in line waiting to vote, that that not be happening in the united states. thank you very much. reading axios a.m. in a little bit. sign up for the newsletter. that does it for us on this thursday morning. i'm yasmin vossoughian alongside ayman mohyeldin, "morning joe" starts right now. in 2003 in december wesley clark was winning polls. >> come on. be fair. okay? i've been consistent in leading in the polls after taking all the hits. ego down, and everybody that's hit me is out. you all declare me -- not you, editorially and abroad declare me dead and guess what? i ain't dead. >> nope. he was definitely right about that. >> that's what you call political prophecy by joe biden on december 16th, 2019 and he proved that this past week. >> yeah. when it came to his political prot pe prospects nearly three months ago when joe biden told the

"morning times that. i ain't dead. along with myself and joe and willie we have steve rattner, professor at princeton university eddie glaude jr. and from the super tuesday earthquake that rocked the race for the democratic nomination are still being felt this morning. joe biden added a tenth state to his list of super victories after nbc news declared him the apparent winner of maine. >> wow. >> the only race we haven't been able to call is california. nbc deems that race still too early to call. sanders holds a nine-point lead right now. of the states massive 415 delegates, sanders has been awarded 161 so far. biden 100. the former vice president still leads the overall delegate count, a difference of 52. meanwhile, mike bloomberg's

decision yesterday to end his campaign means biden now has the room to charge ahead in the moderate lane all by himself. as the race now moves to next tuesday's contests in idaho, michigan, mississippi, missouri, north dakota and washington state. here's some of what both biden and bloomberg had to say yesterday. >> today i am clear-eyed about our overriding objective, and that is, victory in november. [ cheers ] not -- not victory for me or our campaign, but victory for our country. [ cheers and applause ] if you remember, i entered the race for president to defeat donald trump, and today i am leaving the race for the same reason, to defeat donald trump, because staying in would make it more difficult to achieve that goal. >> i've always believed that

defeating donald trump starts with uniting behind the candidate with the best shot to do it, and after yesterday's vote it is clear that candidate is my friend and a great american joe biden. [ cheers and applause ] >> this is what we have to do to win. this is what we have to do to unify the nation. that's why i entered the race in the first place. to unify this country. so we welcome all those who want to join us. all those who want to join us, and to build a movement. and this is a movement we are building. it is a movement and we need that movement to beat donald trump and to build a future we all know is possible. >> willie, we'll get to michael bloomberg in a minute shand his campaign and his concession speech and his endorsement of joe biden, but first let's talk about joe biden. in the immortal words of monty python, he was not dead. in fact, it was merely a flesh

wound. the turnaround, still, if you look at it, you see where he was saturday afternoon. how despondent until biden's campaign were, believing that, you know, he was near the end. to turn around over 27 hours has been one of the most remarkable turnarounds in american political history, and it continues. >> yeah. i mean, we added another state overnot with maine making 10 of the 14 states on super tuesday in the column for joe biden. just 48 hours on tuesday morning as we sat here, no one and i mean no one could, have predicted that, including, by the way, people inside joe biden's campaign, but eddie, as we've been talking about this week, african-american voters started a wave, and it started in the state of south carolina and it moved through the south and it went into texas and other places. white suburban voters as well. older voters. he's got a calendar now on tuesday, a place like mississippi that's going to look in terms of voting base a lot

like those southern states pap state like michigan, where jb woe biden wins that state, t mayal all she wrote there. >> exactly. i asked the question moving into super tuesday whether or not joe biden would lose among the african-american vote in way that reflected south carolina or nevada. he lost the african-american vote like he lost it in south carolina across the south, and the interesting thing i would, that i came to understand watching the results, because i was shocked is that, first, we have a lot of african-americans who simply agree with joe biden. right? a lot of african-american whose see that getting trump out of office is the most important thing. right? we also see that bernie sanders has to calibrate his read rihet with regards to race. he's not very good at a race agenda. we have to see what happens moving forward. >> so much to talk about, eddie.

it's something that reverend al and i have been discussing for a year now about how black voters, i think like hispanic voters often are stereotyped and generalized, and put into one group by white liberal politicians and white conservative politicians, but reverend al said his mentor told him black voters are conservative in every area except on race. look what happened over the past month, month 1and a half and it will be black voters seen as the moderating force on the democratic party's most extreme influences and once again, once again, the most pragmatic voters

who look at the field and say, okay. who gives me the best chance to win? famously as we've said in 2007, barack obama was running, michelle obama was talking to mika, they need to vote for us. wait, wait. show us you can win first. >> right. >> show us you can win first. and once again, black voters have been the pragmatic force in the democratic party, asking that question, who's going to win? >> you know, joe, i find it -- i was stunned. it's ironic to me that black voters will be the firewall to protect the moderate conservative wing of the democratic party. three things that really come to mind to me. one, as i said earlier, black voters are more moderate and conservative than most people think. two, i think we still have to kind of keep track of barack obama's effect, maybe distorting effect on the black electorate, and, three, kind of think about this question of safety. this buying time as james baldwin would say that it's a

cold, calculated risk when we vote to buy ourselves some time. there's a sense in which a lot of black folk, there are some who support joe biden but a lot of black folk who don't trust white america to vote for a progressive. so in some ways the idea of getting trump out of office requires a kind of safe bet that this person will be, this person will beat trump, but then there's this thing. back to the first part quickly. as african-american voters, some african-american voters, i should say, consolidate around joe biden we need to ask ourselves the question. will this be the democratic party that doubled down on triang goo xwla triangulation? as we bank away from the primary and go into the general, will they take advantage of, you know, african-american -- take for granted african-american voters and move in a different direction and not pay attention? because it's precisely that triangulation that led to dick morris talking the way he talked with clinton, led to the crime

bill and legislation being passed. we need to ask hard policy questions talking about the black center being heart of the democratic party. we know what that has meant since the clinton revolution in some ways. >> the black vote is the center and the heart of democratic party. something we've been saying for months here when a lot of white people have been running around in iowa and new hampshire talking about who the future of the democratic party was. nobody can say who the future of the democratic party is until black voters say who the future of the democratic party is, and i don't know that black voters going in on super tuesday, asking themselves about dick morris and triangulation or the crime bill and stop and frisk. i think they were asking the same question that a lot of other democrats are asking. wait a second. okay. who has a better chance of beating donald trump? the guy who's still running around defending fidel castro's programs? in cuba. his literacy programs in cuba.

still defending the sandinistans, still defending the soviets talking about their glitters subways? because you see, here's the thing about blacks in the south. they live in the south. they know the history of the south. they know that republicans dominate the south, and they know that unlike liberals on the upper east side of manhattan or in cambridge, massachusetts, they can't take chances on esoteric theories. it's hardball politics, and they got to get the guy, or the woman, who can stop donald trump dead in their tracks. i think that's the calculation. i think it's a calculation jim clyburn made, and i think it's a calculation that black voters will continue to make throughout this process. but the, their voices, mika, on

tuesday night and in south carolina were remarkable and i got to say, jim clyburn still just such a remarkable powerful voice in the democratic party. >> certainly they made themselves clear, but here's how senator bernie sanders framed joe biden's surge. >> joe biden is somebody i have known for many years. i like joe. i think he's a very decent human being. joe and i have a very different voting record. joe and i have a very different vision for the future of this country, and joe and i are running very different campaigns. and my hope is that in the coming months we will be able to debate and discuss the very significant differences that we have. joe is running a campaign which is obviously heavily supported by the corporate establishment.

>> is this the establishment trying to defeat bernie sanders, mr. vice president? >> the establishment are all those hard working middle-class people, those african-americans, those people living in the cities. >> yes, sir! [ cheers ] >> sanders later responded to biden's comments tweeting, no, joe. the establishment are the 60 billionaires funding your campaign, and the corporate funded super pacs that are spending millions on negative ads attacking me. house majority whip james clyburn as questioned sanders description's biden supporters in south carolina as the establishment telling the "daily beast" i find if very interesting someone is referring to african-american in south carolina as the establishment. i don't understand how that vote can be dismissed. >> you really have to say that a guy that owns three houses, that's a millionaire, that's attacking a black voter in

orangeburg, south carolina as the establishment, as the elites may be missing the bigger plot. i want to talk, willie, about mike bloomberg and i want to read something that's in the in the in the. charlie wertzal wrote it. and, of course, everybody was mocking mike bloomberg yesterday, like i thought they might, even though not sure why you mock a man for spending a ton of money with one goal in mind. to stop donald trump. but, charlie, in the "times" says only the number of states won obscures the marvel of a bloomberg experiment in which name recognition and unlimited war chest polling less than 3% on the day announced to 16% by the end of february. it aloud a less than charismatic campaigner and stop and frisk and non-disclosure agreement baggage too skipped the first four nominating states to still

manage to crack 10% of the vote and nearly all of the super tuesday contests. if there's a lesson to draw from this it seems to be that "atlantic's" remark, how close it came to working. and you can take out a few things. i think, willie, if michael bloomberg had listened to mika's advi advice, and that is start with a lot of media interviews where he was really strong, in media interviews. prepare yourself more for those debates, or if when you got into those debates you didn't have one candidate, elizabeth warren, who so focus seem to take you out of the race. our explanation was very few people could survive that on the national stage. especially somebody who had just gotten into the president's race. this is right. this may have actually worked. >> yeah. i understand all the jokes about him spending half a billion

dollar to win a few delegates in american samoa. all true. the claims this was a vanity project fall flat when the guy made a gambit for super tuesday, it didn't work out and just got out the next day. the vanity project, him staying in and trying to do something at the convention. seems to me, steve rattner, say again that you manage mike bloomberg's blmoney. he's a good friend of yours. it didn't work out. as he pledged yesterday he's going to take all that money in defeating donald trump and supporting joe biden. isn't that what he said from the beginning? and did he have to be convinced to get out of the race or know it was time to go? >> i agree with you. did exactly what he said he would do. devoted all of his resources, put together and extraordinary campaign together in absolutely

no time. i did spend time with those folks and he did a remarkable job. the debates weren't so good but as you and joe and charlie wertz's said, he did elevate himself in way, compare it to for example tom steyer, my friend tom steyer, disclose that as well, who spent $254 million and never got a single delegate. mike did make an impact on this race and i think mike's support and what will move over to the biden campaign will also be meaningful in all of this. so, no. look, mike saw clearly, as, he's a data-driven guy. the motto at bloomberg, in god we trust all others bring datda. he was clear-eyed about it and about his decision to support biden. can i say one thing on sanders attacks on biden. i think before you start talking about the corporate billion theirs and all the rest of the stuff supporting biden, at least two, three things to remember. one, biden had the money.

the idea he was supported by corporate billionaires when he beat sanders was sort of hard to imagine. two, no individual can give more than $2,800. i don't think joe biden or bernie sanders can be bought for $2,800. ludicrous to say, and thirdly the point made, of course, the people who elected him in south carolina were hardly the corporate establishment as we talk and earlier. >> eddie, shaking your head as re listened. the case for bernie sanders, argument that we are representing working people, which he is. his platform and the other candidates are tools effectively of the corporate establishment. that argument loses a little steam, seems to me, after super tuesday. after the kind of voters who elected joe biden in all of those states. >> right. it requires a little nuance. hard to have nuance in our political conversation and particularly in the heat of a political battle, but he needs to make a distinction between those who vote, right? and then the political elites and the establishment he's trying to refer to.

i mean, it makes sense to me to say that james clyburn is part of the political establishment. it makes sense to me to talk about the way in which klobuchar and buttigieg and others and how bloomberg have consolidated behind joe biden to begin to talk about them in a particular sort of way, but you can't conflate that with voters. the democratic process is messy. people will make choices at the polls. if you are a democrat, small d, you want to get as much legitimacy to folk making decisions on the voting day as you can, and you know what? on super tuesday, bernie sanders got his behind handed to him. he needs to go back and think, why? kind of as what happened? and to kind of describe it all as just corporate establishment and blah, blah, blah, is too flatfooted. be more nuance and get the message right if you're really wanting to change the lives of

everyday ordinary americans. >> and eddie, also, makes him look ridiculous. three months we talked money, w couldn't spend money in super $100,000 in virginia. i mean, how many millions did bernie spend there? i mean, biden won without any money. he won with hardly any political organization. he won on momentum, reputation and name recognition. so, willie, eddie's right. when bernie's going around spouting these talking points about, he's, but the corporate billionaires -- won the race for him! no, no. >> oh. >> it was black voters in, in orangeburg, south carolina, in

petersburg, virginia. in demopolis, alabama. all -- you know, in nashville, tennessee. these are states where joe biden didn't spend any money. these are states where people made the decision on their own for bernie sanders, he's being a one-trick pony here talking about joe biden bought and known by corporate -- it just -- it doesn't work on biden. because he was dead broke on super tuesday, and bernie had millions and millions and millions of dollars in the bank which is fine. he spent it. that's great. but money didn't decide super tuesday. something much bigger decided super tuesday. and that's something much bigger was the question of, who do you trust? >> yeah. >> who do you trust to beat donald trump? and who do you trust to return normalcy to the united states of

america's federal government? who -- and you know, those exit poll questions about, do you want to have obama-like policies? do you want to go even further left? i mean, those exit polls, it wasn't close. they want the return to the normalcy that they saw with barack obama and joe biden in the white house. >> yeah. you can add a couple of other states where joe biden didn't play. less influential were the african-american voters but more white suburban votes that's minnesota and massachusetts. the state next door to bernie sanders home state of vermont. joe biden won those states as well and bernie sanders at that press briefing yesterday, we just heard, railing against the establishment, also talked about low turnout. he didn't turn out voters the way he thought he would. young people didn't come out to vote for him, and he obviously did not expand his base of support. he said that out loud. not just political analysis. he knows that, and he knows if he's going to do better coming

up he has to change that. it's unclear how exactly he all of a sudden will be able to court african-american voters, for example, in a way he did not on tuesday. >> yeah. but, you know, he didn't turn out voters, mika. you know who did? joe biden. here's a lead from the "new york times." they were disaffected republicans in affluent washington suburbs. they were shipyard employees in norfolk and they were health care workers in petersburg. they all came together on super tuesday in an extraordinary surge to the polls in virginia to lift joe biden to victory. >> we want to get an update now on the coronavirus. we've got now 11 u.s. fatalities linked to the coronavirus as officials in washington state yesterday said a tenth person died there. while california announced its first death related to the infection, officials said the deceased person's likely exposure occurred while

traveling on a princess cruise ship last month that sailed from san francisco to mexico. and according to the department of homeland security, and an internal email obtained by nbc news, a medical professional who conducted passenger screenings at los angeles international airport has tested positive for the coronavirus. the person's last shift at l.a.x. was february 21st more than a week before the appearance of symptoms. california governor gavin newsom declared a state of emergency over the outbreak. in new york, 11 people including 9 members of two westchester county families have tested positive. according to the "wall street journal," andrew cuomo, governor said all but one are tide today with a connection being a 52-year-old lawyer from new rochelle, the second person in the state to contract the virus. as a result about 1,000 people

who attend the man's synagogue are being asked to self-quarantine as a precaution, and as of last night nbc news confirmed more than 150 cases of coronavirus in the u.s. around 50 of the cases are individuals evacuated from either wuhan, china, or the diamond princess cruise ship. according to the world health organization over 95,000 cases have been reported globally with more than 3,2 opinion deaths in 79 countries. we'll have much more ahead on the virus, and the administration's response. >> we have thousands or hundreds of thousands of people that get better who just by, you know, sitting around and even going to work some of them go to work, but they get better. >> president trump giving credit to people who self-heal from coronavirus. >> and go back to work. which is exactly what medical professionals are telling you

not to do. >> yeah. we're going to go live to the white house to see -- >> go back to work. >> yeah. >> that's what the president is saying? self-heal and go back to work? >> let's listen to the professionals. we'll check out if that is really the official line from the government's health officials. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. we'll be right back. to be honest a little dust it never bothered me. until i found out what it actually was. dust mite droppings! eeeeeww! dead skin cells! gross! so now, i grab my swiffer sweeper and heavy-duty dusters. duster extends to three feet to get all that gross stuff gotcha! and for that nasty dust on my floors, my sweeper's on it. the textured cloths grab and hold dirt and hair no matter where dust bunnies hide. no more heebie jeebies. phew.

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♪ we had a report today the global death rate at 3.4% and a report that the olympics could be delayed. your reaction to that? >> well, i think 3.4% is really a false number. now, this is just my hunch, but based on a lot of conversations with a lot of people that do this, because a lot of people will have this and it's very mild. they'll get better very rapidly. they don't even see a doctor, they don't even call a doctor. so if, you know, we have thousands or hundreds of thousands of people that get

better, just by, you know, sitting around and even going to work. some of them go to work, but they get better, and then when you do have a death, like you had in the state of washington, like you had one in california. i believe you had one in new york, all of a sudden it seems like 3% or 4% seems like a very high number as opposed to a prakz fraction of 1%. >> oh, my god. a false number. what president trump called the world health organization's latest global death rate of the coronavirus talking about a hunch what he has going on. >> instead of the scientific numbers, he has a hunch. >> whew. >> willie, even more sterning than that is the fact that the president of the united states is telling people that they're going to get better by sitting around and "going back to work" with the coronavirus. this is exactly what is causing

right now consternation up in new hampshire where a dartmouth hospital employee was told to self-quarantine and instead went out that night to a school event, and now, who knows how far it spread. you look at the new york case to see that one man has infected his entire family, infected the man who drove him to the hospital, who then affected his family. this spreads quickly and easily. so for donald trump to be saying, you know, you can just sit around and get better and, hey, you can even go back to work is about as reckless and irresponsible. you can imagine, let's hope the white house clarifies that later on today. >> it's totally reckless. it's not a time for donald trump's hunches. it's a time for science. it's a time for doctors. it's not a time for donald trump to be calling into cable shows and riffing on things he doesn't know anything about. it's not a time for him to tell people to go back to work when every scientist and every doctor has said just the opposite.

it's a time for the cdc, it's a time for the world health organization toexplaining to thy what this is, how this pandemic is taking hold and what americans should do about it and went so far yesterday, joe, as to blame the obama administration, very vaguely. he said, we had to undo a decision they did. why our response has been so slow. no one seemed to know exactly what he was talking about. there was no decision to be undone. joining us now from the white house, nbc news white house correspondent geoff bennett. geoff, good morning. let's talk about the president calling into hannity last night and the riffing on a global pandemic that dr. fauci has said will become a pandemic at some point. is there any strategy? is there anyone in the white house who can say to donald trump, it's sort of become a moot question over the years, but anyone who can say, this is too important for you to be riffing off the top of your head? >> if someone is telling the president that it's clear he's not listening.

remember last week we reported the vice president's office was going to use a heavier hand in controlling all of the coronavirus messaging coming out of this white house. well, then, as it is now it appears president trump himself is the main one spreading disinformation. completely contradicting the information and the data put out by public health experts. the president disputing the 3.4% data-driven assessment of the overall coronavirus death rate saying it's a false number, no evidence to back it up only saying it's a hunch and completely discarding, you rightly point out, advice from public health experts to people saying, if you feel sick, stay at home. president trump saying people have gone to work and somehow have gotten better and also said there's been a death reported in new york. there had been no deaths reported in new york from coronavirus. there has been that case that joe mentioned. so clearly the president is trying to put a rosy sheen on things, trying to reassure the

public that the administration has it under control, but he's doing it in a way where he's spreading disinformation. that said, though, public health experts do say the administration is doing a couple of things right, in part naming debbie burks. obama appointee, state department ambassador at large brings 30-plus years at real-life experience. someone who is serious, sober-minded, a real professional now coordinating the day-to-day coronavirus response. i've talked to people who say they hope she's fully empowered to do the job. mike pence going to the 3m headquarters today. this government contracted with 3m to make more of those masks and then head to washington state grappling with the coronavirus outbreak there, too. >> thank you, geoff bennett at the white house. mika, point is there are really good people working on this. they've put good, smart, experienced people in place.

when the president calls into a news show, swamps all the date and science that is there. >> absolutely. still ahead we're going to speak -- >> if we can say this also, mika. it's also important, we actually have -- i won't aa rosay a road how to better contain this virus, but there are countries that have dealt with this. >> right. >> china dealt with it in a heavy-handed way, but apparently, if the numbers can be trusted, the number of infections are going down. you see what's happened in singapore. you see what's happened in japan. you see what's happening in italy. there is an aggressiveness where people are being isolated, where schools are being closed down, where things are, you know, the governments are taking fairly aggressive actions, and it is stopping an epidemic. >> helping. >> from becoming a pandemic. at least at this point. we don't know what's going to

happen in the future, but we can learn by what's already been going on in china. the mistake that they made. one of the mistakes they made was a lack of transparency. they weren't straightforward. they kept trying to downplay the epidemic, and because of it they're facing a crisis that could explode into a pandemic that could ravage their country. look at iran. iran's having a terrible time. once again, the iranian government simply cannot tell the truth to the public in iran. they are incapable of truth-telling, and because of it, you see the epidemic causing a, ravaging their leadership ranks in iran. the united states of america should be able to learn from the mistakes of china and iran. should be able to learn about the proper way to do it. i know that donald trump is not capable of doing that. but for the love of god, i am

hopeful that vice president pence and other health care officials in that administration, that people close to the president of the united states can ask him at the very least to back up and back off, because there are a lot of conservatives, there are a lot of older americans, who voted for donald trump before and who will vote for donald trump again. >> heck, they go to his rallies. >> who will go to his rallies. who will hear from their doctors, and understand that what the president is saying is reckless and false and could put their lives in danger. so there's no political up side to lying about our down playing this epidemic. and -- the net result of that is turning and epidemic that can be controlled into a pandemic that races out of control across the globe and kills far too many

americans and other citizens across the world. >> great way of making that point. and still ahead we're going to speak to a doctor and a virus expert set to testify before congress this morning about developments for a vaccine, which is still months away. plus, house lawmakers have overwhelmingly approved an $8.3 billion emergency aid package. today it heads over to the senate. we're going to talk to democratic senator chris murphy about that. "morning joe" will be right back with the "atlantic" magazine's jeffrey goldberg. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪

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it's our most dangerous addiction. so we took our worst vice, and turned it into the dna for a better system. we created bionic and put the word out with godaddy. what will you change? make the world you want. trump has been televising his meetings on this lately. he had a round table with the ceos of the airlines yesterday during which he presented the bright side of the coronavirus. >> it's affecting the airline business as it would, and a lot of people are staying in our country and shopping and using

our hotels in this country. so from that standpoint i think probably there's a positive impact. >> right, right. [ laughter ] and guess who owns hotels? well -- that's right. the smartest man in the world. >> hospital stockless go up. >> are you kidding me? >> it really is just a clown show. >> yes! >> on a -- a deadly, deadly topic. >> joining u.s. now editor-in-chief of the "atlantic" magazine. jeffrey goldberg and contributor to "time" magazine msnbc news political analyst and former aide to the george w. bush white house and state departments elise jordan. we'll get to the super tuesday elections in a second. first the cover of the "atlantic" is too timely about donald trump's war on institutions. experts on the run. >> really. >> yesterday, last night, on cable news, he attacked the world health organization's estimates on the lethality of the coronavirus. and it will certainly continue

today. unfortunately for donald trump, a virus doesn't really care about loyalty oats, or who you voted for four years ago. >> right. the -- no. you're right. george packer cover story is incredibly timely, although in a way it's didn't timely for three years because experts have been on the run in this administration for three year, and george's point, i mean, we focused on the justice department, on the state department. what is true there is also true at any of the scientist-oriented branches of government and the thing to worry about the most is this. you have a lot of people, i live in washington i know a lot of these people, hanging on in their jobs. in cdc, noaa, thinking maybe there will be a change in november. it there's not a change, if this shifts to what george packard calls a permanent condition you'll see a further exodus, further mass departure of

experts from government agencies. remember, the government is one of the hugest employers of scientists in the world. we rely on them for everything to understand the weather and climate to -- you don't want to see any of these people driven out of government by a president who has no relationship to empirical reality. >> of course, a president who also in talking to these scientists doesn't look at their expertise or health care professionals. he literally looks at their loyalty and wonders about a loyalty ethic. we have a director of hhs that would not let his employees do their job, not let topless do their job because he was afraid they would actuallysomething th ignorant president. here we find ourselves so far behind where the united states of america should be right now. >> right. anthony fauci just as an example

is one of the world's leading scientists on this. if you are a president in ordinary time, and this is what president obama did, obviously, you defer. he spent his lifetime studying infection disease, and wherever the facts lead anthony fauci is where anthony fauci and others, i don't want to isolate it on him, where they should be allowed to go. and when you're worried about angering the president by saying something that might affect the economy in an untoward way, we're not getting the best information, and our scientists, again, going back to the central point, our scientists will say, you know what? the private sector has a lot of opportunities for me, and i'm not going to eat this forever. >> you know, we, elise jordan, this morning have been talking about super tuesday. been talking about the south's oversized role in super tuesday

in helping shape where this democratic party is going. you know, elise, you and i have grown up in the south hearing how conservatism has impacted the republican party in the deep south. what we saw this past week was how conservative to moderate black voters in the southeast actually impacted the democratic race, and proved once again and, please, all democratic candidates, please, understand if you're running nationwide, proved once again that twitter is not consistent with the mainstream of the democratic party. >> well, running up to south carolina, i just, in the back of my mind i didn't see large numbers of african-american voters coming over to bernie sanders. i wondered with joe biden having such a slump who was going to be the front-runner. i'd heard some talk of bloomberg from different candidates in the south he was emerging as an attractive option but then bloomberg had his bad debate

appearance, and then you look at what happened, and it's such a reminder that the democratic party has seeded so much ground in the south, because they are unwilling to make a pitch to moderate democratic voters who might be out of step with democrats in urban areas that are more cosmopolitan and might just be looking for a more moderate choice. so i think when posed with bernie sanders versus joe biden, we see what happened, and i would like to see the democratic party trying to make more of a play, more candidates like doug jones around the south trying to, you know, appeal to voters who might not be ready for full-blown democratic socialism, but are, want to consider a shift from the trump republican party. >> jeffrey, we race through the news cycles so quickly. it's worth pausing and thinking where we were 48 hours ago.

forget a week ago. 48 hours. who really knows? joe biden sweeping through ten states on super tuesday, michael bloomberg out of the race endorsing joe biden pledging to spend whatever he needs to spend to defeat donald trump. mayor pete buttigieg, senator amy klobuchar, harry reid jumping onboard. michigan ahead on tuesday. we expect another endorsement on this show coming up shortly from the state of michigan that may help joe biden in that state where bernie sanders has been leading. just your view of where we are in this race right now? >> oh, i'm not going to predict any damn thing. [ laughter ] huh-uh. >> we learned that three years ago! >> how about looking back about how we got where we are. >> right, right. what everything seems so obvious now. right? i mean, how many hundreds of obituaries did we read for joe biden's political career in the last month? you know, but it's interesting, because the political physics seem to be working here in a way it didn't work in the republican nomination. turns out there's an awful large

number of regular democrats, quote/unquote, who value name recognition, loyalty to the previous very, very popular democratic president, long-term service, the sort of empathy that joe biden gives off. i mean, these things that the professional class, the sort of observers and by the way joe's right what you read on twitter -- if you read twitter you'd think that joe biden couldn't run for dog catcher in wilmington. that's the impression that one got. so i don't want to predict anything. i do -- i just think we all have to be sort of humble about trying to predict where things are going, because there's -- the reality shifts so quickly, and what seems so obvious today was so not obvious a week ago. i'm sure beam saying, no, no, no. biden can come back, but we didn't hear very much of that. >> steve, you're looking at the

numbers and the road ahead for bernie sanders as he tries not to catch up to joe biden. something he didn't think he'd have to do 48 hours ago. >> i'm focused on the policies. joe made a reference earlier to the fact as well as biden has done and as much as biden contradicted to his own success, when you look at those exit polls you see voters clearly preferred a more moderate approach to socialism. i'm not sure people understand exactly what bernie is for. give you idea what bernie is for and put numbers around that. with charts. broadest perspective in terms what bernie sanders would do to the sides of the government. literally double the size of the government from 22% of gdp at the moment to 43% of gdp under his plan over ten years. that means 43 cents of every dollar that circulates through the american economy would pass through the hands of the government. higher than the end of world war ii when in full war mobilization effort. just to give you a sense of

perspective, even elizabeth warren who took obviously a lot of incoming for her positions on expansionary government policies would have enonly increased it % and jb talking 1.5% increase to 24%, joe biden, comparing also to a half percent that hillary clinton proposed and john kerry and others proposed during their campaigns. we're in a whole another world here. if you look how we get there. needless to say, maybe not surprisingly to say, medicare for all clocks in at the biggest peeft. half of the total. $30 trillion out of the $57 trillion that bernie sanders wants to add to federal spending over the next two years, the green new deal clocks in at $16 trillion and an array of smaller things. remember his free college tuition for all. remember universal child care and remember eliminating student debt and so all very worthy objectives but all costing $57

trillion. some estimates even higher, as much as $100 trillion over the next ten years. where is the money going to come from? he's proposed a bunch of taxes, raising individual taxes including payroll taxes partly on the here toly people won't have to spend as much as holte care. proposed a health tax as well. on the corporate side raising corporate rates again all sorts of financial transactions, taxes and so ons, a bunch of other savings. the biggest thing he does not pay for half of his plan. so half of his $57 trillion is unpaid for. which means it ends up in the budget deficit, which means it ends up in the federal debt, which means that the federal debt today which is roughly 80% of gdp goes to 140% of gdp under his plan. more than $20 trillion of new debt. >> you know, eddie, small government conservatives like myself are concerned about that

growing debt. concerned about donald trump's massive deficit. a lot of democrats aren't at concerned, i think it's safe to say, but what i've heard over the past several days from democratic voters has been much like what people were saying in britain several months ago when jeremy corbyn wkoscorbyn was ru than is the disbelief in these promises. we're never going to get this. he's promising us these pie in the sky things and we understand in america nothing's free and there's no way he's going to be ale to deliver. so why should i waste my vote? and so i found that interesting, because i've been hearing for several months that bernie sanders is not jeremy corbyn that we can't draw a parallel between those two men, but i would suggest this morning as we look back on the wreckage of bernie sanders last week, i think that's exactly where we can go. the numbers just don't add up.

>> joe, i think we could debate that particular analogy, but i want to say this. one of the more insidious features of our con tech error political environment is the alljot assault on our imaginations. i mean we seem to imagine the only thing available to us is that which is right in front of us. we can't seem to think outside of our current ideological boxes. i understand what steve is putting forward, but the scale of the crisis that we face when we think about the green new deal we have to think about that proposal in light of the fact that the climate crisis is at a pitch height, when we think about free student -- relieving student debt we have to think about how a generation is in some ways buried under student debt. >> why don't we do this? have politicians that actually think, put together a plan that actually is realistic, that can be paid for, even with higher taxes, yes. even -- say we have to raise taxes.

we've got to cut the defense budget by $100 billion. why don't we have leaders that come forward with plans that actually can be paid for? >> right. >> plans that can actually pass the united states senate, a democratic united states senate, instead of just shooting out these pie isn't the sky ideas that will never pass the senate. i mean, i understand what you're saying. we don't need to look at things right in front of us, but come on. this is not an either/or. you can find something who actually has thoughtful approaches that don't cost $50 trillion or $60 trillion, which we don't have. >> right. so you can have, actually do that. think about what happened to elizabeth warren. the moment at which she put forward a plan to pay for her medicare for all proposition and we heard from -- kidding, like steve rattner simply attack her medicaid for all. >> it was $30 trillion!

we don't have $30 trillion. >> yes. the thing is, we have actually, what we say we don't have, i think we do, because if we go to -- >> but -- but -- but, you know, the thing is, goes cost $30 trillion. oh, guess what? i'm not going to raise taxes on middle class voters. that's just a lie. and everybody knows that. it's a lie. >> what? >> so if i'm going to vote, why vote for her if she says she's going to spend $30 trillion, but taxes aren't going to be raised on middle class americans? you know that's not true and i know that's not true. >> right. her plan suggested she wouldn't raise it, but i think you're absolutely right. we need to be honest with the american people ar the scale of the sacrifices we have to make in order to change the course of the nation. we have to break the cycle. >> also have to be honest about what this plan is. this is democratic socialism. this is taking the government to be 45% of the entire economy. >> steve, i think -- >> beyond what exists in europe today. more important to think of this as an extension what new deal

democrats actually took themselves -- >> this is so far bigger than the new deal. far bigger f. we took what fdr tried to do in his period and apply it to real dollars today it would probably be even more expensive. >> no. >> but, steve, just trying to say to you the scale of the problem that we face, biden's response, clinton's response, kerry's response is not sufficient. i mean, it's just not sufficient. >> i don't disagree about that, but let's come up with a plan that makes sense that we can pay for, can afford and keep the economy doing. in the course of doing this we bring down the economy that doesn't solve problems either. >> i know who to talk to about this when we continue the conversation. much more about the president's nomination including new reporting why joe biden's chances of becoming the nominee may be even bigger than they seem. plus, this is who i was talking about. new york city mayor bill de

blasio joins the conversation to weigh in on the race. mike bloomberg's exit, and what the city is doing to keep the coronavirus from spreading even more. we'll be right back. w silvd adds to the legendary capability of the strongest, most advanced silverados ever. with best in class camera technology and larger, more functional beds than any competitor. the only truck that can compare to a silverado is another silverado. truck month is the right time to get behind the wheel of the chevy silverado. now, get 0% financing for 72 months plus $500 dollars cash allowance on all silverado 1500 crew cab pickups. find new roads at your local chevy dealer.

clearly, young people historically have not voted in the kinds of numbers that one would like them to vote. it's going up, but it is nowhere near as high as it is with older people. >> it's not going up. with your campaign right now

firing on all kricylinder and a the benefits no state saw an increase in young voters as a percentage of the electorate compared with 2016. in north carolina, tennessee, virginia, even here in vermont young voters made up a smaller proportion of the electorate than in 2016. why are fewer young people turning out in 2020? with you on the ballot? >> i will tell you that in iowa we tripled -- we increased by 33%. the number of young people, who are participating. not familiar with these sticks. statistics. i really haven't seen them, but this is the challenge that we have. >> hmm. welcome back to "morning joe." it is thursday march 5th. still with joe, willie and me we have former aide to the george w. bush white house and state department's elise jordan. editor-in-chief of the "atlantic" magazine jeffrey goldberg and joining the conversation chief public affairs officer for move on and an msnbc contributor, kareen

john kerr and house senator for the -- dave wasserman will be with us in just a moment, and new york city mayor bill debloudde blasio who endorsed senator bernie sanders. >> talk politics in a minute. first the coronavirus. obviously there's a westchester county case which shows just how quickly the coronavirus spreads. a 50-year-old lawyer gives to do his family and the man who drives him to the hospital who also spreads it. this is obviously not a virus that you want to treat the way the president of the united states has said, which is oh, sit aaron and go back to work. what is new york city doing to limit the spread of this virus? >> joe, right now we are in a containment strategy, and so far it's working. it's going to be a big question

going forward how much we can sustain that here or anywhere else in the country. bottom line is, test the most people possible who are pertinent. stay ahead of the situation. get people immediately isolated that need to be isolated and get them care. if there's good news here in our experience, we only have four people as of this morning who have tested positive. of the tests completed 25 have come back negative so far. the batting average is good. on the four people, the ones who are previously tested, two of them are doing better. so in terms of folks coming through this okay, we're seeing obviously people get tested, get care immediately, get isolated, vast majority will come through okay. the problem is the federal government was very late to the dan getting tests out. still late getting volumes we need. we need to get testing up to hundreds or thousands quickly and can't do it alone. we need the federal government. there's a strange kind of

approach avoidance to use a psychological term here in the federal response. it was deny and underestimate for a while. then seemed to pick up in the last few days but still not materially what it needs to be. localities need the maximum ability to toast help est to stf this and reassuring to people, joe, when folks hear actual consistent transparent information. i say trying to be the anti-china in new york city and constantly update people right down to the specifics of the person, where their from, what school they went to, whatever it is. that helps people stay calm. we can only do that if we have testing and the ability to constantly update the reality. >> mr. mayor, at the risk of turning this into a new york one interview, i love it, by the way. talk about what you would say to families this morning? a lot of parents getting up with their parents today. i hear it in my own house and

others worried about getting on the subway that fear of not having the nmpginformation you . i joke about new york one what do you say? >> i was a public school parent and say exactly what i said for my own kids. it's really important to understand what this disease is and what isn't. our public health folks constantly make the compares ton measles. we're hanging out here we can transmit measles easily. coronavirus so far takes more to transmit. you need to really have some direct contact. you need to have the kind of exposure you wouldn't get casually on the subway, for example. the other thing is, historically what we're seeing over the weeks is young people do a lot better than older people. healthy people do a lot better than folks with pre-existing conditions, particularly respiratory conditions. if your child is healthy you basically have little to worry about. your child has a serious respiratory problem, really keep an eye on the situation if

anyone in your school or in your life may have it . we want separation immediately and that we protect your child. that's the exception. not the rule. >> bring in dave wasserman with us to talk about the election. dave, rachel maddow last night interviews bernie sanders. sanders kept talking about the young vote growing and coming out. rachel pointed out to him that actually it had gone down on super tuesday from four years ago. what can you tell us about the numbers, the youth vote, the myth of the expanded electorate that bernie sanders team has been pushing for some time now? >> yeah, joe. sanders has pledged to expand the electorate and bring in young and non-white new supporters looks empty right now. his coalition has shrunk since 2016, not grown. we've seen happen, in fact, the democratic electorate has gotten less progressistic since 2016, not more. you know why?

there's a new name for all of those suburban republicans who don't like donald trump. and it's called democrats. they're voting in the democratic primary and so you have kasich and rubio people who had been voting for pete and amy and voted in big numbers for biden in places like northern virginia and places where biden rolled up huge margins on tuesday. >> i saw matt lewis with an "i voted" sticker for virginia and it was jarring to see matt. this guy who's been a small government conservative for years talking about voting in the democratic primary for the first time in his life. that was remarkable. something he would have never imagined doing five years ago, but, again, that seems to be happening time and time again. you've written an article talking about how joe biden may actually be closer to locking down the democratic nomination than all of us think. explain why. >> yeah. look, in terms of the drama this race could be far from over, but in terms of the math, this race

is pretty close to over in my estimation. i late to be a buzzkill, but when you look at the way the democrats apportioned delegates, entirely proportional basis, that means that delegate leads can be difficult to build, but they can be even harder to overtake. and keep in mind that bernie sanders lost the delegate count substantially on tuesday, even though a ton of his delegates and votes were attributable to people who cast ballots before south carolina. before amy klobuchar and pete buttigieg got out of the race. now bloomberg's out of the race, and so he doesn't have that advantage going forward and if you were to model the future contest results off of the states that just voted on super tuesday, the voters who cast ballots after the other moderates got out of the race, biden would steamroll through michigan, missouri. florida would be something like 70-30. sanders needs a seismic shift in this race to have any chance of

catching up. >> wow. >> mr. mayor, listening patiently to this analysis and are a supporter of senator sanders. there's no getting around the fact he had a bad night tuesday night. he's conceded that, that he didn't expand his base. young voters didn't come out the way he hope ehoped. what does he have to do to the next election only five days away? >> with all due respect to the previous commentary, a one-on-one race which i think this will be momentarily is an entirely different animal. by the way, when bernie sanders excelled and shocked the world in 2016 in a one-on-one matchup, respect joe biden i really do, but joe biden as a candidate previous to the last 100 hours or so has had a lot of challenges in terms of what he stands for, what is his vision where is he taking us? how does he account for previous votes taken, the iraq war an example. now it's a one-on-one matchup where voters have a very

different kind of choice. bernie sanders campaign clearly has shown tremendous capacity to organize and the other thing that is missed here, i think, is something's changing on the ground. the latino vote reality, which was getting a lot of attention in nevada is not getting the attention it deserves right now. how did bernie sanders go from a guy that didn't have much latino vote to a guy that dominates the latino vote? because they worked it really hard. they have real work to do. i'm a part of it, team bernie sanders have work to do in these next weeks but he showed in nevada, texas, california, he can go get a much greater share than the latino vote than predicted. we got to do it again. reach deeper into groups of people in the primary who might have been with other candidates previously. but that measure, that strange 27 hour, 100-hour dynamic we went through in the last days is a thing unto itself. >> what happened, bernie sanders seems to explain, for your take, he got his clock cleaned among

african-american veoters across the country through the south. he has to change that dynamic. you know well. why was he losing between 40 and 50 points among african men vamn voters? >> i understand it. >> low information? >> no, no. saying you had a whole lot of candidates, which i think is a very different discussion. the information i think people received about joe biden was some of his historic connection, understandably means something to people. >> barack obama? >> of course. one race, pure little science. one-on-one race brings 0 ut a different set of information and comparisons. joe biden's record i think this is a fair statement, did not get a ton of examination when there's eight candidates as all of these cross -- look, if pete buttigieg had had a couple of different outcomes we would be talking about pete buttigieg right now. not joe biden. so now it's a chance to really examine joe biden. his history on social security.

which i think a lot of black voters and democratic progressive voters are not going to be comfortable with. history, of course, on the iraq war. now this is the kind of examination to go through. by the way, as a democrat, i want that examination, because -- let me finish. donald trump is going to come at whoever the nominee is. >> sure. >> like a ton of bricks. i want them put through the paces and want it to be a tough decision. brgs will bernie sanders can say you're not guaranteeing health care for all americans. but americans want health care. said to a group of donors, nothing will fundamentally change if i am president. >> the way you're -- >> that's a pob fro problem for democrats. >> all of those who voted for joe biden overwhelmingly didn't know enough about them, you're saying, after 50 years in the public scaquare? >> willie, i disday glagredisag.

you hear what you could never do with six, eight, ten people on the stage. i say it negatively, until 100 hours ago you all projected joe biden might be about to leave the race. >> the biden campaign was saying the same and all of those voters voting for joe biden. >> here's a guy may be around may not be around. very different from here's a guy to be next president. three people can be president of the united states. donald trump, bernie sanders, joe biden. now the public gets deadly serious in estimations and those comparisons really, really matter at this point. if black voters, and i'm someone who's had the blessing of tremendous support in my campaigns in the black community. i ran as a candidate of change because black voters certainly do not like the status quo. if joe biden cannot present a vision of change and bernie sanders can on a one-on-one matchup it's a different discussion. >> joe wants it, campaigning for a year and a half. the idea these voters of these states haven't heard enough.

>> in a muddle. come on, willie. >> ten people, eight people. it's been a muddle every time you have a one-on-one matchup it's a different discussion. >> joe wants to jump in, let me ask this one question, because you asked an interesting question. you said, what does he stand for? what does joe biden stand for? the answer might be normalcy. in this context that's change. we've talk and the show for years about the toggling back and forth. is the reaction to donald trump going to be something that is extreme or back to some sort of establishment centrism? seems many voters in the last week have said, you know what? time tested guy, eight years as vice president. normal. i mean, we know all the gaffes and everything else. normalcy represents now kind of change. >> mr. mayor, get joe in. go ahead, joe. >> i was just going to say, mr. mayor, you said when it's a one-on-one race bernie sanders and the voters will get a better look at things like joe biden's vote for the iraq war in 2003.

same holds through of course for bernie sanders. they can see that this is a guy that ran for afoffice, was defeated by the nra and then made peace with nra, in fact, became an aggressive supporter of the nra and voted to shield gun manufacturers from liability and voted for the crime bill. a crime bill that some of these civil rights groups voted against. that cuts both ways. does it not? >> oh, joe, unquestionably. and but i'll take that comparison any day of the week. if you say bernie sanders, a couple issue, been first to say, needs to explain to people why he made votes as a certain time versus joe biden who essentially has an endless record of those kind 6 votes and statements that people are going to ask more and more tough questions about, but to the previous point, respectfully, i don't think people are looking for normalcy. i think they want to stop the madness democrats want to stop the madness what we've gone

through think donald trump. go back to african-american voters, young voters, latino, progressive voters. they're not trying to get back to the world before trump, the day before trump, because it was such a wonderful world and so much fairness and equality in america. i want to be really careful on this. only three people can be president now. if you're a democrat, two people to choose between. if you're one of those voters who needs change in your life, who is not having a great experience for so many of them in america want to see real change, how is joe biden going to convince you he will change things? of course he'll be better than trump and is a very good, decent human being, but where is his vision of change? joe biden has spent a lifetime in the status quo, and i think this is a vulnerability and joe, invoke one of your heroes. joe biden can't be the outsider candidate. he can't be the candidate who says i'm going to disrupt what's broken. donald trump did that effectively in 2016. as did barack obama in 2008. as did ronald reagan in 1980.

the outsider who can disrupt a broken status quo is in a strong position. my fear is joe biden up against donald trump, joe biden looks like the candidate of status quo. in ways empowers donald trump. >> i've got to say, from everybody i have talked to, democrats, republicans, independents alike, there is a sense of exhaustion that has set in over this country because of three and a half years of absolute chaos from donald trump. there are a lot of people who think change back to normalcy as it was under barack obama will be a pretty -- a pretty damn good place to start. and there are a lot of things that voters obviously see in bernie sanders that they don't find comforting. i am curious. following up on what willie asked, why is it that bernie sanders does so poorly among black voters? why is it that he spent the past four years trying to expand that base of support among black

voters, and yet things have only gotten worse for him? >> look, i think for every candidate you have to constantly improve your game and your work. i think -- >> why hasn't he? he's had four years. didn't even ask jim clyburn for his support. >> joe, i want to put that aside. well known where jim clyburn was going. >> no, no. no it wasn't. jim clyburn, i need to be accurate here. jim clyburn the week before he made his endorsement still wasn't sure which direction he was going. >> let's go to this point. you could say the same of bernie sanders coming out of 2016 about latino vote, put a huge amount of focus and energy absolutely blew the doors off the latino vote in texas and california, which bluntly -- >> so why don't black voters -- >> let me get this point in, i've heard you talk about his

phi hispanics. we need to know why black voters don't trust bernie sanders? >> we have to go out into the community. 2 million african-americans in my city. it's my job and everyone else's job in the community to gain that kind of respect to bernie and connection for bernie we need and i think we can do to. the latino parallel was from nowhere in 2016 to stunning result in 2020. obviously he has capacity to expand his coalition. he can say to people he has a vision of change that they need in their lives. that's what he has to do we all have to do effectively. again, it's a one-on-one race, it's a different discussion. >> mr. mayor, we need to move it. got a lot of people. forgive me for cutting you off. why did you cut him off? alex is yelling in my ear and everybody wants to talk to you. >> joe, you can cut me off anytime.

>> you can cut me off as well well's -- well. karine, why such a lack of trust when it comes to black voters and bernie sanders? >> yeah, so one thing i want to say while medicare for all and the green new deal is very popular, here many t's thing. voters are not voting on ideology. they are votering on the fear of for more years of donald trump. that is what i am hearing. while the african-american vote, the black vote, is a block, it is a diverse block. the one thing that's connecting them is, how will the next four years look like if donald trump gets re-elected? and so there's that fear, there's a desperation. and you know, bernie sanders last sunday had an opportunity to go to selma, to march over the edmund pettus bridge and he didn't show up.

a huge miss for him. the day after south carolina going into super tuesday and he just wasn't there, even, mayor pete buttigieg was there, who at that point he probably was thinking about dropping out. right? and he still showed up, and it got him in goodwill. so the thing that i have, mayor, you say that, you know, we need a one-on-one, but in 2016 there was a one-on-one with hillary clinton and bernie didn't do well with black voters back in 2016. and he's been running for five years and, yes, doing, you're absolutely right, doing well with the young latin x community and an amazing ground effort, diverse staffers but a message is missing to black voters. my question to you what is the message, what does he need to do to expand that base and build a coalition that he's going to need especially going into super tuesday that's coming up in a couple of days? >> karine, i think in the end, again, judging from my experience in the most diverse

place on earth. i think that what i've heard from african-americans all over new york and all over the country is, in fact, they are not looking to just go back to, you know, the end of october 2016 and the status quo we knew before. i agree with joe entirely, agree with everyone, that job one, get rid of donald trump, get rid of the clear and present danger to all of us, obviously particularly for african-americans that's crucial. but i want to be clear. if ever there's a community that has led the nation in wanting to see change in our economic and social reality it is the black community. i think bernie's message and vision connects very directly. i think this is about good, old-fashioned campaigning, connecting to people more deeply. 345 making the message sharper. by the way, look what joe biden just went through. you could not discern the message for most of the last year. he has tightened it up in recent weeks. i give him credit for that. now, game on. it's up 0 toto our side to get

clean message people can believe in. i think people are dynamic when voters are looking in each state anew at the situation, new information. if joe biden was so perfectly beloved before it would have shown up in national polls and everything else previously over the last year. >> didn't it, though? >> no, no, no. he was lagging in recent months coming up to the primaries and caucuses. the fact is, i think what we have to realize is, a brand new discussion. things move so fast in modern american politics, that a few days can make a difference. so now it's up to bernie and all of us who support him to get out into communities uncolluding the black communities and bernie is the one to bring profound change to african-americans and an americans and change the race. this thing could change a bunch of things. if anyone think it's the over look at history. two candidates neck and neck in a delegate count both with

tremendous projection capacity. bernie has all the resources in the world. this is going to be an intense fight over the next few weeks and bernie has the opportunity to go into any community and win a lot of support. >> and dave wasserman made the case why he thinks joe biden is the front-runner and probably will run away with the nomination. what is the path that you see and how would you counter dave's math and what states do you see bernie sanders being competitive in? coming up next tuesday. >> first i think someone said the other day, i think jon meacham, if anyone thinks we understand american politics we're wrong. it's gotten to a point it's ever-changing and we can't predict anything. clean slate. the path is to go into states where you can put together a combination of obviously strength, working class voters, with progressive voters, with latino voters as a base that describes a lot of places including new york. that describes pennsylvania. in large measure that describes michigan. put together that combination

and then build it out. because that next debate, by the way, tune in, everybody. you're going to have the biggest contrast you've seen in a long time on march 15th and that's going to reverberate outward into everything thereafter and no one in the world can tell me this election will be decided before the next debate. so you're going to see pure contrast. what elizabeth warren did to michael bloomberg, different situation, but one debate changed the world versus hundreds of millions of dollars. that next debate's going to be crucial. >> wow. >> do you think your candidate, next debate, will continue to embrace castro's literacy program and chandeliers in the subways? can he just say, castro, bad guy, bad regime a totalitarian regime and enslaved the cuban people for over half a century? why is that so hard for bern ie to just say i. love the fact bernie says exactly what he

feels and i think people admire and appreciate it. >> that's trumpee. >> sometimes good not to say what you think, if the complementary to castro and the sandinistans. >> left finish the sentence. separate the two points. beal bluntly objective. condemns them as dictators obviously. and says different societies produce different things. that's not the point. i agree if you say -- >> that argument is, and by the way, i'm being with you, this is, the spirit of chris matthews now. interrupting you every three seconds now. people need more chris. we love chris and miss chris, but that is the argument. literacy programs in cuba? that's the mussolini argument, he made the trains run on time. nothing more. nothing less. >> i agree with you, in fact, joe. a moment of a beautiful coming together here. >> it's beautiful. i'm feeling wonderful.

>> mussolini comparison is a good one and two, everyone should shot talking about it. it's not per nent to thetinent situation. what do americans want to talk about? bra bread and butter issues. >> is bernie happy about winning the cold war? i kid. >> what bernie needs to do and i'll do it as supporter of bernie get back to the basics's we don't want to talk about things from decades ago not even pertinent to the american discussion anymore. talk about things that will actually change people's lives. health care. number one issue. we can agree. bernie is 110% believable as someone who will change our health care system and get more people health care. talk about that and he has a winning hand. leave the past in the past. >> right. so mr. mayor, no secret you're not a big fan of your predecessor mayor mike bloomberg and happy to see him get out of the race. on tuesday you said he's won

essentially nothing. justice is being served. he came out yesterday. backed joe biden. you don't like that either, i understand that, but he has said he's willing to spend whatever it takes to defeat donald trump. which i think you agree as a democrat is the goal. >> i commend him. >> is that a net good thing michael bloomberg will spend a billion of his own money to defeat donald trump whoever wins the nomination? >> a very good thing. i commend him. said he would do it for any candidate. real decency to beating trump. the big story, but a coda, exclamation point on it is hundreds of millions of dollars, most money spent in the history of american politicance and it didn't work. a good thing for democracy. actually means those debates were more important than all the advertising in the world. i said on nbc the other night had you actually did have all the advertising in the world and it wasn't enough. i commend michael bloomberg for being willing to use his resources to help defeat donald trump. >> i do, too.

new york city mayor bill de blasio, thank you very much for being on this morning. >> and got to get joe to get into a spirit of comedy. where he doesn't interrupt -- >> no. >> comedy or comity? >> it's both. comedy and conti. >> exacomity. >> come back next week. keep the conversation doing. we're baiting you with the bernie talk only to get updates on what we really want to talk about coronavirus and new york city. thank you. >> absolutely. all in this together, brother. >> by the way, mika, next block we're going to talk a lot to dave wasserman, having him break down what exactly happened on super tuesday and deep thoughts with jeffrey goldberg. >> i love that. >> exciting music? vi anything? >> have it soon. >> it's not the white house that's just up for grabs in 2020. the battle for the u.s. senate

has huge implications, and there's a new development on that front from montana. >> that's exciting. >> we'll fill in those details just ahead on "morning joe." liberty mutual customizes your car insurance so you only pay for what you need. only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ no. uh uh, no way. ♪ come on. no. no. n... ni ni, no no! only discover has no annual fee on any card. n... ni ni, no no! when a nasty cold won't let you sleep, try nyquil severe with vicks vapocool whoa! and vaporize it. ahhhhh! shhhhh! nyquil severe with vicks vapocool. the vaporizing nighttime, coughing, aching, stuffy head, best sleep with a cold, medicine.

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all right, sir. welcome back to "morning joe" k. i say that on tv? >> no, you can't. >> calling senator rip van winkle? >> no. democratic hopes regaining the senator are getting a boost from the pending candidacy of montana governor steve bullock. we like him. >> a great guy. >> three democratic officials tell the "new york times" the former presidential candidate is now inclined to run for senate after months of saying he had no interest in the seat, so dave wasserman -- >> yea! >> -- we're going to talk about a lot of stuff.

steve bullock. i love the guy. popular two-term governor. how does that change the dynamics of nome that senate race but the race for majority in the united states senate? if bullock gets in? >> joe, i know if i were steve bullock i don't think i would do it, and the reason, senate races are will popular governors go to lose. seve evan bayh, phil readson try to flip states. it's possible to elect popular governors in places like massachusetts and vermont and he is a democratic senator from montana but a tough sell in a presidential year to elect a secondtougher in a presidential year in his state than it would have been in '18? >> yeah. and got to give voters a reason to fire an incumbent republican senator. a lot of arm twisting by chuck schumer to expand the map but

more likely a republican majority runs through states like maine, north carolina, possibly georgia. >> what is that majority battle look like right now to you? >> it's still uphill for democrats, and when you add in the fact that democrats are going to lose a seat off the bat in alabama. i really don't see a path for doug jones. essentially start at 46 seats meaning he's in plus 4 and the vice presidency to break a tie. look at arizona and colorado. those are pretty good for democrats at the moment. cory gardner and mcsally will probably lose if the election were held next week. maine is looking tenuous for susan collins and north carolina, we've seen thom tillis poll pretty poorly against the democrat kyle cunningham who won his primary convincingly. looking increasingly line a toss-up and a great democratic opportunity. >> jeffrey goldberg, what -- what -- as far as the fight for

the senate, the fight for the house, the fight for the white house would you. everything obviously up in the air. what's your read right now with the state of the democratic party and the way they were able to consolidate and a way that republicans weren't able to consolidate against donald trump? do you think that they are positioning themselves to give donald trump a serious run for his money? >> right. it's just the part i give my deep thought. if you conjured one, i have superficial deep thoughts i have on this subject. >> right. >> the -- what strikes me is, yeah. i mean, that's the dramatic thing here. that the republican party, the regular republican party, could not withstand the onslaught and the wave of donald trump. and i'm not comparing donald trump to bernie sanders. very different kinds of people obviously, but the democrats have to borrow from another story shown a kind of immune response to disruptive kind of ideological leaders that the

republican party didn't, and i think -- i mean, the mayor was doing a very good job of spinning on behalf of his candidate, but i didn't find it hugely compelling. i think in this case and i come back to this point that we were talking about a little while ago. the change that joe biden represents, and this is why you could plausibly call him a change candidate is that he's normal. relatively normal for people who run for president, obviously. there's a normalcy here, and in this period where people are exhausted and both exhausted and frightened by what's happening in the executive branch, people are looking at people like biden and saying, you know what? this will deliver us, return us to the status quo ante to what it felt like in the obama period. that has to help and lift in some ways the senate chances for democrats. >> yeah. all right. now, of course, we do our debut segments of "deep thoughts with

jeffrey goldberg" brought to you by rice-a-roni. >> a great sponsor. >> that's great underwriting. complete with a coronavirus mask inside the ricerice-a-roni. here's the question. in joni mitchell verse which spoke the most? the clouds verse, life verse or love verse? which do you not understand? >> i think he's slightly older than i am. talk about lead zeppelin instead one day? biv it to -- >> what's your favorite led zeppelin album? >> the first one. >> wow. "deep thoughts with jeffrey goldberg." >> not the second one. >> super -- >> deep. you like the first one, and the second one. and also like the one with jimmy paige on it. >> i like the one with jimmy paige and robert plant and bonham. the best zeppelin albums ever. i'm not going to commit. i know songs. >> you have never listened to led zeppelin before --

>> listened to it walking over here. cashmere on my ipod d. you say the led zeppelin? >> did i say that? >> will ie says i didn't say "te led zeppelin." >> the correct answer was, "houses of the holy." dave wasserman, end with you. i won't ask you any questions about joni mitchell or led zeppelin. so what was your, your big takeaway from tuesday night? there was so many things coming at us so quickly. we saw the political world really shift on its axis in 72 hours. what was your big takeaway that you could project forward, moving to november of 2020? >> well, respectfully, i think the mayor was in some denial about the state of the race. if you add up bernie sanders and

elizabeth warren's votes, they didn't even reach a majority of the vote in massachusetts. of all places. vermont was closer than virginia, when you add up the final results. so, look, it would take an absolute seismic shift even a modest narrowing of the race nationally would not allow bernie sanders to overtake joe biden's delegate lead. but the one area where i might actually share some thoughts with the mayor is that joe biden does have vulnerabilities entering into this sben election. what have we heard from joe biden at his victory speeches? well, his message has mostly been, i'm a decent guy and the other guy in the white house is mean and sets a bad example for kids. that message didn't work for hillary clinton in 2016. so biden going forward is going to have to sharpen his message and connect the case against donald trump with everyday voters lives, what impacts them on a personal level. and not just make it about temperament. >> all right.

dave wasserman, thank you. >> thank you, dave so much. >> for being on this morning. today the senate will vote on an$8.3 billion emergency coronavirus package that was approved by the house yesterday, and in a 415-2 vote. joining us now, democratic senator chris murphy of connecticut. senator murphy, thanks so much for being on this morning. what will this package be able to do? bottom line is vaccines are months away, and there are localities that still can't test? >> yeah. we've got big problems, and those problems are caused by the fact that this administration didn't take this seriously enough back in early february. many of us were begging the administration to come to congress, ask for an emergency supplemental request understanding there was no way to avoid this epidemic hitting our shores and they stood back and said they had everything they needed. so we're a little behind the eight ball, but this is a significant amount of money. it's enough to get what we need

down to local public health directors. that's really where the front lines are. it's fluff to speed a vaccine as quickly as possible. the real question is tests. why are we doing 500 tests in a place like the united states when a place like australia can do 1,000? it's going to be a while. a few weeks before we have the ability to test individuals who need it. >> senator, willie geist. you eanticipated my next question. just talking to bill de blasio his business thing is we need the tests. not tens, we need hundreds maybe thousands of those to do every day. will this package in some way help expedite the testing kits to get to places that need them? >> it will. it will, but, again, we're just -- we're about a month behind. there's a report out yesterday

suggesting that early on when the fda tried to go down to the cdc to work on testing protocols they couldn't even get in the door. just a lack of seriousness in this administration that is very, very worrying up until today. and so this will expedite the ability to get tests out there. listen, i think it is fortunate say that the administration is not wrong, that today your risk is pretty low in the united states of contracting coronavirus, but that doesn't mean that we shouldn't know, and this money, if we get it approved in the senate today, the president puts his signature on it will help. remember, the president asking for $1.5 billion. this is going to be $8.5 billion. if the president got what he wanted we wouldn't have the resources necessary to speed up the testing regime. >> you've had access to people and information. what's your suspicion or what do you know about why this administration moved slowly on this? why would it be in the president's interests or anyone else's to have a coronavirus

outbreak? >> you're dealing with an administration that doesn't believe in the government to solve any problem. an administration that believes in one thing owning, obliteration of the public sector. my sense in the early meetings was that the administration sort of thought states and local governments could handle this. that the federal government didn't really have an early role to play. that is just not the case. the only way were you tackle epidemics like this is through national leadership and a reminder for this administration and republicans that there is reason to run government efficiently and well instead of attacking it and demoralizing public sector staff at every turn. >> senator, do you know anything about the classified briefing that was given to top congressional leaders about contingency planning in case coronavirus does impact washington? is there anything you can tell us about p keeping

washington functioning if there is indeed a pandemic? >> well, listen, i think that right now our focus has to be taking steps to slow the spread of this disease, and so i can't share anything with you, i don't know actually, that i was in that particular briefing. i think we are all taking the same steps. be smart about washing your hands. be smart about contact with other people. get in touch with your physician if you start to feel symptoms. i don't think there's a lot different happening in washington, d.c. that's my sense, that's happening out there in every other city. >> all right. senator chris murphy, thank you very much for being on this morning. we want to bring in now the dean of the national school of tropical medicine and professional of pediatrics and molecular virology and microbiology as baylor college of medicine.

dr. peter mohoartez testifying before the house committee today of the development of a coronavirus vaccine. looking forward to getting a vaccine in place soon. obviously doesn't deal with the situation at hand, but what could it do to sort of stem this virus from progressing? >> thanks so much for having me, mika. it's really great to be here. you know, fighting a virus that's this transmissible, this contagious, without a vaccine is like doing it with one hand tied behind your back and why we're seeing struggles. using ancient methods of maintaining a highly transmissible disease. numbers coming out of china indicate it's much more transmissible than things like influenza and for certain populations it's much more serious and causes higher mortality rates, especially among older populations. looking at 10% to 15% mortality rates. so this is a very serious

disease. so the point is, we should have been further along with a vaccine by this time. we at baylor college of medicine and texas children's hospital have had a group developing, i like to say, all the vaccines that the big pharmaceutical companies won't develop because there won't be a big financial return and coronavirus vaccines are among those. so we've been developing coronavirus vaccines. the problem is we get them in one case all the way through manufacture but then couldn't get the funding to move it into clinical trials which is tragic, because, hey you know, we had that manufactured in 2016 and in collaboration with walter reed arm institute of research and then we couldn't go further than that. fortunately my science partner for 20 years dr. bertossi kept it on facility thinking eventually it could be used. the problem now we have to go through clinical trials and what

people weren't really talking about. that's the bottle neck. seeing crazy press releases saying we'll have a vaccine in three or four weeks. it's nonsense, because despite what many people believe, vaccines are the single most tested pharmaceutical for safety we have. it takes months to ensure that these vaccines are both safe and protective, and now we've got to go through that bottle neck. >> so what's the bottom line in terms of getting a safe and pre, mass produced, what's the time lyme? realistic one? >> hearing timelines of a year or 18 months. that's optimistic. the reason i say that is we've learned in our collaborators, they have learned that coronaviruss have a special safety problem. certain respiratory virus vaccines can actually make things worse. we saw it with a respiratory virus known as rsv in 1960s, the

trials were worse and maybe two deaths from that. then early stages after sars in 2003, when that vaccine development program began they saw similarbegan, they saw similar pathology in laboratory animals. we think we've worked around that problem, but the fda is going to want to proceed cautiously with safety test to go make certain that none of the volunteers that get vaccinated are getting worse, especially if it's occurring in an area of community transmissions. that is a long way of saying this is not a quick fix and why you don't want to be stuck in this position that we are now where you're trying to develop a vaccine in the middle of a public health crisis. that's not the way it works. you have to be anticipatory. so we've been trying to do that for the last 20 years. we've gone pretty far along with

a number of vaccines. it would have been great if we had finished that clinical testing. but the problem is, we're too reactive. out of sight, out of mind. by the time we finished manufacturing in 2016, nobody cared about coronaviruses any more. so we have to keep it on hold for a while. >> doctor, jeff goldberg from the atlantic. you probably heard the president speak on this subject last night. he talked about it's okay to go to work, this is not worse than the flu, he was questioning the numbers with the world health organization. what specifically worries but the messaging coming from the united states right now? >> it's not only the president. it's a number of organizations and people that are saying this is a mild illness, this is just the flu and it's not true, right? we don't close schools for just the flu. we've seen what -- we already have an indication of what's going to happen in kirkland,

washington. and the -- and basically, we could have predicted this because our chinese colleagues have been telling us about this for six weeks. they've been putting up the information on preprint servers like bioarchive and they warned us, this, watch out for your nursing homes, this virus rips through nursing homes. sure enough, in kirkland, washington, that virus, we're coming up on passover. it was like the angel of death. seven people killed so far because we know those individuals over 60, over 70, especially over 80, 10%, 15% mortality rates. so we clearly are not ready in terms of our nursing homes. we have that warning. the second warning is our health care providers. we're seeing in wuhan more than a thousand health care providers were affected and 15% of those develops severe illness and often rifs intensive care and were in the icu on

respirationers. so the point is, we're now seeing large numbers of health care workers in icus aside from the obvious work shortage, the psychological impact of colleagues taking care of colleagues is going to be devastating. we saw that in dallas in 2014 with ebola with the two icu nurses and we had to rearrange our whole plan. so we have to keep that in mind. and i'm worried about a couple of other groups, like, for instance, our first responders who we're seeing now are having to be put in quarantine. so what are we going to do about that? so there's a lot of things we haven't put in place yet in terms of our preparedness beyond the vaccine. >> dr. htes, thank you very much for being on this morning. we'll be watching today. and coming up, senate republicans announce new steps in their investigation of hunter biden just in time for joe biden's comeback. plus, michigan's democratic

prime minister is next week and there are 125 delegates up for grabs. the state's governor, gretchen wittmer joins us ahead to explain which candidate she wants to see win exclusively on "morning joe." and as we go to break, we've been talking a lot about the importance of not touching your face during the coronavirus outbreak. >> we're always saying the common sense of washing your hands, not touching your face, ensuring that if you've touched anything, you go and wash your hands again. >> and i haven't touched my fakes in weeks. in weeks. i missed. >> gop manufacturing, safety, you have to work closely. >> everybody in this room has one thing in common. >> and they evaluate the data. >> hi, governor. thank you, governor. those lights are so bright, governor, but you're looking good. thank you very much. (vo) rock! rock! rock!

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in 2003 in december, wesley clark was winning the polles. be fair, okay? i've been consistently leading in the polls after taking all the hits. i go down and everybody who has hit me is out. you all declare me dead and guess what? i ain't dead. >> he was right about that. >> that is what you call political prophesy by joe biden. >> whitd came to his political prospects, it was nearly three months ago when joe biden told the next times that. i ain't dead. welcome to "morning joe." we have former treasury official and "morning joe" economic an lit steve ratner, professor at

princeton university eddie glaud jr. and the after shocks from the super tuesday earthquake that rocked the race for the democratic presidential nomination are still being feld this morning. joe biden added a 10th state to his list of super tuesday victories after nbc news declared him the apparent winner of maine. the only race we haven't been able to call is california. sanders holds a nine-point lead right now. of the state's massive 415 delegates, sanders has been awarded 161 so far, biden 100. biden still leads the overall delegate count, 527-475. meanwhile, mike decision yesterday to end his campaign means biden now has the room to charge ahead in the moderate lane all by himself. as the race now moves to next

tuesday's contests in idaho, michigan, mississippi, missouri, north dakota and washington state. here is some of what both biden and bloomberg had to say yesterday. >> today, i am cleared eyes about our overriding objective and that is victory in november. not victory for me or our campaign, but victory for our country. if you remember, i enter the race for president to defeat donald trump. and today i am leaving the race for the same reason. to defeat donald trump because staying in would make it more difficult to achieve that goal. i've always believed that defeating donald trump starts with uniting behind the candidate with the best shot to do it. after yesterday's vote, it is

clear that candidate is my friend and a great american, joe biden. >> this is what we have to do to win. this is what we have to do to unify the nation. that is why i entered the race in the first place, to unify this country. so we welcome all those who want to join us. and to build a moment, and this is a moment we are building, and it is a movement and we need that movement to beat donald trump. and to build a future we all know is possible. >> willie, we'll get to michael bloomberg in a minute and his campaign and his concession speech and his endorsement of joe biden, but first, let's talk about joe biden. in the immortal words of monte python, he was not dead. in fact, it was merely a flesh wound. the turn around still, if you look at it, you see where he was saturday afternoon, how despondent many in biden's campaign were believing that,

you know, he was near the end. the turn around, over 72 hours, has been one of the most remarkable turn arounds in american political history and it continues. >> yeah. i mean, we added another state overnight with main. that makes 10 of the 134 states on super tuesday in the column for joe biden. just 48 hours on tuesday morning as we sat here. no one could have predicted that, including, by the way, people inside of joe biden's campaign. but as we've been talking about this week, african-american voters started a wave and it started in the state of south carolina and it moves through the south and it went into texas and other places. white suburban voters, older voters pb he has a calendar on tuesday that will will like a lot those sorry states, a state like michigan. if joe biden wins that state, it may be all she wrote there. >> exactly. >> i asked the question as we

were moving into super tuesday whether or not joe biden would lose among the african-american vote in a way that reflected south carolina or nevada. he lost the african-american vote across the south. and the interesting thing that i came to understand watching the results, because i was shocked, is that first we have a lot of african-americans who simply agree with joe biden. and we have a lot of african-americans who see that getting trump out of office is the most important thing. and we see bernie sandsers is not very good in talking about race nelgz to his agenda. so all of that played itself out on super tuesday. now we have to see what happens moving forward. >> eddie, a couple of things. there is so much to talk about. it's something that reverend allen and i have been discussing for a year now about black voters.

i think sphispanic voters are often stereotyped and generalized and put into one group by while lib rap politicians and white conservative politicians. but reverend al said his mentor told him all the time, the conservative -- or black voters are conservative in every area but race. and, obviously, they're progressive on race. and i just -- you look at these results, you look at what's happened over the past month, month and a half of this campaign, and when the history books are written, it will be black voters that will be seen as the moderating force on the democratic party's most extreme influences and, once again, once again, the most paragraragmatics who look at the field and say, on can, who gives me the best chance to win? famously as we've said in 2007, barack obama was running, michelle obama was talking in

the fall going, come on, they need to vote for us. black voters said, wait, show us you can win first. and once again, black voters have been the pragmatic force in the democratic party asking that question who is going to win. >> you know, joe, i find it -- i was stunned, it's ironic to me that black voters will be the fire wall to protect the moderate conservative wing of the democratic party. there are three things that come to mind to me. one is, as i said earlier, black voters are more moderate and conservative than most people think. two, i think we have to keep in mind barack obama's effect on theate. and three, we have to think of this buying time as james baldwin would say that it's a cold, calculated risk when we vote to buy ourselves some time. and there is a sense that a lot of black folks trust joe biden,

but there are a lot of folks who don't trust white he america. so in some ways, the idea of getting trump out of office will require a safe bet. but as after can american voters, some i should say consolidate around joe biden, we need to ask ourselves, will this be the democratic party that doubled down on try angulation, will this be the democratic party that assumed as we bank away from the primary and go into the general, will they take advantage of african-americans, take for granted african-american voters and move in a different direction and not pay attention because it's precisely that try angulation that led to dick morris talking the way he talk with clinton, that led to the welfare bill being passed, that led to the crime bill being passed. so we need to ask hard policy questions. we know what that has meant since the clinton revolution in some ways.

>> the black vote is the center and the heart of the democratic party. it's something we've been saying for months here when a lot of white people have been running around in iowa and new hampshire talking about who the future of the democratic party was. nobody can say who the future of the democratic party is until black voters say who the future of the democratic party is and i don't know that black voters going in on super tuesday were asking themselves about dick morris and try angulation. i think they were asking the same question that a lot of other democrats are asking. wait a second. okay. who has a better chance of beating donald trump, the guy who is still running around defending fidel castro's programs in cuba, still defending the soviets talking about their glittering subway? because you see, here is the thing about blacks in the south.

they live in the south. they know the history of the south. they know that republicans dominate the south. and they know that unlike liberals on the upper eastside of manhattan or in cambridge, massachusetts, they can't take chances on esoteric theories. it's haud ball politics and they have to get the guy or the woman who can stop donald trump dead in their tracks. i think that's the calculation. i think it's a calculation jim clyburn made and i think it's a calculation that black voters will continue to make throughout this process. but their voices, mika, on tuesday night and in south carolina are remarkable. and jim clyburn, still, just such a remarkable, powerful

voice in the democratic party. still ahead on "morning joe," michael bloomberg's biggest impact on the presidential race may be his decision to drop out. how the former candidate is planning to keep up the pressure on the president. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. hills. you crush them... kind of. kale.

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welcome back to "morning joe." we've been talking about the dust settling from super tuesday. here is how senator bernie sanders framed joe biden's surge. >> joe biden is somebody i have known for many years. i like joe. i think he's a very decent human being. joe and i have a very different

voting record. joe and i have a very different vision for the future of this country. and joe and i are running very different campaigns. and my home is that in the coming months, we will be able to debate and discuss the very significant differences that we have. joe is running a campaign which is obviously heavily supported by the corporate establishment. >> is this the establishment trying to defeat bernie sanders, mr. vice president? >> the establishment are all those hard working middle class people, those african-americans, those single women -- >> they are -- >> sanders later responded to biden's comments tweeting, quote, no, joe, the establishment are the 60 billionaires who are funding your campaign and the corporate funded super pacs that are spending millions on negative ads attacking me.

house majority whip james clyburn questioned sanders description of biden supporters as the establishment saying i find it very interesting that someone is referring to african-american voters in south carolina as the establishment. i don't understand how that vote can be dismissed. >> you really have to say that a guy that owns three houses that is a millionaire that is tacking a black civilian in orangeburg, south carolina, as the establishment, as the elites may be missing the bigger plot. i want to talk, willie, about mike blackberg and i want to read something that's in the "new york times." charlie wurtsel wrote it. and everybody was mocking mike bloomberg yesterday like i thought they might, even though i'm not sure why you mock a man

for spending a ton of money with one goal in mind, to stop donald trump. charlie says, look, only the number of states obscures that it helped elevate a candidate polling from 3% to 16%. it allows a less than charismatic campaigner who skipped the first four nominating states to still manage to crack 10% of the vote in nearly all of the super tuesday contests. if there st a lesson to draw, it seems to be as atlantic's mckay remarked how close it came to working. and you can take out a few things. i think, willie, if michael bloomberg had listened to mika's advice, and that is start with a lot of media interviews where he was really strong, the media

interviews, prepare yourself more for those debates or if when you got into those debates, you didn't have one candidate, elizabeth warren who so focused seemed to take you out of the race. our explanation was very few people could survive that on the national stage. mckay is right, this may have actually worked. >> yeah. i mean, i understand all the jokes about him spending $500 million to win a few delegates in american samoa. that's all true. but also the claims that this was a vanity project fall flat b when the guy made a gambut for super tuesday, it didn't work out and then he got out. it seems to me, steve ratner, and we'll say again that you managed mike bloomberg's money. he's a good friend of yours. it seems to me he did exactly what he said he was going to do. he was going to take a shot at super tuesday.

it didn't work out. now he's going to take all that money and spend it to defeat donald trump. idea morning, if you can, take us inside the meeting. he put together an extraordinary xain campaign organization in absolutely no time. and he did a remarkably good job. obviously, the debates were not perfect. they may well have been some kind of a turning point in this whole process. but as you said, as joe said, charlie wurtzel said, he did elevate himself in a way if he could compare this to tom steyer, my friend, who spend $254 million and never got a single delegate. mike did make an impact on this race and i think mike's support and what will move over to the

biden campaign will also be meaningful in all of this. so, no, mike saw it clearly. he's a data driven guy. the motto with bloomberg is in god we trust, all others bring data. he was very clear eyed about it and he was very clear eyed about his decision to support biden. one thing on sanders' attack owes biden, before you start talking about all the corporate billionaires, there are three things you have to remember. number one, bietden had the money. so the idea that he was supported by corporate billionaires when he beat sanders was hard to imagine. two, no individual can give more than $2,800. i don't think any of them could be bought for $2,800. i think that's ludicrous to say. and thirdly was the people who elected him. >> south carolina were hardly the corporate establishment, as we were talking about earlier. >> yeah. that's been the case for bernie sanders, the argument for it which is that we are

representing working people which he is, that's his platform, and the other candidates are tools effectively the corporate establishment. that argument loses a little steam it seems to me after super tuesday, after the kind of voters who elected joe biden in all those states. >> right. and it requires nuance and it's hard to have nuance in the heated ooh a political battle. but he needs to make a decision. it makes sense to me to say that james clyburn is part of the political establishment. it makes sense to me to talk about the way in which klobuchar and buttigieg and others and how bloomberg have consolidated behind joe biden to begin to talk about them in a particular sort of way. but you can't conflate that with voters. the democratic process is messy. people will make choices at the polls. if you are a democrat small "d," you want to give as much

legitimacy to folk making decisions on voting day, on the voting day as you can. and you know what? on super tuesday, bernie sanders got his behind handed to him. he needs to go back and think, why? can i assess what happened and to kind of describe it all as this corporate establishment is too flat-footed. let's be more nuanced and let's get the messaging right if you are thinking about transforming the lives of every day everyday people and so in a way that pulths faith into the democratic process. coming up, the battleground is just days away in michigan and that state's governor is ready to pick sides in the primary fight. gretchen whitmer makes her endorsement exclusively on "morning joe." endorsement exclusively on "morning joe."

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let's talk about mr. sanders. he said joe is running a campaign which is obviously heavily supported by the corporate establishment. what do you think about that argument? >> it is ridiculous.

it is ridiculous. bernie, you got beaten by overwhelming support i have in the african-american community, bernie. you got beaten because of suburban women, bernie. you got beaten because of middle class hard working folks out there, bernie. you've raised a lot move money than i have, bernie. >> joe biden jumts just momentsn his string of super tuesday victories. the race now moves to idaho, mississippi, missouri, north dakota, washington and michigan. and the governor of michigan, gretchen wittmer, joins us right now. and i understand you are prepared to make a decision to endorse someone. who is it goes to be? >> i am. good morning. i am pleased to be here with you. i've been watching this campaign play out and there's been sources of inspiration in a variety of candidates. but as we go into michigan's election on tuesday, i will be

joeting for joe biden. joe biden is someone that i know is working to protect health care that was expanded under the obama administration and that's personal to me. 18 years ago, i was taking care of my mom at the end of her battle with brain cancer and rearing my new child and fighting an insurance company that was wrongfully denying her chemotherapy. i was commiserated with joe about this very thing. he lost beau to the same brain tumor that took my mom's life. and because of their work, i was able to expand medicaid coverage to 700,000 people in the state of michigan. when the chips were down, it was the obama/biden administration that stepped up and helped out the auto industry. it was personal to us here in michigan. so i think that the blueprint from 2018 about showing up, focussing on the dinner table issues and getting things done is exactly what joe biden represents and that's why he's

got my enthusiastic support and my vote on tuesday. >> governor, where do you think michigan voters stand on some of these issues that you brought to the table, especially very personally, in dealing with your own mother because, of course, bernie sanders has his plan. >> absolutely. and i think the great thing about what we've seen during the course of the primary is that every democrat on that stage is work to go expand access to health care. it is such a complete juxtaposition from what donald trump and the republicans are doing to take that health care away. and so i have always been proud to be a democrat because i know that health care is personal. and i've met so much michiganers who have seen a doctor for the first time because of medicaid expansion, all as a result of the affordable care act and that is what is at stake in this election. and that's why i think whether you are one of those heart working autoworkers or all of the businesses and economic

impacts from the industry in this state or you're someone who has seen a doctor for the first time because of medicaid expansion, it was the obama biden administration that brought that to us. when the chips were down, they had our back and that's why i think that this moment is so important to step out and say i'm supporting joe. >> governor, it's willie geist. good to have you on the show this morning. we appreciate you being here. it was just a couple on weeks ago that you said the chances were probably low that you would endorse in this primary. you said i am highly likely to jump in once we get past the primary. what changed your mind on that and was it what you saw on tuesday? >> well, i think you all know that politics can change fast. a few days can be a lifetime. and what we've seen in terms of, you know, the ability to coalesce and build a coalition that has a diverse representation, that is reflective of who we are as a party and what we need as a nation has really started to

show that joe biden is our strongest candidate going into the fall. and i believe that. and i am excited about his candidacy. i am eager to take part, you know, in a lot of the national conversation around his campaign because i think we all know michigan is incredibly important. all roads to the white house lead through my state and i want to make sure that we've got a strong ability to help impact where we are headed as a nation. >> so is it fair to say that the surprising strength vice president biden showed across the nation on tuesday influenced your decision? >> i'll just say as a candidate who has been written off, i saw what happened with joe biden and their ability to pick themselves up off the mat, dust themselves off and show the grit it takes to be successful and bring others along. and i think that is what is so important, too. elizabeth warren, she's fan tastic, same with cory booker

and pete buttigieg. this is a group that has shown we are thinking about everyone in the american population and we welcome all supporters. bernie's supporters, as well. if and when joe is the ultimate nominee, we are going to be at a place where everyone can find a spot because we're fighting for the things that matter to pe people's lives in this country. >> there are five days before michigan's primary and bernie sanders won a narrow victory over hillary clinton in 2016. do you have any predictions for how joe biden will fair in the upcoming contest and do you think that his support, his prior support for free trade could hurt him in michigan? >> i think there's a lot of enthusiasm in michigan for vice president biden. i think that there's a lot of enthusiasm for bernie sanders. and i think we're going to have a spirited debate. i know that, you know, there are a lot of leaders who have he

many braced joe's candidacy and are ready to move forward and there are a lot who like bernie. it is a conversation that is really important. i'm not going to predicting what happens, but i want people to know where i'm supporting joe. i think it's important that we have candidates who are showing up, who are focused on those dinner table issues and have a record of getting things done. and when michigan needed help, it was barack obama and joe biden who had our backs and i think that's really important as we go in and make choices on tuesday. >> governor, corrine has a question for you eshg9swhat do democrats need to do to make sure they come back this fall?

>> i feel like i'm repeating myself. i've done so many interviews since i won my election. but it really is. the 2018 blpt that i used was to show up. to actually stay focused on those dinner table issues, whether it is closing a skill gap or cleaning you drinking water or ensuring that we expand access to affordable quality health care. these are the fundamental that's americans are worried about. we don't have time to focus on every conversation going on in washington, d.c. we're trying to take care of our families. we expect our leaders to be, as well. so that blueprint, showing up with a record of having gotten things done is what inspires and moves and is important to people in not just michigan, but i think across the state. we're thinking about our kids and their future and here we are as americans. and i think that's the most wonderful thing about this

nation. it's a great challenge, too, but i think those are the things that really matter to voters, whether you're in michigan or pennsylvania or wisconsin or california or florida for that matter. >> michigan governor gretchen wittmer with her endorsement of joe biden this morning before that state's primary on tuesday. thank you so much for being on with us this morning. >> good to be with you. thank you. and still ahead, joe biden is surging in the democratic primary race and now republicans are sharpening their investigations into his son, hunter. the gop chairman leading the charge insists the timing has nothing to do with the election calendar. "morning joe" is coming right back. calendar "morning joe" is coming right back

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i will say, though, the h1n1, that was swine flu, commonly referred to as swine

flu, that went from around april of '09 to april of '10 where there were 60 million cases of swine flu and you had over -- actually it's over 13,000. i think you might have said 17. i had heard it was 13, but a lot of deaths. and they didn't do anything about it. >> what is he talking about? why do they let him talk at night? >> i don't know why. >> it's just not good. >> he doesn't get any questions -- >> this is a guy who said that if you get sick with the coronavirus, you should sit around or you'll get better or you should actually go to work and get better. which is the last thing in the world that americans need to hear from their president unless the president, of course, wants to start a pandemic. >> and to rattle off like that and get no questions or fact checking. president trump claiming the obama administration didn't do much to combat the swine flu.

he also claimed, without providing evidence, that hesitate predecessors made it more difficult to conduct widespread testing for the coronavirus. joining us now, ashley barker. her latest reporting examines how the latest efforts undermine by mixed messages and falsehoods. also with us, usa today opinion columnist and former senior adviser for the house oversight and government reform committee, kurt bardella. he's a "morning joe" contributor. >> thank you so much for being with us. there is a lot to sort of keep up with the president starts talking off-the-cuff. what are some of the highlights, some of the insisties and some of the troubling statements that may run contrary to what health care officials are telling americans? >> this is the white house the

challenge the white house is dealing with. he said vaccines could be ready as soon as several months and you had health officials correcting him saying it's much more likely to take a year or a year and a half. you had health officials say use common sense, stay home if you're sick. and you have the president saying go to work if you're sick. so you have the white house trying to handle this in a way without angering the president and costing them their jobs. >> so this morning, stock futures are down again. they've been rebounding up, down, the past couple of days. but do you get a sense from

talking to white house officials that most of the president's don't worry, be happy talk about the coronavirus stems from his concerns about the stock market or is it something else? >> i do know from talking to people in the white house that he is following these gyrations in the stock market incredibly closely. that's one of the reasons, his key thing is he does not like what he views as alarmist language from officials or what he claims is hysteria in the media. that is something these experts are trying to deal with. on the one hand, they are doing what they should do which is urging people handling the response to be open and honest and transparent with the american people, but they also have an eye on the president and trying to tamp down what he would view as alarmist imagery. >> ron shaunson plans to hold a committee vote next wednesday on the first subpoena of his probe

into the ukrainian company burisma and joe biden's son, hunter. teleshenko is at the center of pushing the narrative of alleged obama administration corruption in ukraine, alleged ukraine interference in the 2016 election. johnson insists this is not an investigation into hunter biden, but says hunter and his business associate devon archer, quote, made themselves a part of the story. johnson recently hosted a classified briefing for republican members of his committee to update them on his investigation and says blue star is cooperating fully with his

misinformation. >> after all you went through and now that you see ron johnson in the senate and you see ukraine investigating this issue and then the other countries such as china peter writes about in great detail that hunter, again, no experience, making sons of money, it has to be a campaign issue. how do you plan to use it or do you plan to a campaign issue fo the democrats. they were obviously told you can't bring that up. so even people that are against, if you look at joe, they're against joe, they don't want to bring that up. that was off bounds. that will be a major issue in the campaign. i will bring that up all the time because i don't see any way out. >> you know, willie geist, a couple of reasons why the democrats aren't bringing it up is because when you have "the wall street journal" owned by rupert murdoch reporting now

several months ago that this conspiracy theory not investigating burisma or having the prosecutor fired because of hunter biden, they call that discredited. every news orange that hazard looked at the facts has called it dis-chrised. it's just a like that i suppose sean hannity and donald trump can talk about at night and the president can say he's going to use it. and then on the other front, it's pure russian propaganda for ron johnson to be pushing any idea or any committee hearings that would suggest that the ukrainians interfered in the 2016 election. our own intel agency warned senators not to use russian

propaganda, but senators can't help themselves. they are just awash in promoting russian propaganda. >> and isn't it interesting, joe, that the president, the white house, senate republicans' interest in the alleged corruption of bur is i ma waned when biden was behind in the polls. he should have a report in one to two months looking into hunter biden. obviously, the president said it aloud last night if joe biden is the nominee, ice going to make this an issue. >> clear, they're trying to make burisma the new benghazi for 2020. all of a sudden, congressional

senators think subpoenas should be honored and listened to. if they all said we're going to follow president trump's lead and completely ignore your subpoena, not show up, not provide any documentation at all, i'm sure senate republicans would have no problem with that as they had no problem with mike pompeo or anyone if he white house completely defying congressional checks and balances throughout the entire impeachment investigation. but back to this investigation that now ron johnson is trying to spearhead, it's amazing that they did absolutely nothing on this when they thought vice president biden was left for dead and now they're all of a sudden turning up congressional investigations again to target biden and do really donald trump campaigns, you know, opposition research and i have no doubt that they're going to use this effort, this committee and their power to try to derail the biden

campaign every step of the way. that is the lengths these guys are willing to go to try to politically interfere just as republicans did to hillary clinton in 2016 with the ben zazy probe. >> and then the majority leader bragged about the benghazi hearings taking down president trump's approval ratings. >> one more issue here, chief justice john roberts is denouncing remarks made by senate majority leader chuck schumer after he attacked neil gorsuch and brett kavanaugh as they heard arguments in a major abortion case. >> i want to tell you, goresuch, i want to tell you, kavanaugh, you have released the whirlwind and you will pay the price. you won't know what hit you if you go forward with these awful

decisions. >> so, ashley, you have released the whirlwind which is something that i think he lifted from kavanaugh's speech about the clintons during the hearings. but you will pay the price. disturbing, deeply troubling language for a senator to use against supreme court justices. the chief justice stepped in and made a rare rebuke of a sitting senator. >> he sure did. it is worth noting senator schumer's office then clarified he was talking about a political price, but this is not the first time we have seen the court politicized from both sides. senator schumer's language, incredibly harsh, controversial, looks like leader mcconnell will continue that, weigh in on the senate floor this morning. a week or two ago, president trump tweeting about two liberal justices. i think part of this is the era

that we're in right now. >> it really is. it is disturbing. we talked about it time and time again when the president attacks federal judges, when the president attacks a federal judiciary, but you will pay the price, chuck schumer said that. coming from any senator on either side of the aisle, deeply disturbing, reprehensible, and it certainly justifies an apology, does it not? >> it does, joe. i think we talked about this before. the answer for democrats in general to combatting trumpism isn't to mimic it or to employ their tactics, their rhetoric to try to get the better of trump and republicans. they can't sink to their level. they need to offer the american people a contrast in style, a contrast in tone, a contrast in gove governance. when schumer does this, it allows mcconnell and trump to do this. they'll use the senate floor to

do an exercise of chastising his colleagues. it is worth pointing out to everyone of course none of these people do anything when trump calls out justices, tweets about federal judges and their decisions and labels them with false partisan labels, so there's a lot of hypocrisy at play, but democrats have to be smarter than this, joe. >> i am sure if mitch mcconnell is going to criticize chuck schumer for what he said, he will attack donald trump for the past three, three-and-a-half years attacking federal judges, attacking the federal judiciary, attacking the independence of federal judges. i am sure john roberts, chief justice of the united states supreme court will do the same since he went out and attacked chuck schumer yesterday. he certainly should have, should have been critical. i expect him to do the same as the president of course attacks federal judges, as the president of the united states did, the

roger stone case, really excited to see what john roberts has to say about a president attacking a federal judge in a trial involving one of the president's own political cronies. when he says something about that, that's going to be good. >> ashley parker, cukurt bardel, thank you for being on this morning. up next, an alabama man set to be executed tonight, despite major questions in the case. oldest son of dr. king, martin luther king iii is standing by to explain why he joined the effort to save the man's life. we're back in one minute. e. we're back in one minute ♪ i want to rock! (rock!) ♪ i want to rock! (rock!) ♪ i want to rock! (rock!)

♪ i want to rock! (rock!) ♪ rock! (rock) ♪ rock! (rock) ♪ rock! (rock) ♪ i want to... (chris rock) who'd you expect? (sylvester stallone) i don't know...me? (vo) ♪ i want to rock! ♪ rock! (rock) ♪ rock! (rock) ♪ i want to rock! activists are calling for an 11th hour intervention by alabama governor to halt the execution of a black prisoner set for this evening. nathaniel woods was sentenced to be executed by lethal injection,

convicted of multiple counts of capital murder and attempted murder for the 2004 killings of three police officers in which authorities say a co-defendant was the gunman. prosecutors argued that woods conspired in the killings which occurred when officers tried to serve a misdemeanor domestic assault warrant on him. woods' family members and supporters argued the co-defendant said he was the so person responsible for the shootings and claimed there are outstandin fairness of woods' trial, arguing that woods had ineffective counsel and the trial itself had multiple errors. the nonprofit death penalty organization center says his racially charged convictions and death sentence are tainted with claims of police corruption, intimidation, witnesses, and inadequate representation. in alabama, being accomplice to a murder can also result in a

death sentence, remains the only state in the country where a jury does not have to unanimously impose the death penalty. a federal judge monday dismissed a request for stay of execution, the u.s. supreme court turned down woods' appeal last year. "morning joe" reached out to the alabama governor's office for comment and has yet to hear back. our next guest has called upon alabama's governor to halt the execution of nathaniel woods set for today. joining us now, civil rights leader martin luther king iii. >> martin, thank you so much for being with us. we greatly appreciate it. this is a case where family members, lawyers, supporters, outside groups, civil rights leaders all say this man was not involved in the murder and there's evidence to suggest that, yet tonight at 6:00 p.m. if things don't change, he is going to get executed.

tell us why you got involved in this case. >> so thank you for the opportunity. i got involved when i found out about the gross -- i don't want to say negligence, but how the system, the legal system seems not to be working. certainly mr. woods had an incompetent lawyer on capital case, not incompetent generally, perhaps on capital cases because it is very clear to me if there's any inkling of doubt someone innocent may be killed, then it seems to me that should not happen. and because as you've stated the gentleman who did the actual murders came forward and has stated that there was no involvement, that they were not operating together, it would just seem the governor would provide a stay. that seems to fall on deaf ears.

what it feels like to many in the african-american community is once again this is like a lynching, innocent person is slated to die this evening. that should be unacceptable. the legal system has got to be better or justice certainly has to be served in some responsible fashion, it seems to me. >> martin, good to see you again. my question is how do people get involved in this fight, and not just in this case but in the broader fight to stop, to end the death penalty? >> so i think that amnesty international is one of the great organizations that i've been involved in and everyone is not against the death penalty obviously, but i believe we have to create a consciousness in this country. i'm against it. i'm a victim of violence. my father was gunned down by an

assassin. my grandmother was gunned down, my father by a white man, my grandfather by a black man. i think it is an archaic form of punishment. i think we're better in the way we operate. it is mostly consciousness ultimately, you think about developing nations, we are one of the nations that continues to believe if you do something, we're going to come and get you. this is what feels good momentarily. but i just have to believe we have to continue to mobilize people in the nation and world so that ultimately elected officials will come around to this pogsition. it will take time, we shouldn't give up. >> nathaniel woods, 44, he is set to die at 6:00 p.m. tonight. the man who actually committed the murder said he had nothing to do with the crime, as have

civil rights leaders, lawyers, outside groups, and yet he is still set to die at 6:00 p.m. unless the governor of alabama does something about it before then. martin luther king iii, thank you so much for being with us. >> thank you. >> we greatly appreciate you bringing this to our audience's attention. >> that does it for us, stephanie ruhle picks up coverage now. >> thanks so much, mika, thanks, joe. i am stephanie ruhle. it is thursday, march 5th. new cases, new fears, a new step from lawmakers as the country continues to fight spread of coronavirus this morning. late last night, the governor of california declaring a state of emergency as new cases emerge in the state. two of those cases linked to this cruise ship held off the coast of san francisco while passengers get tested. 21 of 2500 on board are showing signs of the virus. the first death in california now confirmed, while the