discusses the u.s. response to the coronavirus. and buddy carter on his state's reopening and dr. oliver brooks on the racial disparities of the andemic. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2019] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> this is the "washington journal" for the first day of may, the presumptive democratic presidential nominee joe biden is expected to address sexual assault allegations made by a woman who served as staff to mr. biden during his senate days as the former vice president has gained key endorsements from democratic women and other democrat have called for him to address the claims. in our first hour, your comments on the allegations made against joe biden and here's how you can call us. democrats, 202-748-8000. republicans, 202-748-8001. and independents, 202-748-8002. if you want to text us, you can

2-748-8003. if you want, you can post on our facebook page too at acebook.com/cspan. that interview expected to take place on msnbc some time this morning. hopefully, we'll have an opportunity to show you some clips on that interview. as biden is set to break his silence, his campaign would not discuss the msnbc interview but the discussions about tara reid who was a staff assistant while he was a senator from delaware have occupied the time of his top advisors who have been discussing for days how to handle the matter. "there's no doubt this is going to come up. e only question is when --

here join us to give some context to the events of today is crins cristina marcos of the hill. but ms. marcos, in a general sense, what has been laid against mr. biden? >> he has been accused by tara reade who worked for him when he was a senator in the 1990's and she's alleged that he sexually and ms.d on the hallway reade made these allegations ast month but they -- numerous reporters have reported on that but haven't been able to find anyone to corroborate her story

until this week when a neighbor said she has been told this story by reade around the time that reade said this occurred. so far, democratic officials have been standing by or nancy pelosi stood by him yesterday and he's expected to address these allegations and there's more interview within the hour. host: has the allegations made by tara reade always been consistent? guest: well so far her story has more or less not changed but because speaker pelosi when she was defending joe biden, she was saying there was no other people that worked for joe biden at the time who had say had knowledge of the allegation and that has reassured her and other democratic officials that to date, they should believe biden

that this did not happen. host: stay on the line, cristina marcos, we will show our audience what speaker pelosi said about joe biden yesterday. >> how do democrats square with the idea that they're essentially -- they're expanding by -- standing by biden but using a different standard with kavanagh when he demanded an investigation on mr. kavanagh when a similar investigation has -- >> let me just say, i respect your question and i don't need a lecture or a speech. here's the thing. i have complete respect to -- i have four daughters and one son. there's a lot of excitement around the idea that women will be heard and be able to listen to. and thealso due process

fact that joe biden is joe biden . there's been sentence from -- statements from his former employee who is ran his offices and the rest that there was never any record of this. there was any record. and nobody ever came forward or nobody came forward to say something about it apart from the principle involved. i am so proud that happiest day for me this week was to support joe biden for president of the united states he's a person of great integrity, of great concern for the american people. he authored the violence against women act when he was the chair of the judiciary committee in the 1990's. he has been an advocate for funding it all along since then. he will be a that great president of the united states.

hes the personification of hope and optimism and authenticity for our country, a person of great values. so i want to remove all doubt in anyone's mind. i have great comfort level with the situation as i see it, with all the respect in the world for any woman who comes forward but all the highest regard for joe biden and that's what i have to say about that. thank you. host: cristina marcos, sponge support there from the house speaker. what about other democratic women? what kind of level of support for joe biden has he seen from them? guest: well in recent days, there have been people like gillibrand from new york who previously was running against biden for the democratic nomination and could be potential vice presidential nominee and she's also been a big champion of the movement and preventing violence against women and she stood by him this week as did stacey abrams,

another possible vice-presidential candidate. but interestingly, jeffrey who is the house democratic caucus chairman, he has a different life from speaker pelosi and he said in an interview that these allegations deserves to go investigated seriously. and so there is some growing -- there are some concerns about democrats in recent days that perhaps biden himself should address these allegations instead of today, his campaign has denied it through a pokesperson. these democrats are not looking into investigating this and the republicans haven't given any indication of that either. when there has been sexual

assault or sexual harassment allegation made against political figures in recent years, it tends to be calls for investigation often far along partisan lines. i mean, you've seen republicans also also say in recent days that they think biden should address this. they were not saying this for kavanagh or president trump. and that's how allegations of sexual assault can be used in a political way in recent years. there's been a double standard tentimes on both host: cristina marcos, thanks for your time. guest: thanks for having me. host: we hear that interview on joe biden in the 8:00 hour of this morning.

but we'll take your calls for the next hour or 50 minutes or so. 202-748-8000 for democrats. 202-748-8001 for republicans. and independents, 202-748-8002. text us if you wish at 202-748-8003. you can post on our twitter feed at twitter.com/cspanwj. facebook is available to you too at facebook.com/cspan. in arlington, virginia, republican line. john is up first. go ahead. caller: yeah, this is always a dicey situation. and, you know, the hypocrisy is on all sides obviously and i mean, to hear gillibrand, the way she denounced kavanagh and some of the other democrats denounced kavanagh, there wasn't a lot of call for due process or anything like that. and the evidence that was against kavanagh was even more sparse than it was now. one of the more interesting things, your last speaker, a

reporter on n.p.r. this morning, they kind of mentioned why we talk to some of the people that the person that claimed that she was attacked -- gave us to talk to, and, you know, and they said that they kind of skipped this interview that her apparently her mother gave to larry king back in 1993 where it was clear that there was something happened. it certainly didn't fit into the detail that has been discussed but it certainly was something that appeared major and wasn't addressed at the time. host: that previous reporter was rom "the hill," not n.p.r. caller: i would just like to say that this investigation was joe

biden, yeah, we should go through with it and see what they find out or what have you -- host: no investigation has been called for yet just so you know he's addressing those things on television today, but go ahead. caller: ok. i would like to point out that i don't believe in my opinion that somebody's sexual background should have any forbearance on the way they run the country or the way they are elected official for the country because we're not -- looking at officials based on whether or not they had sex with somebody or, you know, assaulted somebody sexually and they should go accordingly with their own personal life. that's their personal life. we were to point out fingers here, why don't we look at an investigation with joe biden eason and how he took over the company and had no experience and no knowledge of the company, you know, and things like that. and again, in the trump investigations, trump was found innocent in all three accounts

the mueller investigation, the russian investigation and also the impeachment trials -- host: ok. we will stop you because it's further than what we're discussing right now. al otherwise the republican line. hello. caller: good morning. if i remember correctly, the me too was driven by the media and hollywood. and when the president says fake news, this is what he's talking about, the double standard. i mean, where is the college level yearbook investigation of joe biden who's been in washington since 1972? that's what we're talking about. where is the press that's supposed to find out the truth? this is why we don't trust the press. host: so the charges against by tara reade specifically, what do you think of them? caller: they need to be looked at at the level it was looked at at kavanagh. let's look at joe biden's college yearbook. host: the allegations to ms. reade on its face, do you

believe them or not? caller: well, hillary clinton told us that all women should be believed. we should go by the democratic bomani's standard we should believe her until joe biden's proved innocent. host: massachusetts, we will hear from our independent line. this is joseph from new york. go ahead. caller: hi, pedro. i just want to speak against the lady's indication and i feel like people call in and they talk about you have to believe what the lady says, ms. reade ced initially, well, we just heard she has her stories are inbound consistent. this person and that person doesn't recall. i don't have a problem with investigating, but my whole thing is what's her point of

coming out to bring up the allegation just so people know joe biden did something wrong? you can't compare him, compare to the person we have in the white house right now. t's nowhere close. she -- some of them don't remember and she has reasons she got fired. she said she was fired because joe biden's staff fired her for retaliation and then another one she said she got fired because she didn't refuse to serve at a dinner that biden was hosting. so it's like you are giving two conflicting stories. which one is it? i'm a feminist. i have a daughter and i'm married to my wife.

my first thing is to believe what the woman said, but i mean, it just seems something -- she just has -- i mean, at this point right now, i'm sorry. at this point, we really don't care the allegations joe biden has. we're just trying to get trump out that's the point. so i'm sorry. host: so that's joseph in brooklyn, new york. another angle on the "washington post" saying there's also a unique opportunity to demonstrate good faith. he should open up the records of his 36-year senate career that he donateed to the university of delaware in 2012 and are under field until two years after he leaves public life. what might be in there? no one really knows until they look.

host: mitch mcconnell did a phone interview with fox news yesterday and that topic came up. >> when you run for the president of the united states, your life is an open book. and i can't imagine that vice president bye is not -- biden is not going to have to participate in releasing all of the information related to the allegation. it's a very challenging time to run for president and i think eryone who has done that has their entire life is opened up to scrutiny and that's happening to vice president biden and they

shouldn't be surprised. host: this is bill, republican line from bowyer town, pennsylvania. caller: thank you, joseph, from new york for saying what all the democrats think, which is trump is so bad that it doesn't matter that joe biden assaulted a woman in a hallway. host: allegedly. caller: yeah, allegedly. so let's face it. we've got -- what's his nickname? it's "creepy joe." creepy uncle joe sniffing women's hair. he gets too close to a woman. now we have a woman. so this isn't coming out of the blue. he has a reputation of getting too darn close to people and now we have a woman that says he got so close to her that he stuck one of his fingers inside of her. unwanted. i mean, this is what the allegation is. and the democrats want to deflect it like it's nothing. let's face it. this guy has a problem.

his ship was leaking. and the democrats have to face the fact that they rallied around him when barnes -- bernie sanders was really the candidate of the people. let's face it. come on. host: that's phil in pennsylvania. michigan is next. this is kathy, democrats line. hi. caller: hi, good morning, c-span, pedro. the caller bill was right. bernie sanders should have been the nominee and i expressed that on the show before. it's almost impossible to get a child to lie about being abused and i think that he needs to be investigated. if he has nothing to hide and he didn't do iten he needs to stand in front of the american people and tell them that. i think mrs. reade is probably a credible person. i would like to hear more from her. host: what do you base that on when you say she's credible or do you think she's credible? caller: it -- i can't imagine

myself as a woman, coming forward and making an allegation so serious as this that someone touched me without my permission . the truth always reveals itself, pedro. whether anything's done about it r not, i don't know. but i've never liked the actions that i've seen from this man. i don't like as close as he gots to people it's not appropriate. and we teach our children to say no and to tell someone. and the same standards holds true to mr. biden as an adult. host: do you think this is a long-term problem for his campaign? caller: i think it's a very big problem long term, yes, i do and i don't like it as a erazem and if he's the nominee, i'm going to be very hesitant to feel like need to vote for him.

i don't like his coziness with the banks. he takes the train home. he probably doesn't do a dish, he doesn't mop up a floor. i don't like that you wanty ttitude that he has. host: let's hear from kevin, democrats line. caller: i got one more politics, politics, politics. but having said that -- host: why did you mean by that? caller: it's all politics. i mean, let's go back. host: what do you think of the allegations? caller: good question.

i'm in no position to make a judgment, unlike other callers, who, you know, they don't have the facts, ok? so i'm not going to judge until the facts come out. but may i make one last comment? host: what facts are you looking for in particular in this case? fact. well, an actual i mean, people can say things like that woman can say things, but ok, so let me just put it this way. there needs to be an investigation. host: ok. hat's demeven massachusetts. the democrats have very deep bench and numerous very competent candidate who is come to the floor if mr. biden choose to withdraw. james in des moines, iowa saying

after president trump, it's all good but adds not to me. albert in jamestown, new york, going back to bret kavanagh saying "what goes around comes around." jerry in mississippi, independent line. good morning. ou're next up. host: what do you blase base your belief in? caller: it's evidence. the larry king, her mother called in larry king and brought nanny three. it's a lot of things with the joe biden saying it's a lot of smoke, it's got to be some fire somewhere. host: ok. jerry in walnut, mississippi, on

our independent line. we'll go to beliveau, new jersey, democrats line. this is where we will hear from michael. michael, you are on. go ahead. caller: good morning, pedro, and thank you for c-span. i think that this is more of an indictment on the corporate media, like being stuck in my house and on the internet, i've known this story for about a month now. and her neighbor from 1993 corroborated her allegations. biden and the "new york times" -- there's a buzzfeed article about biden and the "new york times" giving talking points to like all of the potential v.p. andidates that day then. like stacey abe remains said the same talking point and they found nothing.

we will see a calculated denial on morning joe and this will get swept under in the rug. i think people aren't stupid. so this is going to end up hurting the democratic party in the long run. host: so for her accusations and those corroborations that you spoke about and based on all that, have you come to the conclusion that she's tell the truth? caller: i mean, obviously we'll never know but i do think it's more likely than not, especially ased on giant's pattern of his - joe biden's the way he is. there's hours of him touching family members of people being sworn in. it's just doesn't -- it doesn't pass the eye test. it doesn't seem right. and it really speaks to like the general distrust of the d.n.c. and politicians in general. it feels like there's people

behind the scenes that do know the real story that they're trying to keep it from us for some reason. host: you talked about after today you thought it might get swept under the rug. if it doesn't, does this become a problem as you were choosing joe biden and voting for joe biden should he become the nominee? caller: i think that will probably -- if it's not biden, they will end up swapping someone in at the convention because if nobody has the delegates, then it goes to a second round of voting. so i think whoever runs the d.n.c. and like the smoke filled room will pick pick someone they find acceptable and they'll put up against trump. i mean, this has already been a crazy year. so i don't expect things to change in that regard. host: that's one new jersey and another one lives in cape may a republican line. this is joe.

caller: i want to add a comment about joe biden. you have an article there that you highlighted and it stated that joe biden specifically has to be out of office. he is out of office for almost four years now. he is no longer a public servant. my thought on that, those messages should be -- can you elaborate on that? i would appreciate it. host: i will point you to the article at the "post" but the line she said did say that they're turned seal two years after he leaves public life. that's the only stipulation. there's more of a background as the act which doesn't apply in this case. read it there for the column if you want to. bill, bill in michigan. independent line. go ahead. covid and h, after

all these last 20 years of investigations, i'm just tire of tit for tat. it's time for us to move a political decorum. host: and how does that apply specifically with these allegations? caller: well i was going to say that this investigation began with bill clinton. and the democrats and republicans have been doing this vice versa to each other for all these many years and it's time -- at this time where we have a crisis, it's time for some reasonable political discourse. host: so as far as the allegations, do you accept them? do you dismiss them? what's your personal take on them? caller: my opinion is that it has very little to do with leadership and it has very little to do with clinton's leadership and it has very

little to do with reagan's leadership or roosevelt's leadership or anybody else. there's been -- yeah, similar allegations about. host: you would apply the same standards to the current administration then? caller: that's right. host: that is joe. caller: this is irma. this is time -- this is ir elative. -- irrelevant. host: judy from facebook says it's a long time ago. why did she not say anything for almost 30 years? generally, there would be more than one. bob snow from facebook as well said the allegation of over 25 years ago against brett kavanaugh were believed by some and disbelieved by some. would joe biden get the same scrutiny as brett kavanaugh? forbiden will get a pass -- about a half-hour, we've been getting your theys on ease

allegations laid about joe biden. we will continue on until 8:00. 202-748-8000 for democrats. 202-748-8001 for republicans. and 202-748-8002 for independents. several have texted us this morning. if you want to do the same, it is 202-748-8003. you can post on our twitter feed and our facebook page too. loreen from redwood city, california, democrats line. hi. caller: good morning, pedro. i just like to remind america about one thing. number one, there's 21 women saying that alleged that donald trump sexual assaultly them. number two, how these two men have responded so differently to these allegations. and joe biden is going through

his papers right now and will release them soon. so i don't understand why everybody is piling up on joe biden when he is doing the right thing. host: a couple of questions. where did you read that he's going to the papers and expects to release those soon? caller: i read it in a "washington post" article yesterday. i'm sorry, i don't remember the title of it at this moment. host: and there were several activists saying he should have addressed these claims earlier. do you think that is an appropriate response? caller: should he have addressed them sooner? >> yes. caller: no. i think that once there's another person that comes out and says yes, i agree with tara reade. joe biden sexually assaulted me, then i will take them seriously. with one woman, sketchy details, one -- maybe two corroborating neighbors at this point, i think. i'm not willing to throw joe biden to the wolves just because

of all of this. we have to accept the fact that these things are going to come up and it's the how the leader responds to the allegations should be more important than how the allegations are brought out. host: if i ask, did you apply the same standard to brett kavanaugh when you initially heard of charges against him? caller: i never believed the stuff about brett kavanaugh until more people came out when more women started coming out about brett kavanaugh, then yes, that's when i started believing it. host: that's laureen in california. they had a story as of october of last year taking a look at the current president, 25 women accusing the president of sexual misconduct. that website posting several stories concerning tara reade, the allegations she has made, corroborations that has been reported on.

that's all available at that website from john in jasper, ndiana, republican line. caller: i think the president serve four more years and in 2024, we should have our first lady. thank you, sir. host: what about the accusations against joe biden if you're not in favor of joe biden? caller: i don't know much about them but i'm not impressed with the guy. so thank you, sir. host: next up is gwen, grainger, indiana, democrats line. caller: good morning, pedro. host: hi. caller: hi. tarat to make a comment on reade's accusation on vice president joe biden. i don't believe one bit of her accusations due to the fact that she didn't comfort as a woman at

64 years old had i been in her position, i would have surely went to somebody more credible than a neighbor or a brother and said this man stuck his fingers up in my private area instead of just keeping it quiet for many years until now, the election year. so, no. i don't believe one word that she's got to say. host: do you think it's unusual that a woman would hold on to that story for decades? that's something that we learned uring the me too moment. caller: right. i understand that but i believe that this is a political move to keep trump in office and i don't believe a word and i believe that vice president joe biden will step up to the plate and defend himself. the truth always prevails. host: and so -- -- ok.

that's gwen in granger, indiana. the president ask about these allegations that were laid against joe biden during a press conference. here's the president's statement. >> what do you say to joe biden? president trump: i don't know anything about it. i don't exactly. i think he should respond. it could be false accusations. i know all about false accusations. i've been falsely charged numerous times. and there is such a thing. if you look at brett kavanaugh, there's an outstanding man. he was falsely charged. what happened with him was an absolute disgrace to our country. and i guess three of the four women have admitted that. and of the fourth, give me a break. i mean, take a look. 36 years. that is -- this is a fine man. i saw a man suffering so

unfairly. i'm talking about brett kavanaugh. but i don't know. i can't speak for biden. i think he should respond. i think he should answer them. host: viewer off of our text service says if the president didn't feel the need to talk about the 20 woim women who he abused, these are allegations from a reporting, mr. biden doesn't need to say one word about this allegation. bob snow from facebook saying the allegations of over 2025 years ago against brett kavanaugh were believed by some and disbelieved by some. would -- i apologize, i read that one previously. let's go for david. david in massachusetts. line. dent caller: it is political without a doubt what's going on here. i believe that they should at least give this one the same pass that they gave for the kavanaugh accuser and really look into it. t it on tv like they did

especially with the democrats did. but it's funny that you don't see the me too movement around right now and they were so vocal about everything. i think in the end, joe biden is going to say that he will not remember what went on and you've seen the past appearances he's made where he can't remember things, which honestly, i think leads to another problem which we won't get into here. but i think the democrats have to be really worried about a man who cannot complete a sentence. so he's going to get up there and he's going to say i don't remember and they are going to believe it. host: ok. this coming from i believe reporter nicholas wu about mr. biden when referencing these allegations saying biden in his first statement out on the tara reade allegations ahead of 8:00 on the msnbc appearance saying "i want to address allegations by a former staffer that i engaged in misconduct 27 years ago. they are not true this never happened. goes on to say responsible news

organizations should examine and evaluate the full and growing record of -- inconsistencies in her story which has changed in small and big ways. there is a small critical part that can be verified. the former staffer said she filed a complaint back in 1993 but she has not record of this complaint. there is only one complaint this could be in the national archives." biden ced that he's asked the secretary of the senate to ask the archives to find the record if it's there and make it available to the press. again, that just coming out in regard to the story looking at joe biden. from francis in pulaski, tennessee, republican line. caller: yes, i wish you all would show that clip where the -- i think it was the secretary of defense being inaugurated and joe was over there caressing his wife, blowing in her hair, all

sorts of things. and this was on live tv. so if he were doing that for the whole public to view, i wonder what he was doing in private. and the other thing is does or does not the congress or did they or did they not pay off the charges that were leveled against congressmen so that everything could be hush-hush. and when this was done, i think that practice of paying off people was in effect. so -- and the last thing i'll bring up is we saw how mr. biden behaved in the ukraine. he said within an hour, you must fire that man or you will not get to be -- $1 billion. host: we will go to peter in utah. democrats line. hi. caller: hi. yeah, i was just thinking the

timing of the abuse is kind of suspicious and it's a ploy by re-electlicans to help trump. host: what do you base that on? caller: well, trump lies a lot. so, you know, this might be just be another lie to try -- i mean, biden's doing quite well and this could, you know, if it goes on a lot, it might affect his, you know, the percentage that he gets. host: you're not -- are you inclined to believe tara reade at this point? caller: no. host: why not? caller: well from what i've heard, she's not very credential. -- credible. host: that's peter from utah the previous caller had said acts of congress from payment. i will take you back to december of 2018. it was then that redshirts reported that lawmakers passed

legislation on swear. requiring lawmakers to pay for settlements and some courts award themselves instead of awarding public funds. 2k caller: we already have tara reade and that's already more evidence than there was against judge kavanaugh. host: well, the cnn story only talked about the difficulty in the office.

no specifics were mentioned back on the cnn interview with larry king if that's what you're referencing. caller: i'm referencing in the totality of the circumstantial evidence that we had was more than what we had against judge kavanaugh. they didn't even remember meeting the judge. we already have more evidence against joe biden and we have democrats and the media pushing donald trump to remove judge kavanaugh's nomination and demanding judge kavanaugh step down from his nomination. so shouldn't that be the same standard be applied to joe biden who we had more evidence of guilt? so let's apply this the same standards to joe biden as the prum of guilt that he had to prove his innocence of judge kavanaugh. we already had more evidence so shouldn't joe biden are design? host: ok.

that's david in vermont. let's hear from chris from marion, indiana, republican line. caller: thank you. i was just wanting to mention the larry king episode where tara reade's mother called in and talk tt about how scared her daughter was that a senator pinned her up against the wall. larry king's episode online has been taken down. it seems like the media's trying to cover up for joe biden. pretty much what the last caller just said. like to say that -- me. host: mike from florida. democrats line. go ahead. caller: yes. just trying to survive this covid-19 but i do have a comment on it. i did see the story and i heard the larry king audio push by fox. but there was no story -- this is not the first time joe biden's running for president.

i heard nothing about this the first time he ran for president. now that he's the nominee, it comes out. so it seems like a political smear and i'm not knocking the woman. i heard the audio. her mother said problems but her tone is one of frustration, not of anger. so the evidence with her neighbor is kind of vague and complaining and, yes, ok. lest have an investigation. let's hear it all. but i don't think that you get down to one-on-one how do you prove that when one says this happened and the other one says it didn't happen? so it seems like a public court kind of dilemma with how you're going to choose, you know? but the evidence is vague in complaining. so i don't know how do you deduct truths from a story like this? so that's my comment. thank you. host: some of the vice president's statements that was

released via the campaign thing responsible news organizations could examine and evaluate the full growing record of inconsistencies in her stories. what has changed but this much bears emphasizing. she has said she raised some of the issues with her supervisor and senior staffers from the office at the time. they both men and women have said unequivocally she never raids issues. news organizations have talked with literally dozens of former staffers, have not found one, not one who corroborated her allegations in any way. ndeed many of them spoke to --

host: that's the statement in part. it's a long statement. but you can find it online from the biden campaign and the vice president on this ishikawa. -- issue. sadie from democrats line. hi. caller: good morning. don't talk to say about his terrible behavior over the years. leave biden alone. i'm voting for biden. he's a much more credible person than trump. host: do these allegations not eserve an investigation? i er: no, because biden -- want him to win.

i don't believe her. and i'm voting for biden all the way. love biden. let them talk about trump's affair -- behavior with women which is abominable. host: ok. ron from new mexico. independent line. hello. caller: yes. i just want to let you know i've had a years experience as a criminal defense investigator. all the people i heard this morning are emotional. and when you're emotional, you're going to feel a certain way. that's the way it is. when you check out evidence, you got to see where it takes you. and i'm telling you right now, i don't think there is any evidence left that length of time for physical evidence at the people she's talked to, i know the attorneys i worked for would do just like trump did. there's things that you can do to stop this in its tracks. it could do that. that's what trump did and he could do the same thing. but whether or not it's true or not, i don't know. but i'll tell you one thing.

if any of these people who are witnesses, they will do a background check on everybody and see if there's a record. host: she's made allegations and she says she has people that can corroborate that. could that fall into the realm of building a case in this matter? caller: it does but they're going to check all those witnesses and see if things match up. let me just give you a quick example. we had an armed robbery case in illinois where i'm from. and it was way before we had all these gadgets and things to be able to look at alabama's stuff. they said this guy did it the they had an eyewitness who said he did it. he didn't do it because the clock wasn't change when he went to it last time. wasn't changed and it saved him. it saved him big, big time in prison. and also got the lady charged with perjury. host: so ron, if this is a matter of decades, then you're saying it's very hard to establish whether this actually happened or not unless there's some type of physical evidence?

caller: most of the times, i've seen cases like this that wait this long, my question is oh, why did you wait this long? if it was such a big deal, why did you wait this long? when you do things behind the scenes, you find out they've got an ax to grind but there's things behind the sustains where they've got connections with people and you don't know it me, i look into everything. the sidebars are important. i'm concerned about what ain't happened instead of what-ifs. host: that's ron from new mexico. this ron is from pennsylvania, republican line. caller: yes. good morning. i'd like to just make a quick comment. i was a -- i'm in my 60's and i was an abused teenager by a catholic priest. back then, i did mention a little bit of what went on to certain people that knew, but i was afraid to go to the authorities because the

institution was so powerful. nobody would believe me. nobody, i don't care if it was the mayor or whatever. oh, these individuals wouldn't molest you. these individuals wouldn't sexually abuse you. but there again, i held it for all these years because as i state, no one would believe me at the time that somebody or an institution this powerful would do anything like this. years later, it affected me throughout my entire life into my adulthood and even my retirement. it affected me psychologically and the only way to open up and heal yourself is to talk about it and bring these allegations if they're true to have the justice done because so many people are used and abused by people in power. host: so with that in mind, i suspect you inclined to believe

ms. reade? caller: yeah. people don't believe the priest but abuse the allegations on the children that were abused. now years later, finally, they're seeing that yes, it is true. these children and these people were abused but back then, nobody wanted to say anything because it's such a powerful institution. host: that's ron in pennsylvania calling on our republican line. we'll hear from lee, next. lee in st. stephens, south carolina, about these allegations laid against joe biden. he's made a couple of statements online. expected to do an interview in the 8:00 hour on msnbc. lee, go ahead. caller: yes. well, i'm not saying that she's not credible. he was vice president for eight years and it never came up and everybody's comparing it to brett kavanaugh but no one is comparing it to the president of the united states. you have all these women, said he groped them, he raped one.

they heard a tape of him saying what he did women but they are comparing this one incident to brett kavanaugh? no, i think it's political and as far as him coming out and saying he didn't do it, to me, that's irrelevant because when he was going after the president and everyone was going after him and his son, he didn't get into it with them. host: but the fact that the vice president is addressing these allegations directly now after being prompted by many to do so, what do you think of that move then? caller: i feel if he want taos address it, it's a good thing that he does. but as far as whether it's true or not, we condition tell and everybody said it should be investigated well i feel the same about the president of the united states. why didn't they investigate those women? those women were never heard. i mean, so it's a double standard. host: did you think that christine ford's testimony needs to be examined then? caller: yes. i think it was. she said what happened and nobody believed her. so, i mean -- host: why not apply the same

standard of investigation to these claims by tara reade? caller: because they didn't do it for the president of the united states. they didn't investigate all the women that accused donald trump. one lady said she was raped in a department store. he said it himself on tape that he gropes women. so it's almost like a double standard all the way around. host: but this is a person running for the highest office in the land. do you think that deserves scrutiny? caller: i think everything needs to be investigated. but the way i feel about it, it doesn't make a difference. one lesser or two evils the one in the white house, one going in the white house. i don't quite get how it's a double standard. you keep bringing up brett kavanaugh. what about the president? why not use him as an example? host: ok. that's lee in south carolina. let's hear on our independent line from virginia. mark. hello. caller: good. good morning to you. look, you know, when you say 27 years ago, you know, i overall like joe biden, but that also

takes us back to that notorious time of the anita hill time frame. and at the time of that hearing, you know, going back watching the movie and reading up on that time frame, there was such a high disregard in disbelief for women overall. and i just lost so much respect for joe biden during that time frame. so if you look at the joe biden of those hearings that basically just kind of threw anita hill underneath the bus, i can't say that i would have a hard time believing that that joe biden of 27 years who refuse to apologize to anita hill when he knew he was wrong is it was documented he was wrong under his leadership, i can't just give him a pass and i just think that you probably need to have the proper investigations go forward to check the veracity of this

person who is bringing these allegations. host: so if this persist in his campaign, would that sway for how you would vote for him or if you will vote for him? caller: the fact that he did not come clean and apologize to this law professor, anita hill, i got a problem, you know, with that. i mean, he was only the chairman of the judiciary committee. and he basically allowed the good old boys' club to sway his decisions or who he allowed to testify, didn't allow to testify and he just really just mangled that up. host: ok. that's mark in virginia. we'll hear from donna in south carolina, republican line. hi. caller: hi. thank you for taking my call. i just want to say about this situation is i would like to think that women, especially in this era who are kind of an older group of women, back in

those days, women were fearful of reporting anything because they risk losing their jobs, especially in a political power type job. and we have fought very hard for people to hear us. the institution for the politicians have always protected their own. there was a time where the politicians even had a reserve of money to squash any -- well, wrongful thing that they did with regarding assaults towards women. you know, this is an important time. i'm not saying that biden did or didn't do it or wasn't offensive to this lady but we, the people, we really do deserve to know the truth. the democrat party has always supported their own and have always been offended and against the republican party. this should not be about politics. this should be about the support

of sexual allegation, harassments, regardless of what the party is. we, the people, deserve to know the truth we, the people, deserve to have an investigation. host: the previous caller had talk about the allegations laid against this president. would you apply that kind of standard to him? caller: i didn't listen to the previous comment on the standards. so, you know, i can't really commit my opinion on that one. host: well, as far as allegations made against him by 25 different women. would you apply the same standard on the president then? caller: yeah. i apply that standard to any of the politicians. let's not oxalate just the president. let's look at other situation where is the politicians are just outright lying. they tell the truth but they lie. no, that didn't come out right. host: that's donna in south carolina, calling out to give us her thoughts. a couple of this one other bit

of news to let you know about on monday just something to watch out for. the supreme court, because of covid-19, has been forced to conduct -- the way they hear cases this case on monday, the first time that they'll ever hear it by telephone. the justices will be in their various locations and arguments will be made by preventing cases by telephone and we'll show you that on c-span at 10:00 and the lead up to that, bruce collins, our general counsel for c-span taking a looking like at this change in the court's workings about going on air saying changes afoot at the supreme court. monday the court will for the first time allow news media to provide outside yeah coverage. this is only 10 conference but it is live coverage which is the bed rock of television journalism. goes on to say the court's decision to conduct its business during the pandemic by teleconference is not much of a

size surprise because so many other organizations have done the same the remarkable development is the justice's unexpected live coverage. c-span has long argued for greater public assess tonight the court. and welcomes this development. it's been a long time coming you can see that play out on monday. go to our website at c-span.org for more information. you want to read more of the comments of our general counsel, you can find it on line at "the washington post." fred, stafford, texas, democrats line. caller: yes. there should be an investigation. anybody get assaulted. but this is for the republicans. if oured can admit to assaulting women, grabbing their private parts and over 25 women bringing up charges against him, if i was a republican, i wouldn't even call in. that's all i have to say. host: so as far as the allegations for ms. reade, what do you think of them on their

she waited a long time but if she says she was assaulted, she would be investigated. on judge kavanaugh, i disagree with the democrats going back to investigate his years on kavanaugh, but everyone should be investigated. host: one more call on this topic, lorraine robbins, illinois, democrats line. caller: good morning, pedro. i tend to not believe her story, not only because of inconsistencies of her story, but the one thing is that they don't have a copy of her complaint. with the senate personnel office. i think i read she said she filed a complaint with the office, but they cannot can -- cannot find the complaint and

she did not have a copy. isn't she an attorney? host: as far as the complaint is concerned, mr. biden has asked the national archives if there is anything regarding that that can be produced. remember a congressman, i can't remember his name, from michigan, an allegation was laying upon him -- laid upon him. host: that was the line for democrats. we will change topics, back to issues concerning covid-19. that with a date on doctor, dr. sarah fortune. later on in the program, we take a look at racial disparities we see in covid cases with dr. oliver brooks, national medical association. take onny international

this topic, boris johnson thursday contracted thursday, came out of the hospital, and he gave his first briefing after contracting covid-19. here is a portion. >> your efforts and sacrifice is working and has been proved to work. today, the number of covid falling,missions is the number of patients in icu is falling. we have seen it. the most important task we set ourselves as a nation, to avoid the tragedy that engulfed other parts of the world. at no stage has our nhs been overwhelmed. no patient went without a ventilator, no patient was deprived of intensive care. we have five of the seven , andcted nightingale wards

it is thanks to that massive effort to shield the nhs that we avoided an uncontrollable and catastrophic epidemic where the reasonable worst-case in area was 500,000 deaths -- worst-case scenario was 500,000 deaths. i can confirm today, for the first time, we are past the peak of this disease. we are past the peak, and we are on the downward slope. and, we have so many reasons to be hopeful for the long term. the u.k. is leading its national efforts to find a vaccine. today, oxford university announced a partnership with astrazeneca to develop what they believe could be a means of an ocular eating ourselves against this disease. comes, andthis day i'm afraid we cannot say exactly

when it may be, we will have to beat this disease by our growing resolve and ingenuity. i will be setting out a comprehensive plan next week to explain how we can get our economy moving, get our children back to school, back into childcare, and how we can travel to work and how we can make of the workplace safer. >> "washington journal" continues. host: our first guest this morning is dr. sarah fortune. not only is she a professor at the harvard school of health, she serves as the chair of the department. she is here to talk about the response of covid-19 in the united states. good morning. guest: good morning. host: in the ultimate process of

resolving covid-19 or putting controls to it, can we start with the role of antibodies. play ine will they stopping the spread of the disease? guest: antibodies are how we are going to get out of this mass at a biological -- mess at a biological level. this is how you protect yourself against infectious diseases, and antibodies are how people who are infected with the virus and survive, how they are protected against secondary challenge and how a vaccine works. host: the collection of data on anybody's, how does that work, and what type of numbers do you have to see to make a good estimation of where we are at? you just asked two questions, how to we use antibodies to understand how people are infected, and how do we understand whether those antibodies in those people are

and how can we use that information moving forward. i think we know a lot more about the first question that the second, because that is what we have been doing at a population level these days. we have been rolling out tests and trying to use those to understand who has seen the virus. ,n some places in massachusetts like chelsea, where they go out on the street corner and test antibodies from people they find , 30% of people who think they have been well, 30% of those people have seen the virus. that told us a lot about where we are in the epidemic. host: how accurate are the tests for antibodies generally? guest: that is a superb question. it turns out it is all over the map. there are over a dozen different antibody tests on the market, and some are superb, and some

are not so superb. all of them have utility. it is important we understand the characteristics of any given antibody tests and trying to understand how we use it. host: is there a way to determine how -- the superbness from one test to the other? guest: of course. we do that in a lab. , basicallytest blood, from people you know who have had covid and blood from andle that has been stored you know they don't have covid because it is from like five years ago, and you run the antibody tests and see how well they do. have error rates around 1%, so it gets the answer wrong about 1%. some of them have rates around

10%. those are really different, in terms of whether you are trying to make an individual decision about what you should do about that information, or a population level decision about what you should do with that information. host: i guess one of the things in the last couple of days about this false positives about these types of things. guest: right. is not the first coronavirus in the world, and we have all been infected with many coronaviruses. it turns out our body has a memory of seeing those coronaviruses. we have antibodies to those viruses, and they can create a background in those test results. distinguishrd to some of these low-level positives to the new coronavirus from that background.

but, those errors really have enormous implication for their data, the data that you as an individual are trying to use to decide whether you are safe to go back, say to work in a hospital or a nursing home, because 10% error rate for you means, if there are 100 of you, 10 times, that antibody test will tell you you are safe and you are not. and that is unacceptable. ist: doctor sarah fortune our guest, talking about the response of the coronavirus pandemic. you can call in, eastern and central time zones, (202) 748-8000. if you live in mountain and pacific, it is (202) 748-8001. for medical professionals, (202) 748-8002. you can text us at (202) 748-8003. dr. fortune, in the discussions about the developments of vaccines, the new efforts talked

about the house yesterday, from anthony fauci about the rapid pace of trying to develop a vaccine, i want to play a little about what he said about this operation on the today's show. of theobviously part team that is involved in that, and the question is, you always have to say you want to get a vaccine that is safe and effective, and that you can scale up rapidly. what the plan is right now, as i mentioned a couple of times on this show, we are in the early stages of a trial phase one. when you go into the next phase, we will safely and carefully, but as quickly as possible, try to get an answer as to whether it works and is safe. if so, we will ramp up protection -- production with companies involved. you do that at risk, in other words you do not risk -- weight until you start manufacturing. you proactively start making it, assuming it will work.

and, if it does, you can scale up and hopefully get to that timeline. we want to go quickly, but make sure it is safe and effective. i think that is doable. host: that was part of dr. fauci's sharing of what they are doing. dr. fortune, what do you think about the approach they are taking? guest: i think it's a streaming -- it is externally important, and i'm impressed we are taking that on, because that is an ambitious and risky effort, but without it, we are not going to get to a vaccine in the timeframe we need to really save people's lives and save the economy. host: in the process of developing a vaccine, what is the importance of tests, whether it be trial tests, small simple, large sample. where does that fall into the administration's desire to get a vaccine?

'sest: i think dr. fauci framing of the process for developing a vaccine helps you understand that, so the first thing you try to understand is whether a vaccine is effective. you can do that in relatively small numbers of people. do that first by measuring the antibodies in those individuals, how well that vaccine generates an antibody response. then, you have to worry about safety. that really is a different problem, and that probably requires a combination of animal testing and larger numbers of people, because we know most people who get covid are going to be fine. so that safety signal is trying to convert --

actually a little more of a needle in a haystack. you need larger testing to do that. at the same time, what he is doing in terms of capacity to manufacture a vaccine, that, in and of itself, is a huge hurdle. that infrastructure now is making a bet on our future. host: this is dr. sarah fortune of harvard's school of public health. our first caller is greg in new jersey. go ahead with your question or comment. caller: good morning, doctor and rank you for appearing on c-span. -- doctor, and thank you for appearing on c-span. a question to these antibody tests, is there any rating system, let's say from one to 10, in terms of their reliability? and the people who are tested, of they actually informed

the problems or shortcomings of any particular test or the strengths, relative strengths of the certainty of the results and so forth? and, i had one other question, which is interesting. and ier from hayfever, usually get a call during the winter. i am wondering if it is something about what happens in your nasal passages when this occurs that may actually protect inhaling this molecular enemy. host: thank you. guest: i will answer both questions. i love the second question, but let me answer the first question because it is a little easier. yes, there are comparative studies of all of these antibody tests. scientists don't make that data easy to digest. they don't write everything on a one to 10 scale, but there are

comparatives, so they give you a of how it attacks people and the specificity. it gives you those numbers. the question about how the test is being used -- tests are being used is interesting. in the population studies i'm aware of, people are not actually being told what the results of those tests are, because they are used at a population level. in part because we do not know what the result of the tests thoseor people, so studies are not actually set up to return that information to people, but i think you raised an important point about how people are informed about the strengths and failings of those tests, in terms of using the data. the second question of your hayfever is super interesting, because it speaks to a certain may of immune response that

be good or, sorry to say, may be bad in terms of why people tend to get sick from covid. there are different flavors of immunity, sort of allergy was implicated in sars in terms of people who got sick from the infection. that is part of what makes a vexing complicated, trying to get the wrecked -- the right flavor of immunity. host: the next color is from maryland. hi. caller: good morning. my sister and her husband both contracted the coronavirus. he died a couple days ago, her husband. me, his wifeelow died from the coronavirus. both were in nursing homes. see howy bothers me to

our president misleads the american people with this garbage he talks. we need some real people like dr. fauci and the lady doctor that comes on this news conference. i don't understand why most american people is listening to mr. trump in the garbage he talks every day. he's an embarrassment to this country. host: thank you. guest: i'm very sorry about your family members and neighbors. it speaks to the fact this virus attacking communities equally. some communities are suffering much more heavily from this virus than others. and, it would be nice to see more coordinated and consistent messaging at a federal level, although, as you say, dr. fauci hero, and-- folk

is doing a fantastic job. it's nice to have him at the helm of the nih. host: we go to john in pennsylvania in johnstown. caller: thank you for taking my call. i have two questions for the doctor. , have theyhemselves waived fda approval for these tests in a rush to get them available to be used, and my second question -- used? my second question is, i am at a loss to understand why the trump administration has decided to and severalwho things they are trying to do. i think it sends a message the world -- message to the world that the poor people of the world do not matter. thank you. on the first question, the tests are being approved. they are being trialed and

approved. it is important to recognize that different test characteristics are useful in different situations. if you are going to survey an000 people, you might want easier test and except a higher error rates. if it is you making the decision on what you should do, you might want a different test with a lower error rate. the tests have different use profiles, which makes them all valuable, but it is important to know what they are. i 100% agree with you about the who. if we think this is a terrible burden for our country, which it is, it is important to realize there are countries with many fewer medical resources for whom this is just an incredible catastrophe. host: dr. fortune, you have seen the numbers, i'm sure, about the united states surpassing 60,000 deaths related to covid-19. how does that compare to deaths

from influenza? i'm sure you hear the comparisons as well as this one and influenza. the 2018-2019 flu season, which the flu season is weirdly not the calendar year, it can be longer than the calendar year. there are about 60,000 deaths in the united states as well. i think it is important to realize, in the united states, our 60,000 covid deaths have occurred in the past six weeks, eight weeks. whereas those influenza deaths occurred over a period of about 12 months. up, we are in pace to rapidly outstrip influenza, is easy towhile it equate this to numbers, i don't think that comparison is fair. host: dr. fortune, at the time

we are talking, several states have decided to reopen portions of their business and allow some transactions to happen that way as -- way. as an epidemiologist when it comes to social behaviors, what do you think we might see when it comes to rise of cases? guest: from an infectious disease level, the more people interacting with each other, the more covid transmission we will see. i am very sympathetic to states needing to do this, and i think the dialogue around flattening somehow, implied that by flattening the curve we will make the virus go away. ist we are really doing limiting the rate at which the virus transmits to the population, such that our

medical establishment can take care of people. it is not inherent of the logic of flattening the curve, is understanding we will have to -- we will have to relax social distancing, and the virus will inevitably transmit through the population. just need to do it at such a rate that we can take care of people. then, make sure people who are really high risk are protected. host: let's hear from linda in sharon, pennsylvania for our guest, dr. sarah fortune. go ahead. caller: hi. [laughter] i love you, c-span. i was just wondering about mosquitoes. if somebody has the virus, can mosquitoes transmit it to somebody else after they take the blood from that person to spread to another person?

guest: that is an excellent question, and there we are lucky. this is not transmissible via mosquitoes. there are other viruses that are, but this is not one of them. host: what about this idea that someone talked about on this program and other places about the transmission being capable through air instead of through contact? guest: yeah. notfor people who are thinking about viral transmission all the time, there is this distinction between droplet born transmission and airborne transmission. droplet transmission is when you sneeze and cough and droplets fly out, and they are kind of big. if people are in the trajectory, they can get infected, or they land on surfaces and get infected.

on tbansmission, i work as my primary focus, and it is an air pathogen. what happens there, the droplets dehydrate into these little tiny droplets that can hang in the air for hours and hours and float around. anybody who happens to come into the dust cloud, even a much longer time later, can be infected. that is much harder to protect yourself against, so, when people are saying airborne transmission, they are invoking morespecter of a much difficult to contain pathogen. i think the epidemiologic and biologic data suggests airborne transmission is probably possible but not the dominant way this virus spreads. is most of the spread through droplets and surfaces. that is really -- because of

where most of the risk is, that is where we should focus our efforts. which is not to say in a hospital where there is a huge cloud of droplets people don't need to be worried about droplets -- or airborne transmission, but it is probably not where the general populace's efforts should be focused. host: this is lisa in charlottesville, virginia. caller: hi, doctor. thank you for taking my question. what i wanted to know, do we know, if someone has the antibodies, does that mean they will not get covid-19 again? guest: another excellent question. course, what scientists like to equivocate about, technically we do not know. that is really because all antibodies are not equal. antibodies,k about numbers matter.

to haveple are going lots of anybody's that are really good and will probably be highly protective. others might not have so many antibodies or antibodies that are not quite as good or highly protective. level, at a population having antibody responses means most people will not get as sick , if they get sick at all. for a given individual, we don't know that answer. host: dr. fortune, how do you factor in those who are a symptom attic as far as the future spread of this disease? guest: as what makes this pathogen so complicated. it is estimated about 40% of transmission occurs through people who do not have symptoms. obviously, if you don't have symptoms, you don't know to get tested. it is hard to find you, and it is hard to protect people

against that form of transmission. day whenenvision a viral testing is widely available, and we can do testingance viral and find people who are a symptom attic transmits thing -- a symptom attic transmitting -- symptomatic transmitting. we are really not there yet so difficult to protect ourselves against asymptomatic transmission. host: is there a way to understand what triggers from one from being asymptomatic to symptomatic. guest: there is a way but we don't know it yet. there are pretty good guesses. that, clearly, some

people have what you will obesity and diabetes. it is likely those people are not getting sicker because they have other illnesses but because of all of these, their immune response system has altered, and it is not the virus per se that is making people sick when they get really sick. their immune response is causing more damage than having the virus itself. that gets to the earlier .aller's question people have different qualities of immune response and sometimes that works in your favor and sometimes it works against you. you would like to be able to predict that and help people understand the risks, and

understand risks early in some of these trajectories, but we do not have the tools or understanding to do that yet. host: from kentucky, we hear from randy for our guest, dr. sarah fortune of the harvard school of public health. caller: good morning. thank you. over 10 states, there were such a high rate of health care professionals contracting or getting this virus, and they did have adequate ppe, the report said. so what is going on with the sterilization techniques, or is this such an easily contracted , the that the people common person out in public, doesn't have the professional training like the professionals have? what will happen there when this all blows up? guest: thank you for the question, randy. i'm from kentucky as well, so it

is nice to hear from somebody from kentucky. the complexity of protecting yourself against this illustrated inis this question of why health-care workers who are wearing n95 masks are still getting infected. we have learned it is very hard to not touch things and not touch her face -- your face. settinga health care where people understand they are high risk and services are dirty , as people are taking off their yourthe art of taking off ppe is complicated, especially if it is covered with a high density of covid viruses. health-care settings can easily infect themselves as

they are taking off their ppe. in our hospitals, we have dedicated people who are standing there, helping doctors take off their ppe, so they do not infect themselves. that does speak to the problem of trying to stop transmission. health-care settings are special. there are lots of people with covid and there -- in there. there is a high density of viruses, but it speaks to the surface and trying to protect people from viruses on surfaces. host: this is from marianne. marianne, lakewood, new jersey. hi. caller: hi. i'm not going to ask a medical question, but i have a little comment. number one, you stuck up to the who. i don't believe they did their job. my daughter works in a bank. withyears ago, she worked

a chinese woman, and her husband was a sign is -- was a scientist. she told my doctor the chinese something,was doing that they were going to destroy the world. my daughter thought she was a nut. she says yes, they are creating something. i don't exactly know what it is, but they are creating something. and when they are going to do it, i don't know. so my daughter let that go because she thought, come on. she didn't believe it. look what's happening now. that itot an accident was like go with bats or somebody accidentally brought that out into china there. host: what exactly would you like our guest to address then? democrats would

rather blame trump when he did when whymediately wasn't the who doing something and why didn't they pick this up? host: we will leave it there. doctor, go ahead if you wish. guest: i agree with you. there have been failings at every governmental level, and that is the level of the who, in terms of response to this. i don't think anybody wanted to see how serious it would become, and there was a systematic tendency to underestimate the severity of this virus. , basically every national government, and by the chinese government, the local and national chinese government. that doesn't mean we don't need all of those institutions having forward to combat this pandemic and protect us from future

pandemics. host: doctor, you have also remdesivir the drug, . what is the best way to think about it in context? guest: this is the first drug that has been shown to have some clinical efficacy against the virus. in the short-term, it is drugs, not vaccines, that will save people getting very sick from this virus. i think the way to think about this is sort of a moderate success. remdesivir appeared to have clinical efficacy in terms of limiting the duration of your like,ms, but it wasn't you know, when they rolled out the first antibiotic and people so thism dead to cured, was a really important step

forward. it doesn't solve the whole problem, though. tennessee.ille, robert, go ahead. you are on. caller: thank you. i was wondering what the doctor thought occurred when the -- fall on natural fibers such as wool. i don't actually have a good answer for you and i think you must have been following virus,terature -- this when the droplets fall on surfaces, this virus is incredibly hardy, and people are saying steel is different than wood. i take all of that with a grain of salt, and i think that sort of the overarching message is that surfaces are a problem, and

probably there is no reason to think stainless steel is different than wool. you can come up with reasons, but i think it is easier to problem andall as a we need to be very cognizant of surface transmission in order to protect people as we are working out whether some surfaces are worse than other services. host: we have a few people texting in questions, saying, the first question is mark in texas, saying is it possible that exposure to other coronavirus is in the past allow people to be less susceptible or have less severe cases of covid-19? guest: i think that is very likely to be true. this idea that there are some antibodies that you acquired because you saw a coronavirus in the past that can kind of recognize covid-19 and

give you a measure of protection but not full protection. it is appealing to think that might be true. people are giving the opposite argument as well, trying to understand why older adults and kids -- and then they say older person -- older people have coronavirus exposures and maybe some of those are driving severity. i think it is a great and biologically plausible model, but we don't really have data for it. importantly, we don't have a way to predict whether it is true for you. host: this is bill in connecticut, saying if a person have anti-bot -- has 80 bodies from encountering covid, will a vaccine be necessary for that person? also a good question. in most cases, natural infection provides more robust -- in more

cases -- most cases of other viruses, natural protection provides more robust and long-lasting protection then vaccine induced protection. we don't know that in this case, and because we can't understand arewhat antibody qualities truly protective, it is hard to say that with certainty, but i think that, probably, if you look at the whole of viral biology that that would be true. int: this is steve charleston, south carolina, asking you, if the vaccine, once it is developed, should be mandatory. i remember taking the polio vaccine and i don't think i nor my parents had a choice in the matter. think that vaccination -- i don't think there is advice for mandatory vaccination.

but, i think it should be strongly encouraged as an opt out policy. vaccination protects individuals and populations, so a good -- improve people's understanding of the importance of vaccination and safety of vaccination is important as we think about rolling out a covid vaccine. host: norman in wesley chapel florida, go ahead. caller: i am a 72-year-old man, year.live with -- every one of my questions, how many people have died from the flu since this all started with also, there isd

a nurse on radio, and she said at the hospital she worked in, which she did not identify, said all deaths are being listed as this coronavirus. by just be will there everything we hear. guest: i think the numbers are might berd, and we being flooded with numbers these days. i will speak to your question about the flu. i don't actually have an exact number for you. this started to occur at the tail of the flu season. as you probably know, flu is a winter virus, so this was tailing off. flu wasthat because

tailing off as this emerged, and we know that because we do flu surveillance, so you can see the number of flu cases going down. actually, people are tested for flu, because we have a drug for in this setting, people would receive flu tests. i think that, while i can't guarantee every person who is in a hospitalized -- who is hospitalized for covid has been tested for flu and doesn't have flu, i think that the vast majority of them have covid. i think the question of how people are being tracked and how deaths are tallied is incredibly, located, and it cuts both ways. in the state of massachusetts, for example, you have to be a covidor covid to have

counted death. that is true in new york state as well. this huger there is spike in mortality of deaths not something covid, but weird is going on for people dying at home, for example, and that might be covid. you can also imagine the scenario where people come to the hospital, have a heart incidentallyre also covid infected, and that happens too and counts as having a covid death. i'm not sure that sort of calleeping, which i will bookkeeping errors on the edge, should distract us from what an and norm's covid itself probably normous covid itself.

you mentioned asymptomatic transmission, how do you ferret out who is infected and who is transmitting? really only by testing people. you, andsmit to 10 of let's say four of you are asymptomatic carriers, you will transmit without being picked up , and that is going to propagate the epidemic. andwe have contact tracing testing, and that makes the nips the spread. i think that is important to slow the virus -- transmission of the virus. host: our next caller is from alexandria, virginia. caller: thank you for your time and expertise. , one, ifto find out

someone is showing -- if someone is asymptomatic and showing no any whatsoever, not having of the signs that shows you are sick like fever, chills, , and milddiarrhea cough as well. i has a second question as well, i think it is probably more they comment. what about home remedies? from the ivory coast, and i can tell you that people back home are using home remedies for those doing it as preventive measures, things like onion, garlic, and things

blended in the blender, and using the extract to mix with and honey. salt and it is working from what i understand. aey are using it as preventive measure. i know it is not scientifically proven, but maybe it works. maybe we should do something like this in the u.s.? what do you think, doctor? guest: let me answer your first question first, which are asymptomatic transmitters truly asymptomatic? that is all in the eye of the beholder in the memory of the person who is asked. as far as people can figure out, yes, truly asymptomatic in most cases. sometimes they will go through and say, are you sure you didn't have a headache? and people will be like maybe i had a headache. i think the trick to asymptomatic is that people did

not think they were sick, and even if you live like i do, in an area of high covid ,ransmission, there is a strong human desire not to think you have covid. when i have a headache, i would rather think i have a migraine then covid until it really smacks me in the face. i think, as we think about control measures, it is difficult to believe we are going to rely on people's reporting of their symptoms as a filth roof -- phil proof measure of preventing transmission. fever might be different, but clearly there are people who are don'tng the virus who have a fever. the question of home remedy, i think people do what makes them feel safer. i'm a big believer in home remedies if you are actually

sick. i do have to say, even in a clinical trial, it is difficult to prove something works. you need a whole lot of people who are followed carefully who do and do not get whatever treatment it is to really know givening works, but, there is not a downside to it, i think if it makes people fear better, theyl should carry on with their home remedies. biologically, since we don't know, i don't want to say it's not having an effect. host: from connecticut, we will hear from paul. good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for having me. doctor, i have a question about the testing. 10%mentioned there was

false positives, but you did not say about false negatives. that i much rather hear have a positive and know it has a chance of not being correct than hearing i have a negative and finding out they were wrong. right you are exactly about thinking about those tests. i don't want to say every anybody test has a 10% false positive rate. there are some tests out there and some have positive -- hi positivefalse rates. are you this idea of going to set the test performance characteristics, and you can fix that into the test. a lot of the high false positive likely to capture a

bunch of people, or has a high false negative rate and is likely to miss people. the way the tests have been developed, thus far, the errors seem to be in their favorable positivity. it is important to understand that in understanding how we should use those tests. host: kevin is in massachusetts. hi. caller: hello. host: you are on with our guest, go ahead. caller: i have a question about the micron size of the coronavirus. use the n95 masks we generally for tv, once it goes into the sterilization process that massachusetts just started, does that mask function in its original way? guest: i don't actually want to

go out on -- way out on a limb for this one. i have not seen those data. i'm going to give you my commonsense answer, which is probably the masks might have lost some protective capacity, but it is substantially better than a surgical mask. there clearly is some degradation over time in terms of quality and protection for extended use of a mask, but i think it is still reasonable to expect it will provide substantial protection. i have not seen those data yet, so i don't want to commit myself too much. host: dr. fortune, if we see another rise as the experts are

talking about coming this fall and winter, what do you think we have to do differently then we have done up to this point? see --i think we should prepare ourselves to see another rise. we are going to see another rise. i don't think we should do anything -- i don't think we need to do anything different because i think that is inherit in the biology of a pandemic. as more people contact each other, we will see more cases. i think what we need to do is make sure we have all of the pieces in place to limit transmission as much as possible, and that is about protecting our medical infrastructure and taking care andeople who are very sick, having that testing in place, part of it as having the testing in place and part of it is ppe and resources for our

health care providers. the medical infrastructure, that is what is driving the differences in mortality rates we see in different locales. it is important our health care system is able to take care of people who are sick. host: would you advocate for the level of social distancing we have seen two recent days -- up to recent days? guest: you mean should be go back to stay-at-home orders if we see a rise in the fall? host: correct. guest: i think we should aspire to something better than that, better than that whole scenario, which is that we relax social distancing, but do not eliminate it. so, we relax social distancing in such a way that we understand there will be continued transmission. not a big spike.

and, that we are able to sustain that, in terms of taking care of people, to sustain both a level normalcy in our economic and personal lives and take care of people who are sick and protect people most at risk. host: let's hear from a medical professional, san antonio, texas, from michael. caller: hello, dr. fortune. i'm a retired family doctor, sitting on the board of directors of a child development center at my church. we are struggling with try to figure at -- trying to figure out how to determine when to let children come back into the , andopment center personally, i am interested in understanding why the kids not

sick from these disease -- from this disease though they are carriers. guest: that is an important question, societal question, and an interesting biological question. don't getbasically, very sick from this virus. they clearly can carry the virus, can transmit the virus, and they don't get sick. we do not understand why that is. there are theories about pre-existing immunity, and there are people who have seen coronavirus is best coronaviruses in the past -- coronaviruses in the past. there are theories on the others, kids have a lot of colds and they have primed immune responses and they are protected as well. i think the honest answer is we don't understand that, and that

is important. at a societal level, i think we need to have a discussion about whether allowing children back into childcare centers and schools is an important way both to move us forward, but also allows a measure of transmission among the population who are generally not going to get sick. if you are a purist epidemiologist, that is appealing, but those children come into contact with teachers, parents, grandparents, and trying to understand how you control that, because it is hard to control children, and don't an explosivet transmission change is complicated and requires a sophisticated conversation between educators, providers,

and public health officials. host: next up in georgetown, massachusetts. dan, hello. caller: thank you for having me on. i have a couple different questions. i would like to start with the response ontor's how she feels south korea has dealt with the covid disease. guest: she is worth -- he is referring to the fact that south korea has taken a different tactic that we have and implemented a really aggressive testing and contact tracing policy early, and have not shut down societal activities in the same way we have. my daughter tells me all the appealing -- it is an appealing model, but for us,

the cat is out of the bag, so we need to learn from what they have done well and try to adapt it to the realities of the epidemic as it hits the united states now. host: gary in florida, hello. gary in sarasota, hello? sorry, gary. we go to charles in colorado. no ahead. caller: i just have one observation and one comment. my first observation is, every time i go to the grocery store, i see all of these people, and i wear a mask too, but they are touching everything. then, i see them walk to their cars and they are touching their car doorknobs, then getting in and touching their steering wheels and the shift. it seems counterproductive if you are not cleaning your hands and surfaces you would be touching, like your groceries, and wearing a mask.

i don't get it. my second comment, i won't say i am a pandemic not, but i did listen to the cdc and american general medicine for years, and they always stayed with global warming that, as temperatures rise, species are going to be in stress, and these pandemics are going to become more frequent and worse. a good example is the bats in china that they say caused this. -- 400ve over for hunch strains of covid in one batch. i'm wondering, as global temperatures are warming, are we going to see worse pandemics? re: going to see them more frequently-- are we going to see them more frequently? guest: the grocery store question, they are complicated. i think it's important to recognize most transmission is not occurring through random contacts in the community but people who have pre-sustained

exposure to individuals who are infected. so nursing homes, low income communities where people are living in eligible h -- in relatively dense housing. while there is probably some in the grocery store banana aisle, that is not the majority of transmission is occurring. right aboutlutely and global climate change the stresses that puts on animal species who are carriers, and especially bats. haveare amazing, and they -- they carry not just coronavirus's, they carry ebola, rabies, all sorts of viruses. and beto predict

perspective about understanding where the next pandemic will emerge is an important task for the future. host: last call will be from long island, new york. caller: hi, dr. fortune. thank you so much. i'm a woman of color, and i listened to the news. i watch, try to stay mindful of what is going on. and the impact it is having on our communities. i sit here, you know, following what i have been told to do, social distancing, the masks. however, i do not want to look up at some point and be told, you should have done something. question,ing the should i be going out to get tested, should i do something to ?ind of make sure i'm ok, or the second part, the previous

caller asked about just being out. you mentioned random contact is not necessarily how i am looking at china and other places. should we be wearing gloves? i noticed that they're not wearing gloves. other countries are not doing certain things. i will stop now. thank you so very much. guest: on the first question, i think the recommendations from the c.d.c. do reflect our very best understanding of what you should be doing now, and i understand the frustration with ,he fact that they have changed and that does reflect that our understanding is new and understanding what works and what doesn't work is a little bit of a giant global experiment. so this comes to your question of gloves.

eople look around and say, where have individual countries tried intervention, masking is one of them and have they worked? originally we thought maybe surgical masks aren't going to provide that much protection. it's clear now that they probably do provide a measure of protection, and i can't 100% say at gloves wouldn't be -- provide a measure of protection as well. but that does reflect the complexity of dealing with a new pathogen. host: our guest has been dr. sarah fortune of the school of public health, where she is the chair of immunology, talking about aspects related to the u.s. response to the coronavirus pandemic. doctor, thanks for your time this morning. guest: thank you so much for having me. i really enjoyed it. host: we will finish our last

hour the way we began. your comments and calls on the sexual assault allegation against joe biden. he appeared on television this morning. we will show you portions of that interview. you can call us. 202-748-8000. 202-748-7001. we will show you chad wolf taking part in a virtual discussion on the topic of the coronavirus, particularly how his department is fighting the virus. here is a portion. >> doing a variety of different initiatives. i started off most discussions around covid-19 focused on three priorities that i have had from the onset and that's to respond, to recover and to restore. so we are responding currently. the department along with h.h.s. and fema, responding to the pandemic. we need to make sure the

department is able to recover and utilize the function and fulfill the functions every day not only during the crisis but when the crisis ends as well. then, of course, restore, make sure we restore trade, travel, commerce to the american economy as we move out of the pandemic and as the country begins to open up. that's my priority. it's been the priority of senior leadership in the department and the framework which we are operating under. i also want to talk about mitigation. we talk about it in the task force that meets daily. we talk about social distancing. we talk about cloth-based coverings. i would like to re-emphasize that, it's critically important that we continue the social distancing, the social mitigation, well beyond the end of this month, well beyond the end of next month.

these measures will be with us for some time. simple things, washing your hands, not touching your face, these things work. they're not high-tech. they are absolutely critical, and we have heard that repeatedly from the doctors on the task force. we talked about fema. i can spend many hours talking about what fema is doing on the response. s you know, all 50 states, all five territories are under -- we are working with the tribes as well, all receiving assistance from fema regarding covid-19. to date has obligated $19 million in covid-19 related efforts. they have also, again with h.h.s., looked at probably about another $51 billion in support of covid-19. so a lot of hard work is being done. >> "washington journal" continues. host: with me, the former vice

president and current democratic presidential presumptive nominee joe biden to talk about sexual assault allegations by tara reade. here is a portion of the interview from this morning. >> a former senate aide accuses of you sexual assault. to our viewers, please excuse the graphic nature of this, but i want to make sure there is no question as to what we are talking about. she says in 1993, mr. vice president, that you pinned her against the wall and reached under her clothing and penetrated her with your fingers. would you please go on the record with the american, did you sexually -- american people, did you sexual aassault tara reade? mr. biden: it never happened. it didn't. >> do you remember any types of complaints that she might have

made? mr. biden: i don't remember any complaint she may have made. it was 27 years ago, and i don't remember, nor does anyone else that i am aware of, and the fact is that i don't remember any complaint ever having been made. >> have you or your campaign -- have you reached out to her? mr. biden: no, i have not reached out to her. 27 years ago. this never happened. when she first made the claim, we made it clear that it never happened, and it's as simple as that. >> in the past 30 minutes or so, you released a statement and among others saying -- you write this. there is only one place that complaints of this kind could be. the national archives. i am requesting that the secretary of state ask -- the senate ask the archives to identify any record of the complaint she alleges she filed.

if there was any such complaint, the record will be there. are you preparing us for a complaint that might be revealed in some way? are you confident there is nothing? mr. biden: i am confident there is nothing. no one ever brought it to the attention of me, 27 years ago. no one that i am aware of in my campaign -- excuse me, my senate office at the time is aware of any such request, and -- or any uch complaint, and so i am not worried about it at all. if there is a complaint, that's where it would be. that's where it would be filed. if it's there, put it out. i have never seen it. host: we will show you more portions of that interview from this morning from the former vice president. you can call us on the democratic line, the republican line and the independent line.

if you want to text us, do so at 202-748-8003. please include your name, city and state. it's on our facebook page also. ohio, democrats line, adrian, you are up first. good morning. caller: he definitely did it. host: what leads you to that conclusion? -- she it's like she got talked to people about it in the past. you need it ---- to stand by what you say. host: even as you say -- that's

what i was going to ask. you are still planning on voting for him? caller: the other guy -- i am realistic. it's sad, but i am realistic. host: let's go to linda in st. petersburg, florida, also our line for democrats. go ahead. caller: yeah, i think it's a little ridiculous that -- you know, i didn't think that it mattered anymore once trump was elected the president with all , e sexual assault allegations , you pe allegation, and know, i wouldn't doubt that they epstein's death. host: when it comes to mr. biden, do you believe him or not?

ller: i do, but i think it's irregardless. i would not vote for him because look at your choices. host: ok, richie in minneapolis, minnesota, independent line. you are next up. caller: hello, america. my comment is about joe biden. i believe joe. the reason why i believe joe, why is it now, now? why was it something that had to come out now? not at the time when he was vice president. why now? i honestly think there is somebody behind it, kind of like donald trump brought out all the women about bill clinton, at the same time he had an enormous amount of allegations or facts about himself behind the door.

he had no idea that was going to fall through. these are the reasons i am independent. i have a hard time believing the g.o.p. i have a hard time believing the democrats. i am a black american. i think i am intelligent. i have a career. i have a good point of direction. i am 57 years of age. host: but it's only the time frame factor of miss reade's claims, that's what disturbs you most? caller: true, because anything of that value, that sincere, why wait? why hold on to something that you know is going to spoil? if it's that ripe, you would take it to the market, to the people. they're going to know about it. they're not going to sit with a

stale fruit. knowing that it has some type of stench. so you get rid of it. go to the garbage and grab the stench and bring it back and spoil your home and say hey, listen, this is what i got. host: i am curious, did you apply that same standards to the claims made against brett kavanaugh? caller: yes. though i went to school, college, and i know how college , and i know it's a world of craziness, chaos on a lot of different levels, and those guys that graduate out of college and they find roots or life in whatever market they went to college for. college is like a relief of pain that you carry to try to get past -- host: did you believe brett kavanaugh? caller: i had a hard time

believing him. i still stand on the dividing line. i listen to everything. however, going back into those college years, i saw how guys were kind of crazy, mixed up with a lot of different ideas, besides going into the real world. i can see that. i can see the craziness. i can see him being abnormal. host: ok, let's go to west virginia, republican line. you are next. good morning. you are on. go ahead. caller: how come they never asked about that billion dollars -- he -- ukes rain host: sir, that doesn't apply to the allegations made against him. do you have a comment about that? caller: yeah. let them -- to find out if that woman said that

or not? host: we will go to bert. bert, michigan, democrats line. caller: how you doing? host: fine, thank you. go ahead. caller: my comment is that the -- joe biden was the vice president for eight years. if that was a big issue, it would have came up then. so i will take joe biden over a man who has 25 such allegations, paid off porn stars, has just lied over 3,000 times to the american people. why are we debating this? there is no comparison. i would just say to my republican friends, until you can come up with someone that is not embarrassing to you by donald trump, i would be quiet. host: what about the claims of tara reade? why do you not believe those? caller: i don't believe because she waited until he was running

for president. if she had an issue, he was vice president for eight years. she could have came out then and made her claim because he was vice president. that's pretty high on the totem pole as far as being in the public atmosphere. so if she had a complaint with him, she should have brought it up then. she wait until he was running for president and bring it up, that sounds like a setup to me. i mean, just common sense. host: carol in new york, republican line. good morning. caller: yes, good morning. thank you. in 1986 i was abused by two police officers in my home in kentucky. i took it to federal court, and unfortunately my jury was bought off. the attorney became state senator without an election. second attorney became county attorney without an election. the jury came back and said that

they found nothing wrong with the police officers sexually abusing me. back andwo jurors came aid to my attorney, who became state senator without an election, back in those days no one believed anything. well, i am now 67 years old. it's 2020. this happened in 1986. i still have severe post-traumatic stress. i have two family members who were sexually assaulted. one was my daughter who died this past year, who was sexually assaulted, would never bring it through that she had been sexually assaulted by someone. unfortunately, back in those days people didn't come forward with those things. host: how does that apply to thesal gages against the former

vice president? caller: simply, i said in 1986 i was sexually touched or whatever by two police officers. nobody believes it. nobody believes it. it's only recently that people believe that women are assaulted. unfortunately, this woman may still have post-traumatic stress disorder because of what was done with her, because as i said it was 1986. host: but then you believe tara reade then? caller: i certainly do. host: ok. we will go to linda in new jersey, democrats line. hi. caller: hi. i feel for the lady before me, but she did do something at the time of her alleged assault. this woman didn't. i say follow the money. probably has a hand in her pocket. and --vote for biden host: even in light of these allegations? caller: oh, absolutely.

i am 74. 40 years ago, 30 years ago, if a woman was trying to make her way up either as an actress or politically, there's always a choice to put yourself into a situation where you think you might make out ok, you think you might not. i don't believe that anybody in a hallway is incapable of protecting themselves, period. host: does this become a problem for his campaign, do you think? caller: no, no, i think it just becomes media news. i think the media makes a lot of it. trump has 17 allegations. allegations against him. follow the money with trump. host: i think that number is up to 25 according to some reporting.

mohammed in louisiana, independent line. caller: good morning. first, i don't believe the allegations against biden, but what i really wanted to say is -- host: why don't you believe them? caller: well, basically because of the timing. as many of the callers have already said, he was vice president for eight years. one of the callers said that she had been sexually assaulted in 1986 or something of that nature, but that's anonymous people. this guy was the vice president. people that reached that height generally these things come out. so after eight years of being the vice president, just coming out and he has gained the nomination, yeah, that's suspicious. so the main thing is, though, that these allegations of 27 years ago, they're pretty much irrelevant. it's almost impossible on the he

said, she said basis to determine a sexual assault allegation that happened last week or yesterday. host: why do you characterize them as irrelevant? caller: pardon? host: why do you characterize them as irrelevant to the campaign? caller: for the simple fact that it's very difficult to determine sexual assault allegations when it's on a he said/she said basis anyway, never mind something that happened 27 years ago. it's too far back in the past. at the risk of making some women's movement people angry, this is too long ago. these things should be -- there should be a statute of limitation even though they're allegations. host: ok. we will hear from kate. hello. caller: hi. you know, i don't know whether i believe it or not, but what

concerns me is that every time we have a good political candidate -- i am sorry? host: i didn't say anything. go ahead, please. caller: ok. i feel like there's always somebody making a sexual allegation about this or allegation about that to ruin their reputation for the election. so i wanted to make a suggestion. host: do you think that's being applied to mr. biden's case? caller: i don't know if it is or isn't. i agree with everyone else, 27 years ago, my goodness. times were different. people thought differently about that sort of thing. t i am surprised that no one has come up with a penalty for anyone who issues a false allegation against someone. in other words, i could say something about someone that's completely false and everybody jumps all over it. if my allegation is false, why

am i not being penalized for making a false allegation? i don't know. it's really -- this sort of thing is difficult to prove. host: ok, that's kate in ohio. more from mr. biden's interview from this morning. >> you were unequivocal, mr. den, back in 2018 during the kavanaugh hearings. you said for a woman to come forward in the glaring light of the focus nationally, you've got to start off with the presumption that at least the essence of what she is talking about is real, whether or not she forgets the facts, whether or not it's been made worse or better over time. she's going to be going on national television on sunday. tara reade is coming forward in the glaring light. to use your words, should we not start off with the presumption that the essence of what she's talking about is real? she says you sexually assaulted

her. mr. biden: look, from the very beginning, i have said believing women means taking the woman's claims seriously. when she steps forward and then vet it. look into it. that's true in this case as well. women have a right to be heard nd the press to rigorously investigate the claims. in the end, in every case the truth is what matters. in this case, the truth is the claims are false. >> is it possible these claims are held in an n.d.a.? do you have any n.d.a.'s that have been signed by women who were employed by you? mr. biden: there is no n.d.a. -- no one has ever -- i have never asked anybody to sign an n.d.a. there is no n.d.a.'s, period, in my case, none. host: "the washington post" making comparisons between

claims by tara reade and christine ford during the brett kavanaugh nomination. he writes, now mr. biden has to answer a simple question. es that also apply to tara reade? unlike ms. ford, reade has multiple witnesses to back her claim. her next-door neighbor, a very strong democrat who plans to vote for biden, says reade told her about biden's alleged assault in detail in 1995 or 1996. a colleague who worked with reade as a staffer in the california state senate says reade told her at the time she had been is sexually harassed by her former employer in washington. reade's brother confirms she .old him about the incident she said, quote, after working for a prominent senator, the only thing she could have done

is go to the press and she chose not to do it out of respect for him. if there had been any corroboration of ford's charges, kavanaugh would not be sitting on the supreme court today. from california, democrats line, tom, good morning. caller: yes, good morning. host: go ahead. caller: yes. when it comes to sexual assault, people are really emotional and they stop thinking clearly. i have been accused of sexual assault twice by women, both younger and older, put in jail and found that it was absolutely false allegations. the women, they don't know the difference between sexual assault and the law, i guess is what you would have to say. totally false allegations, just like with joe, but you have to deal with it because when a woman screams that she has been

sexually assaulted, everybody's ears perk up like a rabbit or rooster or some darn thing. host: what specifically makes you categorize them as false? caller: both times i was accused, it was false. i went through four years of hell because a woman falsely accused me of sexual assault. totally false accusations. she finally came and said yes, i lied. she finally came out and said yes, i lied. i got out of jail. but i still went through hell because she falsely accused me of sexual assault, which was everybody believed her, nobody believed me. host: do you think mr. biden has to provide more information like these papers that have been discussed this morning from his archive? caller: absolutely not. i agree with the other guy, he said, she said. papers are papers. talk to the woman. let's talk to the man. i like what joe said.

go ahead, speak your peace. let's talk to her. let's see what she's got to say. i got a feeling she's just making another false accusation just like what happened to me. host: about those documents, another topic of discussion from this morning's interview on msnbc. here is a portion. >> your senate documents at the university of delaware were supposed to go public and they were resealed. i know that you are saying any h.r. complaints could be in the national archives but why not reveal your documents that are being held in delaware? i know there's 1,800 boxes but if she believes and she alleges that the complaints may be in there, why not strive for complete transparency? why was the access to those documents sealed up when they were supposed to be revealed? mr. biden: they prpt supposed to be revealed. i gave them to the university.

the university said it will take them time to go through the baches. that wouldn't be before 2020 that that occurred or 2021. i can't remember the year. a record like this can only be one place. it would be -- it would not be in the university of delaware. my archives do not contain personal files. my archives contain documents -- when i say personal, personnel files. they don't contain personnel files. they are public records, my speeches, papers, position papers. if that document exists, it would be stored in the national archives where documents from the office she claims to have filed her complaint with are stored. that's where they are stored. the senate controls those archives. i am asking the senate today to identify whether any such document exists. if it does, make it public. >> right, but there are claims and concerns, she claims a complaint or some sort of record

of this might be at the university of delaware. so for complete transparency, why not push for the release of any documents with tara reade's name on them, whether it's at the university of delaware or the national archives? mr. biden: first of all, let's get this straight. there are no personnel documents. you can't do that. for example, if you worked with me or i worked for you and you had my income tax returns, you had my -- whatever, they're private documents. out in the et put public record. any senator or vice president or president -- look, there is one place that she could file the complaint. that office at the time was all those records from that office are in the archives and they're controlled by the senate. that's where personnel documents

would be if they exist. that's where the complaint would be if it exists. host: all those are from msnbc this morning. that full interview, you can find on their website. we are taking your calls on these allegations made for the next half-hour. 02-748-8000 for democrats. 202-748-8001 for republicans. independents, 202-748-8002. john in new york. john, you will have to turn down your television. go ahead. caller: i believe the woman's allegations should be seriously investigated. i believe by doing that, other people may think twice about casting these types of aspersions knowing they're going to be truly investigated. host: do you believe her?

caller: i believe -- without evidence, i can't pass judgment. i believe something happened. i don't know to what level, what degree. it needs to be investigated. it needs to be transparent. people have to be held responsible. even the time you guys are spending covering these types of issues, it's kind of sad. host: who of the two are you more inclined to believe? caller: her. host: ok. that's john in new york. we will go to our independent line. this is from richard in alabama. richard in alabama, hello? caller: yes, sir. joe biden say that -- the commercials and everything, every lady i've seen

him come up to, kiss on the mouth. come on, you know. if he was all against kavanaugh, he should try to wiggle out of it. i've never seen people kiss ladies on the mouth as much as this man. that's all i wanted to say. host: that's richard in alabama. michael in new york, democrats line. caller: thank you, pedro. i want to thank c-span. you guys do a great job. i want to say, didn't this issue no longer become an issue when donald trump was elected president sm he was accused by how many women of sexual assault. he admitted in a video what he does to women. walks up to them and you know what he said he does. in my opinion this is no longer an issue. these republicans who caup, they're hypocrites. host: the democrats made a big issue of it during the campaign.

now that the former vice president -- why is this not an issue? caller: how can it be? isn't it hypocritical that it's an issue for him but not an issue for donald trump? trump never answered these allegations. a lady who called up earlier said he responds by calling women names. that's how he responds. he disrespects them and calls them names. host: what do you think of the vice president's response to date? what do you think? caller: i think he has done a good job of responding and addressing these allegations. i am not saying these allegations don't need to be addressed. they do. but if they are addressed for the vice president, they should be addressed for the president as well. host: do you believe mr. biden or do you believe miss reade? caller: at this point i believe the vice president. i think miss reade waited a long time to file her allegations. if she filed a complaint with the senate committee on sexual harassment, that should be brought forward. if she didn't, i think that speaks to her veracity.

and another comment i want to make, comparing the vice president's conduct to a candidate for the supreme court is mixing apples and oranges. the reason i say that is obviously a judicial position, someone's integrity and background matter when they make a decision. presidents are elected. we elected a charlatan. host: mr. kavanaugh's case, this was an allegation that came up during his confirmation hearing. it became the focus of his confirmation hearing. why don't those things apply in this case? caller: they applied in that case because there were a couple more that came forward afterwards. clearly his background mattered. it's a different standard. the standard to become president, yes, this should apply as well to a president, but what happened in the last election, clearly that doesn't matter to people. how can people now accuse joe

biden and ignore what donald trump has done? host: that's michael in new york. a republican strategist that we have had on this program sends out a couple of tweets, saying here is my suggestion to joe biden. since you are now apparently talking about tara reade's allegations, set up a process where someone will go through your archives and find anything that relates to her. you hire an independent auditor type person. you give that person a certain amount of time, a day, two months, to review material and report out what they find. it needs to be someone within an unimpeachable character and background as possible. i deally a firm that is not a group. ic party aligned ernie from oregon, republican line. hello. caller: good morning. i would like to say what the

gentleman said -- here they are again trying to blame trump for something that biden may or may not have done. i am not accusing anybody. actually who was -- if you want to believe anybody, look what clinton did? host: he made the point as far as being the standard applied to trump, why it doesn't apply to joe biden. what is wrong with that standard? caller: oh, i am -- clinton set the standard, not trump. why do i hear these people mentioning trump in a case that involves biden? host: the caller made the point previous allegations, 25 women or so making these type of allegations and the scrutiny it got. so in this case, it's towards one, towards the vice president. former vice president, i should say. caller: well, that's why i am glad you are -- i am not blaming

one way or the other. i know standards for 27 years ago, i think it's hard unless there is a police report. host: who do you tend to believe at this point? caller: who do i tend to believe? i am up in the air as far as who to believe. it probably doesn't even matter if it happened 30 years ago unless it went to a police report. i am tired of these people always mentioning trump whenever something happens. host: ok. that's ernie. we will go to brian, independent line, north beach, maryland. caller: good morning. i would like to point out, the hypocrisy of all of this is just beyond major. comparing it to kavanaugh for one thing, he was drug through the mud with very little evidence, very little information. we have a lot more information with this one and it's like everyone is ignoring it. again, everyone is bringing up trump, which someone had

mentioned about comparing apples with oranges. come on. i believe her because he can't keep his hands off of people that are near him. that's obvious by a lot of the photographs out there. he makes these sexual innuendos. i would like to point out the media hip is si about this, including the gentleman i am speaking with now. you had your moment there a little bit ago when someone mentioned whether they believed it was 17 allegations against trump and you made sure you corrected it and said it was 25. host: it was 25 reported by business insider. that's what i was saying. caller: you corrected someone. you are a moderator, not supposed to be interjecting your opinions. host: i didn't interject an opinion. i pointed people to a business insider story that talked about 235 allegations. -- 25 allegations. i wasn't interjecting an opinion. caller: it's probably because you can't hide. host: ok. let's go to john.

john in pennsylvania. democrats line. caller: good morning, pedro. you brought up brett kavanaugh. brett kavanaugh was a different situation. first of all, there were some witnesses that were not called that said they actually saw what he did. there were no witnesses with joe biden. also, the reason why this is happening is because joe biden is leading in the polls and the republicans have to dig up something. i think this whole thing is bogus. i did believe the woman in the brett kavanaugh case. i don't believe this woman at all. host: why is that? what is the difference between the two? caller: there were witnesses that were not called in the brett kavanaugh case that said they saw what he did. there is no witnesses with joe biden. it's his word against her word. i think this is way out of line. this is something that they're bringing out from 1993. it's seems like the timing --

and also i agree with a lot of callers saying they could have done this when he was running for vice president. why are they waiting or why is she waiting right now to bring all of this out? that's ridiculous. host: to mark, south carolina. republican line. caller: i have been listening timently but not heard one on the subject of term limits. if we had term limits, we wouldn't have this problem. host: how do you make that assumption? caller: well, if someone stays in office four years, how many people have created problems in their first four years? i don't know. to get liticians seem more powerful as they stay in office and cross the line.

i think the only reason that bill clinton ever got caught was they physically had evidence. if you don't have physical evidence, then you are always going to be questioned by whoever is going to publish it to the public and that's the media. who owns the media? i think it's the left. they're going to either excite the story or kill it. they're in the process of killing it right now. host: david in new york, democrats line. line. rning. good morning. you are next up. caller: yes, good morning. how are you doing? host: fine, thank you. go ahead. caller: the thing with me is i am not particularly -- i am not concerned who said the truth, whether it's her or joe biden. what interests me is the timing

of everything. y question would be why now? she had time while he was in office. he had time to put it out when there was this thing about donald trump, bringing up joe biden. so for me, find out who is telling the truth, whether biden is telling the truth or whether she's telling the truth about it. my thing is it just came about until biden started going up in the polls and donald trump started going down. that's my issue. that's the only issue i have. host: so you will support joe biden to begin with? were you going to support biden to begin with? caller: yes.

but the thing of it is we have presidents that have done things the past, ok, and i am just curious what has to be investigated as to why now? so look at it, someone will be moves in.ther biden they're both on the record for having something, even with the kavanaugh thing. i don't know who is telling the truth. host: if you say that, are you so inclined to vote for joe biden? you don't know who is telling the truth, are you still inclined to vote for joe biden or not? caller: yes, absolutely. but what i am -- this is politics. people try to look for truth in politics, ok? that's like trying to find a needle in a haystack. host: sarah is next from washington, d.c., independent line. caller: hi. just would like to say

regarding the difficulty coming forward. as someone who has worked with exual assault survivors, the issue with not coming forward immediately is false. it's even more difficult to talk about it. the survivors are talking about a traumatic private experience. it's what they're comfortable with. host: how does that apply as far as things you heard about miss reade and the timing of her story? caller: well, i think that people are trying to discredit her allegations because it took her 27 years in order to publicly come out with her story. i don't think that's diminishing thing -- that because of how long it took her necessarily the right course to take.

christine ford's allegations also took her a long time to address that matter. host: that was sarah in washington, d.c. for his part, the president referenced the allegations made against joe biden. here are those statements from yesterday. >> i don't know anything about it. i don't know exactly. i think he should respond, you know. it could be false accusations. i know all about false accusations. i have been falsely charged numerous times, and there is such a thing. if you look at brett kavanaugh, this is an outstanding man. he was falsely charged. what happened with him was an absolute disgrace to our country. i guess three of the four women have now admitted that, and of the fourth, give me a break. i mean, take a look. 36 years -- this is a fine man.

i saw a man suffering so unfairly. i am talking about brett kavanaugh. but i don't know. i can't speak for biden. i can only say that i think he should respond. host: this is from twitter, people are pointing out what this allegation in 2008 when president obama considered him for v.p. i still don't know. another person, peter from massachusetts, am i mistaken? what really troubled me is how he did not come out and say search my files at the niversity of delaware. i also know that biden will secure trump if trump's campaign tries to pursue this given the cover-up of payments to women just before the 2016 election. from california, republican line. we go to wanda. caller: did you know that when

clinton was president, biden would go skinny-dipping in the white house pool right in front f the female staffers? this is what biden did, go skinny-dipping. we have live on tv handsy biden, that's his nickname. he touches little girls. he smells their hair. he kisses women on lips. host: how does that directly apply to these allegations? caller: it proves what kind of a person biden is. host: how so? you are saying one directly relates to the other? caller: why not? this is his lifestyle. if he does it to all these other people, why wouldn't he do it to this tara woman? host: alexandria, virginia, democrats line. hi. caller: hi, how are you?

host: fine, thank you. caller: yes. archives inhis, the delaware, i think it's all politics. it's trying to uncover stuff from his personal files. if a complaint was filed by this lady, why can't they check the senate records instead of going to his personnel files at the university of delaware? host: david in utah, independent line. caller: yes, good morning. i have been watching this for quite a while, and i noticed a number of months ago when this tara reade first came out that she was pretty much downplayed mainstream media and the me too movement. this wasn't brought out by the

republicans. it was brought out by an independent outfit, podcast. so why not look at it? didn't -- last night toe briefing, that's what's bothering me. --s like it's been host: about the allegations? caller: they need to be haired. i think it needs to be investigated. i am sick and tired, when they did kavanaugh, it was 180 out, everything was brought out by cnn. everything was thrown all over the place. as far as the guy claiming that there were witnesses that were not heard, that's b.s. because dianne feinstein made sure that every witness that was halfway credible was called out and brought into the light.

i am irritated with the whole group of people back there in washington. i used to be a democrat until the utah democrats went so far left that they irritated the crap out of me. my parents were democrats. i used to go to the democrat caucuses but no, i am sick of it. the democrats are just trash as far as i am concerned. host: that's david in utah. he is bringing up the brett kavanaugh investigation. christine blacey ford at the centerpiece of those accusations of now justice kavanaugh. christine fors coming up in the interview with joe biden. >> mr. vice president, as it per -- pertained to dr. ford, everyone wanted -- high level democrats said they believed it happened. you said, if someone like dr. ford were to come out, the essence of what she is saying has to be believed, has to be

real. mr. biden: no, what i said -- >> why is it real for dr. ford and not tar ra reade? -- tara reade? mr. biden: i am not suggesting she had no right to come forward. i am not saying any woman -- she should come forward. they should somebody heard. it should be investigated. it should be investigated. if there's anything that makes -- that is consistent with what is being said and she makes the case or the case is made, it should be believed. but ultimately the truth matters. the truth matters. period. i fought my entire life to change the whole notion of cultural -- culture around sexual assault. i fought for strength of protection for survivors. we have a long way to go until there is a position of a fair and unbiased view, but at the end of the day, it has to be

looked at. these claims are not true. there is no -- they're not true. >> mr. vice president -- host: california, democrats line, emma. you are next up. caller: ok. i am on? host: you are on. caller: good morning. host: good morning. caller: i am upset about this is the same thing with hillary clinton. they brought up emails. that was a diversion. now since they can't go after hunter because they said if you go after hunter biden, we are going to go after your kids. where are your getting money? now they putting up this sexual thing about joe biden. you know, but you still haven't investigated stormy daniels stuff. you know, this man has the

ability to put the spotlight on other people, where -- host: the former vice president himself is addressing these issues as of today. what do you think about that? caller: he ain't nothing but a patsy, like him and everybody -- i used to say this is a soul collector because if he has everybody before had, you know, aptitude and knowledge, got up into the trump administration. they -- their moral aptitude, i don't know what it is. the jim jones -- host: but the vice president himself, joe biden, is addressing these issues. what do you think of the fact he has to address the issues? caller: why now? how come it wasn't before when he was supposed to be vice president?

why now? ost: ok. north carolina, republican line. hi. caller: yes, i am a domestic iolence advocate, and it's terrible to see this has turned into a partisan issue. domestic violence is not republican. it's not democrat. when a party looks at it district ok, joe biden is a democrat, so therefore all these women that e supposed to be standing up for women are attacking her. this lady -- the republican party -- did not go looking for her. she has been living with this for all these years. whether it's true or not, i feel

that the whole thing should be looked at. i am not accusing joe biden, but her response is critical. she knows when it happened. she knows how it happened. she tellsa report and people that -- one of her people is a joe biden supporter that no matter what happened to her, it's going to vote for joe biden but she says this lady is credible. i don't understand why people would defend somebody just because of party lines. host: ok. from north carolina calling about the situation on joe biden. brief detour. this is about michael flynn. "the washington times" this f.b.i. had a story,

closed flynn case. federal prosecutors have said flynn lied about his contacts with the then russian ambassador , late 2016. flynn appeared to agree, admitting to the crime. the documents released thursday show that on january 4, 017, the f.b.i. decided to close the investigation. the decision came nearly three weeks before flynn's ill-fated interview and the memo on the decision, the f.b.i. cites the absence of derogatory information as the reason for ending the probe. this was a topic of discussion with the president of the united states yesterday, asked about it. here is what he had to say about the michael flynn case. president trump: when i looked at what they did to him, they tormented general flynn. general flynn is a fine man, 35 years or so in the military. you don't get to be where he is

by being bad, that i can tell you, and then he right at the beginning of the administration, dirty comes came in. whether you are on our side, that side, i assume let's talk about fairness. what they did to general flynn -- by the way, to roger stone and to others -- was a disaster and disgrace. it should never be allowed to happen in this country again. cnn tormented him. i really hope -- they haven't been doing it. i appreciate your question. i hope to see that ynn will not even apologize, which they should, but cover it fairly, because he is in the process of being exonerated. if you look at those notes from yesterday, that was total exoneration. these were dirty cops at the top of the f.b.i. and you know the names better than i do. they were dishonest people.

now we have to see what is going to happen. general flynn was treated like nobody should, and i am not talking about generals, like nobody in this country should be treated. host: back to the allegations against joe biden. bobby on our independent line in maryland, hi. hello, go ahead. caller: how you doing today? host: fine, thank you. you are on. caller: i want to make the point in the t happened workplace with men all across the country, it's to the point where you can't go to work and tell a woman you look nice today. it's that type of fear. you know, you have c.e.o.'s and people who don't want to be around women because they think they might lose their career. now you have cnn, msnbc, the democrat party and these women's

. oups -- it's hypocrisy they don't -- host: are you inclined to believe tara reade? caller: when i heard the phone call from the show -- i believe it was larry king. it gave her credibility. host: how did the phone call give credibility in your mind? caller: if it's really her mother's voice and that's a recording, proper recording, in the sense that something happened at the time to the point where her mother was activated enough to make the phone call. she's not going to call you for -- like i did. it's a real phone call, the activity that something did go on. the paperwork is there. but what i want to say is when it came to everybody else other than joe biden, they didn't care

about a phone call, didn't care about paperwork. they said the woman mentions something, that man is supposed to go to jail, lose his career. how many men -- off forll finish us this friday the first day of may. the statements made by joe biden on cnbc. i will tell you about our washington journal primetime program, a special edition. on tonight's show, the federal response to the coronavirus pandemic being a topic with the profession -- infectious disease professor at the university of birmingham. you will also hear from the spillover, animal infections and the next human pandemic." another edition of the morning show comes your way at 7:00.

we will see you then. ♪ announcer: live programming today on c-span includes the first news conference from the white house press secretary set for 2:00 p.m. eastern. we will take you there live. later, an update from the louisiana. governor john bel edwards will brief reporters this afternoon scheduled for 3:30 eastern. president trump participates in a ceremony honoring first responders and healthcare workers at the white house at 4:15 on c-span.

♪ washington journal primetime, a special evening addition of the washington journal on the federal response to the coronavirus pandemic. an infectious disease physician and professor at the university of alabama at birmingham's school of medicine joins us to talk about the latest in clinical care for covid-19 patients. " spillover:hor of animal infections in the next pandemic." looking at pathogens that can pass between humans and animals. join the conversation tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. >> sign up today for c-span's newsletter providing new updates daily to the coronavirus pandemic response from state