Digital program, here to talk about the white house transition process. Implications for National Security. Transition, what National Security information is shared . Guest when the gsa administrator ascertains that a all of thosect words being the specific ones in the legal process, that unlocks government Transition Office space, emails, government cell phones, as well two major sets of information. Theis the ability for Transition Team to access classified information. Agencyond is to allow review teams from the transition to begin to meet with government officials and both of those are very vital assets. A lot of focus on whether president elect biden is getting access to the president s daily intelligence briefing but in many ways, it is the not taking place that these are National Security problem. You have 4000 president ial employees flooding into the federal government over the 2021 and none of them are learning what they need to learn. All of these different staffers and agencies, how long does it take them to get up to speed . Guest it is a good question. The actual answer is, is going to take months or a year or so under the best of circumstances. President ial transitions are always fraught, there are always moments of particular instability and insecurity as a new administration, as new officials learn the ropes of these very important, very complex geopolitical roles. What we have seen now happening is not the best Case Scenario , for obvious reasons. Under the best of circumstances, this president ial transition has 77 days to figure that out. It is now under more than 1 5 of 60. The total time has elapsed for these officials to begin to learn their roles before they step into office at noon on january 20. Host i want to show our viewers and have you respond to lee hamilton, who ran the 9 11 commission, john bolton, former security advisor to the president , talking about the dangers of not passing on this information from the Current Administration to the incoming one. And we need a Better Process for transitions between one administration and another for National Security officials, so that this nation does not lower its guard every four or eight years. Do you believe the United States is vulnerable to attack or some other kind of disruption because the transition is not unfolding in the usual way . I do not think we should be a apocalyptic about it. It is a matter of degree. But you can say with certainty is that every day that goes by that the transition does not proceed in an orderly fashion leaves us more vulnerable. In 2000 and i speak as a veteran of the florida recount days were lost with no real 37 ability for the bush team to interact with the government. And the 9 11 Commission Said that might have been a factor in not being ready for 9 11 attacks. No one can really know that and all like would say is, do you want to take that chance again . Host Garrett Graff . Is where we have a very clear sense of what the worstCase Scenario is. It takes a while to learn these jobs, and lee hamilton there looked at this along with the rest of the 9 11 commission in their work and the Bush Administration really did struggle through 2001 to wrap its arms around the u. S. Government in those initial months. They had lost those 37 days to speak with their counterparts, iny had lost those 37 days terms of access to intelligence, the ability to have classified conversations with their counterparts. And this was seen by the 9 11 commission after the fact as a potential contributing factor to the governments ability and lack of ability to respond adequately to the threat of al qaeda over the course of 2001. The way that we sort of think about history, i think we somehow separate the 2000 attacksand the 9 11 that morning nine months after george w. Bush took office, but the truth is the recount had a big overhang. It was a big part of the transition, the administration, the way george w. Bushs presidency was viewed over the course of 2001. Remember, on the morning of 9 11, president bush was in sarasota, florida at booker elementary school, and there were actually protesters outside morning months after he , nine took office, complaining about the recount. This was much more truncated in think we view i it historically 20 years later. What the National Security threats . What are the top ones that the president elect and his team should be concerned about and that Trump Administration folks should be passing along to them . Guest it is a really great and important question. I think there is a historical aspect that is worth considering in this, and then there is a specific complexity that joe biden as president elect would have faced under the best case transition scenario, which we are absolutely not seeing right now. He is going to accept the presidency in just under two months from now with a raging pandemic, a pandemic that the u. S. Government has all but given up trying to wrestle with, a stalling economy, and massive a massive, unprecedented logistical path ahead of distributing what we hope is one two covid perhaps vaccines over the course of 2021, to the entire country. Any one of those three would have been a tremendously challenging moment. President elect biden, that is not everything on his plate geopolitically. If you go back and look at the president ial transition in 2000, what the main geopolitical issue on the table was at the time, was really the threat of terrorism. When you talk to advisors on both sides of that administration, that is what people were worried about in in in 2008, there was the 2000. Counterterrorism challenge and also a new cybersecurity challenge. This is just as the complexity and vulnerability of the internet was coming to the fore and the nation was beginning to realize what a problem cybersecurity was going to be , geopolitically. When you look at the 2016 transition, you have a counterterror threat from isis, a cyber threat from four major nationstate adversaries of the United States china, russia, north korea, and iran as well as a pandemic morning. One of the things worth going back and remembering was, the Obama Administration had lived through the ebola scare and was deeply focused on the pandemic. They even ran the Obama Administration outgoing officials, even ran a joint tabletop exercise with the incoming Bush Administration counterparts sorry, the incoming Trump Administration counterparts in order to try to prepare them for a pandemic. Of course, we now know that the Trump Administration took none of those lessons, they took none of the knowledge that was in the extensive pandemic playbook but playbook that the Obama Administration had left them. When you look at what those challenges are, what those lessons are, it gives you a moment to pause about what we are living through right now and geopolitical threats we are not talking about right now between the Outgoing Administration and the incoming administration. Of short order, without getting too deep in any one of them, i think there are a handful of top geopolitical president elect biden is going to be focused on in the first months of his administration, even beyond the pandemic, stalling economy, and the vaccine logistics. One is the rising challenge of china, which has been one of the areas of thent Trump Administrations forcible policy, and probably a policy ways President Biden would pick up and continue. The Trump Administration spent an enormous amount of time focused on iran, with actually nothing to show for it. Iran today is in much better position for its Nuclear Program that was when the Trump Administration began what he called it maximum pressure campaign. In many ways, iran is a more destabilizing and worrisome force on the world stage , particularly in the middle east, that it was when Trump Took Office four years ago. Going from obama to trump, president obama told president elect trump that he thought the biggest and most important issue on the geopolitical agenda what was going to be the hardest issue for trump to get his arms around was north korea. That is still very much the case today. Again, you have a country that has a bellicose Missile Program that apparently in the last couple of weeks unveiled new missiles that we do not have a good strategic sense of, and that this is going to be a key regional concern and geopolitical concern going forward. Then, of course, he do have the big question of russia, which is something that trump has been very scattershot over the last couple of years. Both in terms of embracing vladimir putin, as well as the general instability that russia has been trying to press across eastern europe, in ukraine, and elsewhere. And, again rising tide of cyber , a issues emanating from russia , like ransomware that is actually hitting u. S. Hospitals, u. S. Health care systems, u. S. Schools right now amidst the pandemic. This is going to be a really, really challenging geopolitical landscape for President Biden and hourbyhour, they by day, because the gsa is not doing what it should be doing to allow the transition to move forward. Joe bidens job is getting harder. I think the one good piece of news in this is that joe biden left the white house just four years ago. If anyone can make the best of a verybad situation, a dangerous situation, it is joe biden, who is coming into this with a unique understanding of the role of the president. Host lets hear from our viewers. Duane in mississippi, republican. Caller yes, i wanted to find out i wanted to talk to the lady that was there before about in georgia, about this pipe breaking in fulton county. But i did want to ask this gentleman, the middle east is in a better situation. He got to admit the middle east is in a better situation since trump got in the office then since biden left it. I think he would be lying to himself if he say anything other than that. Guest lets spend another minute talking about the middle east. The Trump Administration has succeeded in its push to normalize relations between israel and a number of regional countries, which definitely has its benefits in terms of lowering the temperature of the region. Are we still see, though, two hugely destabilizing forces at work there. One is iran, as the Trump Administration pulled out of the that the Obama Administration and other four nations had jointly negotiated thehe closing months of Obama Administration. Then, of course, you have the Syrian Civil War still underway, still exacting an incredible humanitarian toll on the region, and the spillover of the syrian refugee crisis, which we have seen less of in the news in the last year, but that does not mean the crisis has abated. In some ways, the middle east is apparently more secure today, in some ways the middle east is still treated still deeply troubled and deeply insecure. I think one of the areas you will see joe biden take a different path is confronting saudi arabia as a Regional Power there. Remember, saudi arabia during the Trump Administration killed jamalan journalist khashoggi and faced very little cost to that. I think you are going to see joe biden attempt to reset some of that relationship with saudi arabia. Host lets go to ron, west chesterfield, new hampshire. The craddick democratic caller. Caller thank you very much for your time and this program. Make two quick statements in question. Obama congratulated trump one day after trumps win. He had trump at the white house , giving him briefings within two days. And that was a tough loss for obama. On to socialism, it seems like republicans continue to push this thing. If you are for a few socialist programs that helps the the poor, the sick, the elderly, it our country into a socialist is going to turn country. That is such fear mongering do , that is not. Not vote for a democrat because they will turn the country into a socialist country. Host we will try and stick to the topic here. President elect biden and Vice President elect Kamala Harris are getting briefings because of Kamala Harriss access as a member of the Senate Intelligence committee. Is that a good substitution . Guest it is not and it is worth looking back, as the caller mentioned, at the traditions that had been put into place after 9 11. We saw earlier in the program, those comments from hamilton in the wake of 9 11 and the 9 11 commission report, about the unique intelligence challenges of a president ial transition, which is why george w. Bush put enormous time, enormous resources into a helpful and collegial and thoughtful president ial transition process in 2008. And the Obama Administration was very much prepared to carry on that mission and tradition in 2016. As you said, as the caller said, quickly ascertained that trump was the winner. You saw Hillary Clinton admit that the morningafter the welcomed and trump was to the white house very quickly. Those briefings began quickly. The apparatus of government was assimilatepidly to the agency trump called on the landing teams from his transition. The was, in many ways from obama side, the way a transition was supposed to be set up. The trump transition at the time did not really take full advantage of that. You might remember there was an enormous amount of upheaval within the transition immediately after the election. It took a while for those landing teams to arrive across the u. S. Government. But the Obama Administration really did try to make this work, and make it work both a level and a very specific micro level, putting the incoming Trump Administration officials pandemic table talk response exercise just a few days before the inauguration to try and prepare them for what they saw as one of the biggest likely threats to face the incoming Trump Administration. Host robert, lynchburg, virginia. Independent. Caller i have a couple of statements i would like to make and i hope you hear me out. The reason im calling and my thing is, the transfer should go smoothly since President Trump got his briefing from president obama when he came in office. And you can tell that trump cares nothing about the american people. If he did, he would do that. But we have 200 years of transfer of power between one president and the other. Here we are with trump, he want a recount. We had never had no problem before this until he came in office and wanted to make all of these changes. He would rather go out and play golf than attend to the covid19. Host all right, let me hear from max as well who is in naples, florida. Then we will get a response. Caller good morning. I want to echo what the two of you scholars said. The two before me. The gentleman was very complete. I would like to ask the gentleman, what harm could assumingoccur, even that the Election Results were overturned by giving the president elect and Vice President elect for lacks a to the information . They are loyal americans, and they are devoted to this country. I cant see that there would be any harm whatsoever. Benefit. Ry would host mr. Graff . Guest so, the literal risk is that there is a limited amount of transition funding. Is spent byt money the federal government it would have to be replenished. Seems to me tot be a decidedly manageable risk in the grand scheme of the need to understand exactly how the federal government works. Know, arguably the most complex company in the history of the world if you look at it. You know, trillions of dollars in annual spending, millions of employees, a footprint and physical presence in every state and territory of the united andes, as well as personnel needs and equities in almost literally every country in the world. An huge enterprise. There are going to be 4000 new employees that ident will have to select in order to come in and get his arms around this government. You know, under the best of circumstances it takes a smooth transition and possibly still a for an two administration to get up and running and be able to really understand how to do its job well. Again, we are not living through the best Case Scenario. Day, ithour, they by matters whether joe biden is able to fully engage in this role or not. Host i will point out a story to our viewers as well. Why biden is crowdfunding his transition. Biden has already raised reportedly 10 million. Garrett graff, we have to leave it there. Thank you very much for your time. Guest thank you so much for having me. Host joining us this morning is michael leavitt. He is the former health and Human Services secretary in the george w. Bush administration. Wornnor leavitt, you have many hats over your career. One of them is also helping a campaign prepare for transition. You did that for mitt romney. Election,win that explain the process for when