big crowd outside the kentucky state capitol. they waited for hours to get help with unemployment. >> people desperate to get their hands on one of these, an application for unemployment benefits. ♪ ♪ all the roses turn to black ♪ a perfect storm at the worst time.

you've lost your job. the governor tells you -- >> we will help you. >> -- to file for unemployment. you file. and nothing. >> the pandemic exposing the problems with the unemployment insurance program in states like kentucky. >> it's that mainframe that dates back to the 1970s. >> there are people suffering. >> they were intentionally making it more di for people to access the system. >> there were e-mails that went unread. >> forcing insiders to speak out. >> there were already tens of thousands of backlogged claims. just to be clear. that was before the pandemic. >> that was before the pandemic. after that, wear hit chaos. >> chaos and tragedy. >> he testified the governor's team cut corners. >> i knew this was going to be the most important thing i would ever do in my life.

>> there's nights i cry to myself, can't provide for my kids. >> i worked so hard to get to where i am told. i don't want to end up homeless. >> this is a cnn special report "the price we paid-the economic cost of covid." you think it's a system that was neglected for too long or do you just think it was a perfect storm of these crises coming together? >> i think it was neglected. here, you need a pocketful of treats. >> sky doesn't want to stand still. stand.

good boy! >> we met in auburn, alabama, at the veterinary school. >> there's this big one that just gulped down the whole piece. >> what are your favorite animals to work on? >> i prefer the cats and dogs. >> ever night i get up, take a shower, fix my box lunch, get dressed and i'm headed out the door. same routine over and over every gay. >> ev i've lived here my entire life. >> country girl? >> yeah. >> she passed away at 28. >> went home to live with his mom. >> this is home? what's the story here, guys? >> i love my grandmother.

>> it will stop hurting. >> haven't been able to afford a good cigarette. these nasty ones. i'm trying to quit. >> when you first heard about the possibility of a pandemic. >> i don't watch the news. my wife does. she told me about it. >> we've known each other since we were in kindergarten. >> i don't care. i'm going to continue doing what i do and come home every day. >> the first person to die in the united states as a result of the widening coronavirus. >> there's no respect to panic. they're all -- >> the first person to die -- >> you took it seriously from the get-go. >> i did. ok. >> no reason to panic. >> good. >> my son had auto immune disease a couple of years ago after a respiratory virus and they don't know a lot about that particularly disease.

really didn't want to have to go through that again if we didn't have to. >> there's no doubt in your mind that the coronavirus was not going to end up in franklin, kentucky. >> yes, because we weren't doing any measures to prevent that from happening. >> covid-19 numbers reach record highs here in the state of kentucky. >> that number keeps going up. >> when it first hit it was very, very scared. i was scared to go anywhere. i was scared evenly to go out of the house because i was so paranoid and freaked out. of course, my company shut down. >> what kind of work do you do? >> i am a supervisor at the automotive plant. >> ok. >> we make things for toyota and ford. >> everything shut down. >> talk to me about what kind of work you were doing before the pandemic. >> heating and air. take old units out, put new ones

in. >> what did you think of this work? >> i planned on doing it foes r for the rest of my life. >> you thought this is a job and a career that i can raise my family on. >> yeah. it's not going away. you always want heat. you want air. >> five, four, three, two. >> the world stopped in mid march. kentucky shuts down and that obviously is going to stall the economy. the governor right out of the gate started doing daily press conferences. >> we're staffing up right now. we're working as fast he can. >> he is telling people to apply for unemployment. >> i ask people every day when i have an update to sign up for unemployment. i actually encouraged them to do it. >> worrying and broke. so goes the story for thousands in kentucky. >> the influx of people trying to get help, trying to get paid was greater than anything we'd

ever seen. >> like the last hundred dollars. >> about to lose my car. vent way overdue. >> i'm completely dependent on the unemployment insurance and i haven't received anything. >> kentucky has failed us for unemployment. and it is a shame. a complete shame. >> what them doing is begging. they were trying to do anything they could. ma'am this. you've lost your job. the place where you work is closed. the governor tells you to file for unemployment. you file, and nothing. >> big crowd outside the kentucky state capitol. they waited for hours to get in-person help with unemployment. >> many of these people have been waiting in line since 8:00, 9:00 this morning. they're going into seven hours or more. >> they've got a line you can go stand in. i ended up standing out there for eight and a half hours. >> you remember how we had to get the check for daddy when he

didn't work? >> when you dialed the number at 7:00 in the morning to try to be the first in line. >> yes. >> and the line is full and you can't get through? are the warning signs going off? like wait a second. there's a lot of people in trouble right now. >> it's scary. you don't know where to turn. you can't get through. the lines are backed up. you try to set an appointment. it's already booked up. >> when you couldn't get anybody on the phone, it was definitely frustrating. so i decided to go ahead and get on line. i have a degree and i was having problems, so it was pretty frustrating that i couldn't figure out how to navigate the system. >> ki save animals lives -- >> yes. >> -- but i'm having a hard time where this online application. >> right. it shouldn't be that difficult, but it was.

>> you were appointed as executive director of the office of n employment in kentucky. how did that come about. >> i was surprised and excited. the office of unemployment is a big deal. obviously, as we've learned, it's fundamental to the economy. >> a lot of critics heard that you took this job because of a political favor and a bunch of people in kentucky suffered due to your lack of experience what do you say to that? >> i don't disagree that at the time my wife and i were pretty good friends the lieutenant governor. but i ran a law practice, so have experience in management, supervising employees. >> when did you start in. >> in 2020. >> what happened in your office after that? >> after that, we just hit chaos. >> the previous administration had intentionally gutted the

office of unemployment. he was a mini-trump in a lot of ways. >> i fought so hard to get where i am today. i don't want to end up homeless.

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education and i ended up working on a lot of unemployment insurance issues. >> depression haunted america. >> the entire reason that we have an unemployment insurance program is a direct result of the great depression. >> there was no real safety net at the time. so when people lost their jobs, people lost their homes. they couldn't eat. people lived in shanty towns all over the country. it was a really desperate time for a lot of americans. and we still carry in our collective psyche all of the trauma from a hundred years ago. >> some complex for unemployment compensation. >> in response, we had a series of new reforms, the new deal,

and that includes social security, fdic insurance, but one of those programs is also unemployment insurance. the idea of unemployment insurance is that it's a safety net. so that they literally don't starve or lose their house while they're looking for new employment. >> when the economy shut down here in kentucky in march, how quickly did you feel the effects of that? >> we were out of our house within two months. sloi as the weeks went by, just -- it was either do we save the money for rent or make sure we have food on the table for the kids to eat. >> we've nope each other our entire lives. >> since covid hit, we had a car, we had everything. i could get pack and forth to work fine. once unemployment went downhill, our car got repoed because we couldn't make the payments.

we've been living here with my in laws for about five months now. this is where we fit all three of our kids with my nieces and nephews stay like eight kids in one room. >> you can't there sr. the glasses. >> one bathroom, 15 people sometime . we would call the unemployment off and on all day long, all day long. and it would pick up. you would hear, well, we're going to put you in a cue and all of a stud it's like we'll call you back. every night around 8:00 or y9, you get a call and they say you're in the cue. i've been in the cue since april

and i never got a call back, ever. >> there's nights that i cry myself to sleep because i feel like a piece of shit. can't provide, can't provide for my kids. >> did you think that almost a year after moving out of your home that you'd still be here with your parents? >> no, lord, no. >> this is jane and i watching our son. >> we have four confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus here in kentucky. >> i was governor of kentucky from 2007 to 2015. >> we're sitting here in front of the house where i grew up. >> and then after a four-year intervention, my son andy beshear became governor. >> has your son come to r now vice or is he like most sons, he

doesn't want to hear their dad. >> he lived through the great recession with me. >> a brutal bloody monday. more than 70,000 jobs cut today. >> americans asking for unemployment benefits. >> 2.6 million jobs lost in 2008. >> became governor in 2007, about the time that the great recession started hittings in full force all around the country including kentucky. it hit us pretty hard. >> unemployment was 25% in the great depression. during your tenure in the great recession, unemployment was at about 10% here in kentucky. in the pandemic economy with a rate of more than 16% unemployment. what was your experience with the unemployment system in kentucky? >> as the recession deepened. we got more unemployment, more

unemployment, more unemployment claims. we got through it but we saw the shortcomings of the system. the computer system that we still have was put in in 1970, i think. that was before andy beshear was born. >> the core of the program runs on an ancient system, i believe it's a mainframe from back in the 70s. at one time it actually ran on tape, a giant room with reels of tape. the core of our program still runs on that. the mainframe that we were using was one of the two oldest unemployment systems in the country. >> did anyone ever raise any warning flags about hey, i don't think our 1970s antiquated computer system can handle this? >> no. i never raised concerns about

the computer system. the head of the i.t. department said that's going to be tricky. the federal government, sewed the states, we would like you to implement some reforms in your program, expand benefits to some new classes of people, and if you do that as an incentive, we will provide this ui modernization money to you that you can use to modernize your programs. and most states took that. about 75% of state took money, used that to help modernize their systems. but there were a handful of states who didn't. kentucky was one of them. we just didn't take it. >> the american recovery and reinvestment act -- >> true. >> in 2009 was supposed to be used to modernize the computer system in kentucky. >> you foe, honestly, i don't

remember those details. >> in hindsight, do you wish you had done more with the computer system? >> oh, sure. you look at it now and we were able to get through the great recession with that system, and of course nobody could anticipate a once in a hundred-year pandemic, but i certainly wish we had spent money on it and got a new system in there and up and running at least before this covid thing hit. but we left the next administration with a pretty decent system. what they did was dismantle it. >> america is getting soft. the underbelly is getting soft. >> they are potentially making it more difficult for people to access the unemployment system. trap stains at the molecular level and flush them away. plant-based detergents clean your clothes. it's just science!

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being lazy. >> i'm unemployed and i have a

job. >> ok. >> i want one and i don't have one. trying to get one but no one let me have one. i don't have a job. >> but i do have a job and help does not. that bothers both of us. >> there's this moral weight attached to the idea of providing unemployment benefits, because if we're going to provide unemployment benefits, then we have to decide somehow whether people are deserving of them. this is true in the press. this is true in politicians. >> together we can and we will make it through these tough times. >> are there any lessons from the great recession experience that you had that you think applies to the pandemic economy? >> certainly. we opened up, i think, 31 field offices around the state in order to be able to deal with our people face-to-face. we bumped up the budget.

we had an a hundred people well qualified and trained that could handle major events. >> we left the next administration, the one that came between when i served as governor and when andy came in in 2019 with a pretty decent system set up that needed some more improvement. what they did is dismantle it. >> the underbelly of america is getting soft. >> he was kind of a membership trump in a lot of ways. >> in places like kidnap, they care about their wallet. they care about whether the money they earn is able to be kept as much as possible by themselves. >> he was a pro-business businessman. so he was very anti-unemployment insurance. >> the very first thing we talked about was enacting pro-business right to work

legislation. this was controversial. it was controversial to many. >> prior to bevin, the easiest way to submit an application or get help with an unemployment insurance issue was to go into the local unemployment office. and we had a lot of them. we had 51, i think, scattered throughout the state. we didn't ever want somebody to have to drive more than an hour to get to an unemployment office. >> former republican governor bevin closed 31 unemployment offices across the state. he reassigned 95 staff and the budget was cut from 41 to $25 million? that's the reality you walked into? >> on day one. >> do you know what the logic was closing all these offices of unemployment? >> he is libertarian and doesn't believe in government handouts and i have think they were making it more difficult for people to access the unemployment system.

>> the first time i had to claim my first benefit check, i requested it online. said it went through everything, everything processed fine but i never received the check in the mail. so i kept trying to call, call, and call, never could get through, nevada could get through. finally after maybe two months, i finally got through to somebody. she was saying, yeah, we sent that check out on such and such a date. i said but i never received it. something looks odd about my claim. she said ma'am, where do you work? i told her. she says on here it says you work at poop eye's chicken in louisville. i was like no, i never worked there. >> what was your reaction? >> it was scary. me and my son were standing

there. my benefit amount was like 14,000 that i could use. all of that's gone. >> every dollar of unemployment that you were gone is gone. >> is gone. i've still been fighting trying to get this straightened out. >> it was pretty early on in the pandemic. >> yeah, since day one. and i've been fighting it ever since. >> i was surprised when matt benns calls me up and said hey, come work for me. >> what did you do? >> first two years i worked in the labor cabinet and then we moved over to the education work force fab net. >> they say the governor deliberately tried to make getting unemployment more difficult. >> are you serious? who said that. >> a number of people. >> give them my number, please. he's a compassion ait man. he's very wanting to do things right. you don't make unemployment

hard. no, now, to make sure that you earned it or it was yours, yes. >> you think that's an unfair criticism? >> not unfair. it's idiocy. i wouldn't blame any governor for doing that unless i had absolute knowledge of that. >> when the number of unemployment offices around the state were closed down, were you concerned? this could be a problem? >> absolutely not. there's 450 some odd offices. he closed half of them and the others were turned into career service. they weren't being used. we saved three or $4 million closing them. >> the federal government provides the vast majority of the administrative cost for the program. if you have somebody closing local offices and letting go of unemployment insurance staff, the question becomes why are you not doing that?

it's not a cost saving measure because the federal government is picking up the tab. i think the bevin administration said that claim is dubious. i have never heard a suggestion that the federal government was going to disallow costs for local unemployment offices. when she's offices are closed, isn't that money that's coming from the federal government? >> let's change that around. even if those offices are open today, i would say they need to be closed to do this online and to bring it up to date. these unemployment centers, you keep saying we shut down is not the reason we're having the problem. it should have been shut down and even today if they were existing, i would shut them down. >> really? >> yeah. because -- especially with covid. you're not going to go into a place and stand in line six feet away and this and that and get things done.

>> back in 2017 when i got word that this downsizing was happening, i got hal heiner, who is former governor bevin's secretary of education and work force on the phone and asked, hey, what happens, you know, if the unemployment rate goes up and people suddenly need unemployment benefits again and there's a big demand for them and suddenly we don't have as many places for people to go. and here's what he said. >> by going to higher level of service using technology, whether it's online, having easy to use call centers to make it easier for those individuals to do it at home. >> evidently, that higher level of service that heiner talked about never happened. >> i try to keep track of everything. so far, this is the total amount that was stolen. this is a nightmare. every day you try to call and call and call.

i'm constantly always trying to think about what am i going to do? that's why i'm trying so hard to fight, say hey, you guys need to get this straightened out. i've worked so hard to get -- i'll try not to tear up. but i've worked so hard to get where i am today, to just lose it all in a split second, so i just can't -- i just don't know what to do. >> you feel like you're running out of time? >> yeah, i do. i don't want to end up homeless because i can't afford to pay my represent or have my car ree poeed, i can't pay my car payment. >> you said when you walked in to this job. >> yeah. >> you inherited an understaffed staff. average hold time was over an hour and there were already tens of thousands of claims. >> i did say that. >> and just to be clear, that was before the pandemic. >> before the pandemic.

the administration has intentionally gutted the office of unemployment. they took away the ability for most people to be able to walk in a building and get help with their unemployment claim. the whole time got incredibly high. >> there are some from the current administration who say look, we inherited a mess. >> let's assume that's true, which i disagree with. we've had a year, what's the problem now? >> there were a lot of management mistakes in running the program during the pandemic. there was well over 400,000 e-mails that went unread. there has been many nights i've cried myself to sleep. i can't do anything to help provide.

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i'm going to put out the order today to close all restaurants and bars. >> we found out the same way everybody else did that the governor was going to shut things down. it was at his press conference he held. we had to start to figure out how to handle all the applications we knew were coming. we were understaffed. at the same time i got a call from the deputy secretary who

said the governor wants to find a way to start paying people right away, as fast as we can, and paying people that are otherwise not eligible. >> as everything starts shutting down in kentucky, what decisions did you guys make? >> well, before it had shut down -- hurry up so we can fill these bird feeders up -- i decided as a nation we were not doing anything. i was going to withdraw my son from school, just try to figure out what we were going to do. >> at that point did you know anything about how the unemployment system sfwhorkd. >> no, i did not. i had no clue. >> we are waving the waiting period for unemployment. >> i learned about that through watching andy's briefings that he started having. >> we will help you. we will do everything we can to make sure that you qualify. >> he was talking about if you were off work or afraid to work, you could apply for unemployment. >> i want to make sure you have enough to get through this.

knowing the ramifications of the decisions i've made, and it's on me. >> that increased exponentially. >> 150,000 priapplications. >> the math overwhelms you. you're not going to get to 200,000 calls. >> i'm the deputy secretary of the labor cabinet. i started with the cabinet in june of 2020. >> what do you say to those people who say what's taking so long to get this program back on track? >> the first thing i would say is programs cannot be invented overnight. what the governor did know when he -- or assessed when he first took office was that we had an antiquated system, we had a backlock of appeals and adjudications. he said out to fix that.

but in his administration he was faced with having to pitt and what to do that's best for the citizens of kentucky. >> you haven't been able to speak to a real person. >> we want to talk to a actual person. >> i talked to somebody but i don't know if figure's going to change. >> your first reaction to the system was -- what was that like? >> calling on the phone, just trying to get people to answer questions to see if i should even apply. >> we have set aside time to hear from our auditor. >> my position as the auditor of public accounts, the unemployment system findings, and we had released our stayed wide single audit of kentucky, which is something that our office does every year. unopened and archived e-mails. these were to the office of unemployment assistants. one of our findings in the report, the one that kind of broke my heart, we found out is that there was well over 400,000

e-mails that went unread that they just took and they archived. according to our report, initially they did try to start to organize them a little bit. but then at some point they just archived them. it was some time in april that the first batch got archived. then there was another series about a month or two later that ended up getting archived as well. >> i'm hoping i don't have to refile another claim. it was a nightmare. >> everything's fine till the end. it says ui issue. please call us. i called. you couldn't get through . >> there's about two million people in the labor force in kentucky. >> ov over the course of this year

about a third of our labor force has filed for unemployment benefits. that's a really big percentage. >> the sheer number of people who lost their jobs because of the pandemic, that was always going to cause problem. i don't think there's a single unemployment insurance program in the country that hasn't struggled at least some. >> we were thinking about what's happened in kentucky with the unemployment system breaking down. it's not surprising at all, because we see that happening on a national level, and that's not surprising at all, because we have stopped funding the unemployment system and we've stopped doing that nationally and at the state level. specifically sh since the great

recession we've seen less and less federal and state support. >> it's kind of a textbook example of everything that can go wrong with the unemployment insurance program. >> we're going to have to see how far these onions go. >> you submit your application in march and you don't hear from the unemployment office until may? >> uh-huh. she did say that i was eligible for unemployment but the way it was worded. my employer said we didn't cause any health condition. i said i never said in a. so she contested that finding. and of course tried to call unemployment again to get them to straighten it out. can't get hold of anybody. >> and we had to pay some back. >> oh, yeah. they said because i didn't qualify for unemployment that i

had to pay back all that money i had received since march. >> that must have come as a shock. >> it did. i know other people don't have money to pay it back. >> you had a cushion? >> we had an emergency fund. lot of people don't have that little cushion. >> you don't want anybody to feel sorry for you, you want people to understand -- >> just how frustrating it is. >> if need that money -- this was our room.

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that's the unemployment system. they want us to go out and look for jobs. but i'm on hold for eight hours. >> no one's responding to e-mails or anything. >> almost eight to nine months, i haven't seen a dime of unemployment. >> a lot of people are being evicted from their homes because of unemployment. the reason thinking about the unemployment system is so important is because many more americans will experience unemployment than we typically realize. somewhere between 60 to 70% of americans will experience at least one bout of unemployment in their lifetime. study after study has shown that the more support that people receive, the more lineally the unemployed are to find work that

matches their skill set and to find work that pays them well. >> we have requested to speak with governor beshear for nearly two months about this insurance program in kentucky. he's canceled twice. many people want to know what exactly is being done to get this unemployment program back on track and serving the needs of millions of people in kentucky. >> we have returned $5.9 million you can i believe, in benefits and that's a good support story. >> including this outdated computer system but my understanding is it wouldn't take effect until 2023? >> i can't speak to how long it will take for a new system to be created, developed, and implemented. i think the most important thing that we can say to clients is that we want them to know that we are every day working harder

to find solutions s to resolve e crisis that we had. >> the day you guys moved out of your house, what was that like for you guys? >> it sukoched. kids room, kids room. it was just awful. we had moved in a year before that. >> two months after you lost your job, you moved out? >> uh-huh. still beds in here. couldn't make the payments. there's been many nights i cry myself to sleep because it doesn't feel like i'm worthy enough to have the three kids in my life because i can't provide for them. i don't want to feel what i feel but what can i do? i'm trying anything i can. >> do you have any kind of safety net? no kind of savings -- >> no, no.

>> no. >> it's paycheck to paycheck. >> are you getting unemployment now? >> no. >> are you supposed to be getting? >> yes, yeah, yeah. i amide and got approved. i don't know where it stopped. >> do you find yourself kind of thinking about the future and -- >> once i can finally find a job and get going, get back on our feet, you know, we'll be all right. >> were there any stories like real-life stories that you were able to tie directly back to the problems you had in your office? >> certainly, anybody that i've heard of that's lost a house or been evicted or something like that, that was because we weren't getting benefits out fast enough. >> i would imagine those stories sting pretty heart. >> yeah, those kill me. those kind of stories kill me. i regret i wasn't going to see this through. because in the moment i knew

that this was going to be the most important thing i would ever do with my life. >> the former head of kentucky's unemployment office has died. he died yesterday after what his obituary called a battle chronic depression. >> just 11 days after we spent nearly two hours interviewing muncy mcnamara, we learned that he died by suicide. his family tells us he had been battling chronic depression. in may of 2020. he was fired for, quote, unprofessional behavior towards cabinet leadership and lacked skills necessary to address the issues to work in the office of the unemployments insurance. mcnamara told us he was fired for exposing and blowing the whistle on the failures of the insurance office. at the time of his death, he was apapapaling his ng. mcnamara's wife also shared this

statement with cnn. >> muncy cared immensely about causes of quality and justice. the girls and i will miss him so much and we are grateful for the outpouring of love and support for our families during these difficult days. >> what do i think the unemployment crisis here in kentucky can teach the rest of the country? >> the biggest failure here was perspective. because if we had sat there from the beginning and said this is going to last for a year, we would have made very different choices. >> what has that done to your kind of outlook about jobs like this and how effective they can and can't be. >> it's a struggle not to get cynical and depressed about politics generally, when you've seen the sausage made. i still think if it's done well,

it can -- it can be a positive force for good in the world and help people. this is probably an issue with government everywhere. you've got to get people in there that are looking forward. now i'm sure they'll probably try to fix the unemployment office and pour mountain into it. but it shouldn't take a crisis like this to do that. people should look at it and be like, we've got a potential failure many this department. we need to address it now so that when we need it, it's there.

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so jeff, you need all those screens streaming over your xfinity xfi... for your meeting? uhh yes. and your lucky jersey? oh, yeah. lauren, a cooler? it's hot. it's march. and jay, what's with all your screens? just checking in with my team... of colleagues. so you're all streaming on every device in the house, what?!! that was a foul. it's march... ...and you're definitely not watching basketball. no, no. i'm definitely not watching basketball. right... ( horn blaring )

coming down through calabri on a train obviously. we're going to cicely, the biggest island in the mediterranean, because there's no bridge, they take the train and put it on to a ferry.