tv MTP Daily MSNBC March 11, 2020 2:00pm-3:00pm PDT
2:00 pm
what's happening all around us. >> i do think there's a larger concern, though, which has to do with schools not being able to be in session. >> of course. >> that creates a problem for low income kids, for example, who aren't able to take long distance classes, who don't have broadband access. >> what about lunch? they don't have breakfast and lunch. >> i can watch the ncaa from home. i'm much more concerned about kids who can't get an education. >> absolutely. i think we all are. this is a breaking story. my thanks to joshua, to steve, to matt, to you for watching most of all. mtp daily with katy tur in for chuck starts right now. [ audio difficulty ]
2:01 pm
-- control. after meeting with bank ceos on a day when the markets again plunged, the president just tweeted that he will be addressing the nation from the oval office at 9:00 p.m. tonight. he total reporters he'll be announcing what he plans to do about the spread of the virus and its impact on the economy. we don't know exactly what he's going to announce, but his oval office address will come after one of the most trusted public health officials on his white house task force team, dr. anthony fauci, sounded the alarm while testifying on capitol hill today. >> is the worst yet to come, dr. fauci? >> yes, it is. >> can you elaborate? >> we will see more cases and things will get worse than they are right now. how much worse we'll get will depend on our ability to do two things, to contain the influx in people who are infected coming from the outside, and the
2:02 pm
ability to contain and mitigate within our own country. bottom line, it's going to get worse. if we are complacent and don't do really aggressive containment and mitigation, the number could go way up and be involved in many, many millions. if we don't do very serious mitigation now, what's going to happen is we'll be weeks behind and the horse is going to be out of the barn. >> even in areas of the country where there are no or few case we've got to change our behav r behavior. we have to essentially assume that we are going to get hit. >> dr. fauci, who has served six administrations, also recommended a ban on large crowds. those warnings come amid an ominous sign that the everyday life of the average american is about to change dramatically if it has not already. the number of cases in the u.s. continues to rise rapidly. it is now well above 1,000, with more than 30 deaths.
2:03 pm
schools, businesses, churches, conferences, sporting events, community centers across the country are restricting movement or temporarily shutting down. the ncaa just announced moments ago that all tournaments including march madness will apparently be played with no crowds. washington state has just banned gatherings of more than 250 people in its three largers counties. seattle is closing all public schools for at least two weeks. a containment zone surrounding a cluster of cases outside of new york city goes into effect tomorrow. globally the number of cases continues to soar past 100,000 and the death toll stands above 4,000. the world health organization has now declared the coronavirus a global pandemic. and officials are urging countries to act more aggressively. germany has warned its citizens that 70% of the country could be infected. closer to home, though, sources tell nbc news that congress's in-house physician told staffers
2:04 pm
on capitol hill that he expects roughly a third of everyone in this country to be infected. joining me now, nbc's geoff bennett is at the white house. nbc's kasie hunt is in d.c., where she's covering capitol hill. nbc host david gura is at the new york stock exchange and also in d.c. former surgeon general dr. viv echl k murthy who is a member of joe biden's just announced public health advisory committee. geoff, the president's going to speak to the public tonight we think it's going to be around 8:00 p.m. do you have any knowledge of what he plans on saying? >> reporter: well, katie, the president just tweeted in the last ten minutes or so ago that he plans to address the nation from the oval office at 9:00 p.m. eastern, 6:00 p.m. pacific, and he could use that setting based on our reporting to announce a national disaster declaration. that would unlock up to $40 billion immediately, push billions of dollars out the door to help state and local
2:05 pm
governments confront the spread and the economic impact of coronavirus. this would be in addition to the stimulus package that he's working out to congress. we also expect that he might -- could potentially announce travel restrictions to europe. health advisers, administration health advisers are said to have advised him to restrict all but essential travel to europe and that any americans who would travel there would have to self-quarantine when they come back. one of the things that we're keeping close watch on is this issue related to increasing the capacity of testing. just yesterday in the white house press briefing room i asked the vice president when the administration, specifically when the administration expects the coronavirus test kits would be widely and readily available. the vice president said that millions more test kits have been deployed and have been delivered, but still there is this bottleneck. just today the north carolina congressional delegation, members of that delegation, both democrat and republican, wrote a
2:06 pm
letter to the vice president, making clear that north carolina is a state with 10.5 million people, they only have 300 test kits left. so there is a clear bottleneck happening somewhere between the delivery of these test kits that the vice president speaks of and the receipt of them all across the country, katy. >> geoff, that is a remarkable -- that's remarkable reporting. can you tell us, the change in the president's tone, has he been listening to dr. anthony fauci? have his advisers been getting to him? he tweeted today that he's prepared to do whatever he needs to do in order to combat this virus. it's a change in tone. he had been saying that it wasn't a big deal and comparing it to the flu as of yesterday. >> that's right. and remember when he was on the hill yesterday he urged americans, he said be calm, it will all go away. well, certainly that is not the case. to your question, has he been listening to his advisers? it appears that he has. we know that delivering an oval office address was among the many options presented to him
2:07 pm
this morning and he has chosen to do it, to use that position from behind the resolute des desk to convey to the american public just how serious the situation is, katy. >> kasie hunt, house democrats met at 4:00 today. what is the latest on their coronavirus package? >> well, katy, we know the broad contours of this package because chuck schumer and nancy pelosi outlined their priorities on sunday afternoon, sunday evening, talking about where they want to focus the relief for people who are grappling with this. and as the political reality and frankly the health reality has gotten more urgent as the week has gone by, that's been reflected on capitol hill. so the big question mark right now on the hill is is the president ready to get behind this? nancy pelosi has a lot of policy leverage in that this president clearly wants to be taking steps to address this, both for the
2:08 pm
health and safety of the american public, but we've also seen kind of his tone in the political imperatives that he faces demand that. and that puts pelosi in a position to say and basically get the ideas she thinks are most important out front. the idea of a payroll tax cut which the president was up on capitol hill talking about yesterday seems to have been set aside in terms of any fast track legislation. and fast track, i'm talking about a speed that we very rarely see on the hill. we're talking about the next 48 hours. i'm setting that payroll tax cut and any tax cuts for industries affected or even cash infusions for industries saying all that. that's definitely something they're looking at on maybe a two or three-week horizon which is till as you know very fast for capitol hill. right now we're talking about things like paid sick leave for people that need to stay home. we're talking about covering costs of people for their health care treatment when they want to go get treated for coronavirus.
2:09 pm
trying to make sure that people don't feel as though they can't follow the advice of our health officials. so we're thinking -- or we're reporting that this could be on the floor as soon as tomorrow. >> and it could also include an extension of unemployment insurance, expanded food stamps and most importantly food for kids who are not able to go to school. a lot of kids get their hot meals -- >> school lunches, right. >> at school. school lunches. and if they close down schools there is concern about whether or not children will end up going hungry or will they be left out of being fed frankly if they don't -- were unable to access that is at school. david gura, we are officially in bear market territory, right? >> we are. we've seen a 20% drop from the peak here with the dow jones industrial average. we're in bear market territory with the s&p 500. what we saw today were losses in every one of the s&p sectors. so this is hitting all facets of the economy. when you talk to investors, that's what they're honing in on
2:10 pm
here, that there is a general sense of anxiety that we all have that's certainly affecting the markets as well. you look at tourism. you look at manufacturing. there is still a whole lot of concern about supply chains and manufacturing. the president notably met with the heads of some big banks this afternoon. each of them stressed the fact that the banking sector is doing pretty well. there are other sectors that are doing worse than that. what i want to talk about if i could is just the efficacy of the tools that the president has at his disposal right now. this morning the bank of england, the central bank in the united kingdom, lowered rates. markets reacted positively to that for a while and then they fell once again. it kind of mirrored what we saw in this country just a week ago when there was this emergency rate cut that the federal reserve put in place. again, markets responded positively for a few hours and then they fell once again. that's on the fiscal side. then on the monetary side, you get to the fiscal side what kasie was just talking about a moment ago, investors are hearing all these things, suggestions being bandied about but there's still nothing concrete yet aside from what
2:11 pm
democrats proposed. i think what they'll be listening for tonight, katy-s concrete proposals from the presidential. and what stands a chance of getting through the congress before congress goes on recess. >> dr. murtha, what would you like to hear from the president tonight? >> what i would like to hear is more about how we're going to move aggressively to change the course of this growing pandemic. we know things are going to get worse before they get better. we should all the unfortunately expect that there will be more cases and sadly there will be more people who die because of this virus. but the future is not fully written yet and part of what it depends on is what we choose to do as individuals, what our government chooses to do and how aggressive we are in taking the mitigation steps we know can protect us and the people around us. >> so the president up until now has been sending? mixed messages. and there's also real concern from health officials about whether we are going to be able
2:12 pm
to get a handle on this. dr. fauci today warned this is only going to get worse. the capitol hill doctor told staffers and lawmakers to expect 75 to 100 million people to be infected. that's a third of the population. what do you want to see happen across the country immediately to start to get a handle on this? >> in these kind of situations there are three core principles that we need from our leadership and from our government. we need first of all to lead with science and with scientists. second, we need transparency. we need to make sure that we are communicating to the public what we know as a government in terms of how many cases we have, how many people are being tested. but third, we have to make sure we get the resources for the people on the front lines. this means departments of public health. it means doctors and nurses and hospital systems and people who are struggling for information at times and need to know how to keep themselves safe. what i would like to see across the country is all of us recognizing that there are steps we can take to keep ourselves
2:13 pm
safe. washing our hands frequently, making sure that we stay home if we're sick, covering our mouth if we cough. and certainly ensuring that we are practicing social distancing. now, this has been part of the mitigation strategy that we've been hearing now is so essential right now. social distancing means changing how we greet people, moving away from contact, handshakes to a hand on the heart or at most an elbow bump. we also need to think about shifting to telework. we need to start avoiding large crowds, especially if we're vulnerable, if we are older or if we have other illnesses and they put us at increased risk. this is not easy to do np means changing a bit and sometimes a lot of how we live. but these are the steps that if we take them can make a real change in the trajectory of this illness. >> simple but steps everybody can take. why is there a bottleneck in terms of resources? why were there problems italianly with the cdc getting the test out?
2:14 pm
why are there not more tests available? there's also reporting now that there's a shortage of lab materials to process the coronavirus. what's going on at the federal level? >> i don't think it's entirely clear what is causing the challenge with testing. but one thing that has to be resolved quickly because without adequate testing we are flying blind a little bit. we don't exactly know how many cases we have in our community if we can't test people for it. one of the key elements of the response that we saw in south korea, in china, and in other places where they moved aggressively to get the virus under control was that they had adequate and expansive testing. so they knew where the virus was. listen, to be fair, we have to recognize that in any of these response efforts there are going to be some stadium numbles. i say this having been inside of the administration during the ezika outbreak and ebola.
2:15 pm
what you need is to get the help that's needed, whether it's within government or outside of government in terms of public-private partnerships. to resolve these road blocks so we can ultimately get tests and resources to the front lines where people need them. >> to be fair, and i'm not trying to look backward, but the president fired his pandemic response team in 2018. you were part of administration that's had that in place. did that hamper in place? >> well, certainly after the experience with ebola and zika the administration when i was serving recognized that we needed to invest much more deeply in global health security, recognizing that what happens in health care systems around the world has a direct impact on us. we're seeing that once again with this novel crohn avenorona we will see it again with future outbreaks. that's why it's so important we invest in global health security, why we build strong partnerships with other countries, and why we help strengthen health care systems around the world. that is the way that we keep ourselves safe, and that's where
2:16 pm
we need to invest more money, more effort, and i believe more partnership attention. >> dr. murthy. doctor, thank you very much for joining us. geoff bennett, thank you as well. kasie hunt, david gura, we appreciate it. we were expecting to hear from the white house coronavirus task force during this hour but we just learned a couple minutes ago while we were on the air that the briefing has been canceled after the president said he will be addressing the nation tonight. so coming up, the coronavirus is now officially a pandemic. in massachusetts more than 70 people are sick after a conference in boston. i'll talk with boston mayor marty walsh about what's being done to keep things from getting worse. before we talk about tax-smart investing, what's new? -well, audrey's expecting... -twins! grandparents! we want to put money aside for them, so...change in plans. alright, let's see what we can adjust. ♪ we'd be closer to the twins. change in plans. okay. mom, are you painting again? you could sell these. lemme guess, change in plans?
2:18 pm
2:19 pm
over the course of 24 hours this week coronavirus cases in massachusetts doubled jumping from 41 presumptive cases on monday to 92 on tuesday. and that number ticked higher today. over 75% of those cases are believed to be the result of a single gathering, a leadership conference for the boston-area
2:20 pm
based biotechnology company biogen. massachusetts has declared a state of emergency. universities including harvard and boston university have moved classes online and have told students to spend the rest of the semester at home. and boston has canceled its st. patrick day parade. but the city has not yet pulled the plug on next month's boston marathon. joining me now is boston mayor marty walsh. mr. mayor, thank you very much for joining us. cases in massachusetts have more than doubled in recent days. do you have an updated number for us? >> yeah, the number in the commonwealth of massachusetts as of right now is 95 cases. 19 of those are in boston. and those numbers literally will be updated hourly as people's tests come back. >> how many more are you expected -- or how much more are you expecting it to rise? >> i mean, it's hard to say but when i talked to my colleagues around the country, i talked to jenny durkin in seattle. they started off kind of like we
2:21 pm
are and they're expecting the worst. i spoke to bill de blasio in new york yesterday as well. and those cases are expected to rise. it's very difficult to see what the numbers are. we have not had any community transfer right now. in boston we have one case out in the western part of the state. but once we start seeing that these numbers will then, as we're watching not just here in the united states but around the globe, we'll see those cases multip multiply. we're expecting quite honestly, we're preparing for a worst case scenario and we're being aggressive in making sure that we keep our people safe in boston because i think that's really important. and it's also important for us not to cause panic but just to make sure people are doing what they need to do. >> what do those preparations include? >> well, we're working -- we started -- it seems like this has been going on for three months and really it's been going on for about five days, preparation. we started in city hall. we started looking at stopping travel for our city employees. we started making arrangements for people working from home. we started to make arrangements on what do we do -- a couple of
2:22 pm
your last guests were talking about when schools shut down 80% of our district was on free and reduced lunches. we're going to have to deliver those lunches to those families, those kids, at home if we have to close our district down. >> do you have the resources in place to do that? >> we're planning on using city employees to the best we can to supplement that. we've met with all our unions to let them know that we're -- potentially if we have to go to crisis mode we're going to be asking for help to be able to do that. it's really important as we think about who's going to get hit here. i think the hardest group that's going to be hit here are low-income workers quite honestly. our hospital business is down. our hospitality business is down. we've already canceled the st. patrick's day parade. we're having conversations about the marathon. this conversation is going on right now in the country about major league sports. all of those different venues and all of those places that people work at are mostly low income, low-wage earners and they're going to be hit harder and we have to make sure -- we have to think about all of that
2:23 pm
as we move forward and do our preparation in boston. >> what exactly can you do as the city or what do you need the federal government's help with? >> well, you know, in this particular case, and i've been hearing a lot of different aspects, we need to work together in this. this is an opportunity for us as a country to come together and put our differences aside whether you're democrat or republican. i know we're in the middle of a presidential race here and we're going to -- it's about to get real intense in a couple months here. but i think this is an issue, this is right now for america, this is an american issue. and boston, we need to continue to work together. we need to work with the governors across the country and my governor in massachusetts, a republican, and our offices are staying very close to each other. we're working with legislative leaders, with city councils, with other elected officials and town managers. we just need to put our differences aside. this is not a time for us to be fighting and bickering. that means we work with the state and then the state will work with the federal government
2:24 pm
and hopefully some of what they're talking about will trickle down fairly fast. we can't wait. i don't think weeks. like i said to you, we've been really aggressive this week. it's wednesday. i feel like we've been doing this for a month and a half and it's been three days into planning this week. we can't be waiting a month, month and a half for congress to pass legislation. >> let me get more specific. in terms of those low-wage workers, the ones who don't have paid sick leave, the ones who can't afford to miss two weeks of work, the ones who might not have health insurance, can the city -- does the city have the ability to prop up those workers or do you need the federal government to step in? >> we need the state in massachusetts and the federal government, if they come out with a short-term fix here. i think there's an opportunity here for legislatures around the country as well as the federal government. this might not be prolonged. this could be anywhere from four to six months. and there's an opportunity for us to figure out unemployment, figure out health care, figure out all those needs for all
2:25 pm
americans because if people aren't covered with health care or people don't have wages coming in it's only going to get worse. the whole of the arena's going to get deeper. do think now is a time for to us work collectively together. in boston we've already made decisions of people who don't have sick time left. if they're sick or they feel sick or connect with somebody who has coronavirus we're asking them to stay home and self-quarantine, go to their physician to see if in fact they have it. if they don't have sick time we're going to continue paying them. we're looking right now at our bus drivers and our schools and parents in our schools, those are hourly wage workers. that means if they don't work they don't get paid. they're not salaried. we're looking at a policy now and a procedure to move forward to continue to pay them if in the case we do close our schools. i'm not saying it's inevitable that's going to happen, but seeing what's happening in seattle today and other places, that might have to be -- that might be a decision we have to make. so we're looking at our employees to see how we can keep moving those forward and allow them the opportunity to earn wages. >>s that that is so important. boston mayor marty walsh.
2:26 pm
mr. mayor, thank you very much for joining us. >> thank you. and coming up, with the president set to speak from the oval office tonight, we're looking at the mixed messages that have been coming out of the white house over the past two weeks as this crisis has grown. with hepatitis c... ...i felt i couldn't be at my... ...best for my family. in only 8 weeks with mavyret... ...i was cured. i faced reminders of my hep c every day. i worried about my hep c. but in only 8 weeks with mavyret... ...i was cured. mavyret is the only 8-week cure for all types of hep c. before starting mavyret your doctor will test... ...if you've had hepatitis b which may flare up and cause serious liver problems during and after treatment. tell your doctor if you've had hepatitis b, a liver or kidney transplant,... ...other liver problems, hiv-1, or other medical conditions,... ...and all medicines you take. don't take mavyret with atazanavir... ...or rifampin, or if you've had certain liver problems. if you've had or have serious liver problems other than hep c, there's a rare chance they may worsen. signs of serious liver problems may include yellowing of the skin, abdominal pain or swelling, confusion, and unexplained bleeding or bruising. tell your doctor if you develop symptoms of liver disease.
2:27 pm
common side effects include headache and tiredness. with hep c behind me, i feel free... ...fearless... ...because i am cured. talk to your doctor about mavyret. i need all the breaks, that i can get. at liberty butchumal- cut. liberty biberty- cut. we'll dub it. liberty mutual customizes your car insurance so you only pay for what you need. only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪
2:28 pm
get 'em while they're hot. applebee's 25 cent boneless wings are back in your choice of three sauces. applebee's 25 cent boneless wings you try to stay ahead of the mess. but scrubbing still takes time. now there's new powerwash dish spray. it's the faster way to clean as you go. just spray, wipe and rinse. it cleans grease five times faster. new dawn powerwash. spray, wipe, rinse.
2:29 pm
2:30 pm
as you saw there, president trump has spent the better part of two weeks trying to downplay the threat of coronavirus. but u.s. health officials are now warning that the u.s. could see millions of infections. and president trump will be addressing the nation tonight from the oval office. joining me now, beth phuey, senior politics editor at nbc news. john pod more edits editor at commentary magazine and msnbc contributor. and democratic strategist basel schmeichel. i'm laughing not because of the news but because there's some drama in the studio and it's making me giggle. anyway, the president's going to address the nation tonight. this is a crisis he has not been able to control. in the words of peter baker, he can't tweet his way out of this. and it's exposing a real lack of leadership on a federal level for a coordinated response in the event of a real emergency. >> yeah, this kind of thing would be a challenge for even a president who is very invested in the federal government working and functioning as it is. and we know from president trump
2:31 pm
that this hasn't been something he's, a, been interested in or b, believes in. he's spshts of the federal government, sort of the levers of the federal government working in a way he can't completely control. so he's done a lot to marginalize civil servants, question their loyalty, in some cases empty out office as cross the federal government. now that he needs them it's very hard for him to reclaim his credibility with managing something like this. >> he fired the pandemic response team in 2018. i mean, the team that was in place to prepare for an event like this. and he said you couldn't expect something like this happening, although you definitely could and experts have been warning about it. we've had threats like ebola or sars or various other issues in the past. john, what do you want to hear from him tonight to stabilize the ship? >> i don't have any idea. that's why we have presidents. he's supposed to know more than we and know more about what the
2:32 pm
capabilities of the federal government are and congress and what emergency declaration cans do and then explain them to us, even those of us who follow politics. it is the very fact that we don't really have confidence that he even after three years as president even grasps that element of the job that is so unnerving. >> well, let's play the president just downplaying the virus over the past few weeks. >> we're testing everybody that we need to test. and we're finding very little problem. very little problem. now, you treat this like a flu. >> it's going to disappear. one day it's like a miracle, it will disappear. >> this is the new hoax. >> anybody that needs a test gets a test. they're there. they have the test. the tests are all perfect. like the letter was perfect. the transcription was perfect. >> it will go away. just stay calm. it will go away. >> basel? >> you know, it's really disturbing because going to a
2:33 pm
point that you said earlier, in many ways i want the president tonight consoler in chief. i want him to have some empathy. i want him to be able to be a calming force in this nation. and it's everything that he's not. and i've been thinking a lot about two things. one, matt damon in "the martian." when he says in the moment of his crisis i have to science the hell out of this. but when you don't believe in science and you defund programs and offices, there is no one left to actually do the hard, very challenging work that we need and will depend on to actually get through this. and you're right, this isn't an opponent that he's used to. this is not a person that he can tweet away. it's going to fight back and it's going to fight back hard and he just doesn't seem to have the capability to deal with it. >> this will affect his voters. >> absolutely. >> it will affect americans. and some of them are his voters. it will affect people who don't believe in it. it will affect people that the president says -- that look at
2:34 pm
the president and say this is not a big deal. it will affect everybody. >> well, because even if you're a republican, democrat, conservative, liberal, in general voters expect the government to function on basic levels. not necessarily manage everybody's health care in the world like perhaps a bernie sanders would suggest but just to manage the basic functions of protection. this is basic sort of government 101. and because that's not happening, president trump's voters will not only be affected but perhaps will start to question his whole approach to this. >> you had the mayor of boston on earlier. one of the things i was saying in the green room is if you listen to how he talks about the work he has to do to get his city through this, the complexity in dealing with unions even is tremendous. and you just don't get the sense that this president understands or even cares about managing the complexity of something. >> you know, he doesn't even need to console. i think it would be actually wrong to console. that's also a form of happy
2:35 pm
talk. we are it appears to be on the verge of something very terrible very likely. and so what you need is for the captain of the ship to say i am putting my hand on the tiller, we are going through rough seas and we're going to come out of this on the other end, but make no mistake. like this is -- that's -- you don't say this is the end, this is only the beginning. >> is part of the lack of a response because he's worried about the stock market and he fears if he comes out and says i'm declaring a national emergency, i'm going to suspend -- i don't know if he's going to say this. but i'm going to suspend travel from europe. i'm going to get the cdc to start manufacturing tests, they're going to go to everybody, everybody is going to get tested, whether they like it or not, i mean, these are just pie in the sky scenarios. i mean, is he worried about doing that because of the effects it might have on the market and therefore his re-election? >> obviously. but you know, just not doing it, as we can now see, has a
2:36 pm
horrible effect on the market. we've gone into the bear market after what, 12 years? >> since 2008. >> it wipes away president trump's entire narrative of his presidency, that everything's going great, everything's getting better. the best economy we've ever seen, the consumer -- repeatedly recently, the consumer has never been in as good a position as they are now. he's such a marketer. and he's been marketing his success for his entire presidency, from day one. and this contradicts, flies in the face of everything he's tried. >> and we will see if his marketing continues to work on the voers who liters who like he supported him so far. beth, john, and bails, thank you very much for joining us. don't go too far. ahead, bernie sanders' math problem. he says he's sticking it out after some big losses last night. we're heading to the beg board to figure out what his path forward could be. time for wrink? neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair®. we've got the retinol that gives you results in one week. not just any retinol. accelerated retinol sa. one week is all it takes.
2:37 pm
neutrogena®. get 'em while they're hot. applebee's 25 cent boneless wings are back in your choice of three sauces. applebee's 25 cent boneless wings noand, silly question:ki is nwon't it sink?! alright, i'm going to get back to you. i'm going to get back. people ask me what sort of person should become a celebrity accountant. and, i tell them,
2:38 pm
"nobody. nobody should." there's nothing wrong with liking privacy, but i just don't think you need a separate private plane. but i, but i want it! you can't claim that as a dependent! because it's inanimate! that's what the pay me for. not enough, though. not nearly enough. hey, buddy. what's the damage? i bought it! the waterfall? nope! a new volkswagen. a volkswagen?! wow! i think we're having a breakthrough here! welcome to caesar's palace. wait, you're in vegas? sure looks like it! wha-, what, what? what are you doing back there?
2:40 pm
efforts to prevent the spread of coronavirus, we're also following the latest developments in the 2020 race. bernie sanders said today that he will remain in the race despite another disappointing showing in last night's primaries. >> last night obviously was not a good night for our campaign from a delegate point of view. poll after poll including exit polls show that a strong majority of the american people support our progressive agenda. >> sanders' remarks came today after biden's decisive wins in michigan, mississippi and missouri. and most importantly biden now leads sanders by nearly 150 delegates. we're going to look at the sanders delegate math problem in just a moment. but first, joining me from burlington, vermont is nbc's shaq brewster. shaq, always good to see you. is there going to be a change in strategy from the bernie sanders campaign after last night? >> well, you know, it's
2:41 pm
interesting because we did see a clear change in strategy. and sorry, i'm competing with some music here in burlington, vermont. but we did see a change in strategy after super tuesday where you heard those stepped up attacks against vice president biden. you heard that focus on trade and you saw those ads on the television airwaves that were blasted out in michigan. the problem is as yesterday showed that just clearly didn't work for this campaign. so what you heard from senator sanders today is an acknowledgment that he's behind in the delegate map, he's behind in the electability argument, and michigan, that loss in michigan was a big reason for that. michigan was a place where senator sanders pointed to regularly saying he had the energy and excitement needed to take on donald trump but wasn't able to defeat vice president biden last night. what you're seeing from senator sanders right now is him focusing that attention, instead of going all in on michigan he's going all in on the debate on sunday. that was the message he got -- that was part of his message during his statement earlier today listing out questions he has for vice president biden. it's clear that right now he's
2:42 pm
not getting out of the race but he's also not getting out of that opportunity to take on vice president biden head to head on sunday. ka katy? >> shaq, thank you very much. and as we said, bernie sanders has a tough road ahead ease tries to catch up to joe biden with pledged delegates. steve kornacki's at the big board with a look at the path and the math. so steve, what is it? >> take a look here. if you're sanders, the numbers are not very friendly here. the running delegate tally. this is a gap of 147 delegates. biden leads sanders by 147 delegates at this point. there's still a few dozen to count up from last night. washington, michigan, missouri, mississippi. a few more are going to come in from california as well. but really we expect when all is tallied it's going to look pretty much like this. this biden number might grow a little bit, might get up to 150, might get up to 160. but that's roughly what sanders is going to be looking at when everything is counted up. the problem for bernie sanders is that's a lot to overcome in general and especially when this is what he's looking at next
2:43 pm
week. these four states are coming up. florida, ohio, illinois, and arizona. these are all big states. these are all big delegate states. take a look inside some of these states. look at florida. this was a disaster for bernie sanders in 2016. he lost florida to hillary clinton by 31 points. there have been multiple polls out in the last couple of weeks showing sanders trailing by this much against joe biden. if you look at the demographics of florida, who has bernie sanders struggled with for four years consistently? older voters. that's a huge problem for him in florida. all sorts of demographic land mines for him in florida. if you look at ohio, ohio was already a problem area for bernie sanders in 2016. he lost that state by 14 points to hillary clinton in 2016. if you start looking at all the ground that biden kind of improved on over clinton in michigan last night and you start to look at some of the places in ohio where that might apply, you see an opportunity for biden to do even better than clinton did. you look at in arizona the
2:44 pm
margin there was double digits in 2016. sanders got, you can see here, 40% of the vote in arizona. he lost by 20 points in 2016. so these states right here, if he's down by 150 or 160 delegates going into next week and he suffers a landslide loss in florida, a double-digit loss in ohio. illinois was close in 2016. but again, if he slips like he did in michigan, he could lose a bunch of delegates there. he could lose all four states and he could fall 300, 350 delegates behind something like that in the delegate race. and the problem there, katy, is to make that up you don't just have to win states, you have to win big states. and you don't just have to win big states, you have to win big states by landslides. that's what we're seeing joe biden do. he's getting landslides in a bunch of good size states here. michigan i think counts as a landslide for him last night. 17-point margin. that's how biden's been able to build his delegate lead. the only way sanders can erase it is wins by huge margins in
2:45 pm
big states. and you just haven't seen him right now be able to do that really anywhere. >> steve, if he wins decisively in new york or new york and oregon or if he gains a ton more delegates than expected in california, is there a way for him to make that up? >> yeah, the problem is you mentioned california. this was the big hope for the sanders campaign. we haven't actually called the state. you see it takes them weeks, literally weeks to get all the votes tallied. but by the way, it's a seven-point margin right now. sanders 34, biden 27. what you're seeing is that vote that was cast on primary day, march 3rd in california. biden's getting a big advantage out of that. he's been closing this gap with sanders. it's actually inside of seven points if you look at decimal places. the sanders campaign at one point was hoping to win california by 20 points. they were hoping to keep biden under 15%, deny him delegates. instead when you allocate everything from california it's just not going to be the huge advantage that sanders was thinking they were going to get from it two weeks ago. >> steve kornacki. steve, i worry about your back when you bend over like that. i hope your back's okay.
2:46 pm
2:47 pm
2:48 pm
2:49 pm
you'll make a plan that can adjust as your life changes, with access to tax-smart investing strategies that help you keep more of what you earn. and with a new brokerage account, your cash is automatically invested at a great rate that's at least 20 times more than other advisory firms. personalized advice. unmatched value. at fidelity, you can have both. ♪ more than this be stronger... with nicorette coated ice mint. layered with flavor. it's the first and only coated nicotine lozenge. for an amazing taste... ...that outlasts your craving. nicorette ice mint. welcome back. after falling further behind in the delegate count last night, bernie sanders is zeroing in on sunday's debate to flip the script on joe biden. >> on sunday i very much look forward to the debate in arizona
2:50 pm
with my friend joe biden. and let me be very frank as to the questions that i will be asking joe. joe, what are you going to do to end the absurdity of the united states of america being the only major country on earth where health care is not a human right? joe, importantly, what are you going to do to end the absurdity of billionaires buying elections and the three wealthiest people in america owning more wealth than the bottom half of our people. >> back with me, beth, john and basil. can he change things in one debate? >> it's very, very difficult for him to do so. the coalition that he needed to win, those voters are just not coming out in the proportions that he -- that is necessary for that. if you look at the states coming up, they just are not ask youskn his favor. i assume he'll stay in it until
2:51 pm
he's mathematically eliminated. >> until biden gets to 1,991. >> the same thing in 2016, the third week of april he was still battling hillary clinton very hard. i'm not sure if he'll go after joe biden very hard in this debate, he might be looking for an exit. but mathematically i don't know where he goes. >> if he can't change it and suddenly -- barring a massive gaffe or a massive incident with biden, biden is on a trajectory, does he stand to move biden over to the left, to get biden to adopt some of his policies, because biden has a coalition ride now. what's missing in that coalition are young voters. >> that's right. that was the message that i heard from bernie sanders listening to that speech, that little clip you played, was him saying essentially i know i don't have a path to win this thing, but my issues and my coalition while not a winning coalition is nonetheless a vital coalition to the democrats going forward. joe biden, on the debate stage on sunday night, i expect you to pledge some sort of feelty to my
2:52 pm
issues. obviously biden was very gracious last night and said very nice things about bernie sanders supporters and their passion and their energy, but as bernie sanders -- is joe biden going to stand up there and embrace medicare for all? no, he's not. is he going to embrace a climate change plan as massive and robust and aggressive as bernie sanders' plan? no, he's not. biden will finding some common ground, some of the easier ones, but the tough ones are those ones that bernie sanders has hung his hat on, which are health care and climate change. >> so how does he -- how does joe biden -- john, i don't know if i want to ask you this question. how does joe biden -- i'm going to come to you in a second. how does joe biden finding a way to get the young voters, the sanders voters, who are turning out and it's maybe not as many as sanders wanted, but there are young voters turning out for him? >> that's absolutely right. and i think to beth's point, you start to adopt some of sanders'
2:53 pm
position on some of the low-hanging fruit. but take a page from what states have done, affordable college or extending medicaid which john kasich did in ohio. there are some things states have done playing defense against donald trump that he can adopt and say this is my plan for the rest of the country. young voters, there's a place in this party. my kin, we're going to be gone, we're aging out of the party. i don't know if they're going to believe that, but that's something that he needs to be able to say and his vp pick will say a lot as well. >> i got a question directly for you and this centers on michigan and the coalition that biden compiled in michigan. this is tim on politico. first democratic turnout exploded. biden performed far better with key demographic groups clinton did. if either one of those things happens in november, trump will have a difficult time winning the state. if both things happen, the
2:54 pm
president can kiss michigan's 16 electoral votes good-bye and with them most likely the electoral votes of wisconsin and pennsylvania. >> okay. so in 2016, 1.5 million votes were cast in the -- 1.1 million votes were cast in the democratic primary. in 2020 it was 1.5 million. in 2016 in the presidential election, there were 2.2 million votes for hillary clinton. 68% of the overall turnout in 2016 voted in the democratic primary. that is unprecedented, and biden won my 16 points. trump is in deep trouble in that state because every primary voter is a general election voter. they have already got nearly 70% of the vote they need. trump only won michigan by 10,800 votes. >> and if you look at livingston
2:55 pm
county in michigan, and tim alberta pointed this out as well. it's a wealthy, affluent suburb that skews conservative. it got 10,000 more votes in 2020 than 2016. 10,000 in that suburb alone. >> and that's all. if trump gets the same vote in 2020 that he got in 2016, that's all biden needs to win the state. that's it. those 10,000 voters there in november. >> it's going to be interesting. we're not going to be talking about mccomb county, we'll be talking about livingston come up in november. guys, thank you very much, and we'll be right back. lobster fan like wild caught lobster, butter poached, creamy and roasted. or try lobster sautéed with crab, shrimp and more. so hurry in and let's lobsterfest. or get it to go at red lobster dot com so hurry in dad! not cool.o, son.rfest. you know what's not uncool? old spice after hours... and jazz. dad, i prefer ultra smooth, it handles sweat without all that...jazz. you're right son.
2:56 pm
2:57 pm
2:59 pm
before we go, we have really big news to share. this is a new member of the nbc family. meet monroe jackson thorpe, roe for short, porn born on monday. she's the daughter of hallie jackson and nbc capitol hill reporter and producer frank thorpe. we're told mom, dad and roe are all doing great. a big congratulations to hallie, frank and roe from all of us at the "meet the press daily" team. chuck is back tomorrow with more "meet the press daily." and if it's wednesday, there's a new chuck toddcast ready to download. alex seitz-wald and i didn't yamiche alcindor. "the beat with ari melber" starts right now. hi, ari. >> hi, katy.
3:00 pm
we have a lot of news in our program. the president announcing he will address the nation this evening on the ongoing coronavirus outbreak. it is hitting pandemic levels. we'll get to what that means later this hour. also bernie sanders coming out defiant after losing several key states last night to joe biden. and later tonight, we go to queens to hear from voters on the democrats' now two-person race. biden's surge and how voters are viewing the economy. we have that brand new reporting, listening to voters, something we've tried to do throughout this high-stakes cycle. we begin with the latest on the coronavirus which today the world health organization is formally labeling for the first time a pandemic. the virus spreading to more than 100 countries. more than 120,000 people have been infected according to these accounts. 4300 now dead. tonight we are reporting more than 1100 coronavirus cases in the united states
200 Views
1 Favorite
IN COLLECTIONS
MSNBC WestUploaded by TV Archive on
![](http://athena.archive.org/0.gif?kind=track_js&track_js_case=control&cache_bust=1116480135)