Open Book with Anthony Scaramucci - The Crushing Loneliness of Growing Up With Autism - Leland Vittert

Episode Date: October 8, 2025

Leland Vittert is the host of On Balance with Leland Vittert and serves as NewsNation’s Chief Washington Anchor. A veteran journalist, Vittert joined NewsNation in May 2021, where he has been pivotal in covering national affairs and delivering special reports across the network’s primetime weeknight newscasts. Before joining NewsNation, Vittert worked for Fox News from 2010 to 2021, starting as a foreign correspondent based in Jerusalem and later as an anchor and correspondent in Washington. Get his wonderful new book and help make it a bestseller: Born Lucky: A Dedicated Father, A Grateful Son, and My Journey with Autism here: https://amzn.to/3KrXMtm Anthony Scaramucci is the founder and managing partner of SkyBridge, a global alternative investment firm, and founder and chairman of SALT, a global thought leadership forum and venture studio. He is the host of the podcast Open Book with Anthony Scaramucci. A graduate of Tufts University and Harvard Law School, he lives in Manhasset, Long Island. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact connects Ontario at 1-866-531-2,600 to speak to an advisor. Free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with Eye Gaming Ontario. Today we're sitting down with journalist, author, and a good friend of mine, Leland Vitter, to talk about his new book,

Born lucky. Layland opens up about his personal journey with autism, how his parents recognize the early signs and the profound impact of his father's unwavering support. This conversation hits on challenges, resilience, and the lessons we can learn from real adversity. Wow. I didn't realize Layland had autism. He's done such a good job of managing the social cues, such a great job of understanding himself and getting comfortable in his own skin. And I tell you what, it was. was a beautiful love story and a beautiful tribute that he wrote about his dad. But you know what else it was? It was a great parent guide. How to think about your kids, how to love them unconditionally, how to be an actor. It's not your words that matter to your kids, as Layland points out in his book,

but it's the incredible, unconditional love of the actions and the unwavering support that his dad had for Layland that has made him a success today. So if you're facing challenges and you want to grow, dive into Layland's book. It's a great. example of what human beings could do for each other when they really love each other. Let's go to the conversation. Welcome to Open Book. I am your host, Anthony Scaramucci, and joining us as a friend of mine, Layland Vedert. He is the Chief Washington anchor for News Nation, but he's written an incredible book, which I predict will be a bestseller. The title of the book is Born Lucky, a dedicated father, a grateful son, and my journey with autism. Wow.

What a, what a title. I want to go to you for a second. We've known each other a long time. We worked together at Fox. And you've been gracious to me. I've been on your show, both at Fox and News Nation. You've reported from war zones, the White House. But in this book, you're sharing an incredible personal story about your very own childhood. We're going to get into all elements of it. But why? Why was now the time to tell us this story? Well, it was, Unbeknownst to us, Anthony, that so much was going to be focused on autism at this moment, right? With RFK and with the discussion of a cause and is there therapeutics and how to deal with children who have special needs, whether it be autism or ADHD or bullying or whatever it is.

The why was simple is that more and more kids are getting diagnosed. there's no discussion about the cost of diagnosing kids, right? There's no discussion about what does it mean when kids think that, hey, I'm different? What does it mean when teachers teach and treat kids differently? What about when kids treat kids differently? So the word of reckoning in what parenting in America means. Is it gentle parenting where anyone who has issues is put in bubble wrap? Or are we going to once again realize that,

great things and great people come out of real adversity and persevering through adversity. So the idea behind the book, it's about me, really, is my story, but it's not for me. It's for parents and to give parents hope, unlike what my parents had. My parents, when I was diagnosed, were completely hopeless and they felt helpless. This proves that there is real hope. Okay, so you do not express yourself today, 2025, as somebody that's autistic. But you do write about in the book that at the age of three, you were not speaking. Your dad, Mark, sells his company and decides to dedicate his life to, I guess, being a full-time coach is the way you describe it.

So I want you to go to that part of the book. I want you to go to the origin story and how your parents are fixed. figuring out that you have autism and how do they help you deal with this in the modern world? It's a great question. And there were very clear signs that I was different. You know, no kids would ever invite me to play dates. No kid, you know, my parents would never see me playing with a kid. But there was this one moment, a show in the book, where we're at this dude ranch. It's a, you know, families come for a week, a week. in Arizona or whatever. And it's a Saturday. Everybody's there. There's the big field or lawn in front of

the main house of the dude ranch. And everybody gets there and I'm like five or six years old. And everybody starts playing. All the kids have a pickup soccer game. And everybody's laughing and having fun. And I'm sort of running into kids and I'm hitting kids and kids want nothing to do with me and they push me down. And it's very clear to my dad who's watching sort of with all the other dads that I'm much more like a repellent effect of a magnet than the attraction part of the magnet, right? You put two magnets together. They either click or they kind of push apart. I was the push apart. And my dad looks at my mom and says, we got a real problem here. And he could just see that I could not interact with kids my own age. And he said at that point, I realized, and he said to

my mom, we've got a very rough at the time it was about 12 or 14 years ahead of us. So we write in the book, I show you in the book, how he takes that moment, understands that it's going to be bad, says to my mom, he goes, you, this is going to be really difficult. And then goes about trying to figure out what to do about it. There was a request by the school that I was at to have me evaluated because I had some of these very sort of peculiar issues. Couldn't interact with kids my own age. Was, you know, kind of very angry and aggressive physically, but at the same time, I could interact with adults on a fairly normal basis. And so they take me to a psychology testing center. And you know what it's like, you know, the little waiting room with stale coffee and

the vinyl chairs and everything else. My parents are waiting for me. And then the psychologist comes out with me after the test. Results of the test are this, a lot of different issues, but one of them is on that IQ test that's two halves of a test. On one half, I'm genius. On the other half, I'm mentally retarded. So a 20-point spread is a learning disability. My spread was 70 points. Parents get taken into a little conference room. They all sit down. We've all been in those little medical conference rooms. And the woman says to my dad, it's very difficult to know what's going on inside his head. she said at the time he has pervasive developmental disorder social blindness there were all these names for it that we now know to be autism back then that's not how it was diagnosed and my dad goes

is there anything we can do and you know the the desperation of a parent who wants to help their child and the woman goes generally not and he goes anything please anything and she said well if the kid is very smart, which in some ways I was, and if he wants it, you can work with him. But that was all she said. That was all my parents, that was all my dad was given. And he said, okay. And at that point, he decided, as you pointed out, sold his companies. It was very successful at the time. And he said, I knew you didn't have any friends, so I was going to become your friend. Never told a soul about the diagnosis, never asked for a special accommodation,

never put any effort into getting me counseling or therapy or tutors or anything like that. He said, you know, no one else is going to care what's wrong with you. They're only going to care that you're weird or different or whatever. And I think you can be more. And if you're going to have a successful life, I have to

adapt you to the world, not adapt the world to you. So, I mean, Layland, there are lots of increase cases of autism. A lot of people are trying to figure out the causes of autism. The FDA is now talking about potentially uses of Tylenol was one of the contributors.

Your story is an unapologetic one, though. It's like it's a deal with it story. You mentioned bubble wrap. Your dad is not a bubble wrapping sort of a person. No, it was not. Okay. So we have the problem. I'm going to deal with the problem.

and I'm going to help my son come out of the problem. But your own description, you're running over. So what is a distinct characteristic of autism? Because there's a scene in the book, which is very touching. Your dad is touching his watch to try to signal to you certain things. So what are the manifestations of the behavioral traits of autism? And how did your dad help you develop the emotional cues that sometimes people that have autism don't develop intuitively. It's a great question. And one of the two major autism society,

one of the two major autism groups, your autism society or autism speaks, has this saying that if you've met a kid with autism, you've met one kid with autism. And you point out rightly that it went from about one in a thousand or one in 2000 when I was a kid with diagnosed to now one in 36, three times higher among boys, even higher among minorities. And that number, relatively speaking, is increasing still. And nobody knows why, as you point out, there's been some reports about what may contribute to it, but no definitive studies. So what my dad realized at the time, there was very little work, but what manifested with me was that I was unable to get a law in any way, shape, or form.

example. When I was in fifth grade and I write this story in the book, my dad knows how much I'm struggling in school. I write in the book how he comes over to my fifth grade PE class to see me. And he knew the PE teacher from a football program at another school. It's, you know, nice little school. PE, you know, fields are out, out back down this sort of hill when you look down over the field. And he says to the coach, he says, hey, how's my boy doing? And, and Jim Hoots goes, you know, he's doing better. I think today's a good day. And my dad goes, oh, that's great.

Let's go see you. And the coach goes, I don't think that's a good idea. My dad goes, why not? Hoots goes, well, I had to put him with the girls. And that's what I have to do. I have to have them play with the girls all day because the boys are too mean to him. So I could not get along with someone my own age. Someone touched me.

I thought they were trying to hit me, so I'd start a fight with him. I kind of looked funny, terribly cross-eyed, so sort of relentless bullying there, and had no understanding of social interaction. So you asked the question, and you can imagine how my dad's healing now with his fifth grader playing with the boys, and my dad had been quite a gifted athlete. As a fifth grader, my dad says, okay, how do I teach Lucky how to interact with people? And one of the things he would do is we'd go to lunch. We're going to lunch with Mr. Scaramucci.

Okay. So I love to talk to adults. I could talk to adults about adult things because my dad was my only friend. So I was a mini-me. So I would start in before we even sat down asking you about your business or bugging you about politics or whatever it is. Why do you hate Trump so much, Anthony? And I've seen what you did with this and on and on and on, Mr. Scaramucci. And you don't have enough time in this podcast.

I mean to answer that question. I know. But we would at lunch. and I would try it. And then about, and it would be specific questions. It'd be like, you know, when you were in the West Bank, where was your office? Okay, what was your office look like? It just was incensed, insensitive. And he would tap his watch, and that was my signal to stop talking, but also to bookmark the moment. So it wasn't embarrassing me, right? It wasn't being like, you know, little boy be quiet or lucky be quiet. It was tap his watch. I realized time to stop.

and I would wait, you know, five, ten minutes, whatever, and I'd start bugging you again with more questions. This would be a bad business. And then they'd tap is watching it. And then afterwards, we'd almost go back through it like watching game film. And so he'd say, okay, so lucky when Mr. Scaramucci was talking about, you know, what he was doing this weekend and where he was traveling, why did you think it was important to ask him right then about the White House?

I don't know, Dad. That's what I wanted to talk about. Right. Do you understand that that's what, you know, he and I were talking about this? It sounds small, but it was sort of teaching me the very basics of the human social interaction and becoming a student of it rather than it coming naturally as it does to someone like you. So that's the most fascinating part about it because no one would know that you grew up like this if you're interacting.

But do you find yourself now intuitively have? these social cues or do you find that you're living in a rules-based mind where you're hearing something, you're saying, okay, this is the appropriate thing, do you at this moment or not? It's a great question. And this may sound calculating on my part, but it's sort of the only way I can interact. I write at the end of the book, I will always have autism. And my dad points out for parents, whether your kid's autistic or has ADHD or anxiety, any of these issues, or just problems growing up, right? Kids, we are people. This isn't a broken arm. You don't heal. So the book isn't a prescription or a cure, but I'll give you an example. A couple of weeks ago,

I was at a golf course with my father-in-law, and we were having to leave pretty quickly to go do something. And I was trying to pack my golf bag. And one of the characteristics for me, for autism, and is sort of this intense focus on one task to the point of just tuning out everything else, no matter what is sort of socially required of you. And this gentleman we had played golf with came over to try to talk to me about something and actually about the book. And I completely ignored him. It was so rude. And I almost knew at the moment that I was doing it, like, I'm so focused on this task, I need to work on it. And I'm outside the golf club and he's trying to be very nice and talk to me. And I was just

rude is the devil and zip it up the bag and to the point he just walked off finally and you could tell he was quite irritated rightfully so and i thought to myself jesus christ you know at 43 years old you still cannot get these things right sometimes so what i'd say to you is you know it is still a learning process for me it's still a discipline um now of course i sent the guy an apology She texts and really sorry and on and on. But it still stuck with me and was an example sort of every day that I have to keep those lessons that my dad taught me that we write about in the book, top of mind. You know, normal people have this problem, though, too.

I mean, normal people, but people that don't have autism, there's nobody normal. I don't mean it like that. But the thing that I love about the story is your personal resilience. And so you say something in the book as a dad and I have five children that really hit me right in my chest. You said that you had a crushing sense of invisibility as a child. And you were told by teachers and principals and others that you were weird or, you know, some kids think that you're weird. And then the principal's like, well, I also think he's weird. And you got to overcome all of this.

So talk about that. Talk about how you go from that to being an internationally recognized news journals. Well, and congratulations, by the way. Thank you. Thank you. The real answer is my dad is the hero in this, right? And I think you'll understand this as being the father of five kids that my parents in seventh grade, it's a private school that goes seven through twelfth grade.

So this is my chance at a fresh start gets called in. and my parents get called into the principal's office about three weeks in. And the principal's sitting there, you know, wooden desk, a couple of chairs for the parents, little window looking out on the quad of the school, and says to my parents, look, I'm going to cut to the chase. Everybody here thinks Lucky is weird. Arrow number one through my parents' heart because they think that finally I've got a shot. Then she follows up, and frankly, I do too. So my dad realized he wasn't going to get any help from the administration or from teachers or from school.

you know, the school. And he didn't, you know, he could have easily said, well, you know, Bucky is weird. He's got, you know, these, these issues called pervasive developmental disorder. And at the time now it was starting to be known as Asperger's and you need to do all these special things for him on and on and on. Dad's common understanding, and I think the theme throughout the book you're talking about is that adversity needs to be embraced, that so many parents want to pave this really beautiful road for their kids, the easiest road they can. And what what parent wants to see their kids struggle. And what dad knew was that if I didn't struggle, if I didn't face adversity, if I didn't

face challenges, I wouldn't be able to face the real world. So 200 pushups a day, starting when I was about six years old, five days a week. But it taught me something, which was that every pushup was one closer, you know, one pushup closer to a goal, which was after three months, if I did all this, I got to go to Disney World. And that was sort of the basis of his, his, his, standard for me of set goals, set hard goals, but achieve them and it'll teach you can do hard things. So, you know, you were asked or invited to leave the White House because you disagreed

with Donald Trump on a certain few things. I was invited to leave Fox News for similar reasons. And I remember being, you know, in my parents' bedroom, you know, guest bedroom in Florida. I'd almost died of COVID. I'd gotten out of relationship. I was just as low as you could be. And my dad said, look, he said, you've done this before. You know, there was a teacher in eighth grade that looked at you in front of the whole class and said, if my dog was as ugly as you, I'd shave its ass and make it walk backwards. You got through that.

You went to school the next day. You can get through this. And that's that standard and that pressure and that focus of my dad of making me get through hard things, even while I held my hand doing it, that served me very well. Advice for today. You know, we've got a lot of parents at 1 in 36. You've got a lot of parents that have kids that have ADHD or they have Asperger, or they have a form of autism.

What's the biggest lesson from your journey that we could apply to people that are dealing with their journey today? Well, this is different, right? Because it's a parenting book written by a kid and I don't have a kid yet. So I don't want to, you know, this isn't advice or how to manual. But what I would say is my book is proof for parents, no matter what your child is dealing with, that there's hope. There's real hope that things get better. And that enormous amount of love, unyielding standards, holding your kid's hand through adversity, not taking the adversity away.

can change their lives permanently and will. George Will wrote the forward of this. I had the unenviable task of having 240 pages between my dad's afterward, which I think is the best part of this, which was sort of his takeaways for parents and his thoughts, and George Will writing the forward. But the middle 240 pages were mine, and George Will ended his forward by saying,

this is proof of the mountain-moving power of parental. love. And that, to me, is what really the one takeaway is. I love it. All right. So we're down to the five words of my show here, Leland. We call five words from your book, and then we ask you to react to those words. Okay. So you can give me a few sentences on each or elaborate as much as you want. I say the word journalism. You think of what? I think of the relentless pursuit of the truth. without fear or favor. And it comes from my dad who, when I was a little boy, there weren't expectations. There were no expectations about either schoolwork or are you going to be a very successful

business person as he was or any of that kind of stuff. But there were two expectations, one that you worked hard and more importantly that you had good character. And one time I still remember tell the story of the book when he caught me lying, which is a big deal in my house. and he made me right, I will tell the truth a thousand times out. And that pursuit of the truth has sort of been what I was about when I was six, seven, eight years old and still am. Are we under threat the truth, the journalists, journalists under threat today?

I think the truth has always been under threat. More so today? I don't know about more so or less so. I think the bare-knuckle parts of politics are now more apparent. It is no longer waged silently or politely. Look, I covered the Obama White House for Fox News. They were pretty rough, too. They just did so more quietly.

So I remember being the guy who is the morning reporter at the White House for Fox. Josh Ernest and others, members of the cabinet, would always do a round robin with every other network. But they wouldn't go on Fox. It was always my job to walk upstairs. And like, you know, from the lower, you know, the little area down below it under the briefing room where the broadcast booths are and say, you know, hi, Josh. Just need to large our complaint that Fox once again has been excluded. And he goes, oh, Leland, it's so good to see you. How's your weekend?

Blah, blah, blah, blah. And it was all nice about it. But they were doing this. So I don't know. To me, the truth has always been under threat. It's why journalism was the only profession protected in the First Amendment. All right. You say the word resilience, you say what?

Without it and without being taught it, right? It's a learned skill. It's not an innate quality. And without being taught it, I don't know how people succeed at anything. It is a necessary component, I think, not only to success, but to a happy life. Autism. I don't think we know what it needs. means to everyone. I know what it means to me, which was that I didn't understand how to interact

in the world and I'm still learning it. It meant for me crushing isolation. It meant for me humiliation by teachers and kids. It meant for me that, you know, for 12 years, my dad was not only my best friend but my only friend. And it also meant to me now that I have the opportunity to help a lot of people. Leland Vetter. That's two words, Anthony. Yeah, all right. See that?

Well, I'm improvising. Okay, so you wouldn't know what I mean to myself? If you were describing yourself. Boy, I'm just glad that my wife isn't listening right now. I am Mark Vittert's son. and that's what this book is a love letter to my father and a thank you to explain to him that I understand what he did and how much he sacrificed and all of the nights that I would come home humiliated from school. Like the time the teacher said he'd shave his dog's ass and make it block backwards or the teacher who told me in seventh grade choir class. You know what? Sing softly.

In fact, do not sing at all during the rehearsal for the Christmas pageant front of 200 kids. And I would come home and I would take out my anger and my frustration and my unhappiness on my dad. And I would cry myself to sleep. And I didn't know this until now, right? I'm 43 years old. When we started writing the book, and my dad didn't tell me, my mom did. She said he would be up in your room and talking to you all night. And he would come downstairs.

and I would have gone to sleep. My mom would have, so two-story house were upstairs. My parents' bedroom is downstairs. One, two o'clock in the morning, my mom would figure out that my dad wasn't in bed, and she'd walk out to the living room, all pitch dark, and she would see him sitting on the couch crying himself. That's very touching stuff, you know, and it's a beautifully written book. I've got two last words, then I'll give you the last word. What about the two words, Mark Fitter? hero to me, which obviously is my dad, I think what is remarkable about him was that he understood 40 years ago what the world is starting to understand now, that if you put a kid in bubble wrap and make all sorts of special accommodations for them, they won't learn. They won't be more. And my dad thought, I'm going to be more, you know, my son has a chance and the only chance is if I push him to be more. And, you know, my parents didn't tell anybody about my diagnosis.

They didn't tell my sister. And my mom, my sister recently asked them why. And my mom said, well, we didn't want, we didn't want you, you mean, my sister, to see your brother as anything other than just who he was. and my dad didn't want anybody to see me other than just who I am. And I think that kind of goes back to that if there's a reckoning and parenting right now, which I think there is, about how to help kids rather than meet them where they are, he understood that 40 years ago. Well, it's an amazing story.

And I'm so grateful to you for coming on to share it with us. The title of the book is Born Lucky. And it's by Leland Vitter, but I just think it's a amazing tribute to your dad, but it's also amazing story of hope, resilience. It's a story where I think people could open this up no matter what they've got going on in their lives and see some level of direction for themselves. And so I really appreciate you sharing it with us today. I am Anthony Scaramucci, and that was Open Book.

Thank you so much for listening. If you like what you hear, tell your friends, and make sure you hit follow or subscribe wherever you listen to your podcast. While you're there, please leave us a rating or review. If you want to connect with me or chat more about the discussions, it's at Scaramucci on X or Instagram. I'd love to hear from you. I'll see you back here next week.