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CNN Live At Daybreak

How is Bush Administration Handling Public Concerns?

Aired October 30, 2001 - 07:53   ET

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

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: How is the Bush administration handling public concerns? For that, we turn to the president's director of Homeland Security, Tom Ridge, who joins us from the White House. Welcome -- thank you very much for joining us this morning.

TOM RIDGE, HOMELAND SECURITY DIRECTOR: Good morning, Paula.

ZAHN: Good morning. So what is the point of this latest warning? What do you expect the impact of it to be?

RIDGE: Well, we all know that our environment changed dramatically on September 11, and I agree with my good friend, Senator McCain. There is great concern about the fear of the unknown, and I also agree with him that it would be helpful if we had more specific information that we could channel down to law enforcement around the country.

Unfortunately, at this time, associated with this warning, we don't have that. But I also think when you do have, from credible sources, a strong suggestion that this is a week that we may see additional terrorist activity in this country that we need to heighten the awareness. We need to inform, as the attorney general did yesterday, 18,000 law enforcement agencies. We need to talk to our energy companies. We need to just ramp up our ability to be alert, ramp up our security and deal with what may occur.

We had the alert almost a month ago. We'll never know whether or not that thwarted any terrorist attempts, but again, we are dealing with an unknown. We are dealing without a lot of specific information, but we also know, since September 11, the environment is different, and America has to continue to be on guard while the government, as well as the private sector, continues to work every day to better protect America against attack and be in a better position to respond to it if it occurs.

ZAHN: So, Governor, I want to go back to something you just said. You said, we may never know whether that last warning thwarted a terrorist attack. And yet, FBI Director Mueller has said he believes it is possible that the last warning did just that. Can you clarify that for us this morning?

RIDGE: Well, again, I think that we basically said the same thing. Director Mueller and I agree that -- and the attorney general and all of us believe that when we get this kind of information, not just from our own intelligence sources, but again, since September 11, there is unprecedented collaboration around the world to help identify these terrorists and anticipate terrorist attacks. And again, we're going up on alert based on information that we have. You'll never know. I mean, you'll just never know, and I think there's a good possibility that you have prevented or thwarted an attack.

It's just like we may never know how well a job the CIA and the FBI and the Department of Justice have done in years preceding September 11 in foiling an attack before it occurs. I mean, one of the things that you don't ever do is compromise your methods and your means and your sources. That's just -- would reduce substantially our ability to thwart terrorism.

ZAHN: You talk about ramping up the efforts of some 18,000 law enforcement agencies. What is it that you expect the American public to do with this information?

RIDGE: Well, I'd like the American public -- I know the president wants them to go to work, take the kids to school. If you've got a soccer match tonight, go to the soccer match. He's going to the third game of the World Series in New York.

But again, it's just a matter of America being very cognizant of the fact that our environment changed on September 11, and understanding that when we get this kind of information, even though it lacks specificity, when you've got literally hundreds of thousands of Americans involved in security at private energy plants, at public plants, at shopping malls, the neighborhood policeman on the beat, we just want them to be aware of suspicious activity and, you know, if a tip may lead to an arrest that may thwart a terrorist attempt. Just heighten the alert. America is on guard, and we've got to stay on guard for the foreseeable future.

ZAHN: And I know you are fully aware of how your job is being scrutinized right now...

RIDGE: I sure am.

ZAHN: ... with everybody having a little piece of advice for you. I wanted to play a small part of an interview Representative Jane Harman did, where she talked about how if you're going to be effective, you have to be granted some more powers. Let's listen at what she had to say.

Come on, Jane. Well, Jane is not there. But essentially, what she had to say was that she feels that the president has got to give you basically almost the power of a vice president -- I'm paraphrasing this -- if you're to be effective. What power don't you have right now that would make you more effective?

RIDGE: Well, I think -- and the congresswoman and I have had a couple of really good conversations, and frankly, she wants to vest me with budget authority and statutory authority. And I suggested to her that I've got all of the authority I need. I've got the resources of the federal government. There is unprecedented collaboration, justice, the FBI, CIA, Health and Human Services, transportation, the Federal Emergency Management Agency. I certainly recommend to her and have mentioned to her, and other members on the Hill, that down the road as we develop this long-term national strategy, I may actually go up to our friends in both chambers and say, I think you need to realign some of these agencies.

Remember, the president has said -- has commissioned me to create a national strategy. That's not a federal strategy, that's federal, state and local. And that's not just a public strategy, that's public and private. So we've got a lot of work to do. I appreciate her input, and I suspect she and I will be working together on some aspects of this national strategy in the months ahead.

ZAHN: Governor, I'm told I've just been given about 40 seconds left.

RIDGE: All right.

ZAHN: What can you tell the American public about some of the inconsistencies, and how the administration has dealt with information? David Satcher, on one hand, saying we were wrong not to more -- act more quickly in dealing with post offices, the workers, and Ari Fleischer coming out and saying the president is satisfied with the actions taken. You, at one point, saying the strains of anthrax are indistinguishable, and then later, coming out and saying the strain in the Senate Office Building had some different characteristics.

Why doesn't everybody seem to be on the same page here?

RIDGE: Well, I think we are all on the same page, but let me explain to you this: The whole threat of anthrax and the immersion of the public health community and the federal government in trying to respond as quickly as we can to isolate and then to treat the victims. And it's been a learning process. Obviously, the evil that was hoisted upon these communities and these individuals by turning an envelope into a weapon of terror may have something that very few people had thought about.

And again, the public health community, Tommy Thompson at HHS, all of the agencies, the FBI, Department of Justice, I think they have responded. Admittedly we are learning as we go along. Now, we're learning to treat, and we're learning to do some things that heretofore, before the first anthrax case, we didn't know we needed to do.

So again, I think under the conditions at a particular moment, everybody responded. They have learned from that particular moment, and they applied those lessons the next time they had to deal with an anthrax case.

ZAHN: All right, governor Ridge, we've got to leave it there this morning -- good luck to you.

RIDGE: Thanks, Paula.

ZAHN: Thank you again... RIDGE: Thank you. All right.

ZAHN: ... for joining us this morning -- appreciate your time very much.

RIDGE: You're welcome.

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