Secretary Duffy (00:00):
Content creator Paul Saladino, content creator Isabel Brown, and the CEO of Farmers Fridge, Luke Saunders. We're going to talk about health and airports in just a moment, but President Trump has frequently talked about ushering in the golden age in America. And I'm talking about ushering in the golden age of transportation. And so a lot of times I'll hear complaints and I take them to heart. There's cancellations and delays in our airspace. And so just to review, I've talked to you all about this quite a bit, but we have hired more air traffic controllers. We're up 20% year over year right now hiring more controllers. I've also asked air traffic controllers who are about to retire to actually stay on the job. We'll pay you a 20% upfront bonus if you don't retire. Again, bringing more air traffic controllers to make sure that we have less delays and less cancellations.
(00:58)
You've all heard about our old antiquated air traffic control system, hasn't been updated for decades. We have already transitioned a third of the fiber, or the copper to fiber. A third of it's already been done. Last week, we hired an integrator that's going to do the work of moving us from analog to digital. Deploy our radios, voice switches, and our radar. All of this in this phase of the project is going to be done by the end of 2028, which is President Trump's end of his term. I have another phase I have to do where I need another $20 billion from Congress. Hopefully that's going to come in short order.
(01:39)
I also announced a civility campaign. Asking people to bring their better angels, their kindness and their grace when they come to the airport. It can be stressful. There's things that happen that we can't predict. And if we all bring that better side of our personalities, the experience is going to be so much better. As we come into the Christmas season, as the guy who had nine kids, I know when you travel with kids, you can't always predict how they're going to behave. And sometimes when you take off or you land, your kids can become upset. And I would just note that parents when we travel this Christmas season who are going home to see families, they're doing their best to make sure they're comforting their kids who might be upset. I would just say, let's offer those parents who are doing the best they can a little bit of grace if you have one of those upset children on your airplane. I know the parents would appreciate that.
(02:38)
But as I've asked, what can Americans do as they travel to make the experience better, the response has been, "Well, what are you going to do to make the experience better for us?" And that's what we're here to announce today. So I'm announcing at DOT that we have $1 billion in funding for grant programs to make the experience better in airports. And it's pretty wide open on what airports want to ask for a grant, but it might be, I want to expand the play areas for kids. I want additional nursing pods for nursing mothers. Maybe I want a workout area where people might get some blood flow in doing some pull ups or some step ups in the airport. But it could be any range of things. Maybe you want to work, I know this is TSA, but we're going to help on this as well. Maybe you want to have a different lane for families to get through TSA. How can we make the experience better as you come through an airport?$1 billion is going to go to that.
(03:42)
But in addition, people have said, "Well, what are the airlines going to do to make the experience better?" So today I reached out to a majority of the CEOs of our major airlines and I said, "What can you do, airlines, to make the experience better for the traveling public?" And I'm looking forward to hearing back from our airlines on what they have in their future plans to improve the experience when we get on their airplanes and fly safely through the national airspace. I think it's important for us to recognize that we're all in this together, right? The traveling public, you have to do your part. The FAA, the DOT, we have to do our part, the airports have to do their part, and then the airlines have to step up and engage as well.
(04:32)
As I'm talking about what I can do at DOT, I also think, and we've had a lot of conversations about this, making the experience better is also, I think, making the experience healthier. And do we have healthier options in airports as we might spend an hour, we might spend five, eight hours on airplanes and in airports, and there has been no better leader on trying to make America healthy again than Senator Kennedy. And I'd like to turn the mic over to him to talk about what they're doing at Health and Human Services. Secretary.
Secretary Kennedy (05:03):
Thank you, Secretary Duffy. I want to thank you for your commitment to making our airports healthier. We both work for a boss who wants to be the most family friendly president in at least modern history. Sean has nine kids. I have seven kids. We both know what it's like to travel in the airport. There's three million Americans a day who go through airports and it's not in the past, it has not been healthy experience for them. I fly typically over the past 30 years, probably average 250 days a year in airports. And I can tell you that this is where healthy diets go to die. The food that's available in the airport, a lot of it tastes very good, but it's not very good for you. It's deep-fried food, it's sugar bombs, it's ultra processed foods, and all of them are going to leave you sicker than before you ate them.
(06:03)
And one of the things that Secretary Duffy is encouraging these airports to do is to open up new options like the one you see behind you, Farmer's Fridge, which actually provides really healthy food for travel so that you arrive feeling invigorated and robust and healthier.
(06:27)
Another experience that I've had with all these kids in airports is the availability of nursing spaces, nursing pods, nursing rooms. All of the ingenuity of corporate America, all the resources, all the resourcefulness has not produced an infant formula that is superior in nutrition and all the qualities that we want to the infant formula that God made, which is the infant formula in a mother's breast. We at HHS are encouraging mothers to breastfeed as long as possible because there is no better food for your brain, for your gut microbiome, for your physical growth, for your emotional growth, than what's in God-given breast milk. And this airport has some very, very good impressive facilities that we just toured, but a lot of airports are not very family friendly in that sense. And one of the projects that we're hoping that the airports will spend money on is improving the experience for mothers who want to travel with their babies.
(07:44)
And then finally, to give people, Americans, particularly children, the ability to have physical activities in the airport, have playgrounds. Our kids, one out of every five American kids is obese.
Secretary Kennedy (08:01):
About 75% of our kids are not eating the minimum for daily physical activity. Our children are spending on average more than five hours a day on recreational screen time. We got to give them other options. Part of that is our fault. We need to give other options to our kids. They're exercising, they're moving their bodies, they're developing their physical coordination, they're developing their physical confidence and all of the good qualities, character qualities that come with us. I'm very, very excited. HHS is very excited about working with our companions over at the Department of Transportation and Secretary Duffy and helping to develop these alternatives that are going to make flying more friendly, but also the travel experience healthier for every American so that we can make America healthy again as the president has directed us.
Secretary Duffy (09:04):
I would just note the President Trump's side. He has encouraged all of the departments to work together, to collaborate together because he knows when we all work together, we advance his agenda even further. And I'm grateful for him and I'm grateful to you, Senator Kennedy. I started a conversation, my daughter pointed out a video from Dr. Paul Saladino, where he was complaining about there was no pull-up bars in airports, which prompted me to call Secretary Kennedy to give me Paul's number to start the conversation. But he has been a leader in thinking about what do we have for food choices, but also movement choices in airports. And I'm grateful that he's here today with us, Paul Saladino.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Thank you, Secretary Duffy. It's good to be here with you both. When you think about it, airports are one of the most sedentary places that we are as Americans. The traveling experience in general is probably the single most sedentary thing that we do between sitting in an Uber to the airport, sitting in the airport, waiting for your flight, delayed flight, sitting on a flight for three or four hours, getting to your destination, sitting in another Uber. It's a very sedentary thing to travel. And as Secretary Kennedy says, three million Americans every day are traveling and doing this and engaging in sedentary activities or lack of activities. What we know very clearly is that when we are sedentary, this is bad for us as humans. Even one single hour of sitting in inactivity can create vascular dysfunction within our bodies. Two to three hours of sitting, not moving at all can increase inflammatory markers in the human body.
(10:40)
We know that less than half of all Americans get a recommended amount of activity and that 70 plus percent of Americans are obese and overweight. Between being overweight, metabolic dysfunction and the level to which we are sedentary and inactive as Americans, these are directly linked to the things that kill us most as Americans, to cardiovascular disease, to diabetes, to obesity. And yet a lot of this could be made better. As someone that travels a lot for my own work, I know this firsthand. I'm in airports traveling to podcasts or make videos to share information with people across the country. And it's hard for me to be a weird guy in the corner doing air squats or doing a handstand. It's not really encouraged in airports to do that kind of stuff. I'd love Secretary Duffy's intention to make airports more understanding, but I also am super excited about the possibility of getting mini gyms, little airport workout spaces for humans.
(11:34)
We know, according to a 2025 study, that over $190 billion of healthcare spend is directly attributable to inactivity in Americans. That's a staggering number. What if we could create small spaces for humans in airports, for Americans in airports to get mini workouts? You don't have to get super sweaty, but what if we could put pull-up bars and dip bars and parallels for pushups or for L-sits? If we could put boxes for step-ups, maybe put some treadmills for people who want to walk near their gate, we can put some bars for stretching. We can put yoga mats and maybe some rolling pins for people to move their muscles, anything to get people moving, maybe some exercise bikes. These would be a massive step in the right direction, and it's such a huge thing that we could do for Americans. Whenever I talk to people about this, they're super excited.
(12:22)
Anyone I've talked to about the idea has just been, they smile, they get excited. "A mini gym at an airport? That's great. I would use that for sure." I think if we could pair this with healthier food options, unprocessed foods, unprocessed meat, unprocessed plant foods, we could really help all of these millions of Americans every day that are traveling. I want to commend Secretary Duffy and Secretary Kennedy for spearheading this effort. A billion dollars of grants to help airports improve the quality of health for travelers every day, including mini gyms for all of us to move, this is incredible. We've got a pull-up bar set up behind us here. I'm definitely going to get some pull-ups in with Secretary Duffy and Secretary Kennedy after this, but that's what that's there to signify, guys. The beginning of movement spaces for humans in airports.
(13:06)
Hopefully we'll start with DCA and Dulles, but I'm excited to be a part of this. I'm grateful to be a part of this. I'm humbled that a piece of content that I did could have been seen by Secretary Duffy and that we could be a part of bringing this actual valuable resource to Americans throughout the country now. I'm super grateful to be a part of implementing this and amplifying this message. And again, I want to commend Secretary Duffy and Secretary Kennedy for spearheading this effort. I think this is amazing. Modern life is not set up for us to be healthy as humans, but let's keep making small steps in that direction so that we can all become healthier. And then that directly leads to us being happier, more gracious, and more caring with everyone around us. I'm super excited to be a part of this effort. Thank you both for this opportunity.
Secretary Duffy (13:50):
Well done.
Speaker 1 (13:50):
Thank you guys.
Secretary Duffy (13:54):
I hear my wife talk a lot about, again, she traveled all throughout having our nine kids and she would always complain about the lack of facilities when she wanted to nurse. And it's maybe a little odd for three guys to talk about nursing and options for nursing, but Isabel Brown, who's a content creator, a young mother with a young baby who travels all the time, is one of many moms who have reached out to complain about the lack of facilities, of facilities that actually operate, facilities that are clean. And I've also heard that from young mothers. And I want to turn it over to Isabel Brown to talk about her experience and maybe what we can do to improve the facilities for nursing mothers.
Isabelle (14:38):
Absolutely. Thank you, Secretary Duffy, Secretary Kennedy, and the entire Trump administration for your leadership on this and this opportunity as a young woman to express the utmost importance of our ability to serve our children. In all my years of science education, I don't think we have yet figured out a way for men to breastfeed. Thank you for having a young woman's voice here. In many ways, as I have traveled the country day in and day out as a content creator, author and speaker on college campuses nationwide, I've come to discover over the past few years that our culture has often developed a disdain for young mothers and our babies traveling, but the very nature of our very interconnected culture demands travel for young families every single day in America. It can be incredibly disheartening to see the rolled eyes and visible annoyance and anguish when we sit down with our babies on an airplane seat, but that pales in comparison to the jarring lack of support that many airports across the country provide for breastfeeding moms and baby friendly spaces.
(15:35)
The law does technically require every airport terminal to have a nursing room, but the context of the law says nothing about whether that space is clean, clearly marked, or actually monitored and maintained. I've often found myself stranded in airports across the country, trying to nurse my child when I'm on the go or trying to pump and take it home with me safely and seeing that outlets don't work, that there's no sink provided, the lights don't turn on, the door doesn't
Isabelle (16:00):
… block and more often than not find myself resorting to an experience that I would much rather have avoided in the first place. And broader data tells us that the environment nationally is just not working for breastfeeding moms when they are on-the-go. A national survey from this year of more than 3,000 breastfeeding moms found that 55% of us do not feel supported in public places across our country like airports, and 81% have resorted to pumping or feeding in their car. Myself and many, many, many of my friends have, as a result, found ourselves feeding our babies or trying to pump while sitting uncomfortably in a noisy, messy bathroom stall.
(16:34)
When moms feel uncomfortable in airports, we're not just imagining it, it's the infrastructure that is still patchy, it's inconsistent, and it's not designed with real families in mind. This leadership that we're seeing from Secretary Duffy, Secretary Kennedy, and of course President Trump, speaks volumes about our desire to revive the American family today and encourage young women to embrace the beauty of motherhood. I find no coincidence that as our public spaces often fail to accommodate for young moms and our beautiful children day in and day out, we're often seeing the lowest fertility rates that we've ever seen in the last few years in American history.
(17:08)
As we work to rebuild a culture that supports the entire parenting experience and encouraging young people to embrace the single most important vocation we possibly can experience in bringing new life into this world, we also must embrace this sacred responsibility to help moms feed our babies. I'm so excited about this Make Travel Family Friendly Again initiative and the leadership that we're seeing from Secretary Duffy, Secretary Kennedy and President Trump in just that, and can't wait to see the American family continue to thrive. Thank you.
Secretary Duffy (17:37):
Wonderful. Thanks as well.
Isabelle (17:39):
Thanks so much. Thank you.
Secretary Duffy (17:42):
I was talking to one of the staffers at the White House late last week about this initiative. She was wildly excited because she said, "You don't know how many nursing pods they've gone into where they're dirty and the electricity doesn't work. And if you could give us more, but also make sure they're maintained," as Isabelle just mentioned, so important.
(18:03)
We've also talked about making sure we have healthy options here and on-the-go healthy options. One of those is Farmer's Fridge, a healthier option for you, if you have to grab food as you're switching between flights or you're coming a little later to the airport. Shame on you if you are coming late to the airport, but if you do come late to the airport and you have to grab something quick, Farmer's Fridge gives you a healthier option than maybe some others in the airport.
(18:29)
I'm pleased to have Luke Saunders, who is the CEO of Farmer's Fridge, to talk a little bit about what he's doing and the health options he offers to America.
Luke Saunders (18:41):
Thank you very much, Secretary Duffy and Secretary Kennedy. I'm Luke Saunders, the founder and CEO of Farmers Fridge. I started the company 12 years ago because I was a frequent traveler. I was a traveling salesman on the road every single week and I could not find healthy food options on-the-go. So I made it my mission to make fresh, healthy food as accessible as a candy bar.
(19:01)
We started in a shared kitchen at a couple locations. Now we have over 2,000 Fridge locations across the country. We partner with a lot of retailers, but we service over 30 airports in the United States. So I just can't say how much I appreciate you guys drawing attention to the need for more healthy food options in the airport, especially fresh, unprocessed food. We still do everything like we did on day one. We get whole fruits and vegetables in, chop them up, cook them, mix them and bring you Farmer's Fridge seven days a week, especially at the airport. So thank you guys for your support.
Secretary Duffy (19:32):
Wonderful.
Luke Saunders (19:34):
Thank you.
Secretary Duffy (19:36):
All right. So we are willing to take a few questions from the press if you have any. Just some ground rules. I'll take your questions, or for anyone here, as long as it's on the topic that we're discussing, what we're doing for travel for airports, for healthier foods. If any of you want to come and do some pull-ups, we'll film you doing that as well. You can have at it. Yeah, go ahead.
Tim Carney (20:02):
Tim Carney, Washington Examiner. Do you guys have any access to feedback from parents of what they actually want for kids? For instance, I don't know that my kids want to eat salads when they're traveling. What is the demand that parents have at airports that's not being met?
Secretary Duffy (20:17):
And I can pass that to someone else if they want to take it, but I do know that a lot of parents feel like as they're entertaining their kids, there's cell phones and iPads and Senator Kennedy mentioned that. But if you have a space where it's fun and clean for your child to burn some energy, we all know kids have a lot of energy, if you can give them a space where they can play and have fun in an airport, I think parents would prefer that option. I would always think, "Can I tire my kid out? " So they might sleep on the plane, that's always what I would like to have happen. And that play area is one that will do that.
(20:56)
I know we would pack apples. Again, my two- year old's not eating a salad. I get that. But I think there is some planning ahead that parents take to think about what healthy options can they bring on the plane because kids don't eat a whole lot, especially the young ones. But Senator Kennedy, I don't know if you or…
Luke Saunders (21:15):
I have three small kids being at Farmer's fridge, I know I work there, but there's Greek yogurt, chia pudding, some sandwiches and things like that that are more kid friendly. So we see kids go there all the time.
Secretary Duffy (21:27):
Paul says they can eat beef sticks. Eat a little meat, right, Paul?
Paul (21:33):
No, I don't think I've ever seen a child that doesn't like to eat meat. You give a child little pieces of steak, my niece, my nephew, they just eat it up. So you give a kid high quality meat, they're going to love it, with a little bit of fruit, that's easy.
Secretary Duffy (21:45):
Literally. Okay. What do you got?
Speaker 2 (21:50):
Is there an update on the 2024 Department of Transportation proposal to ban airlines from charging families from sitting together?
Secretary Duffy (22:00):
I don't have an update. I know that was under review at DOT. And again, I find it's an issue I'm sensitive to. I want families to be able to sit together. A lot of feedback I get is it's already happening, but that rule is under review, so no update.
David Shepardson (22:21):
Dave Shepherdson from Reuters. So you talked about you don't like the salty pretzels and the calorie-laden cookies. Is there anything you can do from a regulatory standpoint to force the airlines to do more? Or is this just more trying to jawbone the airlines and the airports into voluntarily doing that?
Secretary Duffy (22:34):
I'm not a big government guy. So I'm not finding anyone if they wear their pajamas on the airplane, that's not what we're doing. We're asking people to, again, maybe dress a little better. And I've asked airplanes to give some better options. It's all in the airlines' purview, how they're going to respond to this. And I think they have some ideas of what they're thinking through to improve the experience. But no, this is not about mandates. This is not requirements. This is a conversation about, could we offer healthier options? Could we support nursing mothers? How do we make the experience as we all travel together just a little bit better? That's the conversation we're having, but I'm not cramming this down anyone's throat at all.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
[inaudible 00:23:19].
Secretary Duffy (23:24):
So the question is, lowering the cost of food in airports. And again, it's interesting. It's market demand and supply. They have people pretty tightly contained and there's not a lot of options. And so I don't have a plan to reduce costs. What I am trying to do is provide healthier options for people. And again, who doesn't love a greasy burger at the airport? I know I do. Sometimes you're grabbing chips, but are there options when you want that healthy choice that you can have access to? Because whenever I make those bad choices, I always feel like
Secretary Duffy (24:00):
… garbage when I get on the plane. Letting people have a better option, I think, is what we're focusing on here.
Speaker 4 (24:08):
Sarah Ploss with CBS News.
Secretary Duffy (24:09):
Hi, Sarah.
Speaker 4 (24:10):
Two questions if I can. One is, do you have any kind of timeline that you're looking at for things such as the family lanes and such like that? And if I can squeeze in, as we head into the holiday season, the experience at airports, what are you expecting? Any concerns?
Secretary Duffy (24:26):
Yeah, so we're sending the notice of funding opportunity out right now. And by the way, this is wide open for airports. What do you want to send us to incent us to give you part of this $1 billion? And I've mentioned a few things here, but there's other options that I might not have thought about that airports might present to us that we'll go for. So, again, we're going to start to see those ideas come in. And by the way, anyone who's watching this, if you want to reach out to your airport authority and encourage them to participate in this money, please do that. Get your airports to partake.
(25:03)
And again, it's going to be a busy season. Americans are traveling more than ever. We're beyond the COVID era. We're back at making historic levels of air travel, and especially during holiday seasons. And that's why during those times when we have more people together, and again, we're usually in a pretty good mood, we're in a celebratory mood, we're usually in a generous mood. But we do, when we come together, have to bring our best selves to the airport. And if more of us do that, I think we'll all have a better experience together. It's somewhat communal, right? We're all traveling together and being kind.
(25:42)
And I've mentioned this before, but if I have an older person coming down the aisle and having a hard time lifting their bag up and the overhead bin, well, maybe you can help them out. This is my wife. I love her to death, but she seems to pack really as much stuff into her suitcase as possible and it's really heavy. If you see someone who's having a hard time, help them out. I think if we do that for each other, I just think the experience is better for the people we travel with, but I think we feel better when we help.
(26:12)
We had one more question. Yeah?
Speaker 5 (26:18):
Thank you, Mr. Secretary. You mentioned, in addition to this, the need for a $20 billion investment into infrastructure with air traffic control. Wondering if you can just give us an update on where that process is. You got to ask Congress for that. Are you hopeful that that's coming? Is there a timeline on that? Anything you can provide?
Secretary Duffy (26:37):
So, I received $12.5 billion dollars. And I want to just reiterate this. I've asked America to be better, we have to do our part. I think one of the most frustrating parts of travel is if you're delayed or if you're canceled. And sometimes it's the weather, sometimes it's the airline, but a lot of times it's our air traffic control system or the number of controllers that we have. I take that to heart. And so, the $12.5 billion I mentioned earlier, we are going to get that money spent in those assets deployed by the end of President Trump's term, he's made that very clear and I agree with him.
(27:14)
The $20 billion, Congress has to give it to us. And that really is the new system. We need a new software system that's going to manage the airspace. It's busy now. You asked the question about what's going to happen over Christmas. We just saw a historic level of travel during Thanksgiving. But as we look 5 years out, 10 years out, we're going to see an increase in air travel and complication in the airspace, 20%, 30%, 40%. So, I need a new software system to manage the airspace, to bring more efficiency to the airspace to make sure you're not delayed.
(27:48)
And by the way, in an era of politics and partisanship, this is not partisan. Democrats and Republicans agree on this. Even the traveling public, Republican or Democratic agree, independents like it. And so, it's just the Congress finding out the right vehicle to give us the money. And again, the sooner I get the money, the sooner I can start this phase and then complete this phase of the mission.
(28:13)
Anything else you want to add before we [inaudible 00:28:15]?
(28:14)
… you may have that we can improve the experience. My favorite thing is to take your ideas, make them my own, and then sound really smart and insightful. And then, you get the benefit of getting your idea implemented into a policy. And so, I do think the public feedback has been remarkable for us. And we take it, we listen to it, and we have pure hearts trying to make your experience better in airports.
(28:58)
It doesn't happen overnight, I can't fix it immediately, but you're going to see progressive improvement as you travel because of the hard work and effort that we're putting into making America great again, making travel great again, accomplishing the vision that President Trump had for travel and for this country. God bless him. Thank you all very much. Merry Christmas.
(29:24)
By the way, now Bobby and Paul are going to do pull-ups if you want to watch this.
Speaker X (29:30):
I might do a couple.
(29:31)
Let me turn this off.