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CEO of Electric Reliability Council of Texas Bill Magness Interviewed on Power Failures in Texas During Severe Winter Weather; President Biden to Make Remarks on His Administration's Approaches to U.S. Foreign Policy; Interview with U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. Aired 8-8:30a ET

Aired February 19, 2021 - 08:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[08:00:00]

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: The water crisis is also putting a major strain on hospitals. Some hospitals having to move critically ill patients to other facilities. Other hospitals hauling in water just to flush the toilets.

So last night President Biden spoke with the Texas governor, and he is sending FEMA with federal supplies and resources to the state.

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: Ted Cruz is having a tough time explaining why he hopped a flight to Cancun this week while Texans were freezing in the dark. The senator is back now in Texas, attempting to quiet the uproar. He initially lied about the trip. He lied, claiming he was just dropping off his daughters before returning the next day. But overnight, "The New York Times" published text messages from Cruz's wife proving the trip was intended to last through the weekend. Last night some of Cruz's constituents, a handful, protested outside his home, calling for him to resign.

We begin, though, with the crisis on the ground in Texas. Yesterday the CEO of ERCOT, this is the operator of the state's power grid, independent from the rest of the country's, admitted they were just moments away from a catastrophe that would have plunged Texas into a total blackout which, he says, could have lasted months.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL MAGNESS, PRESIDENT AND CEO OF ERCOT: And it was seconds and minutes, given the amount of generation that was coming off the system at the same time that the demand was still going up significantly.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: And joining us now is Bill Magness. He's the president and CEO of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas known as ERCOT. Mr. Magness, thank you very much for being with us. I know you have had a very, very busy and intense week. How did this happen? How did a catastrophe of this level happen?

BILL MAGNESS, PRESIDENT AND CEO, ERCOT: What we saw with the storm that came into Texas, which, as you've been reporting, is unprecedented and causing tragic outcomes all over the state, was a terrible event for the grid, for the electric grid. The reason is, on the electric grid at every moment of the day, we have to keep power in balance. Demand and supply have to be very closely in balance. If they get too far out of balance, the system can get very unstable. If we let it get far enough out of balance for long enough it causes a catastrophic blackout where it can take an indeterminate amount of time to fix it.

So those are the worst outcomes that grid operators like ERCOT try to prevent. What we saw when the storm came in was the demand on the system spiking to levels we've never seen in winter season in Texas, and the supply, also because of the storm, having a lot of the generation plants knocked out as the storm blew through the state.

So we had the worst kind of combination we could see, and we got to a point where we weren't going to be able to serve the demand, and we had to ask for outages that, unfortunately, had to stay in place for days until we could stabilize the system.

CAMEROTA: The governor of Texas, Governor Abbott, says that just days before you assured him the grid was ready, that you assured him that the ERCOT could handle this coming storm. Here's what he said yesterday.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. GREG ABBOTT (R-TX): They said five days before the winter storm hit, the ERCOT CEO assured ERCOT, and I quote, we're ready for the cold temperatures coming our way.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CAMEROTA: Why did you say you were ready?

MAGNESS Well, when ERCOT says it's ready, what ERCOT needs to do is warn generators, warn transmission owners that we see a big event happening. And we did that in the week before the storm. We don't own the power generation or the transmission lines. We're more the traffic cop or the air traffic control on the system. So we were warning that we were seeing these conditions coming, and we knew that we may have to implement the rotating outages that ended up coming. And as we saw the supply get lower and the demand get higher on Sunday night, those rotating outages were what we implemented. That's what we drill on and that's what we prepare for. Unfortunately, those have terrible outcomes for people when they have to last a long time. That's the preparation we did to take that action effectively before we saw much, much worse outcome.

CAMEROTA: I just don't think that a warning is the same as readiness, and that Texans consider being in the dark and without heat for days as being ready. That just doesn't sound like you were ready. And in terms of being unprecedented, I hear you. It was a horrible storm. But in 2011, you also had a horrible winter storm. And back then, there was a lot of talk about having to winterize the system. And it doesn't seem as though it was done. MAGNESS: Well, the challenge that the system had Sunday night, as we

went into these outages was, as we saw the spike in demand, the supply on the system did see a lot of losses.

[08:05:01]

Generators, because of reasons that had to do primarily with the storm coming in, were not able to provide power to the grid. So certainly, that had to do with why we had to end up calling these outages in such a large magnitude.

CAMEROTA: Right, but how is that readiness, I guess is my question. How is that being ready?

MAGNESS: I think that's something that everyone in the utility industry is going to have to look at and determine how we manage systems that are this intense in the winter season. Certainly, there's going to be tremendous amount of assessment and review of what we can do to make this never happen again. But I think our role and what we feel like we took care of, although there was a lot of trouble for everyone in the state in this, was to be sitting here today saying that most Texans are being able to be restored, power is going to be back on as normal, and we're not talking to you about a much longer, much more devastating blackout.

CAMEROTA: But are you saying that this was a success story on some level?

MAGNESS: No, this is not a success story. I think we understand we're in the electric business. We know that electricity is essential to civilization. And it's awful for us in the business to see systems that can't make electricity available to everyone. So, no, I think we're going to have to look at this very carefully and understand how we can manage the events better as an entire industry. So not a success, but there were worse outcomes, as bad as these were, that we needed to step in and prevent.

CAMEROTA: On Tuesday, Governor Abbott said that he thought that the top executives at ERCOT, obviously, including you, should resign. Will you resign?

MAGNESS: Well, right now we're focused on getting the rest of Texas power back. That's the absolute focus. Next week, we're going to be having legislative hearings to review the entire event. And I think at that time, we can assess what next steps should be. Right now, we want to keep ourselves focused on getting out of the problem and getting Texans all their power back.

CAMEROTA: I understand. But when the smoke clears, at least 15 people have died this week in Texas, maybe up to 23 people. There have been devastating results to people's homes. There have been fires. How can you keep your job after a week like this?

MAGNESS: We need to -- we're accountable to the people and the leadership of Texas. We're going to go and explain the steps we took and how that played into the entire situation on the electric grid. If that's the outcome, that's the outcome. That's where we're accountable, and we want to be accountable and explain what we did. And then we'll see what happens.

CAMEROTA: If the whole state's electrical grid can go down in a winter storm, is it time to join the rest of the country's electrical grids and not be just Texas independent if this is going to keep happening?

MAGNESS: Well, that really wouldn't have helped us in this storm. Our neighbors, who power could have come in from, were having similar problems to us. The power grids on the east and to the west and that are in Texas were having similar issues. So I don't --

CAMEROTA: But nowhere was as bad as Texas, Mr. Magness. Nowhere was as bad as Texas. You could have borrowed, you could move electricity around. That's how it is set up. Oklahoma, which was also hit with this same storm, did not have the same problems. This was a Texas specific problem.

MAGNESS: Well, and I think what was Texas specific was not something that necessarily could have been managed by not having Texas electric grid. In fact, the biggest problem has to do with what I was describing before, that we saw the supply not able to keep up. And once the supply couldn't keep up, we had to take actions to restore stability to the system. And those actions are obviously going to be reviewed and examined very closely by us, by everyone else. And all those questions that are arising about what comes next, those are decisions for policymakers to make. We defer to them on all of those. And we'll see what policymakers want to do to prepare us to never see this kind of event again.

CAMEROTA: But last, do you think the people of Texas should have confidence in your management today?

MAGNESS: The people of Texas can have confidence in the grid operators who made the very difficult decisions they had to make Sunday night when we saw the system getting unstable. Those decisions prevented much, much worse blackouts that we would still be suffering from on a much more extreme way today. So whether people have confidence in me or not, the grid operators who have to make those tough decisions in real time as critical conditions are right in front of them, they should have the confidence in those folks because they made some good decisions.

CAMEROTA: Bill Magness, we appreciate you coming on NEW DAY and trying to explain this to all of our viewers. Obviously, we'll be watching with what needs to change in Texas going forward.

[08:10:08]

MAGNESS: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Thank you.

SCIUTTO: CNN has learned this morning that President Joe Biden will declare America is back in big foreign policy speeches this morning, big changes from Trump, as he hopes to reset America's standing on the world stage. Joining us now is CNN chief White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins live in Washington. And Kaitlan, there will be some major departures here from Trump, for instance, the possibility of restarting the Iran nuclear deal, but on China, for instance, stay the course. So what will be different? What won't?

KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Even just his approach is going to be so much different. Based on what we've been told by White House officials, we should expect as President Biden is making these two different speeches this morning, but he is going to be really talking about this return to the foreign policy stage, even though he's doing it virtually this morning, we should note. But the way he's going to be framing it is just the strength of American allies, European allies, and the United States. And often those were the ones that were derided by former President Trump as tougher to deal with than United States adversaries at times.

And so President Biden is going to be taking this approach, saying that when the United States and our European allies are united, it can present a stronger front against Russia against China, and these threats. And of course, Iran is going to be one that they are dealing with next. We've already seen developments with that with White House officials. So I think that's what you're going to hear from President Biden, and really a tonal shift from Former President Trump.

And one more thing we should note is that he is going to be announcing a pledge from the United States for $4 billion to COVAX, and that's that effort to get coronavirus vaccines to poorer countries. It's something that the Trump administration opted out of doing because, of course, Former President Trump did not like the WHO. So you are going to see a difference even there in how the United States will be playing a role in that effort to get vaccines to less well off countries.

SCIUTTO: Trump just didn't seem to understand that you can't fight a pandemic without a global effort. The thing doesn't obey borders. OK, you're traveling with the president on Air Force One today to Michigan. What's he going there for?

COLLINS: This is a trip he was supposed to make yesterday but got delayed because of the winter storm in Washington. Now we're going to Kalamazoo, Michigan. It is going to be to a Pfizer manufacturing plant. Of course, this comes as the Biden administration has really tried to pressure these companies to accelerate their production so more people can get vaccinated, especially as you're seeing these variants comes out. And my colleague Kevin Liptak and I have some reporting coming up shortly from now talking about how the Biden administration has really struggled with this effort to not set firm deadlines of when everyone is going to have this vaccine actually get vaccinated, not just have them available. Because I think that they've been so cautious of how the Trump administration often would put these deadlines out there, they would blow past us, and you would not see that accomplishment of what they promised it was going to look like.

So Biden and his team have been much more hesitant to put a marker out there. And the times that they have, like when Dr. Anthony Fauci said recently that by April it would be open season, everyone could get a vaccine by then, he then had to shift that deadline because of when the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is expected to be available and how much of it. So that will come today as he is going, and he is going to make remarks later on this afternoon.

SCIUTTO: We'll be watching for them. Kaitlan Collins, thanks very much.

A big part of the Texas story is a massive, massive infrastructure failure there on its electric power grid. Coming up, I'm going to speak to Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg about why it is a priority to restore infrastructure for the Biden administration. That's coming up. You see him right there.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:17:27]

SCIUTTO: After a big stimulus plan, the Biden administration plans to pursue a big infrastructure plan. Boy, has the crisis in Texas shown us the importance of infrastructure.

Joining me now to discuss this and other issues, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.

Mayor Pete, rechristened Secretary Pete, thanks for joining us this morning.

PETE BUTTIGIEG, TRANSPORTATION SECRETARY: Good morning. Thanks for having me on.

SCIUTTO: So, you look at Texas here. Here's the biggest energy- producing state in the country that could not provide energy to millions of people.

And we -- I know you've seen them. We've been playing stories all week. People couldn't keep their children warm. They now can't get clean water to their children.

What does this crisis tell us about the broader state of American infrastructure?

BUTTIGIEG: Well, this forces the question: are we going to do what it takes to remain the greatest country in the world or not? And our infrastructure reflects an example of how Americans have been expected to settle for less.

We're seeing it with the condition of our roads and bridges. The availability of travel options on trains. And right now, in the worst possible way, Texans are seeing it when it comes to our energy infrastructure.

Infrastructure doesn't always sound sexy. It doesn't always sizzle when we're talking about it on the news. We've got to get the big thing right. And it's one of the reasons that I'm so proud to be part of the Biden/Harris administration where there's a real focus on making sure that Americans have the best infrastructure in the world.

SCIUTTO: OK. So, this big infrastructure package coming, there are reports that the price tag could be as high or at least the hoped for price tag as high as $3 trillion. Is that accurate?

BUTTIGIEG: Well, first of all, we've got to get this rescue plan through before we can move on to that conversation about what we hope to do about infrastructure. Let's remember just how much Americans are hurting now, including when it comes to the areas that my department is responsible for.

There are transit agencies that may not make it into the summer if we are not delivering the kind of aid that's in the American rescue package. And so, the White House, the administration are very focused on passing this rescue bill that's going to get shots into arms, that's going to get checks out to families and get us through this moment.

But I do hope that we will think big when we come to part two of that one-two punch. Right now rescue and then a vision for recovery. Dealing with some of the bigger issues that allowed America to be this vulnerable in the first place.

SCIUTTO: So, President Biden hoped to get Republican votes for the stimulus plan.

[08:20:00]

Doesn't look like it now, although they may come around in the end. For infrastructure, are you willing to pursue that via the reconciliation process as well, which would not require Republican votes?

BUTTIGIEG: Well, I think we should earn to seek as many votes as possible across the aisle, definitely on this rescue plan. Look, something like eight out of 10 Americans think we ought to do something like this. Now, whether that becomes 8 out of 10 members of Congress and the Senate, we'll have to see. But there's clear bipartisan support among the American people, among American elected officials, at least if you talk to mayors, and hopefully that will be reflected on the Hill. I feel the same --

(CROSSTALK)

SCIUTTO: But you know -- you know the political incentives are nasty here, though. And we've seen some of these on a stimulus bill. Yes, large portions of the population support that but, you know, Republicans, many calculate, helping a Democratic administration is only going to hurt me or I'm going to get primaried.

And I just wonder if you see that changing on something like infrastructure, because infrastructure is that sort of white whale everybody has been talking about for a thousand years.

BUTTIGIEG: Yeah.

SCIUTTO: You know, we can all agree on infrastructure and here we are. No one has gotten anywhere.

BUTTIGIEG: That's right, and the question is, you know, how far do we want to let America fall behind before we finally do something? I will say, I was very encouraged during my own confirmation process in the Senate, with a lot of senators who I would disagree with on a lot of different issues but coming together and supporting this vision for doing big things.

I'm not saying it's going to be easy. There's a reason it hasn't happened yet. But I think we've come to a moment where it's very clear, in some cases, crushingly and bluntly made clear by things like what Texans are suffering through this week that America cannot wait any longer, that we can't afford not to act.

SCIUTTO: You know, you see it. People tend to think infrastructure, roads and bridges. That's a big part of it. They forget the power grid. We got a reminder of how important, how kind of vulnerable that can be.

But the other thing is, you know, I'm thinking in this age of remote schooling, digital divide. When I see pictures of kids sitting outside of Wendy's, right, to get the Wi-Fi because they don't have reliable access at home is that going to be a central part of what you propose?

BUTTIGIEG: You know, you can't talk about infrastructure without talking about digital infrastructure. Now some of those go beyond what my department, the Department of Transportation, works on, but this is where different agencies need to work together. I mean, if we're digging up an area to put in a road, let's make sure while we're at it that we're laying down some fiber optic cable.

There's tons of opportunity in the 2020s to address that digital divide.

SCIUTTO: OK. Let's talk about an immediate challenge right now and that is getting vaccines out in the wake of these continuing storms, actually continuing storms here. I've heard different assessments as to how long the delay will be. Some say as long as a week. I spoke to the head of Houston hospitals -- Texas hospitals early this morning and said, hey, we're already back up and running.

How long is the delay? How quickly can we turn this around?

BUTTIGIEG: So, we think we can move relatively quickly and definitely have a lot of good people working in overdrive, even over and beyond what they have been to address this issue. Whether it's the cold storage issues or supply chain issues. What I can tell you is there's a laser focus in this administration on getting relief to Americans, on getting shots into arms.

SCIUTTO: OK. I want to ask you -- listen, I don't want to beat up Ted Cruz anymore. He's taking a lot of heat already. But he did something that you and others, doctors as well, have been saying we shouldn't be doing. And that is traveling willy-nilly, right?

You know, even if we want a vacation, because travel is a risk in the midst of a pandemic. Tell me your reaction to that and what you say to Americans who might be considering similar trips?

BUTTIGIEG: Well, I guess what I'd say to Americans is that this is a good time to check the CDC website and look at the guidelines, including the requirements for international travel for a test before you come back to the U.S. and a quarantine once you arrive on American soil.

But to Senator Cruz specifically, all I have to say is the same thing I said to every Texas elected official I've been able to speak with in the last 24 hours, which is that the department and the administration are here to help the people of Texas.

SCIUTTO: Final question just on stimulus in terms of timing, because the time is running out. I know there's a schedule to get it through Congress and Senate. Looks like it gets there before these enhanced unemployment benefits run out.

But can you make a commitment now that the administration will get the stimulus through before those benefits end?

BUTTIGIEG: Well, that's why it's so urgent for Congress to act and the administration is working on, obviously, again in overdrive on a daily basis. But this is coming before Congress and we need Congress to come through.

SCIUTTO: All right. We'll be watching. Secretary Buttigieg, Secretary Pete, I should say, thanks for joining us.

BUTTIGIEG: Good to be with you. Thanks.

SCIUTTO: More than half of America is experiencing disruptions as we were just saying with vaccinations because of the back-to-back winter storms. Up next, we're going to speak with Kentucky's governor, a state critical to getting vaccines distributed around the country.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:28:46]

CAMEROTA: Tens of thousands of people in Kentucky remain in the dark this morning after being hit by three winter storms in just the past week. And it is not over yet. More freezing weather is on the way we're told.

And the CDC warns that these storms could cause widespread delays with the vaccine shipments out of the UPS facility in Louisville there.

So, joining us now is the Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear.

Governor, thank you very much for taking the time this morning.

So, do you have a status report on how the vaccine shipments are doing in Kentucky?

GOV. ANDY BESHEAR (D-KY): Well, we believe that we're going to see more and more progress as we move forward. UPS' Worldport runs one of the largest airlines in the world out of Louisville. And they have a heated runway. They are working day and night to make sure that we can move these vaccines.

A lot of the issue is getting them from the manufacturer, not necessarily further out but we've been in touch with UPS and I know they're working as hard as they can. And we expect that everything will be back online fully shortly.

The good thing, at least in Kentucky, is that we have built out an infrastructure where we can vaccinate about 300,000 people per week and we only get about 100,000 doses. So we can catch up this very next week and that's what we're going to do.

CAMEROTA: But before -- before I get to it in terms of the supply of it, are you saying that?

[08:30:00]