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Good morning. I'm Jane Pauley, and this is Sunday morning. Classic tales of shipwrecks and adventures on the high seas have captivated us for centuries. stories like Shakespeare's The Tempest, Jules Verne's twenty thousand leagues under the sea. and now one of this summer's blockbuster movies, the latest adaptation of Homer's The Odyssey.
As Lee Cowan tells us, this month marks the anniversary of one of our most enduring deep sea stories. that still has the power to fascinate. There is no more famous shipwreck. Then Titanic. that sat alone in dark silence for seventy three years, until oceanographer Bob Ballard, Dove deep.
When you found the Titanic, did you realize what a. See, I didn't think it was a big deal. You didn't? No. It was a huge deal, of course.
All shipwrecks captivate us. We go sleuthing for more. Ahead. On Sunday morning. Just a few months shy of her eightieth birthday, and more than fifty years since her wrap dress became a global phenomenon.
Diane von Furstenberg remains a fashion icon. She's looking back this morning with our Alina Cho.
Okay. Wisdom, creativity, magic. Diane von Furstenberg has lived a rich life, but she knows one dress put her on the map, the wrap dress. Why do you think that dress took off in the way that it did? You know, it's the dress.
That you get the man. And his mother doesn't mind, which means that it's sexy, it's definitely sexy. But it's very proper at the same time. A look inside the life of an icon. Later.
on Sunday morning. Back in February, the United States, along with Israel, launched a massive air attack against Iran. nearly 900 strikes in just the first twelve hours.
Now, as the conflict grinds into its seventh month, What started as a display of overwhelming firepower has exposed a hard truth about America's military arsenal. as David Martin reports. Yeah. Patriot Air Defense missiles coming off the production line. but not fast enough to replace the estimated fifteen hundred fired in the war against Iran.
Do we? have enough weapons to see it through to the end?
Well for a war against Iran, the answer is yes. The problem is a war against China. Facing up to the shortage of high-tech weapons. coming up on Sunday morning. On this Rosh Hashanah weekend, Seth Doan explores how the chance discovery of some long-forgotten photos uncovered a remarkable story of survival after World War II.
Katrina Kaufman reports on ethical challenges in the largely unregulated world of commercial child surrogacy. Plus a conversation with Dario Amade. Co-founder of Anthropic on the potential risks and rewards of artificial intelligence. We'll have a story from Steve Hartman. and more besides, on this Sunday morning for the thirteenth of september, twenty twenty six.
We'll be back in a moment. After more than six months of war with Iran, America still holds the upper hand in firepower. But its dwindling stock of high-tech weapons is raising concern about whether the US is ready for a much larger conflict that could be on the horizon. David Martin reports Yeah. This is the Patriot Air Defense Missile.
designed to shoot down the deadliest of threats, an incoming ballistic missile. Ready to go into his canister. It'll be out the door pretty soon.
So this is the newest This is this is the newest one absolutely state of the art. Tim Cahill is head of Lockheed Martin's Missile Division. And this is the first time a television news team has been allowed to film on this production floor in Camden, Arkansas. How does it destroy the incoming missile? Actually with impact into the missile.
It's going to vaporize pretty much whatever it hits.
So this is the classic bullet hitting a bullet. Absolutely. This is bullet hitting a bullet. Each of these bullets cost about $4 million. And Lockheed Martin is currently turning out 750 of them a year.
Not nearly enough to replenish the estimated 1,500. fired in the war against Iran. If they fire a ballistic missile, we have to use one of our high-end systems to defend. Mark Kancian of the Center for Strategic and International Studies has compiled estimates of the Patriot and six other critical weapons used against Iran. You can very easily see.
U.S. fired off billions of dollars worth of weapons. Absolutely. probably in the vicinity of $25 billion of munitions. Huge shit.
Now in its seventh month, the unpopular war with Iran has exposed for all to see an unsettling fact. A chronic shortage of high-tech weapons. which was largely ignored by both Democratic and Republican administrations. Until the U.S. increased military aid to Ukraine after Russia's full-scale invasion.
The war in Ukraine was the wake-up call because it became clear that we did not have adequate inventories or the surge capability to supply a protracted conflict. Then this February, The US attacked Iran. The United States Joint Forces struck more than 13,000 targets. It depleted the stockpiles quite considerably. The war with Iran goes on.
Do we have enough weapons to See it through to the end.
Well, for a war against Iran, the answer is yes. The problem is a war against China. We might be able to provide enough munitions for a month, you know, getting on to month two or month three or four. You know, that's a great challenge. The Pentagon says claims of U.S.
munition shortages are false. and only embolden enemies to attack American troops. But Defense Secretary Pete Hekseth has been exhorting industry to increase weapons production to what he calls a wartime footing. We're having to reinvest and restart the economic engine, the defense industrial base. At speed, at scalar.
What does that mean for you? We feel it. It's controlled chaos is what it is. It's just move fast, figure it out, find what our obstacles are, break them down. Cahill says Lockheed Martin intends to increase Patriot production from $750 a year to $2,000.
by laying on more shifts. and increasing automation on the assembly line. Hours are going to become minutes as we fully automate this factory to drive those rates up. It takes some six weeks to assemble a patriot. but about two years to manufacture the 4,000 parts that go into it.
But we have a vast supply chain, something on the order of 500 to 1,000 suppliers. That sounds like a lot of potential bottlenecks. You know, our joke is how many parts does it take to build a missile? And the answer is all of them. And so all it takes is one single part somewhere along the line to keep us from building up.
Have you had hold-ups waiting for a part to come in? We have always, yeah. We've had to rely upon single-source suppliers for many of our systems. The rocket motors which power the Patriot are made five miles away by the defense contractor L3 Harris. under time-consuming safety regulations.
We are working with a product that is certainly dangerous if not handled properly. Ken Beddingfield, the company's president of missiles, Says the rocket fuel in each of these motors has to be cured in an oven, much like pottery in a kiln. That cure time in the oven can take from days To weeks. The company has nearly doubled production of motors for the Patriot. and broken ground on a new, more automated plant which is still sixteen months away from completion.
And as with Lockheed Martin, Bettingfield's schedule is hostage to his ability to get all the parts he needs. Nozzles, Uh are parts that are Schedule challenged. Schedule challenge. You have a hard time getting enough of them. That's right.
Do you always have a backup source?
Sometimes there is only one qualified supplier. But we want that to be the absolute exception. Not the rule. No excuses. Speed, scale.
Volume, efficiency. Maximum Urgency. It's fueled by record trillion-dollar defense budgets, which polls show a majority of Americans do not support. This is the fueling of the 20-foot-long super rocket. Think of it as the rebirth of the Cold War military-industrial complex.
Only this time, the complex includes disruptors like Co-Aspire, in Manassas, Virginia. Run by Doug Deneni. Here you're looking at a cruise missile that's launched off of aircraft. And it's designed to go very far, very fast, and very affordably.
So, how much does this cost? A couple hundred thousand dollars. A couple hundred thousand dollars. It's a fraction of what most cruise missiles cost. High-Czech cruise missiles carry bigger warheads and have a longer range than Denenis.
But he claims his are good enough. We're trying to build these in high quantities. knowing that they're not as exquisite. but many of these will get through to the target. The Pentagon plans to buy 10,000 low-cost cruise missiles from the Nenni and other startups.
Is this a good enough weapon to go up against. Chinese air defenses? It is. And if you have thousands of these It's very challenging for even a very sophisticated air defense system to take care of. The missile has just 200 parts, some of them off-the-shelf commercial products.
including BBs glued into the nose for ballast.
So this is the engine. This is the engine. And this comes originally from the hobbyists. Market. While Deneni is working on contracts worth $400 million to make affordable missiles, Lockheed Martin just signed a $59 billion contract.
to build high-performance patriots.
So how long is it going to take the U.S. to replenish its stockpiles? just to the pre-Iran war level. It's about one to five years. depending on the munition, once we've rebuilt the inventories to the pre-war level, It will take several years to get to a level that the war planners would be comfortable with for a war against China.
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Go to ollie.com/slash FirstBox and use code FIRSTBOX to get 70% off your welcome kit. Ollie, feed the obsession. To Lee Cowan now. who takes us far beneath the surface of the sea. Uh Our world is more water than land.
No wonder our oceans teem with tales of Mysteries and monsters. Seafarers. and shipwrecks. As a kid, But I saw Captain Nemo's people walking around on the bottom of the ocean. And I came home and, you know, parents will always ask you, what are you going to do when you grow up?
And I said, well, I'm going to be Captain Nemo. And they didn't laugh. That's renowned oceanographer Robert Ballard. Wow. Yeah.
His discovery of entire ecosystems thriving in deep-sea darkness changed our understanding of life on Earth. His mother hoped he'd always be remembered for that scientific achievement, but Instead, Ballard became known. for a different discovery. I come home. And she calls me.
And she says, Literally, you ready for this? Too bad you found that rusty old boat. Ah! Two days after I found the Titanic. Titanic.
The mother of all shipwrecks. Ballard found her some 12,000 feet beneath the Atlantic 41 years ago this month. It changed his life. But he says it also. changed his heart.
We started seeing all of these shoes. And the shoes were pairs of shoes. in the position of were a body, had fallen. Mm. touch stuff like that.
The oceans are vast museums. With the past sleeps in solitude. the breadcrumbs of our desire for adventure and often our failures to survive it. We are drawn to these stories because they are seeing human beings at the most vulnerable and in the most extreme and dramatic of scenarios. Last year, journalist Sophie Elmhurst told a best-selling tale of a married couple's shipwreck so extraordinary that it could be told a hundred years from now and still be mesmerized.
They're out in the ocean, they're masters of their boat. In 1972. Marilyn and Morris Bailey, boarded their sailboat Oralan. and set sail from Southampton, England, to New Zealand. halfway around the world.
Their friend, Colin Foskett. saw them off. They told us not to worry, that it would take a long time. And as they were going through what they call the doldrums, in the Pacific. They weren't in any rush.
To to get there. But on their way to the Galapagos Islands, one of those creatures from below, a sperm whale, rammed their vessel, dooming it within minutes. When they went back below deck, It was ankle deep in water already and the cabin was sort of very quickly filling up and it didn't take long for them to realize that there was no hope of stopping the water coming in. It was rising too fast and they had to figure out how to get off. Marilyn, who salvaged her camera, recorded the heroine's last gasps.
Then gone. There's this moment of enormous drama. incredible sort of calamity. And then After that is this extraordinary stillness and silence. There is just nothing, it's nothingness.
Their life raft, a dinghy, and a few rations were all they could salvage. They didn't even have a radio. For Morris it was a matter of total despair. He immediately thought that they were doomed and that they would never survive and was thinking of ways that they could kill themselves with a gas canister. And she went the other direction.
She was always thinking about what the route was back to land. Maryland fashioned fishing hooks out of safety pins. while some of their food came to them. There were turtles swimming past and then there were sharks swimming past and you know these were creatures they were catching with their bare hands, hauling them out of the ocean and then working out how to carve them up and eat their raw flesh. The sea has always been inviting.
But if what litters the bottom tells us anything, It can also be a ruthless mistress. How many shipwrecks are out there still undiscovered. How about 3 million? Just this past April. A British diving team found the torpedoed remains of the Coast Guard cutter Tampa.
One hundred thirty one souls were lost. making it America's largest naval combat loss of life in World War One. Off the coast of Norway, archaeologists announced the recovery of a treasure trove of remarkably preserved Chinese porcelain. from the wreck of an eighteenth century cargo ship. Even the Great Lakes are offering up their secrets.
including this passenger liner. that sank more than 150 years ago. Improved sonar and underwater drone abilities have made finding those needles in a watery haystack. A little bit easier, says Robert Ballard. Before you can really go down with vehicles, You really need a detailed map.
And the faster you get a map, the sooner you know where to die. Exactly. Hi, Lee. I'm Marley. I'm Marley Parker.
We met Ballard in his command center in New London, Connecticut, as he was watching the crew of his research vessel, Nautilus. Mapping an area of the Pacific Ocean between the Hawaiian Islands and Guam. Just in the time we've been out here, we have already mapped 35,000 square kilometers, which is the size of Taiwan, roughly. Coming up to the. But it's what he calls telepresence.
that fascinates him the most. Archaeologists can now be present on Wreck. while sitting on their couch, watching a live stream from a robotic vehicle. like the ones used here in the Solomon Islands. There's just artillery holes all over the ship.
It's unbelievable. Humans? May not need always risk the ride to the deep anymore. No one went looking for the Oralan, Morris and Marilyn Bailey's sailboat. No one was looking for them, either.
but a South Korean fishing boat just happened to spot and rescue them. The Baileys had been adrift for one hundred eighteen days. That's four months. By the time they reached land at Hawaii, there was a crowd of photographers, you know, boats coming out to meet them and this huge bank of press. They were so weak and so malnourished they could barely walk.
But in good spirits. What did you live on? What did you do? Unbelievably. just two years after their near-death experience at sea?
the Baileys built another boat. and set sail from England to Patagonia. this time with a crew. including their friend, Colin Foskett. My brother said I was absolutely Mental for doing it.
We had a few experiences which I wouldn't like to repeat. You always remember the good. You never remember the bad? From ocean liners to a pair of solo sailors. The sea takes what it wants.
those that allows to pass. Remind us. Why we keep going back. Kids ask me, what's your next great discovery? And I say, I don't think you understand it.
I don't know. I'm just going to bump into it.
Well, what's left to bump in? I don't know. Let me keep me bumping. It's been another week where the debate over artificial intelligence and its potential excesses has been front and center. Jolene Kent yesterday sat down with Dario Amade, co-founder of Anthropic.
Here's some of their conversation. I won't lie to you, there are real dangers. And I think for too long, the industry. lied to people. About the fact that this technology had risk.
and the biggest risk could be the end of humanity, former Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon warned on social media this past Tuesday, saying Anthropic and OpenAI are gambling with our lives. It doesn't look that different from say Terminator or from science fiction films, it will be smart enough to So killers. In response, CEO Dario Amadei spoke with us at Anthropic Headquarters in San Francisco. I don't think I fully just appreciated what it would actually be like. When the progress was as fast as it was.
So we're, we're, an exponential curve looks a little like this. Where are we on the curve? We're kinda on the bend where it's starting to get steeper.
So is that a five-alarm fire to you? What it means. It doesn't mean we need to panic today. It doesn't mean we need to shut it all down. What I would say it's a warning sign.
It's a warning sign that we need to slow down. In an essay Saturday, Amadei wrote that the entire tech industry must work together to slow the pace of AI capabilities. Does that then mean that Anthropic is going to stop releasing more advanced models? It doesn't mean that. What it means is that we need to make sure.
that every generation of models that we release is properly tested. To attempt that, Amadei says Anthropic will now give independent evaluators permanent employee-like access to their models. whenever anyone builds an AI model. There's a third-party evaluator who can verify whether that company is. Following the safety practices that they're committed to.
It's like a food inspector. But AI experts say this is hardly enough. And Amadei agrees, claiming he supports federal regulation.
So far, proposed legislation ranges from an outright ban on superintelligence to a mandatory kill switch that could shut down risky AI. AI kill switch could be a good idea, but I don't think banning it, completely banning it is the right approach. One, the idea that we would never get the incredible benefits, would never get The medical cures. That doesn't sit right with me. Second, this technology will be built in other countries, including authoritarian countries.
We are in this race with China. Do you actually think slowing down is a good idea when China will not? This is the toughest dilemma. This is the toughest. aspect of our situation.
Amadei looks to the nuclear arms agreements with the former Soviet Union as a potential model. But cautious even his expectations are low. The more long-term thing would be working together to put a speed limit. On the rate of AI progress. I think that's going to be very difficult because the incentives to pull ahead and the military advantage that you get from that are so large.
And honestly, I don't know if it's possible. But We should try. It seems like the fate of humanity is at risk. How much personal responsibility do you feel about where we are going?
So, you know, look, my view here is it has always been very strange that this technology is being built by a private company. People ask me that question all the time. Why isn't this being built by government? And the strangest thing about it is I agree with them. I'm uncomfortable.
Would you be willing to give up the technology to the government? To the right combination of governments.
So the worry I... Are you willing to hand over this company? I am concerned that one single government could abuse this technology just as easily as a single company could. But I think a combination of democratically elected governments. I don't know about handing over, but some kind of oversight, some kind of joint.
governance The question is no longer whether AI will become powerful enough to require constraint. But who in power will take action? If we build in the right way, I think the probability of something bad happening is very low. If we build in the wrong way, the probability of something bad happening is very high. Wow.
More than eighty years after the end of World War II and the Holocaust. Seth Doan offers a living reminder. To never forget.
So this is the box that I would go to in my dad's dresser drawer. She was just curious as a young girl, not trying to unearth a little-known piece of history. And I would go in and I would play with them and I'd set em all up on the floor. But tucked in that drawer next to these toy soldiers was an envelope of photos, which Elizabeth Connolly found intriguing. And I always remembered thinking, hmm, they don't look like any of our relatives.
I wonder who they are. They appeared quite removed from her reality in upstate New York. There was one that just always drew me, and it was a mom holding a little girl's hand coming up the hill. And there was another. woman standing behind that was very, very thin.
Did you ask your dad about them? Yeah, he would just say there were people that he came upon in the train and that was it. Her dad, Carol Walsh, U.S. Army Sergeant in World War II, kept the photos given to him by his friend and fellow tank commander. I think a lot of the soldiers during that time, they came home and they held a lot of those stories in.
That's partly why her son's teacher Matt Roselle started a class project to collect the oral histories of veterans. What were the major campaigns you were involved in? While Roselle was interviewing her dad in 2001, Connolly interjected. The train just before. No, I didn't tell him about the train.
I was about to shut the camera down and he said, A beautiful April day. We're zooming like crazy through the middle of Germany. We came across this train. It was full of Holocaust victims. He said he looked inside the train cars.
He saw the people in a very distressed state. 2,500 Jewish prisoners from Bergen-Belsen were crammed inside on their way to another concentration camp. On April 13, 1945, in the final weeks of the war, advancing American soldiers came upon the stopped train near Magdeburg, Germany, and provided care for the survivors. What did you think when you heard about this train? You know, I was a young history teacher.
I was not schooled enough, believe it or not, in the Holocaust. Did you realize that you were uncovering this relatively unknown piece of history? No, no, not at all. Roselle posted that interview online and eventually heard from dozens of survivors and liberators, inspiring him to write a book. Mr.
Carol. The former Hudson Falls New York teacher also organized reunions to bring together American soldiers with those they helped liberate. including Peter Lantos, who became a renowned neuroscientist and author. That's you? Oh yes.
You were so cute. Apparently I was.
Okay. In his London home, Lantos told us how he was just five years old when he was put on that train with his mom. When you had to leave Bergen-Belsen, what were you thinking? It was my mother who was doing the thinking and her thinking was anywhere. can be better than Balson.
There were dead bodies lying around unburied. first by dozens, then by hundreds. His father died of starvation there. In all, he lost 21 family members in the Holocaust. That was kind of a noise.
Lantos remembers the day they were liberated. And suddenly it became quiet And then people started to shout Americans, Americans. He does not really like talking about what happened. But it's a moral obligation to do it. Why?
Because we are. the last survivor. I'm eighty-six. In few years' time, No one can tell you, yes, it is true. Because I was there.
The people on board that train are, in every meaningful respect, on the brink of death at the point in time that the Americans intercept them. James Balgen is the head of public history at Imperial War Museum London. The net is closing in. The Allies are clearly on their way. Peter Lantos and Matt Roselle recently joined him in the Holocaust galleries he curated, which feature the story of the train.
You might say, oh no, but they're being saved from Belsen, they're being sent somewhere else, but the reality is of course, as soon as they get along the way and then the Nazis realise they're not going to be able to get them to where they're going to get to. then the plan emerges to kill them. The episode reveals the chaos at the end of the war, Bulgan says, and the quirks of fate that led to remembering this story of liberation and survival. All these people, men, women, children. Matt Roselle, when he was doing his interviews, Didn't know.
that he was going to stumble across The history of the train. It tells us so much about the way that history actually happens. That's something award-winning filmmaker Mike Edwards knows well. Wow. While working on his upcoming documentary, A Train Near Magdeburg, his team unearthed a series of photos from that day, which he brought to show Bulgian.
He's holding a photograph of himself of what he used to look like pre-Holocaust. I've literally never seen anything like that before. It's compelling. Because you know about these things and you've seen some of it, but to see new things, every new kind of physical visual trace gives a new insight. What was it about this story that that struck you?
Okay. I think it's a story of humanity. And the cry went up. Oh god. They are free.
Edwards has no direct connection to the train but has spent more than a decade on this passion project which he's screened for some students and one question stays with him. Mr. Edwards, he goes, what do you hope people take away from this story? I said, each one of you in your own lives is going to have a train near Magdeburg moment. You're going to have a choice of whether to care about somebody or not.
to treat them as a human being or not. May you remember this story. They didn't have to stop. They didn't have to help these people. But they did.
Now retired from teaching, Matt Rosell says there's a lesson here for all of us in the value of education. Here is a story that very few Americans know anything about. That They should. You know, we all say never forget, never forget, and it's a great mantra, it's very important, but. What if he never learned it to begin with?
This morning, Steve Hartman shows us how one chance encounter. can lead to a new beginning. While walking along this path in Austin, Texas, Jasper Steinmetz spotted a man with something both familiar and out of place. I saw the Indiana University Athletic Backpack. Uh and since I just graduated from Indiana, we had that commonality and I figured You know, why not talk to him?
Jasper learned the man was originally from Indiana. He'd been homeless for eight months. and his name. was Sampson James. I had a shock when I looked it up on Google for sure.
Sampson had been a four-star football recruit out of Avon, Indiana. Later, he became IU's star running back. He was an amazing athlete. Really a standout star. But then the dream crumbled.
His knee went out. He got diagnosed as bipolar. dropped out of school, and eventually lost it all. Except that red backpack. It was one of his only possessions.
Until along came that fellow Hoosier. He told me that you know he went to IU as well.
So I was like, you know, wow, that's amazing, you know. Like go who is yours? He was able to grasp and understand me. and come to a point of understanding. And so, because of that Hoosier connection, Jasper decided to act.
He started an online fundraiser for Sampson, raising $17,000. And that was just the beginning. We got the keys.
Next came a home. We just prepaid a bunch of rent. and got him everything that he needed for the apartment. And we got the coffee maker. These are his new digs with everything Samson needs to start anew.
Oh yeah.
So now, when they walk along that same trail where they first met, The future looks so much brighter.
Now that all these people donated and you got the apartment. They really want to see you succeed. Yeah, oh yeah, and I'm big on not letting them down. a fresh start and a testament to the amazing connections that are possible. Whenever two people Find common ground.
The fashion world is notoriously fickle, yet Diane von Vurstenberg has remained a defining presence for more than 50 years. She's talking this morning with Alina Cho. How much time do you spend in Venice these days? Five months, I don't know. Five months out of the year.
Well, uh yes, I'm I'm here now. It's my stage, you know, it's it's It's where I think Cruise the canals of Venice. amid the grand palazzos. And Rialto Bridge. And it's understandable why this iconic city is now home to one of fashion's most iconic names.
So I want to set the record straight.
Well, it's up to you. I was born as Dian. because French is Dienne. And then I came to America and I became Diane. Oprah calls you Diane.
My son calls me Livi F. I tell you, a lot of people call me D Viev. Oh my little Venetian thing. Your diary? This is my diary.
Now 79, DVF, or Diane von Furstenberg, burst onto the scene in the 1970s. What made her famous? A single item of clothing inspired by the tops ballerinas wear. a little dress that was comfortable. practical.
and affordable. Do you ever get tired of talking about?
Well, I used to, I used to, because I was doing all kinds of things and people said a rap dress. I said, a rap dress, enough already. I've done so many more. The idea for the rap dress, which debuted in 1974, came to her while watching, of all things, news coverage of Watergate. Julie Eisenhower, the daughter of Nixon, is making a speech.
And oh my god, she's wearing my little wrap top with a skirt in a snake print. And that's when I thought, oh, you know what? we should turn it into address. You had sold one million by 1976. I know.
I know. You were not even 30 years old. I know. In 1976, at 29, she landed on the cover of Newsweek. Crowned the most marketable female in fashion since Coco Chanel.
Uh Dion Simone Michelle Halfen was born in Brussels, Belgium on New Year's Eve, 1946. Her father, a businessman. her mother, a survivor of the Holocaust. When she was released from the death camp, She was barely the weight of her bones. Forty nine pounds only.
And but she came back. 49 pounds. And her mother fed her like a little bird every five minutes. And within six months, she was normal. And thirteen months later I was born.
And she used to say, God saved me so I could give you life. By giving you life, you gave me mine back. You said you both won the day you were born. Yes, absolutely. Absolutely.
Yes. Before DVF became fashion royalty, she became a princess, marrying Aegon von Furstenberg, a German-Italian prince. They had two children together, but their marriage didn't last. It did, however, make headlines, most notably for their open relationship. DVF's Love Life, one could argue, is an open book.
Richard Gere. Oh, sweet. Richard Geard was very sweet. Did you date? We had a little fling.
Warren Beatty and Ryan O'Neill. Two other little flames. Same weekend.
Well, I once boasted that about that, and then it stuck with me forever. You talked about. when you were very young, falling in love with a boy. and then falling in love with a girl. At a time when sexual fluidity was not part of the conversation.
Oh, I mean I mean anyone who goes to boarding school knows that that happens. I mean, you know. Yes, I did fall in love with this girl and we still talk. In 2001, she would remarry, this time to media mogul Barry Diller, another high-profile headline-making romance, especially last year, after Diller, at 83 years old, revealed in a memoir he was attracted to men. He said.
Yes, I also liked guys, but that was not a conflict with my love for Diane. You never saw that as a conflict. I listen, when I met Barry, he was this hard guy. Magic happened and it was passion. It was passion.
It was not something that I expected at all. How did you feel when the book came out and so much of his life that you knew was finally revealed to the world? I didn't feel anything. I mean, it's it's I I encourage him to do the book. It was important that he did the book.
But I mean, he had opened to me long ago.
So, no, I'm I'm happy and he is my soulmate. I mean, you know, he's my companion of life. I mean, he's everything. Over the years, her business has had its own challenges. But the brand, through all of its financial ups and downs, survives.
When people are that success say, Oh, she's so successful, well, maybe things aren't so good. And the same way when people say, Oh, she's finished, That came, I was already on the way up again. Today, DVF remains close to the company that bears her name. while a new generation leads its creative vision. Instead, DVF is focused on designing what she'll leave behind.
like her annual DVF Awards held just last week in Venice.
Now in its seventeenth year, the awards celebrate women changing the world, from actress and activist Jane Fonda. to Pulitzer Prize-winning war photographer Lindsay Adario. On New Year's Eve, you'll turn 80 years old. Have you thought about that a lot? I honor my the year I'm going towards every year.
I am very Sensitive about mortality and always have been. For Diane von Verstenberg, it's a season. of reflection. I think that right now I am starting my last act. I hope it won't be too short of an act.
But it's definitely my last act. You've called this the winter of your life. And it's the winter of my life. I'm just curious to know how do you want to be remembered? Oh, how do I want to be remembered?
As somebody who loved life and tried to honor it. in every way. In the United States, commercial surrogacy. When a woman is paid to carry an embryo for someone else is widely assumed to be a closely regulated process. But a Sunday morning investigation finds that's not the case.
Raising serious ethical questions about an industry with few legal safeguards. Here's Katrina Kaufman. I was looking for stay-home jobs because I wanted to spend time with my kids. When Maria Castellanos came across an ad looking for women to become surrogates, she was instantly intrigued. Getting paid to carry a child for parents who could not do it themselves.
I love being pregnant, so I said, why not? But what happened next was far from the idyllic scenario she imagined.
Sometimes I'm sad, sometimes I'm just in sh I don't I don't know. It all began when Maria was matched by a surrogacy agency with Sylvia Zhang, who claimed to be a single mom struggling with infertility, desperate for a child. Did you view it as something that was a good deed for Sylvia? It was something good I was doing for her. But soon after Maria became pregnant, things seemed off.
I never saw her physically until I gave birth.
So she didn't come to the fertility clinic? No, I was always there by myself. by herself even when she gave birth to Zhang's baby boy. The nurse is telling me that if she doesn't show up, because I have no rights, that CPS would have come in and take the baby. Maria says Zhang didn't show up until the next day, insisting she'd been too busy at work and revealing for the first time that she also had a secret male partner, Guojun Xi'an.
Maria was stunned. But Zhang seemed so apologetic and grateful that when Zang offered twenty thousand more, eighty five thousand dollars, and promised she could see the kids every year, Maria agreed to carry another child. But seven months into that pregnancy, Maria's lawyer called with another bombshell. This would not actually be Zhang's second child. It would be her 18th.
She already had 17 babies, birthed by surrogates across the US. First thing he said was, Maria, did you know? I said, Do I know what? He goes, Sylvia has a lot of kids. I said, What?
No, I didn't know. What is that like to even process? I was seeing shock. Who are you angry with? everybody that was involved.
Everybody. It was a fertility clean. It was the assistants. There's no way that nobody knew that she had.
so many kids at a certain point. Is there any chance we could just talk really quickly? A year-long Sunday morning investigation found Zhang and Xian had at least 25 children by surrogates in the U.S. beginning around 2022, and they had signed contracts to have even more. We spoke with 17 of their surrogates and none of them knew that they were helping to build this massive family until the couple who live in this mansion in Arcadia, California was arrested in 2025 on allegations of child abuse.
Things have been going on in this house for a long time. having these women come over pregnant. Lorena Menez is their neighbor. You saw her yelling, and then she was holding the baby because the baby was screaming, and she was just shaking it. She was just shaking, shaking, shaking the baby.
The couple denies any wrongdoing and the case remains under investigation. Today, all their children born through surrogates are in state custody. Several surrogates, including Maria, have fought to take care of the kids. But as surrogates, they've surrendered any parental rights. Based on documents we've seen and our calculations, we believe they've spent between $3 and $5 million on surrogacy.
When we knocked on Zhang and Qian's door, They called the police. Yeah some people taking the photos in front of my house. They're allowed to do that. In most Americans' minds, it's completely unethical to have 20 surrogates going at the same time in different states and not tell them. Attorney Melissa Brisman has represented both surrogates and intended parents and used to run her own surrogacy agency.
Most surrogates tell me that the best thing they ever did was that day they gave birth and they saw the smiles. and they felt like they did something really special in this world that they could be proud of. They were robbed of that. They're really victims in this. Versman says it's an abuse of the system.
But with surrogacy costing as much as $200,000, she says that's a lot of money moving through a lot of hands. We see the same lawyers' names, the same fertility doctors' names, the same escrow company's names popping up throughout these cases. And you feel like someone must have noticed that. Absolutely. Somebody knew.
Somebody knew.
The problem is that if it is not illegal and they're making a lot of money, there's no incentive for them. to turn it in. If people having 20 or more surrogate babies sounds extreme, it pales in comparison with the astonishing case of a woman we'll call Judy, a single mom who, like Maria, became a surrogate to help provide for her own daughter, while also helping a parent in need. You can change your life by helping a family start a completely different life and family of their own. She asked us not to reveal her identity because she's currently pregnant.
When they matched you, did they tell you anything about their family? It was along the lines of. just a single father looking to have a big family. What did you think that meant? I was picturing sound of music.
That was my immediate first thought. She says she was already deep into the fertility process before her agency, Patriot Conceptions in Irvine, California, told her that the single dad whose baby she would carry was at the time also having children with more than 20 other surrogates. Documents obtained by Sunday morning show the identity of the man Judy is carrying a baby for is Chinese billionaire Shubo. Reports that he had more than 100 children sparked a viral reaction, like this video Ricocheting Around Chinese Social Media. I feel blindsided.
I feel misled. I trusted this agency to kind of protect surrogates and like. match them with People with good intentions, and it's beyond something that you could prepare for. Shoes video game company claims just a dozen babies were born via surrogate in the US, but in July, it posted this provocative photo. It feels like.
He's like creating an army. That's crazy. Did you count how many kids are in this picture? I don't understand what the motive is. I just know that Mm.
It's gonna be hard for the child. You don't even think like this could be legal. Like everyone, every step of the way tells him yes. And allows this is like Creating these agreements, and then it's just up to the surrogate at that point. who has half of the information.
Judy says when she asks questions, the agency's answers keep changing, and they still haven't made the father of the baby she's carrying available to speak with her. We asked Judy's surrogacy agency multiple times for an interview and sent written questions, but they declined to respond. When reached on the phone, they claimed Judy wasn't even pregnant. This is Judy's latest sonogram. We also contacted Shubo, but never heard back.
What are the regulations that should be implemented? I helped one of my son's friends. with his barber shop. The paperwork I had to do for his barber shop is ten times as hard. As opening up a surrogacy agency.
All you need is $300 and an LLC certificate in most states, and you could open up an agency. Surrogacy, it turns out, is an almost completely unregulated industry. To date, New York is the only state where surrogacy agencies are required to be licensed. Bristman says there should be background checks for all intended parents, just like what's required in the adoption system. Many reputable agencies already do this.
In my personal opinion, it's not a big ask when you ask a total stranger to carry your baby to let them look at your criminal background check and decide whether or not they want to help you. In fact, Guojun Xian and Sylvia Zhang have a checkered past. Court filings show allegations of violence and fraud, which they have denied, and Arcadia police responded to at least forty 911 calls at their mansion. Why is surrogacy so unregulated? It's such a hotbed, right?
It touches on IVF coverage, it touches on abortion, it touches on people's autonomy, and nobody wants to touch a triggering bill that doesn't affect a lot of people, and that's not going to get them a lot of votes. The U.S. is the only developed country where commercial surrogacy is fully legal. There are as many as 10,000 surrogacy births in the U.S. every year, and Brisman says most are successful matches.
The majority of people that do surrogacy need surrogacy. And they love those babies, and they wouldn't be able to have those babies without this technology.
So, I don't want people to lose sight of that goal. As for Maria Castellanos, she tells us she worries every day about the two babies she carried as a surrogate who are now in foster care. babies she'll likely never see again. As a surrogate, you don't think you're going to have a connection, but you do.
So when I saw him, I was like, this is why I did that. Because I brought this baby here and you know, he was just he was beautiful. Maria, you've gone through so much during all of this. Did you feel protected? Wow, I've never I don't I don't I haven't been asked that, no?
Yeah. I don't know why I'm motioning them.
Sorry. Do you feel like Sylvia deceived you? Yes? I think the whole process was deceiving. Maria says she still wants to help new moms.
She is now becoming a maternity nurse. How did nursing happen? My thought was if I couldn't help these babies, then maybe I can help somebody else. If you could send a message to the kids, what would you want to say? Is that I hope they're okay.
I just hope that. They know how much I fought and how I tried, but. Yeah, there's nothing I could do. Thank you for listening. Please join us when our trumpet sounds again next Sunday morning.
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