36Margaret Brennan:There was a hearing this week with Dr. Jay Bhattacharya. He's the NIH director. He did say people should get their measles shot, but he was pressed about vaccines and he was testifying under oath. And here is what he said.

47:51Mark Warner:Do vaccines cause autism? Tell that to the American people. Yes? No. I do not believe that the measles vaccine causes autism. No, I didn't ask measles.

48:02Tony Gonzales:Do vaccines cause autism? I have not seen a study that suggests any single vaccine causes autism.

48:11Margaret Brennan:I played those remarks because I think it's important to hear them directly. The director claimed the next day in a social media post that he was mischaracterized and that he's fully aligned with Secretary Kennedy on finding the root cause of autism. Why is the messaging so muddled here? Is it that political embeddedness you talked about?

48:35Tony Gonzales:Look, I think a lot of the appointed officials in the administration who work for Secretary Kennedy are reluctant to buck the secretary in this. And the secretary has been a longstanding anti-vaccine advocate. He really led the charge throughout the last two decades for the anti-vaccine movement. And now that he's in that position, he's able to give much more voice to it and embed it in official policy. You know, Jay's comments there were very carefully worded. He said no single vaccine causes autism. The only vaccine that's been studied, as he pointed out in his Twitter post extensively, is the MMR vaccine.

49:08Tony Gonzales:So he backed away from those comments the next day, I think because he and a lot of other officials are reluctant to buck the secretary on this. Mehmet Oz this morning was speaking to this issue, and he was very clear. And that's what I would expect of him. He's a good physician. He was very clear on the importance of getting the MMR vaccine. I think it's important that more officials step forward with those very clear messages.

49:28Margaret Brennan:You have an op-ed talking about your personal experience with cancer, and you link it to past infection with a virus. Can you explain that?

49:37Tony Gonzales:Yeah, look, I think a large part of the anti-vaccine dogma, if you will, is that these infections aren't that serious to begin with, and therefore any risk, theoretical or actual, from the vaccines themselves isn't worth it. It's not worth taking the vaccine to mitigate a virus that in and of itself is incidental. That's not true. I had Epstein-Barr virus. It led to the development of a B-cell lymphoma. We know that HSV-1 is associated with Alzheimer's disease. Enterovirus is associated with type 1 diabetes. We now believe EBV virus is associated with multiple sclerosis and maybe a causative factor in lupus as well.

50:11Tony Gonzales:So viruses do have long-term sequelae.

50:14Margaret Brennan:Well, Dr. Gottlieb, it's an important read and another good point. Thank you for your time today. That's it for us today. Thank you all for watching. Until next week. For Face the Nation, I'm Margaret Brennan. Today's guests were Virginia Democratic Senator Mark Warner, Texas Republican Congressman Tony Gonzalez, former FDA Commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb, and David Becker, the Executive Director of the Center for Election Innovation and Research and CBS News election law contributor. The senior executive producer of Face the Nation is Mary Hager, and the executive producer is Anne Hsu. This broadcast was directed by Shelley Schwartz.

50:51Margaret Brennan:Face the Nation originates from CBS News in Washington. For more, we're online at facethenation.com and on YouTube. We're also rebroadcast on our CBS News 24-7 streaming network at 12.30 on Sundays, and we're available through our apps, CBS News and Paramount+.

51:09Tony Gonzales:CBS Sundays. It's three incredible heroes on one unmissable night.

51:13Mark Warner:The night starts with a new era of Yellowstone in the CBS original, Marshalls. Casey Dutton is back and bringing range justice to Montana. Then, Justin Hartley stars in TV's number one show, Tracker. When your loved one goes missing, he's the man for the job.

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