This is a rush transcript of "Fox News Sunday" on July 11, 2021. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

CHRIS WALLACE, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: I'm Chris Wallace.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott leaving the pushback to President Biden's

policies and calling a special session filled with hot button GOP

priorities.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

WALLACE (voice-over): From changing voting laws to border security,

abortion, and critical race theory, lawmakers in Austin are meeting to

tackle it all. We'll discuss what's on their agenda and what's not. Plus, a

possible election challenge from a Hollywood heavyweight.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott, only on "FOX News Sunday".

Then --

JOSEPH R. BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're ending America's

longest war.

WALLACE: President Biden moves up the deadline for U.S. troops to pull out

of Afghanistan, even as the Taliban advances. We'll ask Pentagon Press

Secretary John Kirby what it means for America's national security.

Plus, sharp reaction from the administration's door-to-door vaccine drive.

REP. RONNY JACKSON (R-TX): This is still an experimental vaccine being

used under emergency use authorization. It's none of their business who's

had it and who hasn't had it.

WALLACE: We'll ask our Sunday panel about the controversy as the delta

variant surges.

All, right now, on "FOX News Sunday".

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALLACE (on camera): And hello again from FOX News in Washington.

Well, there's an old-fashioned political showdown in Texas right now that

could shake next year's midterm campaign across the country. The battle

geared up in May when Democrats fled the state capital to block new voting

laws the GOP wanted to pass.

Now, the governor is called state legislatures back into a special session

to deal with that and other issues like the border wall, transgender

students sports, and critical race theory.

In a moment, we'll have an exclusive in every with the governor of Texas,

Greg Abbott.

But, first, let's bring in Casey Stegall in Dallas with a look at what all

the fighting is about -- Casey.

CASEY STEGALL, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Chris, good morning to you.

The agenda is a mix of both unfinished business and a few new items, but

they are all measures that appeal, no doubt, to conservative voters.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

STEGALL (voice-over): Efforts by Republicans to pass so-called "election

security measures" died with a late-night Democrat walkout at the end of

the regular session.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A quorum is apparently not present.

STEGALL: They are now redoubled as House Bill 3 and Senate bill 1

introduced after the gavel on Thursday. The voting rights advocates

critical of the election reform bill say the efforts and plans to redraw

congressional districts will effectively disenfranchise low income Texans

and voters of color. Texas Democrats are promising not to back down.

NICOLE COLLIER (D), TEXAS STATE REPRESENTATIVE: We're defiant. We will

defy the push to suppress our votes.

STEGALL: Also on the agenda, border security. The governor meeting this

weekend with border sheriffs to get updates on the security effort.

GOV. GREGG ABBOTT (R), TEXAS: They have incredible needs that have to be

met if they're going to be able to handle this massive influx.

STEGALL: Governor Abbott is up for reelection next year and faces two

primary challengers.

Last week, actor Matthew McConaughey teased a possible centrist run for the

governor's mansion.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

STEGALL (on camera): Republicans no doubt are banking on a victory during

this special session, with also hopes to energize the voting base and the

conservative voters ahead of next year's midterms -- Chris.

WALLACE: Casey Stegall reporting from Dallas -- Casey, thank you.

And joining us now, Texas Governor Greg Abbott.

Governor, welcome back to "FOX News Sunday."

Joining us now, Texas Governor Greg Abbott.

Governor, welcome back to "FOX News Sunday".

ABBOTT: My pleasure. Thank you, Chris.

WALLACE: Let's start with the voting bill that Casey was talking about.

That became the big issue when Democrats were successfully able to block it

in a regular session. Here is the -- a Democratic state legislator. Take a

look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GINA HINOJOSA (D), TEXAS STATE REPRESENTATIVE: We do not have a voter

fraud problem in the state of Texas. Our secretary of state testified that

elections in Texas were safe and secure. The 2020 election was safe and

secure.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: The Texas attorney general's office spent 22,000 man-hours

looking for evidence of voter fraud in the 2020 election and they

apparently came up with 16 cases -- 16 -- of people filing false addresses

on their voter registration.

So, my question, Governor, is, is this a problem in search of a solution?

ABBOTT: Absolutely not, Chris. Remember this, and that was before that I

was governor, I was the attorney general of Texas and I prosecuted voter

fraud cases in the entire state and my successor, Ken Paxton, has been

prosecuting voter fraud across the state, including the most recent arrests

and indictments just taken place this past Friday.

However, I have to disagree with the statement that was just made as well

as the public perception because I'm going to give you the words of a

federal district judge appointed by Barack Obama and the federal district

judge said that voter fraud occurs, quote, "in abundance" as it involves

ballot harvesting.

On top of that, Barack Obama and the Biden demonstration, when they were in

office, they came down to the state of Texas to send an FBI team as well as

a U.S. attorney to investigate and to prosecute a voter fraud scheme where

cocaine was being used to buy absentee ballots.

I will tell you this also, Chris, and that is even Democrats in the Texas

House of Representatives, they agree that as it concerns mail-in ballots,

that is an area where improving the mail-in ballot system is a way to

achieve greater election integrity, so what Texas is doing is we're making

it easier to vote by adding more hours of early voting then we had in

current law, but also making it harder to cheat with regard to mail-in

ballots.

WALLACE: Well, Governor, let me ask you, though, about two other things

that the GOP bills would do. I want to put them up on the screen. They

would ban 24-hour voting and they would ban drive-through voting. Now,

there was no allegation of any fraud in either of those. Harris County, the

Houston area, employed both of those and more than half of the voters who

showed up were people of color. So, you say you want to make it easier to

vote, that's going to make it harder to vote and the question is why make

it harder for some Texans to vote unless the point is to suppress voting by

people of color?

ABBOTT: So you mentioned a couple of things that need to be responded to.

One, you mentioned how Harris County did this and it was Harris County --

for your viewers, Harris County is where Houston, Texas, is located. Now,

let's go back to Article 1, Section 4 of the United States Constitution

where it says in there that it is the states, not counties that have the

authority to regulate elections.

And despite that constitutional mandate, this past election, Harris County,

a county, tried to create its own election system that had never been used

in the state of Texas. It was not used in the other parts of the state of

Texas, and so what the state of Texas is doing --

(CROSSTALK)

WALLACE: But, Governor, why not -- why not let it go on?

(CROSSTALK)

WALLACE: Governor, I guess the question is if 24-hour voting worked, why

not continue it?

ABBOTT: Well, first, I can tell -- I'm going to answer questions

specifically, but you need to go back to elections before now because the

same allegations were made when Texas passed a voter ID law, and everyone

said the exact same thing, this is going to disenfranchise people of color,

it will reduce voting. And the fact of the matter is, after we passed voter

ID, we increasingly saw every election cycle, more people go voted, they

did not make it harder to go vote. It was easier to go vote.

And the same thing applies here and that is with 24-hour voting, one thing

that we want to make sure that we have is integrity in the ballot box

system and we need to have poll watchers and monitors and, candidly, it's

hard even for a county to get people to be watching the polls 24 hours a

day. We are providing more hours per day for voting to make sure that

anybody of any type of background, any type of working situation, is going

to have the opportunity to go vote.

With regard to the drive-thru voting -- listen, this violates the

fundamentals of the way voting and for integrity has always bee achieved

and that is the sanctity of the ballot box. Now, if you do drive-thru

voting, are you going to have people in the car with you and it could be

somebody from your employer, or somebody else, who may have some coercive

effect on the way that you would cast your ballot which is contrary to, you

go into the ballot box alone and no one there watching over your shoulder

so that your -- the way you vote, only you will know what that vote will

be. And to allow other people to pile into a car with you, it will alter

that.

In addition to, it would violate state law because in state law, we have

prohibitions on electioneering close to where people cast their votes. If

you're doing drive-thru voting, this is going to be electioneering. It

could be on the bumper sticker in the car right in front of you.

We do still, however, Chris, provide what's called curbside voting for

those who qualify for curbside voting, that continues to be in place.

The bottom line, Chris, is Harris County, under the Constitution, is not

allowed to come up with their own rules. What Texas is doing where, by

adding more hours, we're making it easier for people (ph) to go vote.

One last point, Chris, and that is if you look at the hours of voting that

Texas provides, it is far more hours of voting than exists in the state

where our current president voted in where they had exactly zero hours of

early voting. It's far easier to vote in the state of Texas than it is in

Delaware and yet nobody is claiming that there is some type of voter

suppression taking place in Delaware.

WALLACE: Governor, let me ask you about the special session in general

because some Democrats say -- and this is the word they use -- that you are

using it to pander to Trump supporter's on the far right of the Republican

Party.

I want to put up some of the key agenda items: voting reform, as we talked

about. Border security, social media censorship, transgender student

athletes, critical race theory, abortion.

And your critics point out that what isn't on the agenda for the special

session is the electrical grid in Texas, which broke down during the deep

freeze last winter. A hundred -- more than 150 people were killed, more

than 4 million Texans lost their power during that.

And the question is, why wouldn't you address an issue like that that

affects people's everyday lives?

ABBOTT: So, you raised two issues and let me answer both of them. One is

if you look at all these issues that are on the special session agenda.

These aren't new items. All of these items were up on the agenda during the

regular session. They got close to the finish line and the only reason why

they didn't get across the finish line is because, as you pointed out

earlier, the Democrats decided to abandon their job and walk off the job,

did not give us the time to get those other items across the finish line.

So, all we're trying to do is to continue to achieve exactly what we were

trying to achieve during the regular session.

I need to point out to you, Chris, exactly why the power grid is not on the

special session, and that is because during the regular session, there were

robust laws that were passed by the Texas legislature that provide all the

changes that are needed to make sure that we will have an effective power

grid.

I must point out, Chris, one very important thing that most people do not

know, and that is, what was the main cause of the power grid failure in the

wintertime, and it's nothing what anybody knows. The main cause of the

power grid failure of the state of Texas actually was a failure by the

power generators in Texas to file a simple document with ERCOT, the

Electric Reliability Council of Texas.

WALLACE: All right.

ABBOTT: And let me -- Chris, I need to explain this very quickly, and that

is in Texas, like in many other states, whenever there's going to be a

temporary shutdown of power in a state, there are certain areas that are

exempt from being shut down, such as hospitals, such as downtowns, such as

police stations. In Texas before the winter storm took place, power

generators and power transmission entities, they were not subject to not

being shut down. When ERCOT shut them down in the winter storm, they froze.

Had ERCOT not shut them down, this would have been a four-hour event as

opposed to a four-day event.

Now, what is required --

(CROSSTALK)

WALLACE: Governor, I've got limited time -- sir, I've got limited time.

And the question -- no, sir, the question I have is the power grid isn't

fixed. You talked about it being fixed by the legislature, but you had over

a thousand unplanned outages in June and ERCOT, the agency regulating is

already asking people in Texas to voluntarily conserve energy because it's

been in danger of being overloaded. So you haven't solved the problem.

ABBOTT: Real quickly, Chris, well, what happened in June did not have

enough time for all the changes that were made during the regular session

to go into effect. (VIDEO GAP) problem whatsoever what happened in June,

there were mechanical repairs that needed to be made to about 15 percent of

the natural gas and --

WALLACE: OK.

ABBOTT: -- coal-fired power plants. And during those repairs, there was no

blackouts, no rolling blackouts or anything like that. Just for a few hours

a day, calls for conservation.

WALLACE: Sir --

ABBOTT: Here's the important point, Chris, and that is turned out that

during the summertime, there were exactly zero people who lost power in the

summertime showing that the power grid does work very effectively.

WALLACE: All right, one last question. You've got 30 seconds to answer it.

You're up for reelection next year and you may face a real high-profile

challenger. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MATTHEW MCCONAUGHEY, ACTOR: Something I'm trying to look in the eye and

give honest consideration. What an awesome privilege and awesome

responsibility and awesome position of sacrifice and service, something to

consider.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Governor, how seriously do you take Matthew McConaughey as a

possible opponent?

ABBOTT: It doesn't matter what the name is, I take everybody very

seriously, and it shows -- I will tell you two things, and that is if you

look at my polling numbers, they are very, very strong. In addition to

that, I have $55 million in the bank already, and I'm a very aggressive

fund-raiser.

So I will have the resources and the backing of a lot of people across the

state of Texas to ensure that whoever decides to run against me, we will be

able to win.

WALLACE: Governor Abbott, thank you. Thanks for your time. I got to say,

some of your fellow Republican governors stick to friendly venues as life

preservers. I appreciate you coming on and being willing to answer all of

our questions, sir.

ABBOTT: Thank you, Chris.

WALLACE: Up next, we'll bring in our Sunday group to discuss the new Biden

push to go door-to-door to promote vaccinations. Why has that set off some

people?

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: We need to go community by community, neighborhood by neighborhood,

and oftentimes door-to-door literally knocking on doors to get help for the

remaining people protected from the virus.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: President Biden laying out a new push to get Americans vaccinated

as the effort in this country has plateaued.

And it's time now for our Sunday group.

Marc Short, former chief of staff to Vice President Pence. Julie Pace,

Washington bureau chief for "The Associated Press", and Charles Lane from

"The Washington Post."

Julie, let me start with you. I think it's fair to say that President

Biden's door-to-door comments started quite a controversy about his effort

to get more people vaccinated. How frustrated is the White House by the

fact that a third of all Americans are, it seems, pretty resolute in

refusing to get vaccinations? And do they have a real plan to deal with

this?

JULIE PACE, WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS: I think this

has become one of the biggest frustrations for the Biden White House. You

know, they went into this vaccination campaign always expecting that there

was going to be some group of Americans that was going to be hesitant or

resistant to getting a vaccine but they thought that they would be able to

overcome that hesitancy with more information and with proof that

vaccinations are working. And what they found is that it's really hard to

get that number to budge and that number is larger than I think they

expected initially.

And so, you've seen this effort to start to lean into the idea of really

personal messaging. Biden floating the idea of essentially a door-to-door

campaign, and I think they were then additionally frustrated by the

blowback to that because it did get a bit misconstrued, the idea that these

are people who are going to be coming with clipboards to check off whether

you are vaccinated or not, that there was some sort of government survey,

which is not really what they're talking about, they're talking but

essentially trying to take trusted people and communities to make the pitch

to people who are hesitant at this point, and they do think that that kind

of personal interaction is the best way to get past some of the

misinformation, frankly, that a lot of people are holding on to, to avoid

getting vaccinated.

WALLACE: Marc, how do you feel about this idea of community -- to

community door-to-door intervention, and you know, they say these aren't

government officials. They are just volunteers because their community has

a stake in people get in vaccinated. How do you feel about that effort?

MARC SHORT, FORMER CHIEF OF STAFF TO MIKE PENCE: Well, Chris, I think

that's really a medical miracle that we have three vaccines within the

first year and I think it's an incredible accomplishment, frankly, that 70

percent of Americans have at least had one dose of the vaccination. I think

at this point, there really isn't a lack of information or a lack of

access. The people who are choosing to not get vaccinated are doing so for

their own reasons.

And so, I think at some point Americans expect the right to make your own

choice on health, and I think that probably better resources could be

expended, perhaps, sending people down to the southern border where they

seems to be a greater influx of COVID coming across with the free access

than trying to send community organizers to people's households.

WALLACE: I got to commend you on that pivot, Marc, that was very well

done.

Chuck, let me ask you about this, because there's a fine line here. On the

one hand, I think the government does have an interest in making sure that

people are vaccinated or trying to at least give them that option. But on

the other end, you do run the risk of looking like big brother. And we saw

that when HHS Secretary Becerra was asked about whether or not the govern -

- it's the government's business who's been vaccinated.

And here was his answer this week.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

XAVIER BECERRA, HHS SECRETARY: It is absolutely the government's business,

it is taxpayer's business if we have to continue to spend money to try to

keep people from contracting COVID and helping reopen the economy.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Chuck, Becerra -- the blowback was so fierce, Becerra had to put

out a statement about, is it government's business, saying no, the

government is not going to set up a database from this door-to-door thing

and try to say, here's who's been vaccinated and here's who's not been

vaccinated. This is delicate.

CHARLES LANE, THE WASHINGTON POST: Sure, it's delicate and you get the

feeling that the unvaccinated and the White House are sort of talking past

each other. If you look at the data about who is unvaccinated, they are

people who tend to be more in rural America and small-town America than in

the big cities of the coasts.

And by nature, those people are little bit more distrusting of government,

so I think the Biden the administration, with the best of intentions, and

with no real threat to anyone's privacy, messaged this very poorly. I'm

also struck by the fact that the government seems to not want to try to

give people incentives, you know, monetary and other incentives to take the

vaccine.

There's a very interesting piece of poll data from Kaiser Family

Foundation, a quarter of the unvaccinated say that they would go and get it

if that got them into a lottery for a million dollars. So I sort of think

this calls for some creative thinking to get that last few people --

there's about a 20 percent hard-core that's never going to do it, but maybe

another five or 10 percent would be persuadable, maybe with some more

incentives.

WALLACE: And in fact as we know, some states like Ohio have set up those

lotteries and incentives.

Julie, I want to turn to another big issue that I was discussing with

Governor Abbott and that is this question of new voting laws, voting

restrictions. The president met with civil rights leaders this week and,

you know, when you've got these red states like Texas imposing the

restrictions, when you've got the Democrats in Congress with their big

reform bill which seems, at least for now, to be dead and you have the

Supreme Court, which just in its final week of its session upheld two laws

in Arizona about voting restrictions.

How -- let me put it this way, does the Biden White House have a plan as to

how they're going to deal with this pullback on voting in the country?

PACE: Well, I think what you're going to start to see over the next couple

of weeks is a pivot from Democrats in the White House to move away from the

focus on this big sprawling piece of voting legislation that, you're right,

is pretty much dead in the water on the Hill right now and a focus more on

restoration of pieces of the Voting Rights Act.

Now, that is difficult even though it is more narrow than the bigger piece

of legislation in one of the things that Democrats are keeping in mind as

they try to pursue that legislation is that this is almost certainly going

to end up back in the Supreme Court. So, they're trying to craft this

legislation in a way that could address them of the concerns we've seen

from some of the more conservative justices, including in the Arizona case

that we just got the ruling out a few weeks ago.

But this is going to be a bit of a slog through the summer to try to get

that voting rights legislation passed. If they do, you could fully expect

that to end up in the courts.

WALLACE: And quickly, Marc, we got less than a minute left. I mean,

there's no real reason to think that would pass muster in the Senate

either, wouldn't it? Are you going to get 10 Republicans to go into the

John Lewis Voting Act?

SHORT: No, of course not, Chris. I think that unfortunately there's a

false dichotomy right now in the nation where it's like if you're

supportive of these election reforms, that somehow you're accused of

believing there was widespread fraud and it was stolen, or otherwise,

you're like Major League Baseball, which requires a photo ID to pick up a

ticket at Will Call, but says if your state imposes voter ID and a

presidential election then you're racist and if we're going to move in all-

star game from Georgia to Colorado.

I think is a lot of people who fall somewhere in between, which is to say

there was not widespread fraud but because of all the problems of COVID,

you had states making unilateral decisions from unelected people who are

extending voting days or allowing ballot harvesting and as Governor Abbott

said in your last segment, that belongs to state legislatures to make those

decisions for each state and the people can vote them out if they don't

like the changes they make. But that's the appropriate process in the

democratic system that we have.

WALLACE: All right, panel, we have to take a break here. We'll see you a

little later in the program.

Up next, we go live to Afghanistan as U.S. forces pull out and the Taliban

makes gains. And we'll speak with a top Pentagon official about the end of

the U.S. mission.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WALLACE: Coming up, President Biden defends his decision to pull U.S.

troops out of America's longest war.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BIDEN: The United States did what we want to do in Afghanistan.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: We'll ask a top Pentagon official what it means for our national

security, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CHRIS WALLACE, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: After 20 years, 2,400 American military

deaths and $4 trillion, U.S. troops are leaving Afghanistan. And they're

leaving behind a fractured Afghan government, a surging enemy, and an

uncertain future.

In a moment, we'll speak with Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby about

what it means for U.S. national security.

But, first, let's turn to Greg Palkot in Kabul with the latest on the

situation on the ground there.

Greg.

GREG PALKOT, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Chris, we have been back on the

ground here in Afghanistan for three days now and there has been no let-up

in fighting. New reports today of clashes between the Taliban and Afghan

government forces in a very important southern Afghan city of Kandahar.

Diplomats said to be evacuating as the trouble spreads nationwide.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

PALKOT: The Taliban on the move, seizing district after district across

Afghanistan this past week, gaining control of stretches of the country's

borders, including key crossings. The Afghan military often giving up

without a fight. Militants displaying commandeered U.S. weaponry.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): It is clear to you and to all the

world that the Taliban has the control of 85 percent of Afghanistan's

territory.

PALKOT: That claim denied by the Afghan government as it said over the

weekend it was taking back some overrun territory and announcing high

Taliban death tolls, also unconfirmed.

What is sure is the bulk of U.S. troops have departed. The hasty exit

including from the main Bagram base, triggering the Taliban conquests,

including a renewed threat to the rights of girls and women under a

passable Taliban rule, people tell us they're afraid.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In our country, everybody, every second, every minute we

are in the fear -- we live in fear.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is something that happened suddenly in Afghanistan

because of the withdrawal of the U.S. troops.

PALKOT (on camera): People want to get out of Afghanistan now?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Afghanistan, yes.

PALKOT: Why?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's hard to live here.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PALKOT: By the way, we were out at that huge Bagram Air Base today. We

spoke to Afghan soldiers there. And they told us they were surprised and

unprepared for the speed and the manner of the U.S. troops exit from that

base. Unsettling times all around.

Chris.

WALLACE: Greg Palkot reporting from Kabul.

Greg, thanks for that.

And joining us now from the Pentagon, Press Secretary John Kirby.

John, the U.S. has spent almost two decades training up the Afghan military

and the police. We've spent over $88 billion over that time training them

up. Why are they failing so miserably in repelling the Taliban?

JOHN KIRBY, PENTAGON PRESS SECRETARY: Well, you're right, Chris, they have

much more capacity than they've ever had before, much more capability. And

they've got an air force, a very capable air force helping defend their

troops on the ground. They've got very sophisticated special forces who

have been in the fight, and they're brave fighters.

So this is a moment of leadership. And I -- you heard the president talk

about that the other day. It's their right and responsibility now to defend

their citizens and their country. And I think when we look back, whatever

the outcomes are, Chris, we're going to look back and we're going to be

able to say that it came down to leadership, civilian leadership and

military leadership in the field.

Now, the one thing that we can assure our Afghan partners is, while we

aren't going to been the ground with them going forward, we are not walking

away from this relationship. We're going to continue to support them from a

financial perspective, logistical perspective and certainly air craft

maintenance. We're not walking away from this relationship.

WALLACE: Yes, but -- but, John, your talk about how well set up the Afghan

military is. They're giving up huge swaths of the country. The Taliban now

say that they control 85 percent of the country. I know you dispute that.

But the Long War Journal, which tracks this kind of thing, estimates that

13 million Afghans now live in areas controlled by the Taliban, 10 million

in areas controlled by the government --

KIRBY: Yes.

WALLACE: And 9 million in contested areas. And as you just heard Greg

Palkot report, the Taliban is now fighting for control of the second

largest city in the country, Kandahar, and people are fleeing the country.

Are you surprised that the Taliban is making these kinds of sweeping

advances so quickly?

KIRBY: We're certainly watching with deep concern, Chris, the deteriorating

security situation and the violence, which is, of course, way too high, and

the advances and the momentum that the Taliban seems to have right now.

I mean we're not -- we're not unmindful of that, Chris. We're -- we're

watching it and monitoring it, which is why we are, again, working with our

Afghan partners to encourage them to use the capacity and the capability

that we know they have. And we know that they know how to defend their

country. This is a time for them to step up and to do exactly that.

WALLACE: The big question from the U.S. point of view is, if the Taliban

ends up taking over the country, which is certainly a possibility, will

that increase the terror threat to the U.S. homeland?

Here is Republican Congressman Michael Waltz.

Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MICHAEL WALTZ (R-FL): Al Qaeda will come roaring back in the wake of

an Afghanistan -- of a Taliban take over, much like ISIS did when Obama

pulled out of Iraq. And we saw what happened there with attacks across the

Middle East, Europe, and the United States.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: John, President Biden talks and talked just this last week about

our being able to -- to blunt the terror threat from, quote, over the

horizon, which means from not in country in Afghanistan.

KIRBY: Right.

WALLACE: But our closest military bases to Afghanistan are more than a

thousand miles away. Are we really going to rely on that to protect the

U.S. homeland from increased terror threats if terror groups find new safe

havens in Afghanistan?

KIRBY: We always want to find additional options, Chris. That's why we're

working with neighboring countries that are closer to Afghanistan to see

what the possibilities are. And we're doing that as briskly and as

energetically as we can to find additional options.

That said, Chris, and you know this, we have sophisticated and -- and

robust, over the horizon capabilities even without that.

Obviously, closing down space and time would certainly make it easier and

faster for us to deal with any kind of threat emanating out of Afghanistan

towards the homeland, but we have the ability to do it even from afar, even

from those bases in the Middle East, an aircraft carrier that's off in the

Indian Ocean, we can do that. And we've proven that we can done that, even

in recent years, in places like Libya. It's not like we haven't done this

before or that there's a -- a scrap of earth that we can't reach if we

absolutely need to.

WALLACE: But -- but in fairness, when you talk about Libya, we think of

Benghazi and the fact that when that embassy was under attack -- though I

understand we're not talking about that, we're talking about them hatching

plots, it took hours for U.S. resources --

KIRBY: Yes.

WALLACE: To get to Benghazi --

KIRBY: Right.

WALLACE: And -- and by the time they got there it was too late.

Let me -- let me move on to another subject.

There's also the question that I think a lot of Americans ask about the

millions of girls in Afghanistan, and women, the girls in schools, the

women leading full lives. What happens if the Taliban takes over and puts

all of those girls and women back under sharia law, puts the women back

under the burqa? Are we really in effect saying that's not our problem?

KIRBY: I think -- I think the progress of women and girls in Afghanistan is

the world's problem. It's everybody's problem. We, obviously, share the

concerns over the progress they've made and the progress they still have

yet to make. That's why we continue to call for a negotiated political

solution to the end of this war that is Afghan-led, that the Afghan people

have a voice in saying and it's not imposed on them outside the country.

It's got to be Afghan-led in a peaceful, negotiated sentiment so that that

kind of progress can continue.

The other thing I'd say, Chris, is that we -- the president's made clear,

we're going to keep a diplomatic presence in Kabul. That means keeping

diplomats at it. That means continuing the programs and the initiatives

that we continue to espouse for women and girls, for literacy, for

education, for advancement, and for reform. We're still going to be

committed to those programs going forward.

WALLACE: But -- but diplomacy and peace negotiations, if the U.S. is out,

we have lost, and, more importantly, the Afghan government has lost any

leverage with the Taliban.

KIRBY: You had this argument that somehow if you have boots on the ground

all of a sudden you have all this leverage has not panned -- that hasn't

exactly panned out the last five, ten, 15 years, Chris, when we had

100,000 troops on the ground. So the idea that if you have boots on the

ground all of a sudden that gives you leverage has not exactly been the

historical record so far.

What -- what we do have is a lot of diplomatic leverage and we're using

that. We are still involved in trying to broker forward a negotiated

settlement in Afghanistan. And nothing has changed about our commitment to

that. And the rest of the international community also needs to stay

committed to that kind of an outcome so that it's Afghan-let's so that this

kind of progress doesn't fall by the wayside.

WALLACE: I -- I want to talk quickly about two other subjects with you.

President Biden talked to Vladimir Putin on Friday --

KIRBY: Right.

WALLACE: About continued cyberattacks from that country on the U.S. A

senior official afterwards, on a readout of the call, said that the -- the

U.S. will, quote, take any necessary action to defend our infrastructure.

What kind of measures is the Pentagon's cyber command prepared to take to

defend the U.S.?

KIRBY: Chris, I think you could understand the last thing I'm going to do

on national TV is talk about cyber operations in any great detail.

What -- what I can tell you is that we -- our job is to provide options to

the -- to the president. Options in the cyber realm. Options outside the

cyber realm. And just because you have -- you face a cyberattack doesn't

mean that that's how you -- you necessarily respond in kind. There's a -- a

whole range of tools at the president's disposal. Some of those tools

reside here at the Pentagon and at cyber command, and we're going to be

prepared and ready to tee up those options for him whenever he might need

them.

WALLACE: And would it be fair to say that the president has at his disposal

a -- a wide set of cyber options from the Pentagon if he decides to go in

that direction?

KIRBY: That is very fair to say, yes, sir.

WALLACE: OK.

Let's finally turn to Haiti.

The -- Haiti's government asked the U.S. to send troops there to deal with

the chaos in the country. Is the Pentagon prepared to send U.S. forces

there, first of all, to deal with the situation, and, secondly, now that

we've had the assassination of Haiti's president, is the situation there

and the disarray, is that a matter of U.S. national security?

KIRBY: Well, Chris, as for your first question, we are aware of the request

by the Haitian government. We're analyzing it, just like we would any other

request for assistance here at the Pentagon. It's going through a review.

I'm not going to get ahead of that process.

And -- and today an interagency team, largely from the Department of

Homeland Security and the FBI, are heading down to Haiti right now to see

what we can do to help them in the investigative process. And I think

that's really where our energies are best applied right now in helping them

get their arms around investigating this incident and figuring out who's

culpable, who's responsible and how best to hold them accountable going

forward. That's where our focus is right now.

WALLACE: And -- and -- and, real quickly, is what's going on in Haiti, is

that a matter of U.S. national security?

KIRBY: I think we are watching the situation very closely, Chris. I don't

know that we're at a point now where we can say definitively that our

national security is being put at risk by what's happening there. But,

clearly, we -- we value our Haitian partners. We -- we -- we value

stability and security in that country. And that's why we want to send a

team down there today to -- to help them get their arms around exactly what

happened and what's the best way forward.

WALLACE: John, thank you.

KIRBY: Thank you.

WALLACE: Thanks for sharing part of your weekend with us. Always good to

talk with you, sir.

KIRBY: You too, sir, thank you.

WALLACE: Up next, we'll ask the panel what happens if the Taliban take over

Afghanistan.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I will not send another

generation of Americans to war in Afghanistan with no reasonable

expectation of achieving a different outcome.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: President Biden standing his ground on pulling U.S. troops out of

Afghanistan as the Taliban make dramatic advances across that country.

And we're back now with the panel.

Marc, President Biden is ordering this pullout, but President Trump, former

President Trump, was planning to do the same thing if he were reelected.

And, in fact, he had wanted to get all troops out by May 1st.

As you look at what's happening in Afghanistan now, any second thoughts

about this policy of total withdrawal?

MARC SHORT, FORMER CHIEF OF STAFF TO MIKE PENCE: Well, Chris, I think that

President Trump was right to initiate it and I actually think that

President Biden is correct to complete the withdrawal.

I think that Americans, men and women in uniform, should not be police

keepers across the globe, nor should we be involved in nation building.

Having said that, I do know that, at the end, the intelligence community

came to the Trump administration and said, if we could at least keep a hub

at -- at a base their because we've had so many effective counterterrorism

covert operations with special forces and that would not require 100,000

troops, it would require enough troops to fortify a base.

And if you look at Afghanistan, strategically located between Iran and

China, having that base to -- continue to do covert operations I think

would be beneficial to America.

So I support the withdrawal of the majority of the troops. I think it's the

right policy that the Biden administration is completing. I think it's

unfortunate, though, that the intelligence community was -- was not

successful in getting their wish to maintain some -- some base of troops

there to allow us to continue to do counterterrorism operations.

WALLACE: Do -- do you have any reason to believe that President Trump would

have kept a counterterrorism force there?

SHORT: No, I don't -- I don't think that at the time that their arguments

made their way with President Trump either. I think he was anxious to

withdraw all troops and -- and I think that that's unfortunate. I think it

would have been good -- better to have had a base for the intelligence

community to continue to do covert operations.

WALLACE: Chuck, the president, President Biden, was categorical this week

that whatever happens in Afghanistan, ultimately it's -- it's their

problem.

Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It's up to the people of

Afghanistan to decide on what government they want, not us to impose the

government on them.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Chuck, the -- the flaw in that reasoning, of course, and you heard

it also from John Kirby, is the Afghan people may not get to decide their

government because it maybe won't be the U.S. that imposes it on them, it

will be the Taliban.

CHARLES LANE, "THE WASHINGTON POST": The way they're going to decide who's

the government in Afghanistan is probably through war. And that's on the

way. And that's why in that very good report we heard from Kabul from Greg,

so many people in that city were expressing fear about what's coming next.

It's absolutely true that this would have been Donald Trump's problem too -

- or his policy too, but it's now happening on Joe Biden's watch and it's

happening in some haste and I would say some unseemly haste. It's almost

like a bugout rather than a phased withdrawal.

And I think we all need to be concern, in addition to the humanitarian

impact this will have on Afghanistan itself, on the prestige and the

perceived power of the United States. I think one reason the Taliban is

being so aggressive is they are going to try to create the spectacle of

humiliating defeat similar to Vietnam in 1974, '75 for the United States,

not just to take back Afghanistan, but to create a spectacle in the world

that the United States is a weakens empire and a paper tiger.

And if that happens, and I hope it doesn't, it will be happening on Joe

Biden's watch and better -- for better or worse, he will own it.

WALLACE: I want to turn to the other big foreign policy story this week,

and that is the continued cyberattacks on the U.S. emanating from Russia.

It got serious enough that President Biden spoke to Russian President Putin

for an hour this week and then had this readout.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The United States expects, when

a ransomware operations is coming from his soil, we expect them to act if

we give them enough information to act on who that is.

REPORTER: You said, three weeks ago, there would be consequences. Will

there be, sir?

BIDEN: Yes.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

WALLACE: Julie, the president keeps saying to Putin, don't do it, don't do

it, and then it happens again and he repeats, don't do it.

Do they have a plan here as to how to deal with it?

JULIE PACE, WASHINGTON BUREAU CHIEF, "THE ASSOCIATED PRESS": Yes, you know,

this feels very similar to the arguments that we were hearing from the

Obama White House in the final month of that administration where there was

a similar message being delivered, largely privately at that point because

we were in the -- in the 2016 campaign, but the message was, we know you're

doing this, we know this is emanating from Russia and you need to stop, and

yet here we are several years later and this is still happening.

So I think, no, you know, the U.S. has not figured out at this point how to

get Russia to change its behavior or how to get Putin to crack down on some

of these bad actors within his country.

I do think that there is a pretty aggressive discussion happening within

the administration right now. John Kirby alluded to this. A lot of this is

going to be classified. A lot of this is going to be -- is -- the response

is going to be carried out in ways that we're not always going to see or

know publicly. But until we see a change in behavior emanating from Russia,

I think the answer to this has to be that, no, there is not an effective

plan at the moment.

WALLACE: Marc, there's a danger when you keep setting redlines and the

difference between what Obama was doing and what Biden was doing was Biden

made those red lines very public at the summit in Geneva. There's a danger

to setting red lines and then not enforcing them.

SHORT: Sure, Chris.

I think that previously the Obama administration often prosecuted

cyberattacks, like the DOJ investigation and a crime.

One thing that's been, I think, less reported is President Trump gave a lot

more latitude to our military and to our intelligence communities to

respond in kind to cyberattacks and to be aggressive with it. And I think

it deterred foreign actors who were looking to -- to -- to attack the

United States.

I don't know whether the Biden administration has relapsed to a previous

policy that's pursuing it more as a criminal investigation, as to whether

they're giving the same latitude to our military with cyberattacks. But I -

- I do know -- I do believe that we have the -- an extreme capability to

cripple other countries who conduct these attacks on us. And whether or not

our military is giving latitude to use them, I don't know right now.

WALLACE: Chuck, I've got about 30 seconds left.

If these cyberattacks continue, and they continued after the warning in

Geneva, now Putin's gotten another warning. If they continue, how much

runway does Joe Biden have left before he has to act?

LANE: I think he's got less runway now then he had before. And I think

Putin is loving this situation because this is a perfect way to harass the

United States and cause a perception of weakness by the president without -

- with deniability for Moscow and no cost to Putin.

WALLACE: Well, and that, of course, was the question, at some point, will

there be a cost to Putin?

Panel, thank you. See you next Sunday.

Up next, our "Power Player of the Week," cellist Yo-Yo Ma spreading hope

through his magical music.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

WALLACE: He's been a major figure in American music for decades. But as we

told you this winter, he found a new way to reach us during the pandemic.

Here's our "Power Player of the Week."

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

YO-YO MA, CELLIST: Since you can't be touched, you can't be caressed, the

music is the caress, is -- is that piece of humanity that is missing from

your aloneness and when you need it the most.

WALLACE (voice over): World-famous cellist Yo-Yo Ma on the role music can

play in the time of COVID. Despite quarantines and social distancing, Ma

has found ways to bring people closer together.

MA: This is a moment for invention. The thing that we then need to look at

is the delivery system.

WALLACE: And deliver he has. Ma began a project called Songs of Comfort,

where he posts video on social media playing his cello.

MA: One of my colleagues said, you know, maybe we could do what we usually

do in times of stress and disasters. How about if we do songs of comfort

and hope? I said, done.

WALLACE: Ma's videos have gotten almost 45 million views and he's invited

other artists to post their own songs of comfort, like James Taylor.

JAMES TAYLOR, MUSICIAN (singing): Trying not to try to hard. It's just a

(INAUDIBLE).

MA: I think we're all trying to figure out ways to find ways to help.

WALLACE: Music has always been a passion for Ma. Born in Paris, then raised

in New York City, he was a child prodigy, playing for President Kennedy at

age seven.

Over the years he's performed on a variety of stages, from Carnegie Hall to

"Sesame Street" to President Obama's first inauguration.

WALLACE (on camera): How difficult was it not to be in front of an

audience, on a stage, for all these months?

MA: It was not difficult for me because I think I was constantly in touch

with people. Music actually does play a part in helping.

WALLACE (voice over): And so Ma played songs of comfort for us and for you.

WALLACE (on camera): What a gift.

MA: Thank you so much, Chris.

WALLACE: Thank you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

WALLACE: You can hear more of Yo-Yo Ma's music on his album, "Songs of

Comfort and Hope."

Now this program note. Join me on Fox Nation as we mark what would have

been Nancy Reagan's 100th birthday. Our special "Nancy Reagan: An American

Story" is available to stream right now.

And that's it for today. Have a great week and we'll see you next FOX NEWS

SUNDAY.

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