0 out because it was jammed. are we to believe that this didn't get any communications out back to beijing because it was effectively jammed all the way through by either the intelligence agencies or the military? >> yeah, well, dealing with the first thing, it's obvious, i think, given the action we took against these three unidentified objects, we did not act accordingly when air space was about to be violated by the spy balloon in alaska, did not shoot it down, that reacted in i think what may be an overreaction to the others. he has to be absolutely clear what we are going to do about it. i don't think he's going to fess up to the fact that they may have made a mistake in permitting it to go across the united states. i believe he did, he's going to get questions around that. in terms of what did we learn and did we shut them down, i'm not a technology expert but my gut tells me we would never know for sure about that until we get ahold of the devices which we have in our hands now and are able to examine them. and that's why certainly if a spy balloon is going to enter the united states, we should destroy it before it has the opportunity to take that information. that just seems obvious to anybody looking at this and i think the american people get it. shoot it down before it can do harm. >> sandra: i'm just looking, just yesterday, 22 hours ago, prior to what we are about to hear from the president, mike mike pompeo, former secretary of state, general keane, sent out a statement, shooting down four objects over american territory is not normal. president biden owes the american people an explanation. news worthy that the president will be speaking moments from now. that being said, general, do you think we will learn anything about the balloon that china claimed and what it was able to retain during its time over american territory? i'm just reading directly from one of our own stories, a u.s. official said the balloon could have been externally maneuvered or directed to loiter over a specific target but it's unclear if chinese forces did so. do you expect any clarity on questions like that, general? >> i don't expect it, but it's obvious those who are now attempting to say the wind took it off course and moved it and maybe in a direction that china did not want, the absurdity is on the surface. we are talking about a balloon that sat owe an icbm nuclear field a couple days and transited near some other significant military bases, one i used to command, fort bragg, that is not the idle movement of the wind directing it and now appears people are trying to support the administration are coming up with these sort of lame justifications in terms of what took place. listen, the american people, i've been talking to them about this ever since this incident took place, they want to know really what happened, why did it happen, and what are we doing about it to make sure it does not happen again. the president has got to give some reassurance to the american people and maybe educate us a bit about this incident. we are trying to do it ourselves and help us understand some of the details and ramifications of it. but one of the things i want clarity on, what have we learned here about our own detection and our own surveillance of spy balloons going forward. are there places that are vulnerable. don't have to get into the specifics of it, but if there are, give the american people some assurances we found some gaps in the surveillance and detection capability and we are going to fix that as priority one. don't try to hide it. be honest about it. and that helps reassure trust and i think trust has broken down over this issue. take the politics out of it completely. it's not about a democratic or republican president, this is our commander in chief talking straight to the american people about the american people's own security, and this is job one for him. >> john: we'll see what he says, general, coming up. so far he said this to him was not a major incursion. a lot of people beg to differ. general jack keane, good to talk to you. appreciate it. >> sandra: thank you, general keane. >> john: peter doocy live at the white house and a lot of people are interested to hear what the president has to say, as jack keane was saying, shooting down objects in u.s. territory does not happen very often, unless i'm incorrect, the last time when george welch and ken taylor took down more than six japanese planes at pearl harbor. >> the first time the commander in chief actually talks about the command that he gave to deploy u.s. military assets over the u.s. for the first time in decades. why did he do it? we hope to find out in a few minutes. >> he will speak to the united states response of the aerial objects, the chinese high altitude surveillance balloon and putting the safety and security of the american people always first. >> should it impact the u.s. and china relations. vice president says it does not have to, does the president agree? the verbiage the white house is using, response to recent aerial objects, not saying balloons, not saying spycrafts or ufo, but recent aerial objects. and president biden's visit to walter reed for a physical, he did not have one in 2022, but in 2021, some acid reflux, stiffened gait from degenerative changes to his spine and some small benign polyps on his colon. and check-ups like this could influence a very important decision. president himself has said so. >> do you plan to run for re-election? >> yes. but look, i'm a great respector of fate. fate has intervened in my life many, many times. if i'm in the health i'm in now, if i'm in good health, then i would run again. >> that was from about two years ago, but it goes to show the results of today's physical could have very profound and potentially historic personal and political implications, john. >> john: sandra, are you still there? >> sandra: yes, hello, my microphone open now? peter, put this all together for us. we have the train derailment situation in ohio, pete buttigieg is being criticized for not being out there and more clear to help the communities on the ground and determining whether or not the air and water are safe. we are obviously awaiting information on these unidentified objects. there's a lot -- there's a lot on their plate right now. do you expect the president to only address the shot down objects in this speech? >> yes, it seems like they have been putting together over the last couple days a very specific, very narrowly focused set of remarks for him to give. to your point about the train derailment, that might be the thing that stuck out the most from the karine jean-pierre briefing a few minutes ago because she was asked about the official in palestine, ohio saying we haven't heard anything about the white house until two days ago. but white house officials insist the epa has been on it since the beginning, that's where there is a real difference of the story because the officials -- people -- there are plenty of examples of people in and around the area of the derailment who say nobody has showed up, nobody has called, no nothing. but here at the white house they say that's not the case. so at some point president biden might have to respond to that and explain exactly, why there is such a difference of opinion on something that should be pretty black and white, but today we just expect it to be about the unmanned, or the unknown aerial objects. >> john: he's at the auditorium and we have heard you and your colleagues have tried to shout a question at him, see if he takes one off script. we can hear that rain coming down. stay dry. >> sandra: thanks, peter. >> john: former defense secretary mark esper to talk more about this. mr. secretary, new information from the pentagon it was launched from an island, where the ep3 plane was forced down in 2001 after it collided with a chinese fighter. initially headed toward guam, then seemed to get picked up by an errant air current and headed to alaska, they watched it over alaska, over british columbia, and through montana and not until a civilian said what the heck is that and took a picture of it and started asking questions. senator john kennedy of louisiana thinks had that civilian not spotted the balloon, intelligence would have just watched this thing from the launch in china all the way across the pacific, across the united states and never said a peep about it. what do you think? >> first of all, i think it's a credible theory. my original question was what did we know and when did we know it, and if we knew it was headed our direction in the air space, why was the decision for the shootdown earlier, it could have been done once it entered the air space in part of the islands or alaska. and now that we know there was more time to make the decision and does beg the question, did they allow the balloon to pass because the white house did not want to disturb relations with beijing, particularly on the eve of tony blinken's trip to beijing. >> sandra: mr. secretary, thank you for joining. sandra here. we are told the president is making his way over to deliver this long-awaited speech to hear directly from the president on these unknown flying objects. we do know that he's going to be speaking after he directed the national security adviser, jake sullivan, to lead the interagency team for the procedures downing the china balloon, do you expect they will reveal protocol now? they did say they developed new protocol, i think it was karine jean-pierre at the white house briefing earlier this week, they have new protocols for taking down unidentified objects. would that reveal that? >> i hope so. i've been talking over a week we should review all of our policies when it comes to air space surveillance and the policy, manned, unmanned, commercial, noncommercial, and not just review the policy -- >> john: mr. secretary, if you could, hang with us. let's go to the president. >> high altitude balloon. our military, through norad, closely scrutinized our air space, including enhancing our radar to pick up more slow-moving objects above our country and around the world. they tracked three unidentified objects, one alaska, canada and over lake huron in the midwest. they acted in accordance for unidentified objects in u.s. air space. i gave the order to take down the objects due to civilian air traffic and could not rule out the surveillance risk of sensitive facilities. we acted in consultation with the canadian government, i spoke personally with prime minister trudeau from canada on saturday and acted out of abundance of caution and opportunity that allowed us to take down these objects safely. our military and the canadian military are seeking to recover the debris so we can learn more about these three objects. our intelligence community is still assessing all three incidences. they are reporting to me daily and will continue the urgent efforts to do so, and i will communicate that to the congress. we don't yet know exactly what the three objects were, but nothing right now suggests they were related to china's spy balloon program or surveillance vehicles from any other country. intelligence community's current assessment is these three objects were most likely balloons tied to private companies, recreation or research institution to study weather or conducting other scientific research. when i came into office i instructed our intelligence community to take a broad look at the phenomenon of unidentified aerial objects. we know companies, companies and countries and research organizations operate at altitudes, not nefarious, including research. i want to be clear, we don't have any evidence there is a sudden increase in the objects in the sky. we are seeing more of them, partially because of the steps we have taken to increase our radar, narrow our radar and adapting the approach to dealing with these challenges. that's why i've directed my team to come back to me with sharper rules for how we will deal with these unidentified objects moving forward, distinguishing between those that are likely to pose safety and security risk that necessitate action and those that do not. but make no mistake, if any object presents a threat to the safety and security of the american people i will take it down. i'll be sharing with congress these classified policy parameters when they are completed and they'll remain classified so we don't give a road map to our enemies to try to evade our offenses. going forward, these parameters will guide what actions we will take while responding to unmanned and unidentified aerial objects. keep adapting them as challenges evolve, if it evolves. in addition, i have directed my national security adviser to lead a government-wide effort to make sure we deal safely and effectively with the objects in the air space. a better inventory of unmanned airborne objects in space above the united states air space and make sure that inventory is accessible and up to date. second, we'll implement further measures to improve our capacity for unmanned objects in our air space. third, we'll update the rules and regulations for launching and maintaining unmanned objects in the skies above the united states of america. and fourth, my secretary of state will lead an effort to help establish a global -- common global norms in this largely unregulated space. these steps will lead to safer and more secure skies for our air travelers, military, scientists and people on the ground as well. that's my job as your president, commander in chief. as the events of the previous days have shown, we'll always act to protect the interest of the american people and the security of the american people. since i came to office we have developed the ability to identify, track and study high altitude surveillance balloons connected with the chinese military. when one of these high altitude surveillance balloons entered the air space over the continental united states, i gave the order to shoot it down when it was safe to do. it was the size of multiple school busses and a risk to people on the ground. instead we have tracked it closely, analyzed its capabilities and learned more about how it operates. and because we knew its path, we were able to protect sensitive sites against collection. we waited until it was safely over water which would not only protect civilians but also enable us to recover substantial components for further analytics, and then we shot it down sending a clear message, clear message the violation of our sovereignty is unacceptable. we'll act to protect our country and we did. now, this past friday we put restrictions on six firms that support the people's liberation army aerospace army, airships and balloons denying them access to u.s. technology. we briefed our diplomatic partners and allies around the world and know china's program and where the balloons have flown. some have raised concerns directly with china. our exports have lifted components of the payload off the ocean floor, analyzing them as i speak and what we learn will strengthen our capabilities. now, we'll also continue to engage with china as we have throughout the past two weeks. since the beginning of my administration, we seek competition, not conflict with china. not looking for a new cold war. i make no apologies and we will compete. and we'll responsibly manage that competition so it does not veer into conflict. this episode underscores the maintaining open lines of communications between the diplomats and military professionals. our diplomats will be engaging further and i will remain in communication with president xi. grateful for the work the last several weeks of the intelligence, diplomatic and military professionals who have proved once again to be the most capable in the world and thank you all. look, the other thing i want to point out, we are going to keep our allies and the congress informed of all we know and all we learn, and i expect to be speaking with president xi and i hope we have -- we are going to get to the bottom of this. i make no apologies for taking down that balloon. thank you very much. >> sir, there's been criticism this was -- criticism that this -- >> compromised by your family's business a break, man. >> criticism this was an >> you can come to my office and ask the question, we'll have more polite people. >> why have you chosen poland for the anniversary of the war and what's your message? >> speaking to president xi, mr. president. >> john: the president thinking about taking a couple of questions but could not decide which questioner to take it from, too many people shouting, he decided to turn and walk away. defense secretary in the trump administration mark esper hung throughs with all this. i wanted to point you to one thing the president said, talking about the three objects in alaska, in the yukon territory and lake huron. gave orders to take them down because of a risk to aviation and the fact we could not rule out surveillance of sensitive sites. but yet he led a spy balloon fly over the entire united states. there seems to be a contradiction there. >> yeah, to me that's the major unanswered question that remains, john. he did a good job and finally speaking to the american people, covered each of the incidents, at least the last three in some details. he talked about the policy framework going forward, i think it needs to be more public, he talked about it being classified, but the two things he did not cover, why didn't he shoot down the chinese balloon down when it was over alaska. that's number one. number two, he should have taken questions at the end. the reporters have a responsibility to ask questions the american people are asking and he simply passed the opportunity to do so. >> sandra: what do you believe is the m he is -- the message he sent to china there? >> we are not going to tolerate bad behavior and he wants to work with them, but i would liked him speaking about the strategic competition the united states and china are in, and china does not have our best interests in mind. american people need to understand and hear the competition between the united states and china is real and it's going to be unending, at least as long as xi jinping is in power and the communist party rules the country. that's what we are up against in the 21st century, the democracies against the autocracy. >> and he said we don't know what they were, likely tied to private companies, recreation or research. i mean, sounds like we shot down some weather balloons. >> yeah, that he is been my hunch all along, john, likely were not chinese spy balloons at that point. mainly because they entered from the north as compared to the southwest. in terms of the policy, he's kind of writing policy in realtime, the decision was if you don't know and it's unmanned and presents some type of safety or security to the united states as he said, we'll shoot it down. it goes back to the question you asked, and i think everybody is asking, why not shoot down the chinese spy balloon before it had the ability to traverse the united states for a week. >> sandra: if these were just weather balloons, wouldn't somebody have claimed them? >> i would think someone is missing a balloon somewhere, maybe they are embarrassed, maybe the administration knows, but somebody is missing three balloons, so i suspect we'll find out in due course. >> john: so just, if we are going to go after every weather balloon that happens to pass by or end up on this newly tuned radar, what's the cost associated to the u.s. taxpayer of doing that? you have to send up f-22 or f-16, firing off missiles at $400,000 apiece, the one over lake huron missed, pretty much a million dollars inside winder missiles there. how much is this going to cost the u.s. taxpayer in the overall? >> the bigger point i was hoping to here, ru