Shots Fired; Ben Sasse; The Pigeon Mafia — 60 Minutes Full Episodes

[0:09] Last night in Washington, a gunman stormed the security perimeter at the White House [0:14] Correspondents' Dinner. The president, the vice president, Cabinet members, and more [0:19] than 2,500 guests were gathered to celebrate freedom of the press. [0:25] We spoke with President Trump this afternoon. [0:28] How worried were you that there were going to be injuries? [0:35] You don't have much time. So why are you spending time doing this? [0:39] You invited me, so I assume you needed to fill some time. [0:44] Precious time with Ben Sasse is well spent. The former U.S. senator and college president [0:50] has perhaps only months to live, but time enough for one last lesson in what America can be. [0:59] Neither of these parties really have very big or good ideas about 2030 or 2050. The Congress [1:05] is not wrestling with big or important questions right now. [1:10] It's a whodunit in the heart of Europe with Mission Impossible break-ins, organized crime, [1:19] and international intrigue. [1:21] We've heard people talking about a pigeon mafia. Is that a thing? [1:25] Forget the Maltese Falcon. This mystery is about a Belgian pigeon and a sport gone cuckoo. [1:33] I'm Scott Pelley. I'm Bill Whitaker. I'm Anderson Cooper. I'm Sharon Alfonsi. I'm John Wertheim. I'm Cecilia Vega. [1:43] I'm Nora O'Donnell. I'm Leslie Stahl. Those stories and in our last minute, an Admiral charts America's course tonight on 60 Minutes. [1:53] Last night in the nation's capital, a gunman stormed the security perimeter at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. [2:09] The president, the first lady, the vice president, cabinet members, and more than 2,500 guests were gathered [2:17] to celebrate the First Amendment and freedom of the press. [2:20] But after shots were fired, the president was evacuated. [2:24] It was at the same hotel where President Ronald Reagan was nearly assassinated by John Hinckley 45 years ago. [2:31] Tonight, federal investigators are looking into the motive of the alleged gunman, a 31-year-old teacher from Torrance, California. [2:40] He e-mailed what a senior official called a manifesto to his family minutes before the attack. [2:47] He wrote he was targeting members of the Trump administration. [2:50] We spoke with President Trump this afternoon at the White House about what happened. [2:57] Mr. President, do you know if you were the target of the gunman? [3:01] I don't know. It sounded to me, I read a manifesto. It's just he's radicalized. [3:08] He was a Christian believer, and then he became an anti-Christian, and he had a lot of change. [3:14] He's been going through a lot based on what he wrote. [3:18] His brother complained about him, and I think reported him to the police, [3:21] and his sister likewise complained about him. His family was very concerned. [3:26] He was probably a pretty sick guy. [3:29] I was in the room, not far from you, Mr. President. [3:35] You could hear what sounded like gunshots or commotion. [3:38] People nearby could smell the gunpowder. Everybody hit the floor. [3:43] How worried were you that there were going to be injuries? [3:49] I wasn't worried. I understand life. We live in a crazy world. [3:55] You are sitting there next to the first lady. The entertainer named Oz Perlman is talking to you. [4:03] He's known as the mentalist. When did you know something was wrong? [4:07] Right around that point. In fact, you can see the expression on the first lady's face, [4:14] and your president of the evening, chairman or president or both, who was doing a great job, [4:20] by the way. Weijia Jiang of CBS News. [4:22] Yeah, she was a terrific person. They were asking the name of Caroline's child that he didn't know, [4:30] I guess, but he was able to... Your press secretary is expecting, [4:32] and he was trying to guess the baby's name. That's right. [4:34] That's right. You mentioned the first lady. Her face, [4:38] she looked very alarmed. Was she scared? [4:41] Well, I don't want to say, and people don't like having it said that they were scared, [4:46] but certainly, I mean, who wouldn't be when you have a situation like that? [4:50] By that time, I think she realized ahead of time that that was more of a bullet than it was a tray, [4:56] and she was... I looked at her face just a little while ago. Before I came, I saw the scene. They [5:04] played it for me in pretty good close-up, and she looked very upset about what just took place. [5:14] Yeah. Why not? [5:16] You see the security moving quickly within seconds, grabbing the vice president by his coat, [5:23] lifting him up, bringing him out. Then the counter-assault comes in, took 10 seconds for [5:30] them to flank you, Mr. President, and then 20 seconds to get you out. It looked chaotic. At one [5:36] point, you were down. What was happening? Well, what happened is, it was a little bit me. I wanted [5:41] to see what was happening, and I wasn't making it that easy for him. I wanted to see what was going on, [5:49] and by that time, we started to realize maybe it was a bad problem, different kind of a problem, [5:55] bad one, and different than what would be normal noise from a ballroom, which you hear all the time, [6:01] and I was surrounded by great people, and I probably made them act a little bit more slow. I said, [6:10] wait a minute, wait a minute, let me see, wait a minute. So, you know, I'm telling guys... [6:14] Just at that moment where it looks like you go sort of down with the service, you were telling them to wait? [6:18] Well, no, what happened is, then I started walking with them. I turned, I started walking, [6:23] and they said, please go down, please go down on the floor. So, I went down, and First Lady went down [6:29] also, but we were asked to go down by the agents as I was walking. In other words, I was... [6:35] They wanted you almost to crawl out. I was standing up, pretty much. I was standing up, [6:40] and then turned around the opposite direction, and started pretty much walking out, pretty tall, [6:47] a little bent over because I, you know, I'm not looking to be standing too tall, and, but I was [6:54] walking out. It was pretty about halfway there, and they said, please go down to the floor, [6:58] please go down to the floor. So, I dropped to the floor, so did the First Lady. [7:02] What was your thought at that moment? What did the First Lady say? [7:04] Well, my thought was, you know, I've been through this before a couple of times, and [7:08] uh, she has not, to this extent, she handled it great. I mean, she was, she's very strong, [7:16] smart. She got it. She knew what was happening. She listened. I did too, by the way. [7:21] Because this was the first time she was... When they said, yeah, when they said drop down, [7:23] that meant trouble, and obviously, I'm the president, and I listened to what they said, [7:29] please drop down, sir, please drop down. So, I was walking halfway, and then I dropped down at the [7:35] final, because we had little ways to go where you're exposed to the ballroom, surroundings, [7:41] and, uh, then I got up, and we went to a hold room for a while, and I tried to get them to [7:49] continue the event, if possible. You wanted to go back in. I did, I really did. You can see [7:55] the gunman running through the metal detectors, and he fired off one or two rounds. His speed was [8:01] rather incredible, actually. It was, it was like a blur. How did he get that close with the [8:06] place swarming with security? I will say, look, I say it because I'm a big fan of the people of [8:13] law enforcement, and, you know, some of these people, they may be crazy, but they're not stupid, [8:19] and they figure things out. He ran 45 yards, they say, and he just went to it, and then, [8:26] boom, he popped through it. I mean, he ran like, I think the NFL should sign him up. He was fast. [8:32] When you look at it on tape, it's almost like a blur. [8:35] Right. [8:35] But it was amazing, because as soon as they saw that, you could see them draw their guns. [8:41] They were so professional, aimed their guns, and then they took them down immediately. [8:45] Two hours later, the president was back at the White House to brief reporters. [8:50] I saw a room that was just totally unified. It was, in one way, very beautiful. [8:54] Do you think this will change your relationship with the press? [8:58] Well, look, for whatever reason, we disagree on a lot of subjects. We talk about crime. [9:09] I'm very strong on crime. It seems like the press isn't. It's not so much the press. It's the press [9:15] plus the Democrats, because they're almost one and the same. It's like the craziest thing. [9:20] I have the strongest border we've ever had in the country, where, as you know, it said zero people [9:25] for nine months came into our country through our southern border. We have a very tough border. [9:30] The so-called manifesto is a stunning thing to read, Mr. President. He appears to reference [9:36] a motive in it. He writes this quote, administration officials, they are targets. [9:42] And he also wrote this, I am no longer willing to permit a pedophile, rapist, [9:47] and traitor to coat my hands with his crimes. What's your reaction to that? [9:51] Well, I was waiting for you to read that, because I knew you would, because you're horrible people, [9:56] horrible people. Yeah, he did write that. I'm not a rapist. I didn't rape anybody. [10:03] Oh, do you think he was referring to you? Excuse me, excuse me. I'm not a pedophile. [10:07] You read that crap from some sick person. I got associated with stuff that has nothing to do with [10:16] me. I was totally exonerated. Your friends on the other side of the plate are the ones that were [10:23] involved with, let's say, Epstein or other things. But I said to myself, you know, I'll do this [10:30] interview and they'll probably, I read the manifesto, you know, he's a sick person, but you should be [10:36] ashamed of yourself reading that, because I'm not any of those things. And I was never, excuse me, [10:42] excuse me, you shouldn't be reading that in 60 minutes. You're a disgrace, but go ahead. Let's [10:47] finish the interview. The other thing that he wrote in the, the other thing in the manifesto [10:52] that I think is worth looking at in terms of determining his motive is he had been staying at [10:57] the hotel since Friday. He checked in. He said he had cased the place and he wrote, what the hell is [11:03] the secret service doing? And he wrote this quote, I expected security cameras at every bend, bugged hotel [11:09] rooms, armed agents, every 10 feet metal detectors out the wazoo. What I got is nothing. He wrote [11:15] like this level of incompetence is insane. Sir, you have already had two. Well, he was pretty [11:22] incompetent too, because he got caught and he got caught pretty easily. So I'd say he was pretty [11:27] incompetent too. You know, I could take any event having to do with security or anything else. I can [11:32] always find fault. Those guys did a good job last night. They did a really good job. I mentioned that [11:38] because again, as his motive, you brought this up. He had social media accounts that had anti-Trump and [11:45] anti-Christian rhetoric. You should read. Why don't you read all the anti-Trump? Why don't you read it? [11:50] You just did. So why don't you read it? Well, he had a lot of anti-Christian rhetoric. He had, [11:56] he was part of a group called the Wide Awakes. He had attended a No Kings protest in California. [12:02] No Kings. What did security tell you about what may have been his motives? [12:06] The reason you have people like that is you have people doing No Kings. I'm not a king. What I am, [12:11] if I was a king, I wouldn't be dealing with you. Also at the dinner last night was your secretary, [12:16] Robert F. Kennedy Jr. His sister, Kerry Kennedy, was there. They've both witnessed their father [12:24] and their uncle be assassinated. That's right. Erica Kirk was there. The House majority leader, [12:30] Steve Scalise, was there. Yeah. Political violence has touched so many people in that room. Is there [12:38] something that you as president can do? What can be done to change the trajectory? [12:43] Well, you know, you go back 20 years, 40 years, 100 years, 200 years, 500 years. It's always been there. [12:54] People are assassinated. People are injured. People are hurt. And I'm not sure that there's any more now [13:02] than there was. I do think that the hate speech of the Democrats, much more so, is very dangerous. I [13:08] really think it's very dangerous to the country. [13:10] AMNA NAWAZ, President Trump told us he hopes to move events like last night's press gala to the new [13:16] East Wing Ballroom that he says is ahead of schedule, though it won't be ready until 2028. [13:22] But he wants last night's dinner to be rescheduled much sooner than that. [13:28] You are committed to doing this event with the White House Correspondence Center. It's about freedom of [13:32] the price. [13:32] I want them, because I don't want to see it be canceled. I don't want to have a crazy person. I think it's [13:38] really bad for a crazy person to be able to cancel something like this. There are great people in [13:43] the press too, like a name, but I don't want to, I don't want to embarrass your show. We have some [13:47] great people in the press, some very fair people, and people that are just on my side. But for the [13:51] most part, it's a very liberal or very progressive, let's use the word liberal, liberal press. But I was [13:59] just really, I was really happy to see the, the, I don't know how long it'll last, the relationship, [14:07] the friendship, the spirit after a very bad event took place. Now, the event turned out to be much [14:14] less bad because nobody was killed, nobody was hurt. The Secret Service agent had, I spoke to him, [14:20] he had a, a bulletproof vest on, unbelievable. He's okay. Oh, he's 100%. Yeah, no, he was 100%. He [14:27] didn't want to go to the hospital. He really didn't, they asked him to go. He didn't want to go. He said, [14:32] I don't need to go to the hospital. But he went because they asked him to go. [14:35] Well, I know the White House Correspondents Association very much appreciates you going [14:40] last night and honoring a commitment to do it again. I hope we're going to do it again. [14:45] Nora, tell him to get it going and we should do it within 30 days and they'll have even more security [14:53] and they'll have bigger perimeter security. It'll be fine. But tell them to do it again. We can't let [15:00] something. It's not that I want to go. It's, I have, I'm very busy. I don't need that. I think it's [15:06] very important that they do it again. Ben Sasse would like a final word. At the age of 54, the former [15:22] U.S. Senator of Nebraska is dying of pancreatic cancer. But a new drug is giving him extra time, [15:31] time to hear his appeal for reason in Washington and community at home. Sasse is a conservative [15:39] Republican of independent thought. With a PhD in American history, he once told his fellow senators, [15:47] the people despise us all because we are not doing our job. His cancer therapy leaves him looking [15:55] seriously sunburned. But we found Ben Sasse as insightful, passionate and hopeful as ever. [16:03] I love America. And I think there's a lot of big and meaty things that we should have been talking [16:12] about and we still can talk about. And having a terminal diagnosis isn't really that unique. [16:20] We're all always on the clock. Some of us have the benefit, maybe it's a weird word, but the benefit [16:27] of knowing our time is finite and defined. And it becomes an opportunity to talk about bigger stuff. [16:33] And you have focus from that. Yeah, I mean, it's weird to be in your early 50s and get a terminal [16:40] diagnosis and people all of a sudden act like you're 93 or 94 and you have a lot of wisdom. I don't, [16:46] I don't know that I have a lot of wisdom, but I have a lot of things that I think we should be [16:50] reflecting on together. Reflecting, he told us, on rebuilding communities, neighbor to neighbor, [16:57] regulating artificial intelligence before it overwhelms us and mending broken politics. [17:05] Neither of these parties really have very big or good ideas about 2030 or 2050 at a national security [17:11] level, at a future of work level, at an institution building level. The Congress is not wrestling with [17:17] big or important questions right now. If Congress is looking at the wrong things, what is it missing? [17:24] We are living through a digital revolution, which is both glorious and horrific at the same time. [17:30] Because what the digital revolution does is it accelerates almost everything about the human [17:36] experience. Anything that can be reduced to a series of steps, which is most economic activity, [17:42] is going to be routinized and become really, really cheap, really fast, and really ubiquitous. [17:48] We've never lived in a world where 22-year-olds couldn't assume that the work they did, they [17:54] would be able to do until death or retirement. And we're never going to have that world again. [17:59] And Congress doesn't talk about any of those kind of most fundamental issues. The disruption of work, [18:04] for good and for ill, should be front and central. Congress doesn't even know how to have that [18:09] conversation. In 2014, Ben Sasse was a college president in Nebraska when he was recruited to run [18:17] for Senate. He became one of the most popular politicians in state history, maybe because during [18:24] Senate recesses, he worked as a garbage man and a vendor at Cornhusker games, just to stay in touch with [18:33] the lives of Nebraskans. What makes you a Republican? I'm a Republican because I think the Lincoln-Reagan [18:42] continuum does the best job of building a constraint on thinking Washington is our fundamental political [18:48] community. I think your fundamental political community is your neighborhood and your city hall [18:53] and maybe even your state legislature. And right now, we are sacrificing a lot of our national politics [19:00] to weird folks who want their main community to be their political tribe at a federal level. And that [19:06] should be like the ninth thing or the 15th thing you care about, not the first or second thing. [19:11] You ended your Republican pantheon with Ronald Reagan. And I wonder, when you look at the Trump [19:17] administration today, what do you see? It's no secret that the current president and I [19:23] wrestled on lots and lots of issues. But I don't spend much time commenting on our current [19:29] politics because I don't really think our current politics are driving what's happening. I think [19:35] it's mostly an echo of what's happening. I think we have really thin, shallow community right now. And [19:43] unless people know the thickness of their local community, it's hard to make sense of what national [19:48] politics are for. I think our national political dysfunction is an echo of larger problems. [19:53] In 2020, Sass was reelected with more votes in Nebraska than Donald Trump. Then came January 6th. [20:04] That day, Sass called out, quote, the screamers who monetize hate. [20:10] You can't do big things together as Americans if you think other Americans are the enemy. [20:17] Later, in Trump's impeachment over January 6th, Sass was one of seven Republicans who voted to convict. [20:26] His stand against the insurrection offended the Nebraska Republican committee. So he sent them a message. [20:33] Personality cults aren't conservative. Conspiracy theories aren't conservative. [20:40] Lying that an election has been stolen, it's not conservative. Acting like politics is a religion, [20:47] it isn't conservative. In 2023, with four years left in his term, Sass quit to become president of the [20:55] University of Florida. There had been too little substance in the Senate and too much absence [21:03] from his wife and three children. Many senators I know would not be able to breathe without that job. [21:13] It would kill them to leave. I don't want what you said to be true, but I fear that that is [21:21] true. And that is a sign of a much, much deeper problem. We got a lot of people who serve in [21:28] government who really do think the highest and greatest thing you can ever do is have the title [21:33] senator or congressman. The best thing you can do is be called dad or mom, lover, neighbor, friend, [21:42] governor, senator, house member. It's a great way to serve. It should be your 11th calling or maybe [21:48] 6th, but never top. His calling left bipartisan consensus on one thing. The voice of Ben Sass is [21:58] missed. Democrat Mark Warner worked with Sass on the Intelligence Committee. [22:04] He never really thought about things as conservative liberal. He much more thought about issues as [22:12] future past. Somebody who was, um, fearless, passionate. Republican John Thune of South Dakota [22:22] is the Senate majority leader. A concern not just for today, but for tomorrow and the future. And [22:28] someone who wasn't distracted by all the noise that goes around us on a daily basis. An example of [22:35] what the Senate should be. Yes. And hopefully, um, you know, an inspiration and an example that, [22:45] uh, that many of us can learn from and follow. The Senate needs to be less like Instagram. The Senate [22:51] needs to be more deliberative. And that means less smackdown nonsense. One of the fundamental mistakes [22:58] we've made over the last 30 or 40 years is putting cameras everywhere in Washington, D.C. This is [23:03] not an argument against transparency. We should have reporters around. We should have pen and pad. [23:08] We should have people recording what's happening. But we should make the Senate less of an institution [23:14] that is built as a backdrop platform for people to get sound bites. That's not what the Senate is for. [23:20] The Senate should be plodding and steady and boring and trustworthy. To be too frank, [23:28] you were expected to be dead by now. That's Frank. I like it. Let's be blunt. What changed? [23:37] Let's go with, uh, providence, prayer, and a miracle drug. Uh, in mid-December, [23:43] I was given a three to four month life expectancy. I am on extended time already. I have, uh, pancreatic [23:50] origin cancer that has metastasized a number of places. So I've got lung, vascular, liver, other, [23:58] liver. Um, liver's pretty far along. You have five cancers? Yes, sir. He's in a clinical trial for a [24:04] drug called daraxonracid, a new idea in therapy. In many cancers, it's a defective gene that signals [24:13] cells to grow nonstop. The drug blocks that signal. I have much, much less pain than I had four months [24:22] ago when I was diagnosed. And I have a massive 76 percent reduction in tumor volume over the last [24:28] four months. Just this month, the drug maker Revolution Medicines reported that patients [24:34] who had six months survived a median 13 months. You are completely devoted to your faith, [24:44] what's known as Reformed Christianity or Calvinism. And one of the tenants of that faith is that God [24:53] ordains everything. And I wonder why you think God has put you to this test? [25:04] Death is wicked. Death is evil. Death is not how it's supposed to be. And me getting a cancer [25:14] diagnosis, again, is pretty small on the grand scheme of things, but it's a touch of grace because [25:25] it forces me to tell the truth. And the lie I want to tell myself is that I'm the center of everything [25:34] and I'm going to be around forever and I can work harder and store up enough that I can atone for my [25:44] own brokenness. I can't. And so I hate cancer, but I'm also grateful for it. I tell a lot more truth [25:54] to myself than I used to do it when I thought I was super omni-competent and interesting. [26:02] He may have to accept the label interesting. Ben Sass has lived life in a hurry with more careers [26:09] than most and ends with his favorite, a teacher. I make no comparison to what you're going through, [26:20] but there was a moment on 9-11 at the World Trade Center that I knew I was dead. And in that [26:27] lightning flash of an instant, the only thing that crossed my mind was leaving my family behind. [26:39] And I wonder how you reconcile that. Yeah. I'm incredibly blessed. My wife, Melissa, has [26:54] we've been married 31 years. We're going to be apart for a time, but she's tough and gritty [27:09] and theologically rooted, and she's going to be fine. My daughters are 24 and 22, and they're [27:18] extraordinary. I want to walk them down the aisle when they get married. That's not likely to be. [27:25] That's not the math of my time card. My son, we have a providential surprise. He's a decade younger [27:32] than big sisters. He's 14, and he's going to be fine. He'll have other wise men and women to put a [27:42] hand on his shoulder. But I'm super bummed to not be there at 16 and 18 and 20 years old in his life. [27:51] I want to give him more advice than he wants, and I want to put my arm on his shoulder, [27:54] and I want his shoulders to get taller. But it's not a surprise to God. [28:00] And God, you believe, has a plan? Absolutely. There are no maverick molecules in the universe. [28:10] …decentralize a lot… More with Ben Sasse and Scott Pelley in a CBS News Things That Matter [28:20] conversation. Watch now on the 60 Minutes YouTube channel, brought to you by Bank of America. [28:27] 60 Minutes has reported on plenty of high-profile crimes before, but nothing like the foul play [28:42] involving the Columba Livia Domestica. That's not some international crime syndicate. That's the [28:49] scientific name for pigeons, and they're being stolen. We're talking about elite racing pigeons. [28:56] The finest compete at international events in which they're released far from home and must find their [29:01] way back. As prizes have risen up into the millions, the birds have become targets for what insiders call [29:10] the pigeon mafia. The Flemish region of Belgium is a land of medieval towers and fine chocolate. [29:21] It's also home to some of the most sought-after birds on Earth. Yep, these guys. What Kentucky is to [29:29] thoroughbred horses, Belgium is to racing pigeons. And there are few better at breeding a champion than [29:38] Tom Von Gover. Where some see a bird that looks like it's trying to remember how to breathe, [29:44] Von Gover sees an elite athlete with a calculating gaze. What makes this pigeon a great racer? [29:51] Yeah, he has everything a good racer need to have, but of course we cannot look in the head. You can have [29:57] a very smart pigeon, but when the body is not strong enough, his head wants to go home, but the body cannot [30:03] follow the other. So... Von Gover breeds, sells, and races his pigeons at events around the world such as [30:13] this. The weight of his dominance can be seen inside his modest home. But in his pigeon loft out back are [30:21] his real prizes. Pigeons that can fly hundreds of miles at highway speeds, feathered Ferraris worth [30:28] a fortune. How much could you get for all the pigeons out there? I think around 10 million dollars. [30:34] 10 million dollars in pigeons? Yeah, for these 300 sitting here. This was his greatest. His name was [30:41] Finn. In a sport in which pedigree is everything, Finn was the secretariat of the sky. Pigeon breeders, [30:50] known as fanciers, traveled across oceans just to take a picture with Finn. People all recognize him [30:56] because of his color, but of course he was a very good racer and of course a very good breeder. Finn was [31:02] not for sale, but he was a priceless stud. Fanciers paid up to a hundred thousand dollars for Finn's [31:10] offspring. And then one night as Van Gaver slept, a nightmare unfolded in his pigeon loft. [31:20] This surveillance video is from 2024. Finn was in his favorite spot when he was snatched by an intruder. [31:27] It's like the Mona Lisa from the pigeon sport they stole. Why the Mona Lisa? [31:32] Yeah, because it's famous. Maybe it's old and it's not for sale, but everybody wants to see it. [31:37] Six other pigeons were also abducted. The first time you watch it and the second time and the third time [31:45] and then start to look, who is he? The whodunit was among 35 pigeon robberies across [31:53] Belgium over the last three years. High value racing pigeons have also been stolen in Great Britain, [32:00] South Africa and the United States. This tape was from an unsolved caper in 2023 outside Philadelphia. [32:07] To understand what's behind this avian crime wave and why a member of our species would risk jail time [32:14] to steal a member of this species, we visited Ryan Zonikin. So what is different about this pigeon [32:22] than the pigeon I'm going to see in New York defacing a statue? They're bred for the performance, [32:28] for their racing abilities. Zonikin is a Canadian fancier who calls himself the pigeon boss. When you're [32:35] holding a pigeon in your hand, what is it you're looking for? It's got to be like a steel bar, [32:41] but then it has to be as light as an empty soda can. And the feathers have to be like the most [32:46] beautiful woman's hair, soft and silky. That's how it's got to be. And then the eye has to look like [32:52] you're at Tiffany's. Look like you're at Tiffany's. The pigeon eye? The eye of the pigeon, yeah. [32:57] That eye, to the uninitiated, looks more like a panic button. Pigeons don't walk so much as glitch. [33:06] Their coloring resembles concrete tinged with the broken rainbow of a parking lot oil slick. [33:12] And when they take flight, they can make you look like a Disney princess that's hit rock bottom. [33:17] They fixed your hair for you, see? Zonikin moved from Canada to Belgium because he loves pigeons, [33:29] like, a lot. If this was a room of hens, of women, pigeons, females, hens, and you came in here every [33:36] day and I said hello, hi girls, hi, and I look, I look at her and she sits up here and I, oh, oh, [33:44] you talk to her a little, talk a little bit, look at her and you make eye contact with her, just like a [33:48] girl at the bar. The love affair Europe has for pigeon racing began in the 1800s and grew into a [33:55] working class sport. There's not a feeling like when you sit there on a weekend and wait for your [34:01] pigeons and you see them come home. It's like, wow, I did this. You're the coach, you're the nutritionist, [34:07] you're the scout, it's the best. But purists have seen the sport change as prize money has soared. [34:16] It started about 20 years ago with a new kind of competition called one loft racing, which fanciers [34:27] from around the world battle for millions of dollars. It's a beautiful idea, but when there's [34:33] money involved, it's not the same. We went to a one loft race in Portugal to see how it works. [34:42] Months earlier, fanciers shipped their best young prospects to the race loft so the pigeons could [34:48] learn to recognize it as their home. The cost to enter a bird is about $500. The more pigeons, [34:55] the larger the pot of prize money. All racing pigeons are identified by leg bands. Just before [35:03] the race, each of the 3,300 birds is scanned into a database and then driven 300 miles away to be [35:12] released. The first pigeon to find their way back into the loft wins. Six hours later, a spotter at the [35:22] finish blew a whistle to signal the leaders were circling above. The first into the loft got the [35:30] biggest cuts of the $1.2 million purse. It's crazy. You only see the last 30 seconds of a pigeon race. [35:41] Isn't that something? People refer to it as a sport. It's a sport. Is it a sport? Sure it is. Is horse racing a sport? [35:50] It's a sport. And as the prizes have climbed, so has the demand for the fastest pigeons. [35:59] One loft winners are considered blue chip assets. Their DNA is like an ATM. [36:07] Producing descendants that can sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars. [36:11] Yep, yep, yep. Come on. [36:15] Ryan Zonikin pays his bills by auctioning Belgian birds online. [36:21] Take a look. [36:22] It all has an infomercial feel. [36:25] She's buoyant. She has it all. And she's got the look. [36:28] Well lubricated with gin and tonic. [36:31] You can actually see the brains right in them. Just take a good look. [36:34] On this night, the highest bids topped three grand. [36:37] But that's chicken feed compared to the largest auction player in Belgium. [36:42] It's called Pigeon Paradise or PIPA for short. [36:46] How many pigeons do you sell a year and about how much total sales are we talking about? [36:53] I think about 40 million euro. [36:56] Are you kidding me? [36:57] Yeah. [36:58] Which is like 46 million dollars in pigeon sales a year? [37:02] Yeah, yeah. [37:03] Whoa. [37:04] I mean, there is still a big potential. [37:07] Nicholas Hazelbrick started PIPA when he was 18. [37:10] About half of the sales go to Chinese buyers, [37:14] who are even more obsessed with pigeons than the Belgians. [37:18] In 2020, a Chinese tycoon paid a record 1.8 million dollars for one bird. [37:26] China has over 400,000 registered pigeon fanciers, [37:30] with five-star luxury lofts and races offering as much as 16 million dollars in prizes. [37:38] If we don't have China, it would be very hard to run the business. [37:43] Because why? [37:45] Because they make the price. [37:49] More big spenders have followed from the Middle East. [37:52] The result? [37:53] A global arms race for wings. [37:56] With so much money at stake, the bad guys moved in and began to steal the sports superstars. [38:03] They'll have the people come in and look at the pigeons. [38:05] Somebody who's orchestrating it, and then they send other people maybe a week later, [38:10] a month later, a year later, take them. [38:13] And normally the time when breeding starts in the end of November, December, January, [38:19] that's when all the key birds will be paired together. [38:22] Easy stealing, right? [38:23] We've heard people talking about a pigeon mafia. [38:26] Is that a thing? [38:28] Yeah, I think there is. [38:28] Again, it's money involved. [38:29] Fanciers and investigators told us they believe international gangs are behind smuggling [38:37] networks that breed the stolen pigeons to sell their offspring on the black market [38:42] to fanciers anxious to supercharge their bloodlines. [38:46] This batch, stuffed in socks and hidden in a briefcase, [38:50] was stopped in December at Latvia's border with Russia. [38:53] Have you seen crazy security at these lofts now? [38:56] Oh, yeah. [38:56] What have you seen? [38:57] Oh, multiple cameras, laser beams going across. [39:01] So now, panicked fanciers in Belgium are turning to this soft-spoken veterinarian [39:07] to help protect their pigeons. [39:09] There's some droppings on this. [39:10] Oh, sure. [39:12] That can happen. [39:14] Ruben Lancrete is a pioneer in genetic testing on pigeons. [39:18] That's a thing. [39:19] He maintains a database of over 70,000 birds that stretch back over 10 generations. [39:26] It has been very important in proving parentage, father, mother, for sale of pigeons. [39:34] He showed us how he plucks genetic samples from feathers. [39:37] The idea is his genetic library offers some protection from the pigeon mafia because a stolen [39:44] pigeon or its offspring could be identified by DNA and make it too risky to sell or race. [39:52] And that gets us back to Tom Vongover and his missing masterpiece, Finn. [39:59] This is the point in the story where you might expect to hear from hard-charging detectives who [40:03] took on the case. But the Belgian federal police wanted 60 minutes to agree to what we might ask in [40:10] an interview, what they might say, and what we could report. That didn't fly with us. [40:14] So, here's what we learned from sources close to the investigation. [40:20] Police combed through security camera video, license plate reader data, [40:25] and cell phone records tied to a dozen robberies across Belgium, including Tom Vongover's. [40:31] That led to a raid in March 2025 in a Brussels suburb on this yellow house and a Romanian national. [40:38] 1,200 miles away, Romanian cops also searched the homes of some of his relatives. [40:47] In all, 87 pigeons were found that appeared to be birds stolen from Belgium. [40:53] The identity rings were gone, so cops turned to Ruben Landcrete and his genetic testing. [40:59] His DNA analysis helped identify 20 of the recovered pigeons, including two of Finn's grandchildren. [41:06] Pigeon deaths have been happening. [41:10] But now you can solve them, right? [41:11] With DNA. [41:12] With DNA, yes, that's very good. Now we can close the case. [41:16] Well, kind of. Eight co-conspirators were convicted with the mastermind [41:22] sentenced to 30 months in jail. But he won't reveal what happened to the rest of Tom Vongover's stolen [41:28] pigeons, including Finn. [41:31] Where are the pigeons? Give them back. [41:33] This isn't about the money for you. This is about the pigeon. [41:35] I want my pigeon back. [41:45] The Last Minute of 60 Minutes is sponsored by UnitedHealthcare, [41:50] coverage you can count on for your whole life ahead. [41:56] Retired Admiral William McRaven had a remarkable 37-year military career, [42:02] which included commanding America's Special Operations Forces [42:07] and the mission to bring Osama bin Laden to justice. [42:11] We asked McRaven to reflect on America and honor. [42:16] I've been all over the world and seen men and women from every country exhibit a sense of honor. [42:21] I witnessed an Iraqi judge who refused to be intimidated by al-Qaeda [42:26] and an Afghan father who stood up to the Taliban. [42:28] I see honor everywhere I look. This idea that we must do the right thing, even when it's hard. [42:35] Honor is what makes humanity so very, very worthwhile. [42:39] But in the American context, honor to me is about upholding the values [42:44] that were baked into our national DNA. [42:46] The ideas of liberty, equality, individualism, the rule of law, and religious freedom. [42:52] Every military officer swears an oath to protect and defend the Constitution. [42:57] And consequently, to maintain our honor as officers, we must always do right by the Constitution, [43:03] even when the consequences might bring our careers to an end. [43:08] Doing the right thing, even when it's hard, will always put you on the right side of history. [43:14] I'm Leslie Stahl. We'll be back next week with another edition of 60 Minutes.