Secret White House bunker may be upgraded under East Wing (Full Transcript)

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: President Trump is rebuilding a secret bunker under the East Wing. And no, this isn't the Situation Room, which is used 24 hours a day. The Presidential Emergency Operations Center, or PEOC, is just for emergencies, and it's fortified to be safe from a nuclear attack or even a plane crash. You've seen it in movies like A House of Dynamite, White House Down, and Olympus Has Fallen. It was used during protests in the Nixon era, and on 9-11, President George W. Bush and Vice President Cheney and other top officials sheltered there when the White House was under perceived threat. It was built after the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, when Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered the secret construction of a secure underground bunker and built the East Wing on top.

[00:00:42] Speaker 2: It is really meant for being activated during catastrophic or immediate threats to the President of the United States, and really designed to give a command and control and survivability for any type of attack. Think of it as a very early era submarine that was self-contained.

[00:01:03] Speaker 1: Today, those underground facilities have been dismantled, with the East Wing once again under construction for Trump's sprawling new ballroom, though the Secret Service has secure backup options available should the need arise. The antiquated bunker is likely to get an upgrade to counter new threats, but officials haven't exactly been forthcoming on what's going on underground.

[00:01:22] Speaker 3: There are some things regarding this project that are, frankly, of top-secret nature that we are currently working on.

[00:01:31] Speaker 1: It's unlikely we'll have any visibility into the plans for the underground project anytime soon.

[00:01:36] Speaker 2: Are we talking about kinetic attacks? Are we talking about electromagnetic pulse attacks against the White House? So there is a broad spectrum of emerging threats that this new facility will have to face as years go on.