these days is a lot of people have time to watch. you might otherwise be busy. former national security adviser to president obama, susan rice tweet thd ten minutes ago. nicolle wallace, please qualify. the pandemic crisis was not an intelligence failure. it is plainly a leadership failure. it is plainly the -- the intelligence community provided timely strategic and tactical warnings, you can't blame the intelligence community for trump's refusal to address this crisis promptly and effectively. thank you, susan rice for weighing in. thank you michael steele, claire mccaskill for spending time with us. most of all, thanks to you for letting us into your homes and watching the day's events with us. mtp daily with my colleague chuck todd starts right now. > ♪ ♪ ♪

welcome to thursday, it is "meet the press" daily. we're going to begin our tap dance when it comes to the briefing. i'm chuck todd, we'll continue the breaking news coverage of the coronavirus pandemic for this hour and then some. we're standing by for today's update from the white house coronavirus task force. the president is apparently going to also participate in this briefing. after he spoke to governors across the country about his new plan to contain the virus, which basically involves an attempt to split the united states into high risk and low risk areas. perhaps as a way to potentially get the people back to work. a number of questions are being raised about that strategy. it's not clear whether this is a serious proposal or it could be overtaken by events or this is actually the plan that somehow is going -- everyone in the country, including the president is trying to wrap their arms around what to do next as we all grapple with what will happen

next. let's take a minute to digest where we are right now. there's no better visual way to hammer home this daunting challenge of this moment than the graphic you're looking at on screen right now. the united states is about to have more cases than italy. we may be there already. but it is about to surpass italy, which is the current global epicenter of this outbreak. for many of us that's hard to grasp how suddenly we climbed this curve. go back into your wayback machine. 20 days ago they were -- the economy was still humming, breaking records at the stock market. president trump was complaining about having to let a cruise ship ashore which, ready for this, would have added 21 cases to the national total. he didn't want more cases. not only double the number of cases. now there are more than 75,000 across the country. more than a thousand people have

died. millions of people have lost their jobs. congress is passing the largest emergency relief bill in american history. this is all in the span of 20 days. new study from researchers in washington state which was the epicenter of the country not long ago, it's forecasting that 80,000 could die in the country over the next few months even if social distancing measures are obeyed. and there are plenty of reports suggesting that they are not. look at this. you look at how we've crossed the thousand barrier. it took us nine days to get to this number. some people look at it and think if that's all it is, it's good news. 80,000 is not that's all there is. that's a big number, folks. in other words, this is just the beginning of this national nightmare. hospitals in the areas hardest hit, especially new york, are being overwhelmed. some doctors and nurses say it's like working in a war zone. we'll talk to a doctor in one of the war zone in a minute. at elmhurst hospital, one doctor

described it as apocalyptic. mayor de blasio said they're in a race against time. we're weeks away from the peak by every model. the president sent a letter to all 50 governors and suggested that a national strategy would go county by county to determine if social distancing measures need to be tightened or relaxed. remains to be seen how feasible that is. are we going to have county border guards in certain states or how quickly it could be implemented. we still have not tested everybody in this country, let alone that many people in washington, d.c. it certainly seems as if the white house is trying to build some type of pal si, explanation, i guess, around the president's claims of an attempt to reopen the country by easter. we expect to hear more about this from the president and we hope from the expert as well when the white house briefing gets underway shortly. before we get to the briefing, i want to turn to doctors.

dr. stavros is a general surgeon in teaneck, new jersey, as you saw the other day, i brought the mayor of teaneck on. this is a hard hit area of the country. bergen county, northern new jersey. he operates in hospitals overwhelmed and chair of the new jersey doctor patient alliance. and dr. gupta is a pulmonologist and pandemics consultant, former air force officer and now an nbc medical contributor. let's start with you, doctor. you gave my colleague on the phone a firsthand account of just the situation. it's very hard obviously. we can't bring cameras to see this war zone. describe this war zone to us, sir. >> it's scary. it's scary. you know, i'm fortunately a general surgeon, not in the icu like my colleague is every day. but it's pretty scary. i have to do these mnl surgeries through the e.r. and you're

pretty -- it's startling to see the number, the sheer number of people in the e.r. they're having trouble breathing and they're there for a legitimate reason and you know the resources are hanging on by a thread. the one thing i do have to commend, my hospital at teaneck, should be the role model for the state as the way they're handling it. they've done a stellar job of turning entire floors, broke out windows, put up mega pressure vents and turns entire floors into negative pressure floors to house covid patients. the real crazy part and the sad part where i made the analogy to war with your colleague, when this whole thing started, i think we dropped the ball. the bomb has gone off on first responders and nurses and the doctors. i know one hospital is 34 people out, 30 have tested positive. that's our frontline. they were sent in to be told by everybody else in the cdc, the hospital administrators, you don't have to wear anything but

a mask, surgical mask in the room with a covid patient. >> turned out not to be true. >> we didn't learn it here. >> tell me the equipment situation at your hospital right now and the best that you understand. how soon do you expect to run out of this personal protection equipment where you are? >> i know that they're ongoing hunting, a lot of donations coming in. the biggest problem right now is we get a lot of leads that turn out to be not properly certified masks. there's multiple certifications, there's a lot of companies in china trying to sell masks here at 10 or 20 times the normal price. then they send an fda certificate that's fake. i've had hospitals actually, they go all the way down the road to try to purchase more. and there's just -- they find out at the last minute it's fake. i do know that it's really dire. they estimate a day or two.

but again, the hospital spokesman has to give an exact number. they're going through 1500 masks a day. the number changes. >> the state of ohio's public health experts i think they said just on masks -- 5 masks alone, one owe 95 masks alone. one 24-hour patient in ohio and the care for that patient ov over -- takes 13 and 95 masks. does that sound right to you, doctor? >> i think that's conservative. i will say that they've done great things of moving the iv poles out into the hallways so the nurses are putting one on and throwing it away every time they hang one. it's been inspiring. what i will say that no matter what it is, it's not going to be enough. not right now. right now we're hearing about stockpiles and millions of masks

coming out. i haven't seen any of them yet. we're at ground zero in new jersey. i haven't seen it. i haven't seen it come through yet. all i can say is beg and plead with our leaders in both d.c. and new jersey, get it to the hospitals on the front line now. >> this is why i wanted doctors on the frontline on the show today. dr. gupta, you just heard on the equipment front. there at ground zero, he's at ground zero, they're not seeing anything. is this -- obviously, we know this is an issue. it seems as if the federal government's got to be the person that procures and distributes, but it seems like that change is just a mess. >> thanks, chuck. you cited the research out of university of washington just before the segment. you know, you would think in most national security situations, we think about intel

briefs. my military crew we would think about intel briefs. what are the geopolitical threats that exist. that research is an intel brief. 81,000 deaths probably are going to occur by july unless we have heroic measures now. part of that -- part of the inflection point islet get ventilators where they need to be. to your point chuck, that means washington has to take control of this. we can't have states competing against each other and need something to be done with the defense production act. let's make it happen. don't make it a suggestion that companies should be potentially redirected to supply chains. we need them to do it and with intention with war-like capabilities. that's how we need to be approaching this. we're just fundamentally not doing that. i will say, if i may, this notion that we're going to do county by county -- >> i was about to ask you about this. you read my mind. go ahead. >> i think it's lunacy.

it's the exact messaging we don't need. we need -- the quickest off ramp and we all want to normalize our lives. there's not a certain american that enjoys this. the psychological impact is enormous on all of us. this notion that there's a quick way out is the wrong type of message to send to families, to americans, to providers. we need eight to ten weeks of a national lockdown, not a county by county approach. that's never going to get implemented. >> i want to play something that dr. fauci said at yesterday's briefing. i'm sorry that yesterday i didn't make a bigger deal of saying the following, which is sadly, the most important piece of information at the briefing was the last thing that viewers ended up hearing because they didn't let dr. fauci speak literally until minute 55. i'm going to play it again and dr. gupta, i want to get your reaction on the other side. here it is. >> would this possibly become a

seasonal cyclic thing? i've always indicated to you that i think it very well might. and the reason i say that is that what we're starting to see now in the southern hemisphere and southern africa and in the southern hemisphere countries is that we're having cases that are appearing as they go into their winter season. in fact, if they have a substantial outbreak, it will be inevitable that we need to be prepared that we'll get a cycle around the second time. >> this gets at obviously this mixed messaging. here's dr. fauci warning us, we're going to get hit a second time. there's probably going to be a second peak in the fall before we get this vaccine, dr. gupta. the question is, are we going to be prepared to both handle the ability to, i guess, scllow dow our social distancing but then come back and be able to fight this in six months.

what's your belief of how we prepare for what dr. fauci is warning is coming? >> i think he's spot-on. any public health expert of any regard is saying the exact same thing. this is not going to magically go away forever. he's exactly right. what we see with flu with that the southern hemisphere first has their seasonal affliction with flu and a few months later we get it. it gets cycled around the globe. so that's what we're definitely fearful about what we're seeing in the southern hemisphere. we need to be prepared, which means let's get a stockpile of ventilators and ppe up front while we're also thinking about therapeutics and vaccine development. we need to be doing these in parallel because yes, winter, we'll have a harsh reality. he's spot on. >> dr. chris tud yus. do you feel there's a best practices in this emergency

climate that your team there has been able to come up with in treating the most sick? >> we're still -- i mean, unfortunately, because of such a new virus, so much research is lacking trying to treat this is like trying to shoot a sniper rifle with the sights removed. we don't have the evidence necessary to treat adequately. right now new york city is one of -- people know about the italian and the french have the study. it's all kind of on the go learning and on the go research because we haven't had this virus to study in a lab under a microscope. unfortunately, it's happening real-time with real lives. it kind of puts a lot of onus on the medical profession now. people are scared. people are scared to practice. people are scared they'll get sued down the line because they don't know if it creates a side effect. one of the things i wanted to bring to light that really is a tragedy. a lot of the health care workers

when this first came out, they were told by the hospitals, you're not allowed to wear ppe except in a room where someone tested positive. the tests were lacking. you have somebody hacking up a lung, you know they're covid positive and administrators are telling nurses and doctors, you can't wear a mask into that room. not a protective mask. we we need whistle-blower protections. i'm being told by a hospital administrator i'm not allowed to protect myself. we need punishments for the administrators who are shortsighted who thinks it's easier to replace ppe than a nurse or a doctor. >> why did they -- i mean, i hate to say this. was that policy put in because they were trying to preserve masks? >> i've heard some pretty awful reasoning. one was because you're alarming other patients, some of them was because we need to keep our supply storage -- the really sick patients or the -- the

problem is that whatever your reasoning is, it's not more than important than safety of the frontline workers. if not because you actually care about them, but because you're going to need them working. what good is a ppe mask if there's no doctor or nurse to put it on. it's tragic when -- the poor nurses in particular. they're afraid to speak out. they've been threatened with their jobs. i know of a nurse outright dismissed because she said it's not fair that i can't protect myself on social media. this is america. we're better than this. you know, we need -- >> you've got a couple -- we've been trying to protect, i know, some of -- you've talked about there's other hospitals in the region that you're concerned about and how they're doing this. i appreciate you speaking out as much as you can. dr. gupta, before i sneak in a break here, we're still waiting on the task force, sadly, while we were speaking, the official count put america past italy.

we've seen -- italy has been at this peak for some time. it's been a -- appears to be just a disaster zone there for the last ten days. does this mean we just have six more weeks of what is just awful, awful recovery here? >> short answer chuck, yes. every modeler who has studied this says this is going to get worse before it gets better. it's going to continue to get worse if we do middle of the road approaches like county by county, determine whether or not you should be social distancing or not. so i am hopeful that we pursue a national lockdown so that the worst of it, maybe we can avoid. it's going to get worse every modeling study that looks as this says it's going to get worse. because we don't have enough icu capaci capacity. numbers will increase in terms of deaths in cases.

we should anticipate that. doctors, in teaneck new jersey, i appreciate your straight talk. hopefully important people in washington are watching. dr. gupta, i know you've agreed to stick around as we await this. so thank you both. here's a live look, by the way, at the white house where we expect to hear from some members of the coronavirus task force as well as the president. it will begin shortly. when that happens, we will bring it to you. also ahead, facing a crisis inside the nation's capital. how washington, d.c. is trying to curb the spread of the coronavirus. i'm going to talk with the mayor in washington, muriel bowser. that's next. i'm happy to give you the tour, i love doing it. hey jay. jay? charlotte! oh hi. he helped me set up my watch lists.

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welcome back. our nation's capital is reaching out directly to residents to urge social distancing. d.c. residents, including several of our own "meet the press" daily team received this message last night imploring people to stay home and announcing the closure of nonessential businesses through april 24th. thankfully our nbc news washington bureau is an essential building and we're going back and forth although practicing major social distancing. that is beyond president trump's easter target date to get the economy up and running. joining me is the mayor of washington, d.c. mayor bowser. nice to virtually see you. >> you as well, chuck. >> let me start with your order

last night and how would you describe it? is it a shelter in place, is it sort of similar to what new york city is doing or do you feel like you have one more -- one more arrow to shoot here if you feel it's necessary? >> well, chuck, we closed down all nonessential business in washington, d.c. this follows closing down bars and restaurants and theaters and arenas and our museums. and this follows us putting basically the entire d.c. government on telework except all of those who have to have face to face interactions to do essential work. so our bustling economy, restaurant sector, tourism sector has all been shut down in d.c. we're telling people to stay home unless they have essential work to go to. they need food or medicine. or they're just going out with their own families to get some

exercise. otherwise, they should be staying home. >> no religious services either, right? that's tough for a lot of people to hear. >> that's been tough. actually, that is some of our first advice regarded religious gatherings anyplace that had a mass gathering. we have a mass gathering order so no mass gatherings over ten. so we know a lot of people are staying in touch with their church and other organizations and schools via the internet and calling. we know that people want to stay connected to each other. but our message is clear. when we take this blunt effort and it's difficult, shut down economy across the country and thousands in washington, d.c. out of work. but we believe, as the experts say, it will get us to the other side much faster.

>> i was surprised to see that d.c. is only -- not even done 2,000 tests yet. obviously, there was the testing shortage at the beginning. but at this point you are really flying blind if we've -- if in washington, d.c. there's only been fewer than 2,000 tests even being given. is there any way to speed that up and get more into the pipeline here? >> well, certainly, just like every jurisdiction around the country, we saw that the early advice around testing and the lack of testing kits, i think, certainly testing has sped up in the nation's capital and all of the areas that surround us. we do continue to urge people to call their doctors and to be tested according to a doctor's advice. i think it's very important that we're sending people and we're using our precious medical staff and supplies for people whose tests would indicate a change in

how they were treated medically. >> i know you were on the call with the president with governors. in this case you were treated like a state. by congress you weren't treated like a state. we can get into that as well, but i first want to hear from you because we're about to hear from the president, we think. what did you take away from the president's call with governors today? >> well, my message to the president was we need him to fix what came out of the senate bill last night. and that was treating d.c. as a territory. as you know, d.c. is not a territory. in every way that in federal funding of all of our activities from education to housing to medicaid, any federal funding that we get, we're treated just like every -- >> i'll give you one more. we also have a presidential vote in d.c. puerto rico does not. not to sit here and say that's

another difference from a territory. >> that's a difference. but we also pay federal taxes. the territories do not. >> another big one. >> that's a big one. we pay more taxes than 22 state. we have populations larger than 22 state. we actually, as you know, are having positive tests in this region. >> madam mayor, i have to interrupt you. >> thanks chuck. >> your most famous constituent is there. thank you, madam mayor. here's the president and we'll fact check the best we can coming up. oh, boy. how the world has changed. how the world has changed, right? but it's going to end up being better than ever. i want to thank you very much for being here and i'd like to update you on the steps we're taking on our ongoing fight to defeat the virus this morning at 7:55. i spoke to the leaders of the g20. had a great meeting.

we had a lot of different ideas, lot of good ideas. we're working together. the leaders gathered virtually around the world to discuss the whole subject of the problem that right now 151 nations have got. we had president alberto fernandez of argentina, prime minister scott morrison of australia, president bolsonaro of brazil. prime minister justin trudeau of canada. president xi of china. president macron of france. chancellor angela merkel of germany. prime minister mody of india. the president of indonesia. prime minister of italy. prime minister shinzo abe of japan. congratulations on japan for

making a good decision on the olympics, make it next year, 2021. president andreas manuel lopez obrador of mexico. i want to thank the president of mexico for having done such a great job with respect to the military. we have 27,000 mexican soldiers on our southern border. very few people are getting through, i can tell you that. we got to keep it that way. we have a great relationship with mexico now. president putin of russia. king solomon of saudi arabia. president ram pose a of south africa. president moon of, as you know, a country that we spend a lot of time in. south korea. we're working very hard on that. prime minister sanchez of spain.

president erdogan of turkey. prime minister boris johnson of the united kingdom. president of the european commission, ursula vander lan. president of the european council -- united nations secretary antonio gutierrez. worl health organization director. world bank president david malpez and the international managing fund monitoring director. so that's a big group. but it's a great group. they were all there. every one of them. we talked about the problem and hopefully won't be a problem for too much longer. the united states is working with our friend and partners around the world to stop the spread of the virus and coordinate our efforts. we discussed how vitally

important it is for all of our nations to immediately share information and data and we've been doing that to a large extent but we'll do it even more so and to inform our, i guess you could say from each of us on the fight that we've got going one way or the other, it's a little bit different. but we're handling it in different ways. but there is great uniformity. it was a terrific meeting. you had 20 countries plus the other people that i mentioned. tremendous spirit to get this over with. after the meeting with the world leaders, i spoke with the governors of our 50 states and territories. our team has been in constant communication with the governors and we had a terrific meeting. somebody in the fake news said that one of the governors said oh, we need tom brady. i said he meant that in a positive way he said.

we need tom brady. we got to do great. he meant it positively. they took it differently. they think tom brady should be leading the effort. that's only fake news. i like tom brady. spoke to him the other day. he's a great guy. but i wish the news could be -- could be real. i wish it could be honest. i wish it weren't corrupt. but so much of it is. so sad o to see. just so sad to see. we had a great meeting. i'm sure you have tapes of the meeting. i'm sure you got tapes. see 50 governors plus. if you had tapes, you would see it was -- no contention. i would say virtually none. i would say maybe one person that was a little tiny bit of a raising of a voice, a little wise guy a little bit. but he's usually a big wise guy. that's how much anymore we saw

to it he wouldn't be any much anymore. a lot of folks in the back were there. it was a great meeting. took place at about 12:00. so we went from the g20 to the governors. we also spoke about the economic relief with the governors and the package that we're moving through congress to deliver much-needed financial assistance to hard working families and small businesses. i want to thank the democrats and republicans in the senate for unanimously passing the largest financial relief package in american history. 96-0. i have to say, it's the largest by far. i'm profoundly grateful that both parties came together to provide relief for american workers and families in this hour of need. the house of representatives must now pass this bill hopefully without delay. i think it's got tremendous

support. when you're at 96-0 and as you know, a couple of those people are quarantined and one, rand paul, he's actually got it. but he'll be better. he's been a great guy. he's been a great friend of mine, actually. the massive $2.2 trillion relief package includes job retention loans for small businesses with loan forgiveness available for businesses that keep their workers on the payroll. that's pretty good loan forgiveness. keep the workers on the payroll. that's pretty good. direct cash payments will be available to american citizens earning less than $99,000 per year. $3,400 for the typical family of four. expanded unemployment benefits. the average worker who has lost his or her job will receive 100% of their salary for up to four full months. these are things that, by the way, we have plenty more to go. but there are things that nobody

has ever had any package like this. i just want to thank them. hopefully it will get approved equally. easily in the house. really, i think it will go through pretty well from what i hear. virtually. could be one vote, one grant stander. for that, we'll have to come back and take a little more time, a little pass. it will just take a little longer. let's see if we have a grandstander. critical support for the hardest hit industries with a ban on corporate stock buy backs. tough new safeguards to prevent executive compensation abuse. over $100 billion for our amazing doctors, nurses and hospitals. $45 billion for the disaster relief fund, more than doubling the amount available. this is tremendous stuff. $27 billion for the coronavirus response, including $16 billion

to build up the strategic national stockpile with critical supplies, including masks, respirators and all sorts of pharmaceuticals. $3.5 billion to expand assistance to child care providers and child care benefits to health care workers, first responders and others on the frontlines of the crisis. and these are really brave, incredible people, i have to say. some of them are getting sick and some of them are getting very sick. and some of them don't even recover. they're incredible people. $1 billion for protection act procurement. we're using the act only when necessary. we use it as leverage. we generally don't have to use it to accomplish what we want to accomplish. as of today, fema has shipped over 9 million n95 masks. 20 million face masks, 3.1 million face shields, nearly

6,000 ventilators, 2.6 million gowns. 14.6 million gloves. and we're sending more every day and we've got tremendous amounts of equipment coming in. a lot of great companies are making equipment right now. the ventilators, obviously, they take a little longer to make. but we have a lot of companies making them. we're going to be in great shape. we took over an empty shelf. we took over a depleted place in a lot of ways. as you know, the testing is going very, very well. that was obsolete and broken and we fixed it. it's been going really good. i think very importantly the stockpile, we're really filling it up. we fill it up rapidly. but we get it out -- sometimes it's sent directly to the states instead. again, the state has to be doing this kind of a thing also. we're sort of a -- we look from behind a little bit and we look at how are they doing and if

they need help, we do it. it's their first responsibility. sometimes they just can't get it. but we load it up and we send it out. if we can, we have it sent directly to the state. we want it to go directly to the point where we want it. i can now announce something that i think is incredible what they've done in the navy. because the incredible naval hospital ship, the usns comfort which is incredible actually when you see it inside, will be underway to new york city on saturday. so it's going to be leaving on saturday rather than three weeks from now. they did the maintenance quickly and it was going to be there for quite a while longer than three or four weeks. it should be arriving, i told the governor, 20 minutes ago, governor cuomo, that the ship will be arriving new york harbor on monday. i think i'm going to go out and

i'll kiss it goodbye. i'll go to -- it's in virginia, as you know. i will go and we'll be waving together because i suspect the media will be following. john, are you going to be following? maybe. you never know. >> it's very important -- >> it's a great ship. a great vessel. if you want to go, i'll see you there. if you don't, that's okay. after being fully loaded with medical supplies, it's going to be -- it's loaded up to the top. it's over at the norfolk naval base. that's where it departs. it is expected then to -- we're saving about three to four weeks by the incredible work done by the navy. and i actually look forward to saturday to see it go. the ship will arrive and i believe it's going to get a little bit of a ceremony. there's something very beautiful about it. it's incredible piece of work. going to be landing at pier 90

in manhattan to provide hospital surge capacity for the new york metropolitan area. so it's a surge capacity. they may use it for this or may have other people coming in from hospitals unrelated to the virus. and then they use those hospitals on land. they'll use those hospitals for the virus. but we'll see how they do. they can do it either way. which ever one is best. it's set up for a regular hospital. they may take people out of hospitals and use those rooms for the virus. the national institute of health and the private sector working closely with the fda continue to collaborate to discover and test treatments and therapies that can effectively reduce the duration and symptoms of the virus and help, very much help people to recover. i'm firmly committed to bringing these treatments to market very quickly. we have a lot of tests going on

with regard to different medicines. and i hope we get lucky. i hope we hit a lot of talented scientists and doctors are working on therapeutics, a cure, vaccines. i think we're doing very well. tony may speak to that a little bit later. i think we're doing well with regard to the vaccines. i think we're doing well with regard to a lot of the things i just mentioned. we'll have to see what happens. we're going to know fairly soon about a lot of them. it's very advanced and the vaccines are very advanced prior to, as you know, fairly reasonably long test period. in that case, over a year. every american should be proud of the incredible spirit our country has brought to this effort. it's been incredible. citizens from all walks of life have come together to turn the tide in this battle. we're witnessing the extraordinary power of american unity like a lot of people have seen. even getting a vote.

you talk about trillions of dollars and you get a vote of 96-0. we're waging war on this virus using every financial scientific, medical, pharmaceutical and military resource to halt its spread and protect our citizens. i want to express our tremendous thanks to the american people for continuing to practice social distancing. like you people are practicing right here. i don't know. this room may never be the same. maintaining good hygiene and follow government guidelines. vice president pence lifts up that card every time. it's not very complicated. but hopefully you can do that. your commitment will make all the difference in the world and that's one of the big ones will be for a while, stay home. just relax, stay home. making a lot of progress. as we continue to gather more information and accelerate the

testing, where we're doing record numbers of tests now, far more than any other country has done. i told you yesterday, eight days here, because you heard so much about south korea, the media kept to themselves in south korea. we have a great relationship with president moon in south korea. but when i hear so much about south korea, so in eight days, in eight days we do more testing than they did in eight weeks. it's a highly sophisticated test. we'll be able to deploy more data-driven and targeted approaches to slow the ultimately, what's a devastating thing. we will vanquish this virus and a lot of progress has been made. that's why earlier today i sent a letter to america's governors describing how we'll be using the data to update existing guidance on social distancing, which will be developed in close

coordination with our nation's public health officials and scientists. because of the sacrifices of our great doctors and nurses and health care professionals, the brilliance of our scientists and researchers and the goodness and generosity of our people, i know that we will achieve victory and quickly return to the path of exceptional health, safety and prosperity for all of our citizens. we have to get back to work. our people want to work. they want to go back. they have to go back. we're going to be talking about dates. we're going to be talking with a lot of great professionals. but this is a country that was built on getting it done. our people want to go back to work. i'm hearing it loud and clear from everybody. we'll see what happens. we're going to have a lot more information early next week. we'll be reporting that back. but i just want to leave it with you. we have to go back.

this is the united states of america. they don't want to sit around and wait and they'll be practicing -- by the way, a lot of people misinterpreting when i say go back. they're going to be practicing as much as you can social distancing and washing your hands and not shaking hands and all of the things that we talk about so much. but they have to go back to work. our country has to go back. our country is based on that. i think it's going to happen pretty quickly. i think it's going to happen pretty quickly. a lot of progress has made but we got to go back to work. we may take sections of our country, may take large sections of our country that aren't so seriously affected and do it that way. we have to process pretty soon. we'll be talking to you more about that next week. and with that, if you have any questions, you can ask. then i'm going to have vice president stay behind and he's going to take questions and also

introduce some of the people. you can ask them some questions. >> mr. president? unemployment numbers have -- i take it not a surprise. >> not at all. >> but still a staggering number. your perspective on that. >> it's nobody's fault. certainly not in this country. nobody's fault. we got very lucky when we made a decision not to allow people in from china at an early date. i say that because some people don't want to accept it. but this was a great decision made by our country. the numbers that you're talking about, we're a big country. it would be far greater, far bigger. so when i heard the number, i heard it could be 6 million, could be 7 million. it's 3.3 or 3.2. but it's a lot of jobs. i think we'll come back very strong. the sooner we get back to work -- every day we stay out, it's harder to bring it back

very quickly. our people don't want to stay out. so i know those numbers, john. i think you'll see a fast turn around once we have a victory over the hidden enemy, as i say. it's a hidden enemy. sometimes a hidden enemy is a lot tougher than somebody that stares you in the face, right? so we'll see what happens. but i mean, they're fully expected numbers. >> the u.s. proposal to deploy some troops along the canadian border and why is that necessary? >> we have very strong deployments on the southern border as you know with mexico. we had some troops up in canada, but i'll find out about that. i guess it's equal justice to a certain extent. but in canada, we do have troops along the border. we have a lot of things coming in from canada. we have trades, an illegal trade

that we don't like. we have very strong sanctions on some. we have very strong tariffs on dumping steel. we don't like steel coming through our border that's been dumped in canada. so they can avoid the tariff. i charge a lot of tariff for the steel. it's been great for our steel companies because now they can really -- you look at what's happened with steel. it's incredible. we've taken in billions and billions of dollars in tariffs on steel. much of it comes in from china. they come from the canadian border too. we're always watching for that. >> the numbers correctly, the united states has surpassed china as the country with the highest number of virus cases. does this surprise you at all? >> no. i think it's attributed to our testing. you know, the number one be, you don't know what the numbers are in china. china tells you numbers. i'm speaking to president xi tonight, i believe. we'll have a big conversation, i'm sure. but you don't know.

what are the numbers? but i think it's attributed to the testing. we're testing tremendous numbers of people. every day, the way the system works, i want to thank especially roche has been fantastic. great company. they've done a tremendous amount. i was hearing before they've stepped up to the plate and done great. as have other of the companies. they're doing particularly well. we'll see what happens there. it's a tribute to the amount of testing we're doing. we're doing tremendous testing. i'm sure you're not able to tell what china is testing or not testing. i think that's a little hard. >> mr. president, on the 3.3 jobless claims, you suggested 6 to 7 million. a lot of the workers -- >> i didn't say that. i didn't say that. i said some people were projecting that it would be 6 or 7. i believe it's 3.3. >> 3.3. millions of americans out of work. some will be losing their insurance. what's your plan to make sure,

through no fault of your own, are you willing to plus up the subsidies in exchange, expand medicaid. what's being considered? >> the things i just read to you are being considered and other things are being considered. people are going to be getting big checks. and it's not their fault. what happened to them is not their fault. so we're doing -- we're doing a lot of different things on health insurance. we have meetings on it today. we're take caring of our people. this is not their fault what happened, and we're taking care. we're starting off by sending them very big checks. i think for a family of four it's about $3,000. and we're taking care of our people. we're taking care of our workers. this was not -- this was not a financial crisis. this was a health crisis, a medical crisis. we're going to take care of our people. please? >> the restaurant association came out -- >> restaurant. >> with a survey this morning saying that 3% of all restaurants in this country have

shuttered for good in the past three weeks. and the projection is that 11% more are going to close in the next 30 days. so what do you say to a restaurant owner who is looking at his sheets and thinks he has to close in next 30 days? >> i know the business very well. i understand the restaurant business. it's a very delicate busy. it's a busy that is not easy. in a restaurant business you can serve 30 great meals to a person or a family and they love it. one bad meal, number 31, they never come back again. it's a very tough business. but they're great people that run restaurants. and i've heard 3% could be lost but they'll all come back in one form or another. it might be a different restaurant. it's going to be a great business for a lot of people. and we're making it easy for people to -- look, what we're doing -- what we're doing in terms of loans, what we're doing

in terms of salaries, they'll all come back. it may not be the same restaurant. it may not be the same ownership, but they'll all be back. yes, sir, please? >> you mentioned pledges from american companies to provide supplies. as we top 81,000 cases in the u.s., does it make sense using the defense production act? >> i talked about the defense production act a lot. and i've -- you know, i've enacted it. i have it. i can do it with a pen. and we have actually used it on two minor occasions and then we could withdraw it. for the most part, the companies, we don't need it. we say we need this, and they say don't bother. we're dealing with ford, general motors, 3m, we're dealing with great companies. they want to do this. they want to do this. they're doing things that frankly that. >> don't need somebody to walk over there with a hammer and say do it. they are getting it done. making tremendous amounts of

equipment, tremendous amounts. and when this is over, we're going to be fully stockpiled, which they would have never been except for circumstances. this was something that nobody has ever thought could happen to this country. i'm not even blaming. look, we inherited a broken situation. but i don't totally blame the people that were before me and this administration. nobody would have ever thought a thing like this could have happened. but the production act, the defense production act is a wonderful thing. but i just haven't had to use it. they know it's activated. they know i can use it. maybe that frightens them a little bit. it's got tremendous power. but i haven't had to. please? >> thank you, sir. question from me and another question if you'll let me for some of my colleagues who are social distancing. >> where are they? they're all outside trying to get in. >> first question has to do with cruise liners like carnival. they want this relief aid, but they're worried because they offshored to places like panama,

liberia and might not qualify. senator holley said they should move back to the united states before they get a check. do you agree? should they pay u.s. taxes to get u.s. taxpayer relief? >> so i'm a big fan of senator holl holley, and i also like the idea. there were some senators that didn't want to do anything like carnival, a great company, but they're based in different places. i won't tell you why. i can tell you exactly where they're based, but i won't do that. but they're based in more than one places. ships are registered in different locations. i do like the concept of perhaps coming in and registering here, coming into the united states. you know, it's very tough to make a loan to a company when they're based in a different country. but with that being said, they have tho people that work there, and maybe almost as importantly, that work on shore filling these

ships with goods and products. and the cruise line business is very important. and i know carnival, what a great job they do. mickey arison, and i would think that we can stick with senator holley and look at that very closely. look, it's a great business. it's a business that employees tremendous number of people outside of the ship itself. i mean, you look at these ports. it's loaded up with shops and people that are involved with the ship. we're going to work very hard on the cruise line business, and we're going to try and work something out. but i like the concept. yeah, go ahead. >> thank you, senator. the senate bill includes a, this directly tied to the airlines. and since before the pandemic, boeing was already suffering from the losses of 737 max airplanes, do you think it's appropriate to use this legislation to sort of provide them with $17 billion of aid on

top of $25 billion when they could qualify for as a passenger airline another $4 billion they could qualify as a cargo airline? is that fair? >> so the airline business a very tough business over many years. it's been very, very tough. it's got everything. it's got labor. it's got very strong, powerful, you know, you look at the cost of these airliners. everything is tough, very highly technological. you look at how complicated, how complex. it's got unions. it's got everything. the airline business generally speaking, it's a very tough business. always been a very tough business. with that being said, we have to keep our airlines going. and we're going to be using some -- now maybe we'll take a piece of the airlines for the country, for our country where we loan money and we take a piece. we're all fully ready. we're ready to go. but if we didn't do that, we'd end up with no airlines, and we can't do that. the airline business is very vital to our country. it's a tough business. we have to understand that. i could tell you other

businesses that are different kinds of business. they're very good businesses. but airlines have always been very, very tough. please? >> mr. president -- >> three questions for you. >> i didn't call you. i called this just a moment. >> thank you. thanks a lot. >> who are you with? who are you with? >> i'm with bloomberg. mario -- >> how is michael? >> mr. president, on monday, did you speak with chinese president xi before you urged americans to not blame asian americans for the coronavirus? we noticed that you backed off that language. i know you're speaking with him. >> no, i'm speaking to him tonight. it's scheduled to go tonight. i'll have a call with president xi of china. a very good relationship. no. i didn't like when they came up -- and it wasn't him. somebody at a lower level, mid level we found out pretty much. but they made a statement that our soldiers brought it in to china. it came from china.

and, you know, we just signed a very big deal with china. they're paying us a lot of money in tariffs and other things. they never paid us 10 cents. china has taken advantage of the united states until i joe biden and bush and everybody else. i'm not blaming them. i'm blaming everybody. they were allowed to -- $500 billion a year they were taking out. we had trade deficits that were so large, nobody's ever seen anything like it. and we've changed it. look, now we're -- and billions of dollars. and we gave some to our farmers because china, you know, they targeted our farmers. and our farmers are very happy. and our farmers got through a very rough period because of what i was able to do. took the money from china and gave to it the farmers, and we had plenty left over after that. now we're going into a phase 2 negotiation with china. but we're getting 25% on $250

billion, and we're getting a lot money after that. so we've never had a deal with china that china took advantage of the united states. you know what? i don't blame china for that. i blame the people that were right here because they should have never allowed it to happen. but the relationship with china has been a very good one. john? >> mr. president, did president xi ask you to calm that language down or to not use it? >> he never asked me to calm it down. somebody might have spoken to somebody, but nobody spoke to member it. i think it was time, though, because, you know, i talk about the chinese virus, and i mean it. that's where it came from. if you look at ebola, if you look at lyme, lyme connecticut, you look at all these different horrible diseases, they seem to come a name with a location. and this was the chinese virus. but i don't have to say it if they feel so strongly about it. we'll see. but, you know we have we just

made a great deal with china. great hopefully for both parties. we made a great deal with china. we're going to do another one. they want to do it very badly. maybe they'll want to wait, like iran. they want to wait to see whether trump gets beaten in the election, because would they love to negligeotiate with bide. that would be their dream. some are waiting until after november 3rd, the election day. but i think we're doing very well. it would be sad if we blew all of the advantages that we have right now. because we've made unbelievable trade deals. whether it's mexico, canada, japan, south korea, china and others we have -- we have changed the whole thing around. please? >> mr. president, earlier today you sent a notification letter to the nation's governor saying you would l soon come out with new guidelines about social distancing and other items. do you have any