Good evening. I'm John Yang. On this Labor Day weekend, there's been no holiday from the turmoil and controversy at the agency in charge of protecting the American public's health.

Several CDC leaders have resigned after the White House ousted the agency's new director, Dr. Susan Menares, after less than a month in the position.

Her lawyers say it's because she refused

to rubber-stamp unscientific directives and fire dedicated health experts. In just six months,

the agency has lost nearly half its budget, thousands of employees, and is caught in a political

struggle as Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. moves to reshape the nation's vaccine policies.

In an essay in The New York Times this weekend, Democratic Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont called for Kennedy's resignation.

Ali Rogan sat down with Dr. Richard Besser, who was acting CDC director in the Obama administration.

He's now CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, which we should note is a funder of PBS

News.

Dr. Richard Besser, thank you so much for joining us. You've been in communication with

Dr. Menares. What is your understanding of what Secretary Kennedy asked her to do that was really a red

line for her? Yeah, you know, it was really coincidental. She and I had a meeting scheduled for

Wednesday. I reach out to all directors of the CDC to offer my support. And she thanked me and said that she didn't expect to be

in the position long, that she had two lines that she would not cross when she took the job.

One was she would never do anything that was illegal. And she was asked to fire her leadership

team, which she felt was illegal, given that they were outstanding public servants. And then the

other was she would not promote anything that wasn't supported by the best science. And she was

asked by the secretary to agree to approve any recommendations that came out of the

immunization advisory committee to the CDC. She refused and expected that shortly after our call, she would be

dismissed. The other CDC leaders who resigned at the same time she was fired have said that

similarly, they simply could not serve at the CDC any longer. How do you think these departures are going to affect

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