robert: an economy and a presidency on the edge. >> this is worse than pearl harbor and the world trade center. robert: the soaring jobless rates stokesear about a great recession or depression. a under pressur ahead of the fall campaign, president trump pushes to reopen the country and pushes back on guidance from t c.d.c. are health experts being sidelined? >> ishhink everythinld be based on scice and not vary wh the c.d.c. recommending and who was making this decision? robert: plus, the justice department drops charges again former security advisor michael flynn reviving questions about

power and russia. announcer: this is "washington week." corporate funding is provide-- y >> life suspect a straight line and sometimes you can find yourself heading in a newio direct fidelity is here to help yough work throuhe unexpected with financial planning and advice for today and tomorrow. [laughter]♪ ♪ >> kaiser permanente. additional funding isrovided by the estate of arnold ams, and koo and patriciauen through the yn foundation, committed to bridging cultural differences in our commuti. the corporation for public

broadcasting and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. once again, from washington, moderator robert costa. robert: good evening. i hope you're staying safe. to get up to speed on this portant week, let's jt tur to the latest reporting about what's happening wh therump presidency and in the nation. first, as to lose olorunnipa now sidelined officialsot tisio seen as loyal. they have dismissed jarring states for reopening without meeting white house guidelines and pushed to disban the coronavirus task force. here's what the president had to say on friday. >> what we've done is incredible. we're going into transition. i call it transition to greatness. it's going to be transition to

greatns because we're going to do something very fast, and year next year. ave a phenomenal robert: but as peter baker writes inner the "new york times" for a president is who staked s legacy on an economic record that was sedded by the in crisis m on may be the best way tole salvage his best chances for re-election evenf the death toll estimates have more than doubled. andolls show the public i not ready to restore normal life. so the question in my notebook is this, what's nex what does it all mean? and what will congress do? we turn tone of the best reporters on capitol hill, susan davis, congressial correspondent for national public radio, to the author of a revealing new buy yolfi, molly ball, national political correspondent for "time"ma zine and author of "pelosi" on the speaker of the housms to peter baker chief white house

correspondent ofhenew york times." and toluse olorunnipa white house reporter for "the washington post." you've reported all week on the president clashing with health ex-perpts, with scientist - experts with scientists, what does it look like behind the scene? >> in response to the coronavirus we are seeing this major shift. the prident was transparent in we wants to transition away from focusing on the public healthcr is which continues to ravage the country with tens of thousands of deaths and he wants to shift towards talking about the economic come bank. he has six months between now and his he realizes that's a short amount of time to try to restore the economi situation that was in place before this situation. now we'ret close to 15% unemployment. the president wants trdshift to completely focusing on the economic turnback. he wants to turn this into a story of an economic comeback

that's why he's sidelines a lot of these health officials. he's saying that top public health officials are not being allowed to testify before congress. is administratio downplays all kinds of scientific data and models which shows how bad of a ion this is. and they're trying to shorten these negatives get out. he has six months to prove to the country that we're in the o midd an economic comeback. robert: they're not the only players in the white house ande president. sue davis, when you talk to lawmakers they're bringing dr. fauci before the senate, dr. rick bright, he's goio to g before the house. what do they want to learnweext when those two figures come to the hill? susan: well, i think both hearings illuminate why so many lawmakers are eager toet back ashington. the house is looking to return

as early as next week. fauci will face a much more partisan r lawmakers have an interest from hearing him directly. there's a lot of queions about testing capabilities. why testing isn't where many of them thought i would be in the previous pacats kath the tm hey autmely fromtim about w the f e possible vaccines and treatments. natgiy' tiooihe face. uch the tone on capitol hill is shifting to familiar battle lines here. he's accusing the white house from removing him from his job about using an eabt malaria drug because he said he didn't have a backing. some lawyers say he should be put back into his job until they figure out what'sle involved. and democrats will point out what they s has been

mismanagement across the board. otat's where a of the conversation will be going forward. less about the pandemic and how it happened but how is the trumped -- trumptr adminion is managing the economy going forward. robert: you've been stuttying, talking to thepeaker. you think about we only have six election. ween now and the there's already been an impeachment process. does she issue a subpoena to dr. fauci to come to the house? what does she do to contain this president? >> she did say she hope not to have to subpoena dr. fauci. i think at this point her eyes are -- as far as containing trump trying to stop trump as so many on the left would like her to do, probably more aggressively than she has. i think she's -- she's set her sithes in novber. she' trying to signal to her party that if they want to constrain the president they should focus on the election. what she's trying to focus on

now is dealing with the crisis, getting legislation through the congress doing oversight but as ssoup s focusing it on the ongoing management of the crisis. there have been a lot f calls from the left to also do investigations and oversight of wh led to this point. but that is not the focus, i think even for the speaker and the congressional democrats. they want to foc on what they can still do particularly since so many believe that the white house has not been up to the task that congress is trying to fill that void. they're trying to figureut at they can do to try to help the americans who are out of work, to try to address the public health crisis, to try to shore up thelt public h system, to try to help the states that have been given so much responsibility and try to ease so many coordination blockages that have been occurs. at the same time lot of law make verse been confused because they've not been on the job in b washingtonause they've been all over the place, there's not

a lot of -- not everybodye son ame page and i think there's a lot of confusion about how and where they're going to proceed. robert: that point about nfusion, peter, it reminds me of the story you just filed for thenew york times"onight about the coronavirus now being part of the white house story. a staffer for vice president pence, a persol valet for president trump. is having the virus now up close and personal in their life affecting their thinking their decision-making at any level? peter: well, not so far as we ca tell atpo thit. but the timing is remarkable. in the time that the president is telling states that it's ok to start reopening, not only ok but they should start to do that, he sees the virusli rally surrounding him now in the white house. just two cases so far. hopefully that'sl all there w ever be. but to have it be a personal valet who helps the president in the residence and have a top aid of the vice president who has

been one of the chief skes people for the white house efforts to curve this virus, both turn time-out be infected, i think is potal moment because it suggests, if the white house, the most prestigious and resource intense workplace in if the white house which has d access to tests not only testsr weekly monthly that other but daily cannot in fact prevent to be part of this workforce, what will these oer businesses do? that's a bloment president could give some guidance to the country about how h thinks they should proceed given how he's proceeding. hestead, he tried to brush it off. aid ne things about katy miller, of course, who has been a loyal aide t ao him is married to steven miller another louisville this is the problem for testing.

therefore testing is of limited utility. that leaves the country wondering then what are we supposed to do? the harvard health global initiative said we need to be doing 900,000 tests day. and right now we're doing 250,000. and that's a real problem fort f businesses as they think about what to do going forward. robert: and i hear it from governors i've interviewed, sting, testing, testing to that point. as we saw friday, the economic pressures on the white house ani every amecan are just enpamous. the ment of labor released a jobs report that shows more than 20 millionmerican jobs were lost in april as the unemployment rate jumped to 14.7%. the worst number we've seen like that since the great depression. and the lincoln project, a group of anti-trump republicans released an ad this week blaming the economic carnage on the

president. >> there'sourning in america, and under the leadershipf o donald trump, our country is weaker and sicker and poorer. and now, americans are asking, if we have another four years like this, will there even be an america? robert: we see this pressureprn ident trump on many republican governors but you sote t week that many republican governors despite all thege testing chall are moving to reopen because what they're seing in their own economy. wh'shat dynamic like out in the states in places like arizona? >>re yeah, thedent realizes that he is vulnerable to these kinds of attacks and that's why he's pushing these governors to go ahead andpen up these economies even though they haven't by a large porti they vice president met the guidelines set out for the white house for what they should do -- what they should see before they begin opening up. the president was plaing to campaign on the economy, 3.5%

unemployment before ts virus hit. now we' at a level j0 millions lost in the month of april that we haven't seenince the great depression. the president realizes that he's going to be the victim -- or the target of relentless attacks fon his han of this virus especially the fact that so many millions a of thericans have lost their jobs. others are struggling to get by. that's trn he's pushing these governors, som of whom seeing their own numbers in their own states to quickly open the economy, potentially put people at risk relaxing some of these social distancing meascaures e if they don't do that people are going to continue losing their jobs and that's going to have very heavy political pce for everyone who is up for re-election in november especially the president. robert: molly, i was reading your book "pelosi." you have a line in the book that says her favorite word is letrage. is t correct?

>> absolutely. it's the focus of all of her efforts. robert: to take that point, now congress has to do on what they're going to doounding the states. are -- funding the states? are they goi to have a liability protection deal? as this veteran politicia approach this cross roads, what's on her mind? >> i think she has leverage in this situation. she feels that under heavy cricism from both sides, the rightng for negotia too harned the right for not negotiating enough, she feels that she has leveraged up to this point. but that was part the reaso bha tlltt t that theast big demand for state and local fuing was dropped in those negotiations because the democrats have calculated that the political pressure from the states will be too overwhelming for the republicans to ignor especially as other types of

funding run out, business mpfunding, uyment funding that the republicans are going to have to come to the table and get something else across even as mitch s mcconnell hasaid that the liability funding is a redo line him -- not funding, the others have tried to sort of downplayed the notion of bailing out the states, i think we're going to hea increasingly from states red and blue that they need tnds money you know, because they've been explicitly put on the front linesf this effort by the president who said that the states ought to be taki the lead and has deferred to the states even if you take that o face as a sort of federalist argument that the states are best positions to be ose es to the penald lead the charge, the states are saying you can't give u allsihis resplity and not equip us to follow through with it. we're going broke. our revue has cratered. a lot of states do want to try to signal to peep that there's a light attend of the tunnel.

they want to be able ho hav a way to do this t gr sadually andw safely and ma people feel protected and taken care of. it's hard to do that, you know, thout leadership in washington, without crdination from washington and especially without fmding f washington. robert: sue, can you jump in on that? because you're talking to sources, republican and democrat . ar you hearing details about a deal in the works that is going to provide more direct payments to americans, that is going to provide the kind of payments that states need to shore up their budgets? >> well, wt'ow ill t rheyea pars taking two very different tactics to the next phase. seeblicans are saying let's where this goes before we commit to anything. there's a sense that they want to put brakes on the spending certainly by senate majority leader mitch mcconnell. that there's a sense that they don't want to do anything in they want to get to the summertime to see how much

assistance will be needed. democrats are talking aboutg passt as soon as next week a minimum of a trillion dollars with that state and local funding, with additional direct assistanh more money for food stamps and other federal programs. when you talk abouthe word leverage, think it's important to think about the reasons why democrats mayave m rorepeubcane strategist that told me they did internal polling ones the c act, that first big wave of support that had thingsikesm the l business loans and they told me it was the most popular piecef legislation they have polled congress passing. right now the public is very supportive of not only congressional action but b government spending that's going to directly improve their lives. reality that a republicans will have to confront if we're still talking about high unemployment. robert: we're going to be o tracking a your reporting and to roos and

pete's. the pandemic is happening. president trump's response, but it's all coming as the attorney general bill barr is flexing his own power this week the department of justice dropped the crimil casegainst former national security advisor michael flynn, retired army lieutenanteneral who pled guilty for liing to the f.b.i. the gamplet decided to reexamine the case and as i wrote with my colleagues, the decion was greeted as a triumph by the president and his allies who have argued forears that flynn was set up be was dire alarm by trump's opponent who saw the move as an attack by the rule of law. asked by cbsow about historians would view this decision barr sd this. >> well, histories is written by the winners. d itends on who's writing the history. robert: peter, is isn't over, one judge still has to sign off he peter: that's exactly right.

judge sullivan has beensk tical of michael flynn's defense in the past. actre led oote hisefen deaeparsetmdenm t didha in dropping the case was they said -- they didn't say that what he said he shouldn't have been asked the question in the first place because there was no viable investigation going on at that time that would have required that interview. anwe that the a that he gave untrue as it might have been was not material or especially rellvapt to such an -- relevant to such an investigation. the judge would possibly look at this with a scans ands maybe h not so interested in dropping the charges. it would be pretty unusual f a ioout to insist that th forward this even though the defendant has pleaded guilty not once but twice. we'll see what he does. but it's important to remembes what ts and what this isn't.

it's not a statement by the justice d tartmentt michael flynn didn't lie. what it's a statement about is that thest previous e department and f.b.i. shouldn't have prosecuted them. they abused their authority that they seemed out to get him rather than to find out the truth. robert: is the administration going to bringim back -- going to bring back general flynn or put him on the campaign tra? what are you hearing? >> i would be surprised if we see him back at the white house. but this is already a very unusual situation in which somebody who pleaded guilty is saying that he was wrong to plead glty and he's essentially being let off the asok. president trumpaid a lot of positive things about michael flynn.g they're try use this to distract with some of the broarhallenges they face. the white house pressecretary talked about mr. flynn for 20 minutes. they want to spend a lot of time alking about this. they think this is a police cal win for them.

they've seen bill barr deliver a number of wins for him by interveninin cases by certainly try to re-do the mueller investigation and discredit its origins. and this is the latest it ration in which the preside can can say, the mueller investigation wait part of this hunt, part of the this deep state coup against myio administr even though there's a lot of evidence investigation was real ler investigation. it did lead to a number of guilty employees by a number of people that are in president trump's orbit and there was a willingness to accept information that was coming from the russians that was negative about hillary clinton to promote some of that information such as the information we saw in wikileaks. the mueller probe made that there was a lot of contacts between peoplet t are trying to push this information during the 2016 election. and this e latestsode shows

that the attorney general was trying to discredit all of that. robert: so molly, if tpr ident is going to go relitigate the russia probe, what is the speaker going to do? is she going to engage? are house democrats going to be >> i doubt it.their own rsia i think, you know, the campaign strategy for the house democrats for 2020 and democrats mostly in general is the same as in 2018 which is to ignore trump, that the backlash to trump whatever -- to whateve exten it exists is baked in. part of the reason that we've seen the president's approval ratings be so stubborn and stable is that seoo manye have made up their mind about them and nothing can change their opiecause they already didn't like him or they had already been completely bought in. th feelings they had is to talk about healthcare, the hding of

the coronavirus crisis and try to make an issue na the democrats are interested in governing. the president said, everything they do is because they're hates. and thahe case that he's going to make. that's the fly development plays into this entire narrative that the trump campaign and that sort of mauga moodea world have created, this sort of alternate uni where he, general flynn has been a vicm of this terrible witch hunt. and to the extent that they can continue to make that reality seem real, they can shutout everything else. and so the democrats have tried shhahe focused on issues instead of being drawn into that whole debate, which gets very messy, very fast. robert: sue, quickly, i've been ur reaygrumblings about chris doiningg enough to overhaul the

f.b.i. what are you hearing about the director? >> there's a lot of republican frustrhrion abouttopher way in part because they don't feel like he's been transparent or proactive inti r what many republicans see has been ha siliticized justice department against the pnt and also to the public concerns that were earthed in reports suggesting abuses in the surveillance hcourts. th hasn't done enough that he's taking their concerns seriously. it's importanto remember, he was confirmed with 92 votes i theenate. and the thing that republicans don't want right now is a contentious confirmation hearing for a.i new f director. a lot of that discontent while they're comfortable talking ati publicly, realistly they're settled in to have him stay in that job. be as always it's entirely up to the preside of whatappens there. robert: what are yo hearing on the s e?wray? >> i think the president is disenchanted with wwray.

while i don't think he's going to fire him there's some bad blood. with this president anything can cppen. robert: anythin happen. we're going to have leave it there as always. as always, anythinhe can nap trump administration. thank you very much for being here to our rorters, molly ball, peter baker, to lose orunnipa and susan davis. thank you all for jonathan:ing us. we will keep taking you as close to the news as we can when anything can happen. on the extra, we will head to the "washington welf" book s and discuss molly's book "pelosi." find it on social media. and to all the moms out there including my own. happy mother's day. i'mro robert costa washington. g aptioning performed by the national captionstitute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy.visit ncicap.org] ♪ announcer: corporate funding for

"washington week" is provided by -- >> life isn't a straight line and sometimes you can find yourself headingn a new direction. fidelity is here to help you work through the unexpecd with financial planning and advice for today and tomorrow. announcer: kaiser permanente. additional funding is provided theer state of arnold adams and by the koo and patricia yuen tion, the corporation for public broadcasting and by contributis to your pbs ation from viewers like you. thank you. ♪

♪ ♪ ♪ woman: ♪ so you came and changed my life ♪ choir: ♪ changed my life woman: ♪ you thought i was worth keeping ♪ choir: ♪ keepi woman: ♪ so you came and cleaned me up inside ♪ choir: ♪ so you cleaned me up inside ♪ woman: ♪ ah ♪ you thought i was to die for ♪ yeah, yeah