save new yorkers' lives. >> where are the ventilators? where are the gowns? where's the ppes? where's the masks? fema said we're sending 400 ventilators. really? what will i do with 400 ventilators when i need 30,000? you pick the 26,000 people who are going to die because you ♪ only sent 400 ventilators. hi, everyone. it is 4:00 in the east which is you have 20 thousand dollars now home to the highest attack ve ventilators in the stockpile. rate in the country when it release the ventilators to new comes to coronavirus infection york. how can we be in a situation rates. where you can have new yorkers that's startling designation made last night by dr. debbie possibly dying because they can't get a ventilator but a birx, a member of the federal agency saying, i'm going coronavirus task force. >> the metro area of new jersey, to leave the ventilators in the new york and parts of long stockpile? i mean, have we really come to island have an attack rate close that point? to 1 in 1,000. >> one of the most stinging this is five times what the other areas are seeing. rebukes yet of the federal so to all of my friends and government's response from a leader on the front lines and as colleagues in new york, this is

the group that needs to new york struggles under the weight of the most coronavirus absolutely social distance and cases in the country, the numbers of cases nationwide and self isolate at this time. the alarming global spread have >> today new york's governor led to the postponement today of andrew cuomo at a press the summer olympics. conference of a convention japanese prime minister shinzo abe saying in a statement this center turned field them to morning, quote, in order to ensure that athletes from all over the world are able to compete in their best condition, and also, in order to ensure the utmost safety of the spectators i have asked the international olympic committee to consider postponing the games by about a year. the news a blow to athletes who spent a laf time preparing and another blow to the american psyche and sports lovers everywhere. it is another beloved tradition up edmontoned by the global pandemic. the headlines against the president agitating for an end to our best weapon against the virus, social distancing. donald trump extremely eager to trade off public health for a

return to economic activity. a tradeoff that none of his health or science advisers has recommended, at least not publicly. reiterating in a virtual town hall today the so-called cure is worse than the problem. and stressing that he'd like to get businesses back up and running by easter sunday. that's less than three weeks away. >> i don't want the cure to be worse than the problem. look. you're going to lose a number of people to the flu but you're going to lose more people by putting a country into a massive recession or depression. you will lose people. you will have suicides by the thousands. you are going to have all sorts of things happen. you're going to have instability. i'd love to have it open by easter. >> oh wow. >> i will tell you that right now. i would love to have that -- such an important day for other reasons but i'll make it an important day for this, too. i would love to have the country opened up and just raring to go

by easter. >> and this afternoon nbc news reporting that that easter sunday target is something trump has already discussed with officials behind the scenes and he'd like the process of remobilizing the country to begin even sooner than that. alsoings bursting into public view far second day in a row, growing frustration with dr. anthony fauci on the part of the president a. piece in today's "the new york times" has us on fauci watch reporting that donald trump is losing the patience with one of the nation's most trusted health officials. jonning us we start with candidate and the former vice president of this country, joe biden. mr. vice president, first of all, how are you doing? where are you? and what is it like to be a candidate in the time of social distancing? >> well, i'm doing fine, thank you, nicolle. better than a lot of americans are. i've been listening to the scientists. we have been social distancing.

i'm in my home in wilmington, delaware. and i think being a candidate now is less about being a candidate and winning or losing an election than it is about getting this straight. we have been through something like this in the obama/biden administration. a pandemic, coronavirus is another pandemic. but it's here at home. we dealt with it in africa and kept it from coming here but it's -- it is frustrating. >> mr. vice president, donald trump making some news last night at the coronavirus briefings and i want to get your take on the briefings just as a means of communicating with a very scared public but i want to ask you what you make of his easter sunday target for reopening the government. do you agree with that? >> i would like to open the government tomorrow if it were possible. let's be realistic.

this curve is going up and up and up because we did not act when we should have acted. some of us call for as far back as january 17th when we knew the virus was on the rise worldwide and it just seems to me bizarre. we have to focus on people's health. listen to the scientists. listen to fauci. listen to others. listen to the woman you just had on, former director laying out social distancing. keep it that way. look. if you want to ruin the economy for a long, long, long time let's go ahead and see this thing continue by having it burst out again and so we haven't even flattened the curve out. i know you know this. i apologize but it's frustrating to hear this president speak. he should stop talking. let the experts speak. >> you know, there is some indication that his approval rating after being way down when this crisis burst into public

view has it canned up. >> he's president of the united states of america and i'd like to see him do better. i would like to increase my prooufl rating of him. this is beyond politics, a survival of people in this country. this is about how we spare this nation from a potential disaster. we can deal with the economy. when the way to deal with the economy is now take care of those people in desperate need now so they don't lose their job, so they don't lose their paycheck and their homes, don't get kicked out of the apartment, to pay the student debt, we can do that now. that's what the congress is working on now but for lord's sake, listen to the medical health experts. listen to them. listen. >> can i ask you just to speak to the desperation? i think people feel like the things that the president's saying, i misspoke earlier, he is talking of turning the

government back on. i think governor cuomo is a hero on the front lines. >> he is. >> made a passionate plea and desperation in the call for respirators. what do you think about the fact he's not sure he has them for sick new yorkers? >> i think he is doing a hell of a job. i think he's been the lead horse here. i've talked to him frequently. he is a friend. i think he's doing a great job. i really mean it. i genuinely mean that. in addition to that, i called far while ago for the implementation of the defense product acti. that's an act the ability to go to corporate america and say, stop manufacturing what you're manufacturing now and manufacture this. and he signed it but he said he wasn't going to implement it. there is an a great line that lincoln had when general mccle

nan said. if you don't want to use the army can you lend it to me? if he is not going to i.c.use i lend it to somebody else. you're a wartime president? act like that. we cannot waste anymore time. >> you know, i'm reading to my 8-year-old of lincoln in the time of no school but i want to ask you about that. a hallmark not just as a politician running for president in this year but president obama's vice president was your ability to connect. how are you able to do that? how are you able to stay connected to people during this period of mandated social distancing? >> well, what i'm trying to do is become much more facile to use social networking here. i'm in the basement -- >> me, too. >> i'm in the basement of my

home and -- you know what i'm talking about. for example, when i -- >> i do. >> i laid out in detail a plan i thought we should be implementing a couple days ago and didn't get that much coverage on national coverage but they tell me over i think 3.5 million people watched it online. and so, i'm learning how to deal with the vehicles that are available to get news out and get -- communicate with people. look. think about this. i am so -- sounds corny. i'm so proud to be an american right now. look at the way the nation is responding, ordinary people reach out. look at the doctors and first responders. i was talking to the firefighters. these folks are risking their lives. they're not -- i talked about we had a discussion announcing saying we had to restore the soul of this country. stop appealing to prejudice and the like. none of the folks, none of the docs are saying by the way, you're black, white, chinese,

you're this, you're that. they're just doing it. they o they're on the phone. we did the biden cancer initiative after the cancer moon shot and put together a board of really significant people including nobel laureates and she got a call from a person on the board saying, jill, are you able to -- we have a lot of people who are cancer patients who are isolated, alone, frightened. can you organize calling them on a regular basis, get people to email them? they're having some psychological problems in life. people are reaching out, they're moving. another example, my -- i got a call from a guy who's a great, great friend. used to work for me. franny parsons and his wife, has three beautiful young daughters. i think the oldest is now 11 and they got a call from their

kindergarten teacher saying i will be driving through the neighborhood. be in the driveway to wave and say hihr hours to drive through the neighborhoods. we have never, never, never failed to respond to a crisis as a people. i'm so darn proud and the poor people who have -- lost -- anyway -- it's just -- my heart goes out to them. >> we're two people in the basements with nothing but time. tell me what you would do if you were president. obviously in november, people will have to make a choice about who leads this country. what would you do that isn't being done? >> well, if i were president now, in november, if i'm elected god willing, i may inherit a different circumstance. depends on how this is handled.

>> absolutely. >> way back in january 17th i wrote a piece, maybe the 15th. i wrote a piece for "usa today" saying that, you know, a pandemic is coming. we have to be better prepared. we should have been in a position, i called for a while ago. i would enforce, enforce the defense production act. i would be surging equipment and personnel. i would be moving in a direction where we had the united states military which i call for several weeks ago building hospitals like finally happening in the national guard helping in new york with, you know, at the javitz center. we have this capacity. most of all, i would be protecting our docs, nurses and first responders because if we lose them we are in real, real trouble. we should be making those masks, moving on those ventilators.

we can do that. why doesn't he just act like a president? that's a stupid way to say that but i really -- >> donald trump was asked on -- >> sorry. >> go ahead. >> no. no. probably best i don't. >> all right. let me ask you this. donald trump was asked at the coronavirus task force briefing sunday night if he reached out to his predecessors. when i worked for george w. bush he reached out. one was real easy, his dad and former president clinton after the tragic, tragic natural disaster of the tsunami. he said, no, i didn't reach out to president obama or president bush or any of the formers because there's nothing he can teach me. if he called you, what would you advise him to do? >> i laid out a 14-point plan. and i said -- i meant it. mr. president, this virus is not your fault but these are my

recommendations. please, please take a look at them. use them. i would give him honest to god advice about what needs to be done. we have been through something like this before. we have an idea what it takes. by the way, you may remember because the last administration when we took office we were dealing with a circumstance where there was a financial crisis and a collapse and, you know, we put together a $900 billion plan to help us get through it and we did get through it. the president put me in charge of it. what i realize is it required to deal with it every day, every minute. t i talked to hundreds of governors, mayors and local officials to say this is how to use it. this is what we should do. the federal government should be surging capacity on a day-to-day, minute to minute basis to help the governors. by the way, from's a lot of good republican governors out there doing the same thing. you have guys like, you know,

dewine in ohio, a lot of people stepping up. we have to -- the federal government, the federal government has to lead this. >> mr. vice president, what do you say about the reporting in "the new york times" and it's been reported at a local level for as long as this virus has been something that people have been anxious about, that's discrimination against asian americans. donald trump i think tried to put something back in the tube yesterday but saying he wouldn't tolerate discrimination but that was after weeks and weeks and weeks of calling coronavirus the chinese virus. >> well, i -- no matter how he got there, i'm glad he finally got there. it was long overdue to say he won't put up the xenophobia. strange coming from him but i'm happy he did it. happy he did it. the irony is you may recall in

the beginning when this started there were folks like me and others calling for him to make sure that he contacts xi, get engaged and send people to -- our experts to china to find out at the source what was happening. there was a federal employee that worked for the president in china to watch this. and either got fired or quit. not sure how it happened. at the time he was out there praising how things were going. china was doing all these wonderful things and everything was going on but we didn't know what was happening precisely and now all of a sudden he is being tough on china. he is making sure -- now he is being soft on his xenophobia in the past so i just -- i just can't figure the guy. i don't know. like watching a yo-yo. i shouldn't have said it that way. >> i want to -- that's okay. i want to ask you what happens to the democratic primary.

bernie sanders is still in the race. you're ahead in the delegate count. what happens to the democratic nominating contest. well, we'll see. i think there's -- looks light we will have a contest in wisconsin. we are still able to run these contests by keeping the social distance and washing down machines and the like. but also, there's a great move toward voting by mail. and i think that's going to increase and so we'll see. i mean, you know, i was asked all along, so and so get out of the race? as i said from the beginning, that's not for me to decide. i'll continue to make the case why i think i could be president and should be president now and make the case for it. its it's in a sense putting all politics aside. >> right. >> people are frightened,

concerned. so many people don't know what to believe when they turn on the television and hear the briefings and really important that folks like you -- not being solicitous but a lot of you are the only rational voices out there getting the news to people in a way that is unvarnished, not, you know, sugar coating anything and the idea the president wants to -- i would like to get the economy going up tomorrow but the idea that he's going to move in that direction, thinks that can be done by easter? that would be a real resurrection if that could happen. >> tell me what you have to say to people who are anywhere on the spectrum from scared to desperate to unemployed to home alone with children to try to teach while doing their jobs. what do you have to say to every american who's to some degree scared? >> they're scared but i've never

been more proud to be an american. ordinary people doing extraordinary things for their community, for their neighbors, for people down the street, for everyone out there. they're scared yet they're united. the american people have been through some really, really tough times. they have never, ever, ever, ever failed their country. and they deserve the straightforward truth, number one. number two, they deserve economic assistance now. this instant. this instant. so that they can pay their mortgage, they can keep the -- if they're still having heat on in the homes make sure that they're in a position that they can pay their bills, that they can -- and students. look. we just went through the people got hurt most in the economic recovery last time were the millennial generation. they inherited this incredible debt that they had as a

consequence of student loans. we should be forgiving $10,000 minimum in student loan debt for the folks up to their ears in debt right now. we can afford to do it. keep small businesses alive, moving, so that when we do flatten the curve and people go back to work full-time we can pick up where we left off and go beyond. we have never come out of a crisis without coming out better than we went into it. my heart goes out, nicolle to those people that lost a son or daughter, a mom or dad, wife or husband. the isolation, it's -- it really -- god. they're incredible. god, they're incredible. >> they are. joe biden, just a guy in his basement talking to a gal in hers. thank you for spending sometime with us. we're very grateful. >> thank you. any time. really.

any time at all. thank you very much. >> thank you. >> really pleased to -- >> open invitation. thank you. >> all right. thank you so much. >> thank you, sir. thank you for spending so much time with us. thank you. when we come back, our favorite reporters and friends weigh in and the rebuke by new york's governor for the federal response. also ahead, the price of disinformation n. a time of choosing for fox news. "the new york times" ben smith and our friend join us for that conversation and the olympics as we just reported are just the latest sporting event wiped out by the coronavirus. we'll talk about the psychological and economic impact of a world without sports. stay with us. life isn't a straight line.

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president trump saying he wants to reopen the country but he is talking about weeks, not months, so everyone is wondering, is that realistic? >> yeah, michael. i think everyone shares his frustration and hope and what he needs to do is avoid second waves and re-infections. we have paid a very heavy cost in our economy and lives to lose the benefit of it at that point by not sticking to our guns is a devastating decision. >> that was donald trump's own former homeland security adviser saying opening the country back in the couple weeks is a devastating decision, joining a chorus of allies who say the decision would overrun hospitals, prolong the public health crisis and ultimately lead to even worse economic consequences. we are living in strange times

when graham and cheney find themselves on the same page as joe biden. my guest before the commercial break. joining our conversation, dr. patel, a treating physician who worked on the h1n1 response and phil rucker and correspondent heidi pryzbela. this news bombshell last night that the attack rate in new york was much higher than everywhere else startles not just new yorkers but anyone there with a family member there. can you explain what that meant? >> yeah, sure. just to be clear, it is not going to be limited to new york if we actually have kind of heed what the president is suggesting and stop this kind of stay at home and social distancing in a malt matter of weeks. we are learning more and more about the virus and one thing we

know is it is more sticky than ever expected and that means that new yorkers who are by nature used to being in crowded spaces, using public transportation, et cetera, are much more exposed and another part of that exposure is health workers themselves. we know from other countries that i am actually -- when i'm not able to get protective equipment, which i'm not, we are passing this along unintentionally. this is just, you know, the canary in the coal mine if we don't take it seriously. >> uh-huh. speaking of that, doctor, let me ask you about what feels like -- jonathan swan reported yesterday there's a guaranteed collision coming between donald trump and his desire to turn back on the economy and the public health and scientists who advise him about the time at which we turn the economy back on and get people out of their homes. what's your take on that debate and that divide?

>> absolutely. you know, this was something certainly we did not have anything of this magnitude around during president obama's time but we were all planning for something like this and here's the facts. having even just an extra two weeks would even help us. that's .04% of an average american's lifetime could prevent a roller coaster effect where if we think that resuming the economy will make this not go away we are wrong and we could experience an even -- imagine the volatility if we see a resurgence and remember this virus is not attacking the country evenly. we are already seeing concerning hot spots in new orleans, florida, parts of texas, my home state. we are not going to just be out of this in several weeks. >> phil rucker, where does the president sort of digging in around his desire to get the

economy back on, where are the pressure points with the other advisers, people on the other side of that equation? when you see liz cheney and tom bossert take to the public air waves, it's clear they don't have a back channel to the president anymore. >> well, the president's phone is lit up for several days now according to our reporting, hearing from business leaders, from some of his allies and friends. ro remember, he is hearing from executives of hospitality encouraging him to do whatever it takes to get the economy turned back on that so many lives will be destroyed if people stay home and unemployment goes up and feeling concern of political fortunes. he knows that the economy is his key to re-election. the election's coming up in november. he wants to try to do what he can to stave off complete calamity on the economy and there's tension emerging inside that task force, inside the

white house, right now between the scientist dr. fauci, dr. birx who are recommending that's not wise and scientific consensus is that we need more time of social distancing, stricter measures and continue for sometime not only to mitigate the current crisis but prevent additional outbreak or recurrence. >> phil rucker, what does your reporting say about the president's sort of counsel? is he gets feedback from communications advisers who admonish him after the briefings turn into essentially maga rallies at the q&a? is he gets attaboys with an uptick in the approval ratings? >> you know, it is a bit of a mix. remember, you don't last long in his employ if you don't give enough attaboys from time to

time. clearly the staff around him encouraging him and praising the performances. that being said, a lot of what we are seeing in the briefings is not scripted moments and has a prepared text that he'll read at the beginning of the speech and last week we saw on twitter that he crossed out coronavirus and wrote in chinese virus but he largely sticks to that script but when the questions begin he engages on any number of topics without a lot of scripted comments or forethought that his advisers can influence. >> heidi, "the new york times" has the story that almost always see about any trump adviser who thinks for themselves and speaks their mind from time to time. i think don mcgahn is another one put in that category and today's reporting on dr. anthony fauci. what is the state of donald trump's relationship with the nation's top infectious disease

expert? >> we are hurtling towards a confrontation because fauci hasn't been seen much since over the weekend. he contradicted trump about some of his statements on some of the medications that are under trial right now. and he is directly in contrast to what dr. fauci is saying about the feed for all of us to continue social distancing and very strictly so for at least another few weeks in order to keep this under control. that is actually why you're now starting to see members of congress in the president's own party speak out, as well, because the whole purpose of this massive stimulus proposal is to give our nation time to be healthy, time to adhere to what the health experts are telling us needs to be done so we're not sick and grandpa and grandma don't get sick and you saw liz cheney say the risk is not just

to us, it is to the entire medical infrastructure in this nation that if our doctors and nurses, as well, become overwhelmed and they themselves get sick, as well, the whole system collapses. so this is serious. this is why we see the governor come out today and speak in the very dire terms. and that underscores the second problem that i don't think is appreciated at this point which is that even when this stimulus passes, we are expecting it to pass, the stock market will rally, most likely, but here's the problem. cuomo told us today they don't have the supply. where do you buy supplies that don't exist? he has said that he's exhausted all of their options on the open market and he needs now the president to do two things, to release ventilators from the national stockpile and to enact the dpa to direct companies so that supply is meeting demand

because what we are seeing at the briefings is a lot of big numbers that sound impressive with no context about whether those numbers meet what the experts tell us is needed based on modeling in terms of the pandemic and how it is likely to spread and to which areas first where we will have the apexes and that all needs to be coordinated. i interviewed the head of the ama saying the president and the administration, they need to be the ones to coordinate this. >> it's unbelievable. heidi, phil, doctor, thank you so much for spending time with us. we are grateful. after the break, inside conservative media today, a blame game. after down playing concern over the rapidly spreading coronavirus, current and former fox news employees talking to "the new york times" about where it all went wrong. ♪ limu emu & doug

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from the earliest days of the pandemic up to this afternoon fox news and donald trump have appeared to be in lockstep from initially down playing concerns to now insisting, quote, the cure can't be worse than the disease. there's rarely been daylight between their messaging. now both sides are facing criticism over how they've handled the ongoing crisis. ben smith writes in "new york times," quote, there are a lot of theories about what went wrong at fox, that the network's dug in hostility of climate

science spilled over to medicine or that its executives cared about ratings above all else but interviews with current and former fox staff members paint a different picture. the network is enthralled with the president and largely beyond the control of the family that owns it. joining our conversation, "the new york times" media columnist that wrote that story ben smith and former assistant director of counter intelligence at the fbi frank faglusi. ben, your reporting is incredible on this topic. take me through all of it. >> there's been a number of different tones on fox as the crisis progressed and it began actually with tucker carlson, sean hannity treating it sear sli but -- seriously but in february they went into attacks on the media which was the president's own position and i think sort of

missed the underlying story, the political story, the media story, pushed the actual story of a virus and a pandemic to the side so, you know, when hannity says this is the latest hoax, i don't think he thinks the virus is a hoax. he thinks that the media coverage transcended what's happening to people on the ground and for a few weeks in there really basic down playing what is obviously become a massive health crisis. >> ben, so you paint this vivid picture of susan scott, a fox executive, very senior, does she run fox news now? >> she is the ceo. >> at a time when -- at a time when trish regan still in their employ who was so even over the line for fox news that she's been taken off the air. talk about that. >> yeah. there is a real sense of what the executives control and don't

control and scott disinfecting the place does not control the talent and going out there for a totally opposite message at times, you know, a really casual message about that this isn't any worse than the flu and not too much to worry about while the boss is freaking out about it. i learned after publishing the story and ran another story that rupert murdoch canceled the birthday party worried about the coronavirus as the hosts on the air saying this wasn't the kind of crisis that it's obviously become. >> you know, frank, i have a million thoughts. i could have spent the whole hour on this story because anyone who knows and loves devoted fans of fox news worries about the quality of some of the information they get and all tv, all of us have viewers that are in these extra at risk categories and think about the stories we have covered and

talked about over three years, disinformation out rodriguuss, disinformation about his own law enforcement or james comey or jeff sessions. they all seem a lot less, terrifying at the time but seem less dangerous today when you look at the president and the favorite cable news network maybe not huing to the same kinds of facts that public health officials and scientists are. >> you know, it is interesting that we have become so attuned as you said to external disinformation, disinformation from outside sources like russia and now more than ever before we have to be attuned to disinformation from within and that means outlets like fox news. carl marx was famously wrote that religion was the opiate of the masses. marx was wrong because he never met fox news. if he's met fox news he would have said that that kind of outlet, that kind of dangerously

mutually dependent relationship between the state and media outlet is the opiate of the people. we are entering a period where the president tries to p perpetuate this notion of opening the economy without major damage and needs a media outlet to perpetuate that fraud on us and the unpleasant notion what some people more than ever before will have to die and sacrifice the elderly in light of saving the economy. we heard it yesterday on fox news interviewing the lieutenant governor of texas, dan patrick, who actually said, some of the elderly will be willing to die and need to die to save the economy. if we are headed in that direction, the president needs more than ever before a supportive media outlet that can spill that nonsense out to us and we have got to keep demanding medical expertise and the truth. i'll tell you. a quick story of an old soviet defector. the fbi agent trying to help the

defector acclimate to u.s. society and stopped in traffic for an hour. they see rescue lights flashing, a helicopter landing, the soviet defector turns to the agent saying, why are we sitting in traffic for an hour? what is this about? the fbi agent says, we are trying to save the life of someone who's been in an accident. and the defector says that would never happen in the soviet union to inconvenience thousands to save one life. but that's exactly what we may be asked to do and fox news is going to have to play a role in convincing us of that. >> you know, ben smith, frank makes such a great point and fiona hill, anyone that watching the impeachment hearings, sowned the alarms of not participating in disinformation campaigns. she was talking about russia. is anyone in the murdoch family or fox news concerned about the idea that they're not putting out facts all the time on their

air? >> you know, that was actually to me the most remarkable part of this story. i called the folks at fox to ask what happened there? it was a disaster. who's in charge? the answer seems to be nobody. rupert murdoch is 89. i think he is in pretty good shape. he was ceo of fox. doesn't seem to have the -- just to run the network. >> i apologize on behalf of the guests for our technical challenges. frank, let me give you the last word on whether there should and an extraordinary time of a global pandemic that threatens all americans with illness and many americans with something far more grave, should there be sort of a reality check, a reckoning, an intervention at fox news? >> well, the question is who would do that intervention?

i think their own viewers and sponsors. this comes down to money. sacrificing lives for wall street, this is about money and fox will respond to that so if there's a concerted effort to get to their sponsors and sponsors to tell fox, we are off this show if you don't get to the truth about the medical planni planning and strategy needed to get the economy back open, we are out of here. we need that more than ever. >> ben smith, i am fascinated by your reporting. i'd love to have you back to talk about it more. frank, thank you, my friend. if you didn't get enough of frank here, catch more of him on the smithsonian channel "spy wars." after the break, opening day of major league baseball was supposed to be thursday but it's been postponed. how the virus is affecting the world of sports, next. life isn't a straight line.

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durant and marcus smart among them. joining our conversation, "new york daily news" sports columnist, mike lupica. i've wanted to talk to you about so many things, but today it's a belated start on our part, but the end of sports at a time when we need it most really probably has one of the biggest psychological impacts on people who are at home during this time. >> yeah, nicole, nothing quite like this has ever happened in my career. we lost sports for, what, a week or ten days after 9/11. this is quite different. i wrote a column that's up today for the "new york daily news." the olympics are still the main event. and the olympics were not scheduled to start for four more months. and they got pushed back a year today. and i keep hearing people say, the sports calendar, the sports calendar. there is no sports calendar. i talked to bob costas about this. he did 11 prime-time olympics for nbc and did another one in late-night. and he said, people keep saying

that things are going to be back to normal and he said, tell me what normal is. and it's amazing that it took this long to cancel the olympics, because as costas said, over 10,000 athletes, delegations, media, throw them together for like wrestling, basketball, have them live together in the olympic village, and then send them back home to where every single country has a varying health care process, and what bad could come out of that? everything. and so, the point of this column is, people keep saying, well, the nba may come back in the summer. and the nfl will be all right in the fall. nicole, if the olympics can go, anything can go. and nobody has any way of knowing when it will be safe for these people to be back on the field again. >> and i am imagine it's not just the players, and a lot of them have the means to actually be spending time doing great philanthropic things. i follow a lot of basketball players and baseball players and

they've -- some of them have used this time to reach out, but all of the people who are supported by the businesses behind baseball and basketball, all of the people who work at stadiums, all of the people who sell merchandise. all of the people who work at television networks that cover them, just talk about the broader economic impact. >> yeah, i mean, i think the sports, by and large, have been pretty good taking care of arena workers and stadium workers. will that mitigate what they would have made if the season went on? i don't know. kevin love was the first athlete i know of to step up. he's with the cleveland cavaliers now, and donated $100,000 to arena workers in cleveland. and now a lot of owners have done that. but i was also thinking about charity, too. i mean, the pga tour has given up billions of dollars in charity. and the longer this goes, those charities are going to be affected, too. and so it's not -- as james patterson said the other day, it's not just like we had our

toys taken away. it's more profound than that. and again, even during world war ii, they played baseball. the olympics were only canceled three times that i know of, for world wars. but this is different. and anybody who tells you they have a reasonable idea about when sports is going to come back, they're just blowing smoke, nicole. >> but we can all hope and pray, right? because a world without sports is very different. mike lupica, we need to pick up this conversation again another day this week. it's a treat to get to see you. >> it's always great to talk to you. >> we are going to techniqsneak break. we will be right back. and save in more ways than one.

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coming up in the next hour here, a white house coronavirus task force briefing. now, the white house hasn't told us exactly who will be in today's lineup, but we're watching and waiting to see if dr. anthony fauci will be there, as his clash with the president continues to spill out into the open. fauci was notably not present at today's fox town hall or the last white house coronavirus briefing. trump claimed he wasn't invited today because they weren't addressing matters that fauci was best on. fauci's specialty, warrants noting, is stemming the spread of infectious disease. hmm. that does it for this hour. "mtp daily" with my colleague chuck todd starts right now.

welcome to tuesday. it is "meet the press daily" and good evening. inam chuck todd, continuing msnbc's special coverage of the coronavirus pandemic. at this hour, we are waiting an update from the white house's coronavirus task force, which is scheduled to start in roughly 40 minutes. we weren't sure we were going to get a briefing from the task force because of the president's town hall, but apparently we are now. it will be interesting to see if the president himself participates. we have not seen the seal, so that tells us maybe not. we'll keep a close eye on that, for what nicole mentioned, we want to see if dr. fauci is there, because we expect the medical experts to be pressed on president trump's assessment ratherti