Face the Nation Transcripts October 5, 2014: Netanyahu, McCarthy, Fauci, Cummings
(CBS News) -- Below is a transcript from the October 5th edition of Face the Nation. Guests included Manuel Bojorquez, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Dr. Jon LaPook, Rep. Kevin McCarthy, Benjamin Netanyahu, Rep. Elijah Cummings, Anthony Salvanto, Jonathan Martin, Nancy Cordes and John Dickerson.
BOB SCHIEFFER, HOST: I'm Bob Schieffer. And today on FACE THE NATION: Ebola and what to do about it. A patient with a first case of Ebola confirmed in the United States has taken a turn for the worse in a Dallas hospital. He is in critical condition. Officials are working to contain the virus and calm fears, but is there a plan?
We will go to Dallas and we will talk with Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top infectious disease doctor at the National Institutes of Health.
We will hear from the new House majority leader, Kevin McCarthy, and Democratic Congressman Elijah Cummings.
We will turn to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the latest on the war on ISIS.
And with less than a month until Election Day, we will have new results of the CBS News/"New York Times" Battleground Tracker survey.
Sixty years of news, because this is FACE THE NATION.
And good morning again.
Well, here is the latest on the Ebola situation. The death toll from the disease in West Africa stands at nearly 3,500. The threat of it spreading here has raised fears and calls for more government action, but what to do?
We begin this morning in Dallas, where Thomas Duncan is now in critical condition with Ebola. He is the man who was first sent home from the hospital, even though he told emergency workers he had recently traveled from Liberia.
Manuel Bojorquez is in Dallas this morning -- Manuel.
MANUEL BOJORQUEZ, CBS NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Well, Bob, he has been in an isolation unit here at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital for almost a week.
Doctors say he has slipped from serious to critical condition. Health officials here have been trying to reassure the public they can stop this virus from spreading after a series of missteps. As you mentioned, he was released initially by the hospital after a first visit to the E.R. He complained of a fever and abdominal pains, but was not tested for Ebola. That may have put other people at risk.
Four family members he shared an apartment with have now been taken to an undisclosed location, but there is criticism they were not immediately quarantined. The apartment has now been decontaminated, but officials also were also criticized for waiting three days to make that happen.
Now health workers have fanned out across the city. They are monitoring 50 people who may have had contact with Duncan. They say only nine of those are believed to have had close contact, and so far none have shown symptom -- Bob.
SCHIEFFER: Is there anymore of explanation, Manuel, as to how they let this slip through after he told them he had come from West Africa?
BOJORQUEZ: At first, the hospital said there was a flaw in the way electronic records interacted between a nurse who knew Duncan had been in West Africa and the doctor who treated him.
Now they are saying there was no flaw, and the team did have access to that medical information about his travel history, but they have yet to fully explain why he was released.
SCHIEFFER: All right. Well, thank you so much, Manuel.
And joining us here in Washington, Dr. Anthony Fauci, who heads up the Allergy and Infectious Diseases Institutes at the National Institutes of Health.
Doctor, thank you so much for coming.
Can you say at this point that this situation in Dallas has been contained?
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: I believe so.
Right now, the way you classically prevent an outbreak is you put the person who is the index person under isolation and care. Mr. Duncan is in that situation. And then you do what you just heard here, is that you do what is called contact tracing.
People who have come into direct contact with the patient are observed for a period of 21 days. If they develop symptoms, they are put in isolation, and if they have Ebola, they are treated. And when you put that umbrella over the people who have been the contacts, that is how traditionally over the years in Africa outbreaks have been controlled.
SCHIEFFER: Well, is it likely that any of these people -- I think there are nine people that had the closest contact -- are they likely to come down with Ebola?
FAUCI: Well, it depends on what you mean by likely.
Is it conceivable they will? Absolutely. I would not be surprised if one of the people who came into direct contact with Mr. Duncan when he was ill will get Ebola. You can't say. You can't put a number on it. It is impossible to do that, but there certainly is a risk. So I don't think the American public should be surprised if you hear that one of them actually does come down with Ebola.
SCHIEFFER: Republican Senator Rand Paul, who is also an ophthalmologist, a medical doctor, says that we are underestimating in his works the transmissibility of this disease.
FAUCI: I don't think that there is data to tell us that that is a correct statement, with all due respect.
We have had experience since 1976 with how Ebola is transmitted. And it is clear it is transmitted by direct contact with body fluids, blood, diarrhea, vomit or what have you. And there is no indication that there is another insidious way that it is transmitted that we are missing, because of the experience we have had.
So we have really got to go with the evidence base. There is always hypothesis and surmising about that, but there is no scientific evidence.
SCHIEFFER: Well, he even goes so far as to say he is worried about us sending 3,000 Army troops over there. He says, can you imagine how easy it is for disease to spread on a ship, that they may come back and they might, you know, spread it among themselves and then to the rest of the country.
FAUCI: No.
I'm sorry, but that is really not a concern. First of all, the troops that are going over there are going to be fundamentally for logistic purposes, command, control, engineering, setting up the hospitals. They are well-trained. They will not be in direct risk of in the sense of contact with individuals.
And even if they are, the protocols are in place to prevent spread from there. So I don't and the Army does not have any real concern that those 3,000 to 4,000 troops are going to be in danger.
SCHIEFFER: We have seen already that human error can play a role here. Is human error the main thing to be worried about right now?
FAUCI: Well, human error occurs. We have seen the misstep in Dallas. It has now been corrected.
Certainly, no one is perfect and there will always be some missteps, but what we need to do is to have layers of capability to overcome that. And if you look at what is happening in Dallas right now, things are going well, particularly with the contact tracing.
(CROSSTALK)
SCHIEFFER: But they didn't go very well in the beginning.
FAUCI: No, they did not. And I think anyone that denies that is not being realistic.
There was a mistake there in the beginning. Hopefully, this will be lesson learned, so that emergency room and clinic docs throughout the country, when they have someone come in and say they have symptoms compatible with Ebola, you ask them, have you been to West Africa? And if they are, then you trigger the protocol.
SCHIEFFER: You said that we have run out of this experimental drug cause ZMapp.
FAUCI: Correct.
SCHIEFFER: That was used to treat two Americans who had Ebola. Is there going to be more of that? And where are we on vaccine?
FAUCI: OK.
Well, there will be more ZMapp. Unfortunately, it is difficult to produce. A lot is being produced right now. It should be ready in a month-and-a-half to two months. We are not going to get it tomorrow or next week. A vaccine to prevent Ebola, we have started a vaccine early phase one trial in the NIH, in Bethesda, Maryland, on September the 2nd, 20 volunteers.
We should have data as to whether or not it is safe very soon, probably by the end of this calendar year, and then we will go into a larger trial in West Africa.
SCHIEFFER: Doctor, what -- we are coming onto flu season.
FAUCI: Correct.
SCHIEFFER: People will show up with flu symptoms.
FAUCI: Right.
SCHIEFFER: I am sure some of them are going to think they have come down with Ebola.
FAUCI: Right.
SCHIEFFER: What can you say to the American people right now as we approach flu season?
FAUCI: I think people have to be -- and it is understandable, the fears. We respect it and we understand it. So, really take a look at evidence.
If you are in Massachusetts now, and you get a cold, there is almost -- there is no chance that you have Ebola, because there is no link between an Ebola case. You have got to look at it in a rational way. The rational way is, you get a case of Ebola, it is isolated, and you do the contact tracing.
I have heard people say, well, should I be afraid of getting on an airplane in San Francisco? It has nothing to do with Ebola, so you have got to really be rational and have the evidence be the major thing that gets you in your decisions and your concern.
SCHIEFFER: And probably not a bad idea to get a flu shot.
FAUCI: And that's exactly right.
It is not a bad idea to get a flu shot. Good point, Bob.
SCHIEFFER: All right, thank you so much, Doctor.
We want to go now to New York and CBS News chief medical correspondent Dr. Jon LaPook.
Jon, thank you for being here this morning. Are you satisfied that the government has the right protocols in place here to prevent the spread of this disease?
DR. JON LAPOOK, CBS NEWS CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: I think the protocols are right, but the big question is, there is a big difference sometimes between theory and practice.
And, unfortunately, with the first patient who ended up having Ebola coming into a hospital emergency room in Dallas, with them fumbling that, it undermines the public's confidence. But I think, that said, this is not Africa. There is 40 years of experience with a couple of dozen of previous Ebola outbreaks in Africa.
And they have all been successfully handled. So I think people should do this and say, this is not the time for magical thinking. This is the time to believe in science. There is experience.
And I spoke to Dr. Frieden this morning, the head of the CDC. He said, we know how to stop this in its tracks, which is to isolate people who come down to it and then figure out who their contacts are, watch them closely.
SCHIEFFER: All right. Let's go over quickly, what are the symptoms and how is Ebola transmitted?
LAPOOK: All right.
Well, the symptoms are really flu-like. So it can be headache, fever, aches and pains, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, and late in the disease, you can have some bleeding problems. This is very similar to flu-like symptoms, which is one of the reasons why I agree with your medical advice, Dr. Schieffer, that people should get vaccinated just to remove any kind of confusion.
SCHIEFFER: All right.
LAPOOK: It's spread by direct contact with fluids. And that is so important, because I was on Twitter, I was on social media yesterday.
It is the same misconception over and over again about how it is spread. It is spread through direct contact with body fluids, meaning vomit, diarrhea, you know, stool, blood, sputum, even semen. So if you do not come in direct contact with that, then the odds of you having Ebola are extraordinarily low.
I think one of the problems that people have is, they are talking about theory. What happens if somebody sneezes in your face? Well, when was the last time somebody sneezed in your face? Yes, if there is fluid that goes into your nose, into your mouth, into your eyes, into a broken piece of skin, then you can get it.
But across the room, there is no evidence that it gets finely aerosolized in the way that, say, the flu does. If this were spread like the flu, there would be millions and millions of cases.
SCHIEFFER: All right, thank you so much, Doctor.
And joining us now, the new House majority leader, Kevin McCarthy. He took Eric Cantor's place. He's the number two in the Republican leadership in the House.
And I want to ask you a little bit about that, but first I want to ask you about this whole Ebola thing. Are you satisfied the administration is doing all it can to keep this thing from spreading?
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY (R-CA), HOUSE MAJORITY LEADER: Well, we are working on it with the administration.
We provided more funding in the continuing resolution that actually speeds up that process that we are talking about, that vaccine, or working to how to treat it. But we cannot ignore Africa. And we have money to go forward with those troops.
But we want to make sure there is a plan out there that -- the safety for the troops, but the logistics to make sure we can move forward. And one thing I have learned from watching what happened in Texas and the human error, every city should deal with their medical emergency rooms and their emergency individuals, being prepared at least. We don't want it to come here, but we want to make sure we are prepared if something does happen.
SCHIEFFER: You know, some on the Republican side have come up with some rather drastic suggestions. Bobby Jindal, the governor of Louisiana, says flights from Ebola-stricken countries should be stopped. You heard me quote Rand Paul just a while ago. He is worried about all of these soldiers coming back that the United States is sending to West Africa.
What is your reaction to those kinds of suggestions?
MCCARTHY: I think it is right to ask the questions.
Now, I am not a medical expert. I want to listen to the medical experts. But I don't want to ignore the challenge. So I want to look at making sure this cannot spread. We know Africa does not have the same medical treatments as we do. So we can't ignore it and let this spread around the world.
It is not just our problem, Africa. It is the world's problems, if someone traveled from Liberia and went to another nation in Europe and met somebody and then that person came to America. So how could we possibly stop all that? I don't know that the planes does that.
So we have got to go to the core of the problem, solve it there, and invest in a vaccine and a treatment, so we cure it once and for all. SCHIEFFER: What do you see as Congress' role? You talked about some of the things you have done already.
MCCARTHY: I see it as making sure the accountability -- that they have a strategy and a plan and that it will work for the safety of the American public, secondly to make sure the funding is there to carry it out.
And that's one thing where I saw Congress has acted ahead of time, not only to speed up. And, most importantly, let's not have bureaucracy and red tape slow down the FDA from any experimental drug that can happen and can cure in Africa and can test it.
SCHIEFFER: Let me ask you a little bit about the war in -- ISIS. We are going to have Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. I interviewed him earlier this week.
He now sees ISIS as posing a threat to Israel. Do you think we ought to send ground combat troops, if that becomes necessary, into Northern Iraq and Syria, if that is what it takes to get these people?
MCCARTHY: Well, first of all, I don't think we should ever sit back and tell our enemies what we will and will not do.
If we need special forces there, if that's what the generals say, then we need to do it. If we engage in a conflict that we know this is a threat to America, we should make it so one-sided that it gets over very quickly. So, we should have everything on the table to make sure we win this.
And this is a big crisis. And this was not an intelligence failure. This was a lack-of-action failure on the administration. You know, Fallujah and Ramadi fell 10 months ago. The -- own former CIA Director and Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta talks about those actions that the administration knew of this and did not take.
So our options are more limited today. Maybe we could have handled this differently. But I think special forces and others are probably going to have to be on the ground, because after those missiles hit and they get out of those Humvees, they repaint their trucks, we have got to know where they are, and are the hits being successful?
SCHIEFFER: Should we go directly after Assad's forces, the dictator of Syria?
MCCARTHY: We have the best trained military in the world. I would listen to them and give them whatever resources they need to make sure our troops are safe, but actually carry this mission out as fast and as lopsided as possible.
SCHIEFFER: And do whatever is necessary, including if that included direct attacks on Assad?
MCCARTHY: I would lay out the mission to see what the troops -- what the generals say and evaluate from there. SCHIEFFER: All right.
Should the House, should the Congress vote on this, take a vote either endorsing or take some other action on this?
MCCARTHY: Well, the current actions we are taking now, the president has the legal authority do.
If he wants to expand this, it has to come back to the House. And the House, the minute the president asks for authorization, we will debate it and we will take it up, no matter what time he wants to call that, if he does.
SCHIEFFER: Do you think it would pass the House right now, just a guess?
MCCARTHY: I see the threat before us. Looking at the chambers, we will have to see what people debate. I can pick and choose what goes forward, but I would never second-guess the House. Let's have the debate and let's let the American people actually see, what is the goal, though?
The president has to lay out a strategy. I don't see that for the American public. What is the goal? What is our foreign doctrine? What is our foreign policy?
SCHIEFFER: What is the policy of Kevin McCarthy? How will the House be different with you as the majority leader than it was with Eric Cantor?
MCCARTHY: Look, I come from a small town of Bakersfield, California,
I grew up with Democrats. I started my first business when I was 19. I learned a valuable lesson as a small business owner. You are the first one to work, last one to leave and last one to be paid. That entrepreneur spirit has to start America working again. And we need to open this House back up.
But, most importantly, as I travel -- I will be to 100 districts before this election. The number one thing I hear from the public, can Washington work again? You just see all these failures by the administration, from the rollout of the health care Web site, to the debacle of the VA, to Benghazi, to -- even the Secret Service even can't protect the White House today.
And then we have in the Senate Harry Reid, who has held up 387 bills that have passed the House, and he won't let them vote on it.
SCHIEFFER: We will have to end there. Thank you so much.
MCCARTHY: Thanks for having me.
SCHIEFFER: Hope we will have you back.
And we will be back in a minute to talk to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SCHIEFFER: We want to turn now to the week's other big story, the war in Northern Iraq and Syria.
I sat down with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after his address to the United Nations last week. In that speech, he called ISIS and Hamas branches of the same poisonous tree.
So I asked him if ISIS now poses a threat to Israel.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, ISRAELI PRIME MINISTER: Absolutely.
I mean, ISIS has got to be defeated because it is doing what all these militant Islamists are trying to do. They all want to first dominate their part of the Middle East and then go on from there for their twisted idea of world domination.
The difference between ISIS and Hamas and ISIS and Iran and so on is, they all agree that the world should be an Islamist hill, but they all want to be -- each of them wants to be king of the hill. They -- that's what they are really fighting about.
Essentially, they want to accumulate enough power to then carry out their mad ambitions. So, that is the danger with ISIS. It is creating a statement. It has two million petrodollars a day. It's weapons it has taken over from the Iraqi army and so on.
And it is dangerous, no question. But if you think ISIS is dangerous, and should be defeated, as I do -- and I completely support President Obama's effort, leadership in this regard -- then think how much more dangerous Iran is. Iran doesn't have two million petrodollars a day. It has 100 million petrodollars a day.
And it has got -- it is working on obtaining nuclear weapons. And that would be, I think, a pivot of history. I think it would endanger the future of our common civilization. So it should be -- that should be defeated, and that should be prevented.
SCHIEFFER: On this battle with ISIS, do you foresee Israel becoming more directly involved in the battle against ISIS?
NETANYAHU: We are ready to support and help in every way that we are asked to do.
But these are things that, you know, we don't discuss necessarily on TV, not even on FACE THE NATION.
SCHIEFFER: There's a lot of back and forth about, what should we do about Assad, and can they defeat ISIS without taking down Assad? What is your sense of that?
NETANYAHU: Look, I think that... SCHIEFFER: Should we attack Syrian forces?
NETANYAHU: I think, right now, the real issue is ISIS.
ISIS has taken over oil supplies in Syria. It has got -- it basically uses Syria as a safe haven and as a launching ground for attacks. And I think, wisely, a decision has been made that ISIS targets in Syria and Iraq are equally targetable.
As far as Assad is concerned, I think that you certainly don't have to prop them up, and you don't have to make a -- cut a deal with them, any more than you have to cut a deal with Iran. They are going to fight ISIS anyway. You don't have to reward them. You don't have to reward Iran with a nuclear deal, any more than you have to reward Assad with bringing back the chemical weapons, because he is fighting these guys anyway, as Iran is fighting them anyway.
So I would say -- I wouldn't say what to do. I wouldn't prop up Assad up, but I would -- in any way -- and I wouldn't give him immunity, but I would focus the effort on ISIS on one side and preventing Iran from getting atomic bombs on the other side.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SCHIEFFER: More of that interview later in the broadcast, including the prime minister's answer when I asked him to describe his relationship with President Obama.
Our commentary is next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SCHIEFFER: Maybe I am just so used to all the bad news lately the I am making more of this than I should, but wasn't that a little good news last week from, of all places, Afghanistan? I am serious.
I read in the paper that Ashraf Ghani was sworn in as the new Afghan president. And get this. Before the ceremony was done, he appointed Abdullah Abdullah, his chief rival in the recent election, to become the government's chief executive officer. That has taken as a strong signal he intends to give the political opposition a real role in governing the country, exactly what we had hoped for, but never got in Iraq.
And unless I read this part wrong -- and let's not say it too loud -- this may be the result of work by U.S. diplomats who helped the two sides to negotiate the power-sharing agreement after the long and bitter election process. So a little shout-out here to that beleaguered American crew.
And here is the part I am still not sure I believe, but appears to be so. The Afghans are also signing an agreement that allows us to keep a small force of U.S. military people in the country as we draw down our forces.
That is the kind of arrangement critics say we should have insisted on before we left Iraq. And had we had such a thing, maybe the country would not be in the state it is.
No one believes Afghanistan is anywhere near where it needs to be. Corruption is rampant. The economy is a mess, and terrorism is still a deadly force. But folding into the other events of last week, that is some progress -- back in a minute.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SCHIEFFER: Some of our stations are leaving us now. For most of you, we will be right back with a lot more FACE THE NATION.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SCHIEFFER: And welcome back to FACE THE NATION.
President Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu's relationship has been the subject of endless speculation over the years, so when we talked last week in New York, I asked the prime minister how he would describe it.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SCHIEFFER: How do you describe your relationship with the president?
NETANYAHU: Actually it is quite good. I have to tell you we had a conversation -- I don't want to say like an old married couple, but the president said that we had -- he has had more meetings with me that with any other foreign leader.
I think you get to a point of mutual respect, you cut to the chase very quickly. You talk about the real things openly, as befitting real allies. I think we have a relationship of mutual respect and mutual appreciation.
SCHIEFFER: Well, let's talk a little bit about Iran.
What concerns you most about these negotiations that are going on with Iran?
NETANYAHU: Well, from the start, I said I don't understand why we should let the world's most dangerous regime, which practices terrorism all the time -- all the time, I mean -- I heard President Rouhani shed these crocodile tears about the spread of global terrorism.
He should talk his own people; they are the ones who are doing it, so this is the greatest terrorist regime in the world, and we don't want them to have the ultimate weapon of terror, which is nuclear weapons.
My fear is that they would get the ability to enrich enough uranium for a bomb in a very short time -- weeks, months -- and that is the deal that I hope is not signed.
And to the extent that you take away the number of centrifuges that they will have left, it becomes a better deal. To the extent you give them thousands of centrifuges, that becomes a bad deal, a very bad deal, not merely for us in Israel but for you and for, I think, for the peace of the world.
You don't want this regime able to kick out the inspectors, which is what (INAUDIBLE) means. They don't care how good the inspections are, they just kick them out and they say, OK, there's, at the time of our choosing, multiple crises around the world, throw out the inspectors, go further in enriching the bomb and you have enough material to make an atomic device, which they can put on a container ship and they can bring it to any port in the world.
We don't want to be there and you don't want to be there.
SCHIEFFER: Do you miss Ahmadinejad? He almost seemed like every time --
(CROSSTALK)
NETANYAHU: Well, he was --
SCHIEFFER: -- stirred things up?
NETANYAHU: -- he was telling it like it is and basically the president of Iran, who is not the leader of Iran -- the real leader of Iran is the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khomeini, rightly named, he is the leader. He makes the decisions. He is a dictator, really. And Khomeini is a good front person, so is their foreign minister, but they don't make the decisions.
They are supposed to smooth talk their way to get in basically bamboozling the West to get a deal that lifts the sanctions, the tough sanctions that the U.S. has put in place and that leave them with enough centrifuges to be able to get to the bombing in a very short time. That shouldn't happen.
We have seen sweet, smooth-talking foreign ministers in the previous century at critical times. That preceded disaster.
SCHIEFFER: As you head home, what most worries you right now?
NETANYAHU: I think between East and West there is -- between the great United States that I would never shortchange. I think it's the leading power in the world, it's a powerful country, it has reservoirs of strength and enterprise and initiative that surpass any other -- between the United States and the West and the rising powers in the East.
I visited China earlier and I just met with Prime Minister Modi here, these are great events that are happening and that are changing our world, obviously.
But in between East and West there is a malignancy of militant Islam that -- whose first victims are Muslims, who don't toe the line, and they are cut down brutally, Christians, Yazidis, Jews, anyone secularist, anyone, gays, women, I think that that malignancy is growing and spreading. It's sending its tentacles to the West. I wrote 20 years ago that you will see domestic international terrorists because you will see them send people to -- jihadists to live in the West in order to wage jihad against the West.
And unfortunately that has come about, but the greatest danger that I see from these militant Islamists is that they will marry their mad ideologies to weapons of mass death. That is a threat, not only to my people, the Jewish people and the Jewish state of Israel, but to your people.
They view us as one because of our tolerant societies they think as weak and corrupt. We understand the value of diversity and human freedom and choice. They abhor it. They want to wipe us away.
If they have the weapons to wipe us away, they will try. They will fail, ultimately, as did the Nazis, but they took down tens of millions of people with them. That should not happen again.
SCHIEFFER: Prime Minister, thank you so much.
NETANYAHU: Thank you. Thank you, Bob.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SCHIEFFER: And we will be right back to talk about the problems plaguing the Secret Service.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SCHIEFFER: And we are back now with Maryland's Democratic congressman, Elijah Cummings, he is the ranking member on the Oversight Committee that heard testimony last week about the Secret Service and the problems it is having.
Congressman, thank you so much.
REP. ELIJAH CUMMINGS (D), MD.: Good to be with you, Bob.
SCHIEFFER: Is this as bad as it looks from the outside or is it not quite that bad?
CUMMINGS: I think it is very bad. And I think there is a culture that has developed, a culture of complacency. We see it with the security breaches; morale is down and we have had a series of events, Bob, that should alarm all Americans.
And certainly the question has become is this the Secret Service that we all thought it was?
And I am beginning to wonder about that.
SCHIEFFER: Well, that is it. What is it that has gone haywire here? Because I am like you, Congressman, I have known people in the Secret Service all the way back to the Johnson administration and these are great people, I mean, who put their lives on the lines; they are patriots to the core. And yet all of a sudden, this thing just seems to be coming apart.
CUMMINGS: But one of the things that's happened --
SCHIEFFER: Why is that?
CUMMINGS: -- I don't think it is necessarily all of a sudden, by the way. I think that based upon some information that we have gotten from whistleblowers, this goes back a ways.
And just the information has not come out. Now don't get me wrong, the Secret Service is a great organization, but you have got to -- we have got to look at certain things, like training. There has been a reduction in training; again, morale: this whole idea of reduction, with regard to high turnover, things of that nature.
And it has led to a group of Secret Service agents who feel more comfortable, Bob, coming to the Congress and even going to their own superiors. And it seems as if we have a Secret Service that doesn't even trust itself. And that leads us to a lot of problems.
And so Ms. Pierson, the director, the former director, she was in kind of a tough situation. She came before the Congress; she was not completely candid with us. And it just seems as if there has been, like I said, that complacency. And -- and when we see a situation like back in 2011, where the White House is shot, $100,000 worth of damage done and nobody knows it for four days, that's a problem.
SCHIEFFER: Well, I mean this whole thing -- I mean the White House says somebody didn't lock the door. I mean...
CUMMINGS: The doors.
SCHIEFFER: -- that's the last thing we do...
CUMMINGS: Yes, but there were...
SCHIEFFER: -- before we turn out the lights in my house...
CUMMINGS: -- this is most...
SCHIEFFER: -- we -- we lock the door.
CUMMINGS: -- this most recent fence jumping incident, there were basically five layers of security that failed, which is ridiculous.
We also discovered that they don't have the kind of technology that they out to have, the modern technology.
So we've -- we've got to really -- this is a -- Bob, this is a transformational moment, where we've got to look at the Secret Service and now we've got to figure this all out and get it right.
SCHIEFFER: And -- and from top to bottom?
CUMMINGS: From top to bottom.
SCHIEFFER: Now it's like...
CUMMINGS: Oh, top to bottom...
SCHIEFFER: -- (INAUDIBLE).
CUMMINGS: Let me tell you something. The -- the mere fact that the director has left, believe me, it did not begin with her and it's not going to end with her leaving. There are still people that probably need to go. And I think that there were some problems -- you have agents that were basically afraid that the information that they wanted to impart to the -- to the top person would never get there.
They were -- they were fearful that a -- you know, that there would be retaliation, all kinds of things. And you never -- I never thought that the Secret Service would have those kind of issues.
SCHIEFFER: You know, there are these reports -- and I know you're aware of them -- in the black community that a lot of African- Americans are worried that the president is not being protected because he's an African-American and that this wouldn't be the case if he were white.
CUMMINGS: Eighty-five percent of all the African-Americans that come to me mention what you just said.
SCHIEFFER: Really?
CUMMINGS: Yes. And I -- I don't agree with it. And the -- let me tell you why.
I -- again, we have information that this goes all the way back to the Bush administration, a lot of the problems that we are talking about now. It's just that they're coming to light.
So this -- a lot of these -- these things existed before President Obama. And -- and back to -- to the present situation, the president's people have told me that he feels very comfortable, particularly with Mr. Clancy that has now come in to take over the Secret Service (INAUDIBLE).
So he feels good about it and most importantly, the -- the first lady feels very good about it.
SCHIEFFER: Well, stay on the case.
CUMMINGS: We will.
SCHIEFFER: And come back and tell us when it gets better.
CUMMINGS: I certainly will.
SCHIEFFER: Thank you so much, congressman.
CUMMINGS: All right.
SCHIEFFER: We'll be back in a minute with a look at how Campaign 2014 is shaping up.
So stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SCHIEFFER: And what would FACE THE NATION be without a little political speculation?
So that's what we're going to do now. Some bad news results from the latest CBS News/"New York Times" joint venture, The 2014 Battleground Trekker -- Tracker, with CBS News director of elections, Anthony Salvanto, Jonathan Martin, the national political correspondent for "The New York Times," CBS News Congressional correspondent, Nancy Cordes, and CBS News political director John Dickerson.
Well, Anthony, start us off.
What's the latest news from Battleground Tracker?
ANTHONY SALVANTO, CBS NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Well, we went back in and looked at every state, Bob. And Republicans keep their lead. They'd be up 51-49 to retake the Senate if the election were held today.
But, Bob, there's a couple of twists and turns on the road there.
Let me tell you about one state in particular, and that's Kansas.
Now, in Kansas, incumbent Republican Pat Roberts has now found himself in a deadlocked race with an Independent candidate. That's Greg Orman.
Now, you might expect in this environment somewhere you'd see an Independent candidate gaining traction, but I don't think Kansas is ever a state Republicans envision having to defend.
SCHIEFFER: Could -- could the Republicans actually...
Congressman
SCHIEFFER: -- retake the Senate if they lose Kansas?
SALVANTO: Yes, they could. The -- the good news for the Republicans here is that they still have a lot of options. There's a lot of states they can win. And they're within striking distance right off the bat.
But Kansas complicates things because...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.
SALVANTO: -- first of all, we don't know with whom Greg Orman might caucus if he is elected and it's a -- there's a lot of layers to this story, including fractures within the GOP (INAUDIBLE)... SCHIEFFER: Well, Nancy, you were out there. You were covering this race. But tell us -- and I want to hear your thoughts on what's going on out there. But tell us what Anthony means when he says it depends on where he caucuses, because I think we all know what that means, but a lot of people out there might not.
NANCY CORDES, CBS NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Well, what it means is, is he going to work with Democrats or Republicans if he gets elected?
And what he told me is that he will caucus with whichever party is in the clear majority. He thinks that that is in the best interests of Kansas.
But that's obviously complicated, because neither party may have a clear majority at the end of the night.
SCHIEFFER: He may be the deciding vote there.
(CROSSTALK)
SCHIEFFER: Yes, for the first time in the history of the world. But a -- I mean what that means, though, is he will decide whether to vote with the Republicans or vote with the Democrats on -- on how to organize the Senate. And that means on who they're going to elect as the -- as the leader.
CORDES: Right. And Democrats, of course, are willing to take enough of a chance on the possibility that he might caucus with them that they'd basically push their own candidate out of the race to kind of clear the way for Orman to take on Pat Roberts.
SCHIEFFER: You know, he may wind up, John, as chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee or the Appropriations Committee.
JONATHAN MARTIN, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": He'll have some opportunities.
SCHIEFFER: He may...
(CROSSTALK)
SCHIEFFER: -- in order to...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He's going to have some good office space, Bob, I think, in his future if he wins.
SCHIEFFER: A good parking place.
MARTIN: That's exactly right. I was in Kansas a couple of weeks ago, too, and it is an unlikely place that you would have thought earlier this year could be shaping control of the Senate. But you've got one of these scenarios where it's a long time incumbent in Pat Roberts who does not have a home of his own in Kansas, and an environment there where people are tired of Washington. He represents Washington in a lot of voters' eyes. And here's this Independent with a fresh face and some deep pockets funding his own commercials who is saying I'm not of Washington, I'm going to stand up to the Rs and the Ds.
Now, that said, Kansas historically is a very conservative state and Mr. Orman is net -- is now taking on a lot of negative commercials. So it remains to be seen if he can hang in there through Election Day.
But the fact is, this scenario for Republicans of taking back control of the Senate gets a lot harder if they can't keep Kansas. It just creates one more seat elsewhere that they're going to have to pick up.
It's possible, but it makes it harder.
JOHN DICKERSON, CBS NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Yes, just to look at the map, we know Republicans need to take six seats away from the Democrats. There are already three races in which Republicans have pretty much got their -- those locked in, in West Virginia, Montana and South Dakota. That means they'd need three more seats before Kansas became a part of the conversation.
Now, they need four seats out of about seven possible seats they could take away from Democrats. That's pretty tough, because all seven of those seats from which Republicans could pluck their victories are all tight as a tick.
SCHIEFFER: And again, to go back to what this means about having this Independent, the majority names the chairman...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.
SCHIEFFER: -- in the Senate. So this is extremely -- this is extremely important.
Talk about some of these other races.
SALVANTO: Yes, speaking of tight as a tick, we have a very close race. But the Democrat has now moved ahead, Kay Hagan, in North Carolina. This is one of those Southern states -- there's three of them -- that the Republicans have been eying as possible pick up opportunities for some time. So we've got Kay Hagan up now in North Carolina.
But in Arkansas, the Republicans seem to have cemented their hold a little bit for now with Tom Cotton up ahead of incumbent, Mark Pryor. This is a race that the Republicans have been eying for a while, too.
That makes them a little bit closer to that majority.
And then in Louisiana, I think there's a real strong possibility of that going to a run-off, which could further delay knowing who is in control of the Senate.
SCHIEFFER: And the reason you have a run-off on Election Day is because in Louisiana, they do it differently.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Right.
SCHIEFFER: They just take -- everybody runs in one election and then they take the top two. It's not -- it's not a parti -- they don't have partisan primaries there. Everybody runs on Election Day.
What's going on in Georgia?
That's another close one.
DICKERSON: Well, George, you have two people who are running who aren't politicians, which is a the fun part of that race. We don't have that anywhere else. And Georgia is one of those states that, you know, one of those battleground states and where the question at the end of the day, if we have got seven or eight states that are very, very close on election night we may be looking at saying it was a horrible national year for Democrats, the president is not well thought of, the races are being run in red states which is tough for Democrats, and the national issues set is all, you know, for everything from the ISIL threat to the VA to the Secret Service, it is just bad news for Democrats.
What may help Democrats in what to look for in Georgia and all of these states are sort of the sandbags on the levee. And that is their turnout operation. Are they finding the Democrats and getting them to vote, but also are they finding people who just don't vote in the past?
They have put unprecedented amount of money in all of these states from Georgia all the way to Alaska, where they are flying planes, landing on the water to find native Alaskans to sign them up, person by person, that's one thing we will talking about on election night if the Democrats hold off this onslaught.
SCHIEFFER: Nancy, talk a little about the women's vote because I know for example in Georgia I think that race in my view turns on two things, a large black turnout and a large women's vote turnout. If those two things happen, I think Michelle Nun wins. If they don't happen, I think she probably loses.
But we're seeing that across the board.
NANCY: That's right. And if you want to see just how important the women's vote is, got to Colorado, that's where we were this past week, where the number one issue in the race to the outside observer would seem to be birth control. Senator Mark Udall is bringing up reproductive rights every chance he gets against his Republican opponent, Congressman Cory Gardner, because he knows he needs to run up the women's vote if he is going to win. He won by 15 points among women, six years ago, he needs to repeat that if he wants to pull it out in this very tight race. Four of his ten ads have been about reproductive rights.
SALVANTO: There are gender gaps in all of these races that favor the Democrats. That is really what is keeping a lot of them close, but it also speaks to how the Democrats have to maximize that turnout operation, because let's face it these midterms are not being won and lost on anybody being awarded for their recent performance, certainly not if you -- neither party, really.
MARTIN: You can't underestimate, too, how central women voters have become for the Democratic coalition in the Obama era. This is the campaign for a lot of these candidates. You mentioned Colorado, but certainly in North Carolina too, it is a very simple matter of math. If Senator Hagan can get a certain percentage of the female women vote, it makes it almost impossible for the Republicans to win.
SCHIEFFER: Have you all noticed anything in your polling. I mean my sense of it based on no polling is people are so kind of turned off by the whole thing that there is not nearly as much interest in these -- it is always that way in an off year election, but I sense less interest than usual.
SALVANTO: Yes, there is.
But for the voters who are going to turn out, there is a great deal of enthusiasm on the Republican side to vote against the president, and that is what is motivating the Republican side and that is why they have this edge right now because they tell us in the polling that they are more enthusiastic than the Democrats.
MARTIN: And that's the challenge for the Democrats. As John mentioned their extensive turnout efforts which is important but the fact is organically if you look at the polling, the Republicans are just more excited about this election. And while there is no overriding issue that is driving this election, a la Iraq from a few years ago or the recession of '08, the fact is that for a lot of Republicans, the issue is President Obama himself, and they are going to show up, basically send a message to President Obama. Harry Reid to a lesser extent. That is the best thing the Republicans have going.
Look at what happened the day after President Obama's speech in Illinois last week. How many Republicans grabbed is sound bite saying that these issues are on the ballot and put that up on the air Immediately.
The Republicans want to make President Obama the issue.
SCHIEFFER: Well, is there any polling that suggests that more people are going to the polls to vote against President Obama than are going to the polls to vote to show support for the president, Anthony?
SALVANTO: Yes, there are in each of these states. We actually find that the majority say it is more about being against the president, but that is particularly true for Republicans. For the Democrats it is about different issues, but it is not about the president.
DICKERSON: Gallup Poll has a poll out JUST recently that shows THAT those numbers more people are turning out to vote against the president than for him match the way people felt advance of the 2010 election. As you might remember, that was a very bad night for the president and his party.
CORDES: And that is also why you don't see the president out on the campaign trail. Now, Democrats say he will make an appearance or two by November 4, but as of right now, they won't tell us where he is going or when.
You know who you do see out on the campaign trail a lot these days is Mitt Romney. Republicans all across the country asking him to come in and vote for them and work for them.
MARTIN: And the Clintons for that matter, too, by the way.
CORDES: Yep. Yep.
But, you know, when we were at an event in Colorado this past week, Mitt Romney was treated like a rock star, people were chanting run, Mitt, run.
SCHIEFFER: Do we really think -- I mean, I said early on, it seemed to me like he was sort of testing the waters here and might actually run.
Let me just go around the table, do you think he is going to run, John?
MARTIN: I am skeptical he does. But I think he's looking closely at Jeb Bush and Chris Christie. In fact, I talked to somebody this morning about this very issue on the way here, Bob and he said if he looks at Jeb and Chris Christie and they either aren't running or they don't look formidable, he might make a late move in, which by the way it would be a rich turn of events because remember in 2012 Romney was plagued by Christie hanging out there for all that time thinking about getting in.
DICKERSON: And he knows that. And he keeps saying the one who is most attractive is the one that is not available and that was the problem for him when he was running and now he is benefiting from it.
One of the benefits of having him around, though, is it keeps Obama in the conversation in these races.
SCHIEFFER: All right. Well, it is fun to talk about all of this this morning. I am sure we will talk about it some more and we will be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SCHIEFFER: We hope you will join us next week when the former Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta will join us to tell about his new book, "Worthy Fights." We will see you then.