n95 masks than we would during a typical year. over a matter of a couple of weeks, we had more masks than we would do in a year. think of that, over a couple of weeks. moreover, we're bringing supply chains back home and we've learned a lot about supply chains. we've learned are that it's nice to make things in the u.s. i said that a long time. one of the reasons i ran for office, we started making things everywhere but here. if one thing comes out of this, more than anything else, it's that we should make product in the united states. and these supply chains, they sound wonderful. but if one country has a problem, the whole chain is ruined. i've been saying did for a long time. i ran partially on that. i ran partially on that. i ran strongly against china, and then we made a great trade deal where they buy

$250 billion, they're supposed to. they're paying tariffs. they paid us tens of billions of dollars. i've given $12.01 year, $16 billion another year, $19 billion to our farmers and ranchers who were targeted. i ran on china and other countries the way they were ripping us off. they were ripping off our country. china understood that. china fully understood that. they're big, strong, smart people. i wasn't friendly and it wasn't a friendly situation. we ended up making an incredible deal with china for tens of billions of dollars of product, $40 billion to $50 billion of products to the farmers. the most they spent was $15 billion to $16 billion, now they're supposed to spend close to $40 billion.

now the virus came along. i'm not happy. i let them know i'm not happy. we had a great relationship. we had a bad relationship then we had a great relationship because we made a good deal. but we're not happy, this is not a good thing that happened, came out of china. we're not in a position where we're going to say much yet, but the deal itself is great. the deal is going to put many, many people to work in our country. all of that has to be taken into account when you look at all of the people that are dying in our country burks all over the world. all over the world people are dying. i had a g7 call and their economies are in tatters. they're shattered, the g7 countries, japan and germany and france, the different countries. italy, look at what happened to italy. look at what happened to these countries. look at what happened to spain.

look what happened to spain, how incredible. it's just been shattered. and so many other countries are shattered. so, nobody ever thought this could have happened, a thing like this. it's very, very sad. but if we've learned something, it's about supply chains. i just saw yesterday where the auto industry gets back, they have a problem because the supply chain going through a different country. this has been going on for years, for decades. i always said it was no good. why do you need a supply chain? very simple, make your parts here. they get one part from this country, one part from that country. it's all over the place. the problem is if one country has a problem, you have no car or whatever it is you're making. so we've learned a good lesson. i think a lot of smart people knew that before. but we've distributed many hundreds of millions of masks. this pandemic has underscored

the vital importance of reassuring our supply chains and bringing them back in the united states where they belong, where they should have never left. what happens if you're in a war and you have a supply chain where half of your supplies are given to you by other countries? who are the people that thought of this? these are globalists. it doesn't work. it certainly doesn't work during rough times, bad times or dangerous times. so we're going to continue to fight the virus. we're talking to china. we spoke to them a long time ago about going in. we want to go in, we want to see what's going on. and we weren't exactly invited. i can tell you that. if you look at some of the investigations that are going on in terms of world health organization -- and i'll take it a step further. world trade organization, too, world trade. we did years ago, years ago,

many years ago, the world trade organization from the day china came in, that's when china bloomed. they were main lining it, then, boom, they were up like a rocket ship because they took advantage of every little ridiculous clause in the world trade organization documents. they were a developing nation. china was a developing nation. they make the cars. they make the plant, they make everything. and they're a developing nation. so we've had -- i might have gotten elected to a certain extent because of china and other countries. one of my big things was trade. the united states was getting ripped off in trade. now japan is paying $40 billion and buying a lot. that's before we even do the deal. u.s./mexico was a great deal, nafta was one of the worst deals made in trade history. and i would also put the world trade organization in that same group. so i was very tough on these

countries. with china we made the deal and it became friendly, but then this happened. this is tantamount, this is something that's really incredible. i do want to read something that i just saw today on television. i was looking and i just said, that's an interesting statement. we talk about the democrats. a statement made by brett baer, great guy, smart. on february 19 there was a democratic debate in las vegas. that was february 19th. that's way after i closed entrance from china into our country. so brett goes, on february 19th there was a democratic debate in las vegas. three words weren't said during the debate. virus, coronavirus, or covid-19. those three words never came up. i just thought it was very

interesting because you hear these people, some of the people, the democrats said oh, this, that -- it never was a part of their dialogue. now they bring it up because you see what happened. but they didn't bring it up. but i brought it up. i brought it up long time before i made the trade deal. i was not easy to deal with. i was not easy to deal with. they understand that. we still have 25% and $250 billion that they have to pay us. it's a lot of money. they've taken a lot of money. we've had a lot of beneficiaries, including our farmers and ranches. in addition we've launched an unprecedented effort to develop new treatments and therapies to battle the plague. therapies to me are the most excitin exciting. the vaccines are important, but therapies are immediate. when we have things really looking good, really looking good, we call it covid treatment

acceleration program. we're celebrating companies that are looking and government agencies looking, too, n.i.h. this extraordinary program is slashing red tape to speed and development and to rival -- if you look at what we're doing in terms of the speed, it's unrivalled. it's totally unrivalled. there there's never been anything like it. the fda and steven hawn, highly respected man from a great institution left that job to come here. the job he's doing is incredible. we're working with scott, his predecessor is trick. we're working with a lot of people. but the speed of development for antiviral, antibody and immune therapies is at a level nobody thought even possible. and i'll say we're getting good results. it's a little soon yet. but if we could find the

therapies to solve the problem, somebody gets a problem we can take care of it so it's not so devastating as it has been. with that i've going to ask vice-president pence to come up. i have to say it's sunday, sunday evening and this man has not stopped. he's working -- we all are in all fairness, but he's been working with his task force and everyone round the clock for months and i want to thank mike. thank you, mike. >> thank you, mr. president. and let me echo your words about all the dedicated men and women on the white house coronavirus task force. >> the vice-president is starting and i can owing what the president said. we want to recap and fact check here. monica alba is with me as well for starters. the president saying that it is a local thing, testing should be a local thing. but this is not what governors have said. republican governors, larry hogan, head of the national

governors association. he announced he is going to use the defense production act what they have been calling for to produce 20 million swabs, he showed us an example of the swab, 20 million swabs needed for these tests a month. he didn't say when it would be put into effect, but he is answering to the pressure, bipartisan governors complaining they might have test kits, but they can't do tests without the swabs. they can't do tests without the reagents, chemicals needed for the tests. he was blaming the governors for not knowing where all the tests were in their states. they were saying that should be a federal responsibility. he's still not taking that extra step of inventorying the tests and taking it over as a national federal responsibility, so that it isn't just governors to governors. he also announced, monica, as we've been reporting on nbc news, that they are very close to a deal on an additional, what we are reporting to be some $470

billion. it could be voice-voted in the senate as early as tomorrow. that's when they have their next pro forma session. we are also reporting steny hoyer sent out a message house members may have to return on wednesday so they could also vote on whatever is agreed to, but that the president says they are very close to a deal that could come as soon as tomorrow. that doesn't mean it would be voted on as early as tomorrow, but -- a deal, we understand, does not include food stamp re4r50e6 and does not include state relief, but does include billions of dollars for hospitals that have been hurt by this pandemic. they're not being able to do elective surgeries which is where they make most of their money. monica, what else did you hear? you heard a bipartisan donald trump today praising and playing part of a clip from andrew cuomo praising the federal response at

the cuomo briefing. this was very different from the attacks on governor whitmer and occasionally on governor cuomo as well in the last 48 hours. >> reporter: yes, andrea. this is the second time we've seen the president in one of these briefings revert to the video option and show a clip. he said actually they didn't play out everything he wanted to say or show from governor cuomo who was praising cooperation with the federal government which he tends to do in his daily briefings. what the president didn't include or show is governor cuomo continues to calm on the federal government for more guidance on testing. and ironically earlier today and for days now, governor cuomo is the one who has been asking the president to use his full powers on the defense production act. that is a significant development we heard from the president, really the news coming out of this otherwise more grievance filled briefing we saw last night. that is important to break down because so far this president has resisted using the defense

production act. he's acted in a couple case whz it came to ventilator production. he said e wants to use it more as leverage. he's hoping that private companies will continue to compete with each other and he doesn't want to dissuade them from doing that. he implied they are the ones coming to the white house for help. back uh few weeks ago when there was such a shortage of medical protective equipment for medical workers, we heard about reagents, swabs, the president was pressured by governors of both parties to fully enact 9d d.p.a. he's going to be doing that in the coming 2k5iz. we're not sure how and what capacity he's going to do that, but that is quite important to note. given his resistance to that. and you mention andrea in terms of the governors, the president said tonight he doesn't want to make that partisan. we have to point out that is quite ironic coming from him. throughout this entire process he has been slamming democrats. if you look at his twitter feed he was taking on speaker nancy

pelosi and calling her dumb in terms of the negotiations that continue over that new paycheck protection program package. so as he's saying this about bipartisan ship, he has to look at his own words. i do believe he is trying to say and his campaign will use flattering words from governors during the pandemic to paint his leadership throughout. he has to be clear about his own words. it was a couple days ago he was saying the governors, he wasn't impressed with, he wanted them to step up and do more. he continues to put the onus on them when it comes to testing. it doesn't square with what we've heard so far today, andrea. >> indeed. robert cost a, "the washington post" and host of pbs week as well. you flew with the president yesterday when the president was taking on the governors and

pushing and goading these protests against the governors. protests against the president's own policy of sheltering at home until there is enough testing, until they have satisfied the requirements of two weeks without an increase in cases or increase in deaths. some sort of bending of the curve. but despite that, the president was egging on the protesters, which we've reported, and i know "the washington post" has, in many instances are part of the republican organization and other conservative groups supporting the president. we've seen from a lot of the banners and hats they're wearing, a lot of them are closely allied with the president. the politics of what the president is doing today, it does conflict with his tweets as monica just said, all day today, slamming nancy pelosi and others. >> this briefing tonight, it's hard to call it a news briefing. not much news, if any, is being made. what you do see is president

trump not focusing so much on what you were mentioning, the idea of liberating states, but bringing attention to himself i. and he's talking about an article in the "wall street journal." it's important to note the article he mentioned was on the editorial page of the "wall street journal." it was not a reported piece. it was by a long-time conservative donor, conserve 2i678 activi conservative donor christopher. not so much to defend his administration's response, but to talk about himself and to try to say he's in charge and he's getting praise from both editorialists and others. >> and one of the other points is the president did not refer to an article that was posted late this afternoon in "wall street journal" in the news pages as opposed to the opinion pages. the headline is coronavirus hampered by disarray of shortages and backlogs.

it basically condemns and criticized point by point the national testing because of the lack of leadership. i also wanted to quickly point out while the president has been briefing, we've gotten just terrible new numbers, the statistics which, of course, represent people suffering and people dying. 40,000 people, 40,000 americans have now died because of this pandemic and also more than 750,000 people have been infected. we also understand those numbers are under reported in so many cases because people are at home and not tested and are not officially part of the cdc count. the other thing that happened this weekend, monica, i want to bring you in again on this, is that the cdc acknowledged now this weekend that they had contaminated labs and those initial tests put out by the federal government came from contaminated labs, a majorer

under fda leadership. this investigation has led to confirmation from officials from the cdc for the first time this weekend. >> reporter: really an extraordinary setback there, andrea, we've seen over the last couple of months. the president has continued to place blame elsewhere for some of the time line and criticism he has received in terms of action. and he is consistently pointing to what he did in late january when it comes to the tlafl ban and foreign nationals prevent on flights from china. there were so many questions during february into mid-march. that's when they finally put the social distancing guidelines into effect about why things didn't happen sooner. now we finally have a glimpse into part of the picture why that was. that error at the cdc is so significant. and you have doctors birx and fauci who i want to note were not in tonight's briefing. we're not sure why that is. dr. birx was on the sunday shows this morning, but dr. fauci was

not at the briefing last night and he does not appear to be there tonight. there were other members of the task force that are there. both of them have said this was a cdc failing and something that really didn't help in terms of getting off on a very rocky start when there are already so many questions about the time line, about china's forthcoming ability to report deaths and cases and what we knew coming out of there which the president continues to mention. you mix that together with the contamination at the cdc and that paints a more stark picture why it took so long to get all of us together and get more information, andrea. >> it was a six-week delay. kimberly atkins is with us ask. kimberly, when the president tries to present this rosy picture, misstating the numbers, johns hopkins says there are 3.8 million tests.

the president says 4.1 million. in any case, you're talking about less than 2% of the american population. and so when he talks about how there are millions more tests done here than in any other country, that is not the case per capita, which is really what matters. >> it is not the case. and it is coming at a time which, as you pointed out, the number of deaths in the united states is soaring. the testing is at lower levels than we've seen in other countries that have been able to get ahead and lower their curves at a much faster rate than has happened in the united states. but, again, these briefings are used just as much by the president to substitute for the rallies that he cannot have on the campaign trail where he is looking for praise. he's looking for feedback from his supporters. if he can't do that, he creates this narrative as part of these briefings every day. we saw that with the video clip

and we saw that with the reading of that opinion piece. so there is a major conflation here between what the president sees as the purpose of the briefings. there's a difference between defending one's record in the face of criticism and just heaping praise on one's self or seeking out that kind of praise. that's become a central part. >> and, kimberly, seema verna is speaking about one of the major crises in this whole pandemic which is the deaths in nursing homes. let's see what she is saying about that because that's under her leadership. >> in those communities that show spread starting in the nursing homes. so, again, i want to thank all of the local officials that have done an amazing job in supporting the nursing homes and would urge all state and local leaders to follow their lead and do everything that we can to keep nursing home residents safe. thank you. >> thank you very much.

>> that's the tail end of what seema verna was saying. one of the things that has happened under this administration is that some of the regulations, the regular lalg regulation of nursing homes were loosened under president trump, and there was not enough regulation at the state level as well. let's listen to the president for a moment. >> please, go ahead. >> mr. president, thank you very much. if there were people planning to protest tomorrow against the government shutdown, what would be your advice to them? >> against the shutdown? >> yes, they want the shutdown lifted. >> people feel that way. you're allowed to protest. i watched the protest, and they were all 6 feet apart. it was an orderly group of

people. some have gone too far, some of the governors have gone too far. some of the things that happened maybe were not so appropriate. i think in the end it's not going to matter because we're starting to open up our states. and i think they're going to open up very well. we're going to watch it closely, we're working them on testing. whatever they need. i don't think they need ventilators any more. the term the governor used was phenomenal. that was the only sentence they left out, which is okay. i appreciate that's what governor cuomo said. but they've done -- these people have done a phenomenal job. as far as protesters, you know, i see protesters for all sorts of things. i'm with everybody. i'm with everybody. please, in the back, go ahead. in the back, go ahead. are you ready? >> yes, please. thank you, mr. president. ann pelagri, no. you pointed out iran was not

truthful enter reporting of the virus. feinstein and other democrats are looking for $5 billion in aid to iran. are you considering giving aid to iran? >> if iran needed aid on this, i would be willing to do something if they want it. if they asked for it. they were hit hard. obviously those numbers weren't correct numbers they reported. if they needed help, if they needed aid, they needed ventilators, we have thousands of ventilators currently on hand and ventilators under construction, that are under construction. that's a mosquito. i don't like mosquitoes. i don't like mosquitoes at all. but if they -- yeah, we would certainly be willing to help and make a deal. you look at what happened. john kerry doesn't want them to make a deal. they're probably figuring they

can wait. maybe it will be biden and they'll own america if biden gets -- they know with me it doesn't work that way. it doesn't work that way. if joe biden got in, they'd own america. between china, japan, mexico, canada, they'd own america. you wouldn't have a country left if they got in. go ahead, please. >> mr. president, you said you think some governors have gone too far. which governors are you referring to -- >> i don't want to mention names obviously. much beyond this is virginia with what they've done on guns. he is playing with your second amendment. we can't allow that to happen. that is indirectly related to this. you know what happened with guns. people are buying guns at a level you haven't seen before because of this surge of plague.

so what he did was totally inappropriate. other than that, i'm not going to mention governors. i have a list, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. >> you mentioned off the top you hope there will be a deal for the small business loan. >> i hope so. >> mnuchin seemed like it was ready to go. >> every time he says it's ready to go, they say we have a good negotiating position. let's see what happens. we want to take care of our small businesses. they're the engine of this country. we want to have small businesses ready to go. we don't want those businesses abandoned because they couldn't afford their employees, they couldn't take care. >> what's the hold -- >> i can't tell you that. i can tell you we're negotiating with the democrats. they goshl for things we can't do, things we think are in the

best interest of the country. you want me to say we have a deal before we have a deal? we have a good chance of getting a deal. a lot of good discussions were had today. we have a good chance of getting the deal. we want a deal. we want to take care of our workers. we want to take care of our small companies. go ahead, please. >> thank you, mr. president. i have a question for you and will for dr. hawn after you answer the question. you said you wanted to be safe. >> i do. >> tens of millions of americans -- >> it seems at odds, mr. president, with the tweet that you had on friday about liberating those three particular states, virginia, minnesota and michigan, because none of those states, mr. president, have met the

requirements that the vice-president and others on the task force have talked about in terms of reopening the economy. do you see those two -- >> there were things in michigan i don't think they were necessary or appropriate. everyone knows that. i think the governor of michigan, we're getting along well. i think she wishes she didn't put them in. you can't buy part, you can't buy seeds -- we want to be safe. we're not going to be closing anything. but we're going to do it beautifully, systematically, not all of them. a couple of them. you can never satisfy. you could find a secure and they wouldn't be satisfied. they'd find a reason to complain, wise guys. we're working well with the governors. we have a great relationship with the governors. i've been on numerous calls with the governors. without exception they were friendly. that's going back even a month,

a month from today. so i think that we're going to do a terrific job. i think the governors are going to do of a terrific job. we're starting to open our country. i spoke with greta abbott, fantastic governors he's going to be opening up texas. you know what that is. by the way, other countries are starting -- i see where germany is starting to open up a little section. there are a lot of great things happening. we're going to start to open our country. it's like, as they say, a beautiful puzzle. there are portions of the state -- there are big states. you can have portions of states, mike. you can have a portion, a county that's perfect. you can have another county that's far away and it's not

toog so well. rm so we're going to do it very, very carefully and i think it's going to be very successful. when you say safe, i want it to be very safe. >> mr. president, thank you very much. >> let him just do this one. go ahead, please. >> thank you very much, dr. hawn. there's a question that i don't know the answer to. i was hoping you could provide an answer to. there is an epidemiologist at the university of alabama in birmingham who is actually a covid-19 survivor. his name is michael sed. the question is this. why would people's susceptiblity be any different on june 1st, july 1st? this relates to reopening the economy. can you give an answer to that specific question? >> i don't think we have evidence one would be more

susceptible or less. we can say the mitigation efforts have helped with respect to this. what we've seen is the number of cases have gone down. if we follow the gating criteria for the opening, we're able to measures in place to reduce any flare-up of the cases. >> is there a chance of rebounding if you open too soon without the type of mitigation efforts that we've had still in place? >> yes, i think dr. birx talked about this at the podium. the key is surveillance put in place at the cdc. there will be great help in terms of trying to reduce that risk. >> and i think they have the rest of that clip. i just thought it was a very good clip. i think it's a tribute to new york. i think it's a tribute to the federal government. if and i thought it was nice. so, i think they have that now. they can try it. go ahead.

>> have we saved everyone? no. but have we lost anyone because we didn't have a bed or we didn't have a ventilator or we didn't have health care staff? no. the people we lost are the people we couldn't save, not for lack of trying and not for lack of doing everything that we could do as a society. not only as a government and as a health care system. >> okay. >> mr. president, you called on me. >> yes, i did. >> appreciate it. you shared something with us you saw on tv today. you said on thursday you were angry because information about the virus should have been told to us earlier and a lot sooner. people knew it was coming and people did not want to talk about it. many americans are saying the

exact same thing about you, that you should have warned them the virus was spreading like wildfire through the month of february instead of holding rallies with thousands of people. why did you wait so long -- >> who are you with? >> why did you wait so long to warn and why did you not have social distancing? >> who are you with? >> i'm weijia jiang with cbs news. >> if you look at what i did banning china from coming in -- >> american nationals. >> nice and easy, relax. we cut it off. everybody was amazed that i did it. we had 21 people in a room. everybody was against it but me. dr. fauci said had i not done that, perhaps tens of thousands and maybe much more than that people would have died. i was very early, very, very early.

and we just saw, you saw brett baer making a statement. they had a debate well into february and not even mention -- it wasn't mentioned, the democrats, we were very early. i'm the president and you know what i just did? >> by the way, when you issued the ban, the virus was already here. >> you know how many people when i issued the ban? how many cases of virus were in the united states when i issued the ban? do you know the number? >> there were -- >> no, no, how many cases? remember i said one person. how many cases were here when i issued the ban? you have to do your research. >> i did my research. on the 23rd of march you said you knew this was going to be a pandemic. >> can i tell you what? i did know it. all i had to do was look. anybody knew it. are you ready? how many cases were in the united states when i did my ban? how many people had died in the united states? >> so do you acknowledge -- >> keep your voice down, please. keep your voice down. how many cases were in the united states -- i did a ban

where i'm closing up the entire country. how many people died -- >> and that's a fair point. >> how many people died in the united states, and yet i closed up the country and i believe there were no deaths, zero deaths at the time i closed up the country. nobody was there. and you should say thank you very much for good judgment. go ahead, please. >> you just mentioned germany. germany is allowing small stores to open. >> yes, they are. i just spoke to them. >> does this give you confidence some european countries are on the mend and recovery? >> i hope so. i hope it works out. i spoke with angela and they're going to start a process of opening very much like we are. we are, too. i spoke with numerous governors. they're doing it also. areas that have been -- number one, they've done a good job, or they don't have much of a problem. germany is starting the process also, and i'm very happy about that. some places in europe as you know can't start the process for

a while. yes, ma'am, go ahead. >> thank you, mr. president. the mayor of las vegas thinks it's total insanity for busin s businesses to shutdown. who is right? >> they shut down one of my hotels. i'm not involved. i could be if i wanted to. i chose not to be. by the way, i could be if i wanted to. they closed a hotel i have in nevada in las vegas. it's a very severe step he took. i'm okay with it. i'm okay with it. but, you know, you can call that one either way. i know the mayor is upset with it. some owners are upset with it. some of the developers out there are very upset. others, they say, hey, we have to get rid of it. i can see both sides of it. >> one other question. i asked you recently about an sba rule that said the patient

protection money could not go to small casinos. >> they are looking into it. they have small casinos that don't have too many people: 2450er going to make a ruling next week. >> they already did make a ruling. they made it small casinos with a third couldn't qualify -- >> they're continuing to look at it. a lot of people are involved. >> mr. president? >> let's give it a shot. >> what you played in the clip -- >> excuse me. he didn't say a lot. he said we did a phenomenal job. he didn't say a lot. he didn't say you did a goods job on ventilators, but nothing else. he said we did a phenomenal job. report accurately. you are one of the most inaccurate reporters. go ahead. >> what he said along with republican governors what they need is a national strategy when it comes to testing. >> they said the same thing with ventilators and now we have so

many we're going to be able to send them and help other countries in need. we're doing great on testing and we are actually using the act, as you know, on a certain company. >> what about the reagents? >> we're in great shape. reagents and swabs are so easy to get. when you have to build a very expensive piece of machinery controlled by computers, that's a different thing. and, no, we'll have everything is going to be in very good shape very soon. everything is going to be in good shape very soon. go ahead. >> mr. president, the latest stimulus package, will have that funding for states and local governments? >> i don't want to comment on it, but we will be saving that for another time. and, by the way, the states and local governments need it. i'm the first one to admit that. we're going to be saving that for a little bit of a later date. it will probably be our next negotiation. but they do -- i'm in favor of it, i will say, and i fold the

republicans today, i had a great talk with republican senators today. and all of them, i think, just about all of them and -- conference call. that is going to be a big topic over the next couple of weeks. it's very important. >> what is the administration doing to make sure that, you know, hotel chains and hedge funds -- >> that's another one. you have hotels that are massive buildings that are under levered. but if you have no income at all coming out, no income at all, these hotels, they go from under levered to they have to be closeds do closed down. it's a terrible thing. i don't know if they're working on that specific problem. it's a problem they're working on. you have people who own a hotel, they go from having a successful hotel, many employees, thousands of people to all of a sudden closing it down. ifs read where my wonderful

place in miami, doral, they had to let a lot of people go because it's essentially closed. you can't have the restaurants. you have to close it down. that's an example. many, many hotels are closing down throughout the country and hopefully they're going to be able to open up quickly. >> specifically for small businesses, would the administration -- >> it depends how the hotel is considered. is it owned by a big chain? even if it's owned by a big chain, that's devastating. if they have 200 hotels in the country and it's closed. this isn't only in the country. they can have 2000 hotels in other countries. we're in better shape than most, when you think about it. i think we're going to be looking at it. i think it's a very big problem. it's a lot of people employed. here we go. >> more than 22 million americans are currently unemployed as a result of this. we hit the grim milestone of

40,000 americans having died from the coronavirus. can you explain, then, why you come out here and you are reading clips and showing clips of praise for you and for your administration? is this really the time for self-congratulations? >> i will tell you this. what i'm doing is standing up for the men and women that have done such an incredible job. not for me. men and women. admirals, vice-president if i might, but all of the men and women, thousands, tens of thousands of them that built hospitals in new york and new jersey and all over this country in record time. they throw up a thousand beds in four days. i'm stick up for those people. they've been incredible. i'm also sticking up for doctors and nurses. >> what you read earlier was praising you and your administration. >> governor cuomo said positive

things about the job the president has done. >> 40,000 people have died. >> those people have been absolutely excoriated by the fake news. like you, you're cnn, you're fake news. they were excoriated by people like you that don't know any better. you don't have the brains you were born with. you should be praising people for the job. if we didn't do a job -- >> not why are you doing it -- >> i'll tell you why. are you ready? these people right now in hospitals, it's dangerous. it's going to a battle field. and i want these people, i want you -- it's all about that. it's not about me. nothing is about me. look, look, you're never going to treat me fair lyft, many of you, and i understand that. i don't even know, i got here with the worst, most unfair press treatment they say in the history of the united states for a president. they did say abraham lincoln had bad treatment, too. >> it had your name in it it.

it talked about trump remaking the play book. >> that's a positive thing. that's an exercise in what to do it and how to do. that's good for the future. people can learn from that. i want the men and women in this country that are in danger, the admirals and the generals that have done a job like they've never done before -- we're in war, the invisible enemy, it's a dangerous war. we're at a level, you said 40,000 people. you're right, almost 40,000 people -- more than, okay, correct me, correct me. i'm really glad you corrected me, cnn. here's the story, let me tell you something. if we didn't do what we did, the 40,000 right now could be a million people. not 40,000, it could be a million. we're tracking at much less than the lowest possible estimate, and that's a great tribute to a number of people and a number of things. one of the things it's attributed to is what's taken

place in this country with the american people because they've gone inside, they've done it. they've done a job they thought wasn't possible. nobody thought it was possible. they did models based on this success. i've seen new york streets. i watched it all my life, new york streets. you can't even see the pavement, there are so many people. you take a look this morning, even on friday morning i looked at it through a camera. there wasn't a person on 5th avenue, wasn't a person on madison avenue. i've never seen anything like it because people have really listened to instructions and they've listened to what we've had to say. and the professionals, they've listened. people should give them credit, including people like you because you just don't have the sense to understand what's going on. all right, please, go ahead. >> mr. president, should trade companies like shake shack and

ruth's chris, should they have access to the ppe program? >> i don't know much about any of those companies. a lot of times they're owned by franchisees where they're one or two places. they are small businesses. that would depend on what the formula is. again, many of those companies are, you know, they're out to franchisees. a franchisee could open up one of the places you mentioned. i would say that's important. that's like a restaurant. go ahead, please. >> you referred to protests earlier. it's pretty intense. we're getting death threats from governors -- >> you are in the media? >> no, the governors are getting death threats, increased numbers of death threats. are you inciting violence among a few people? >> i've seen the interviews of people. these are great people. look, they get cabin fever,

you've heard the term. they've got cabin fever. they want to get back. they want their life back. their life was taken away from them. and you know, they learned a lot during this period. they learned to do things differently than they have in the past. they'll do it hopefully until the virus has passed. and when the virus passes, i hope we're going to be sitting next to each other in football games, baseball games, ice hockey games. the masters is going to have 100,000 people, not 2,500 people watch bei watching at the course. >> -- >> no, i've never seen so many american flags. i'm seek the same thing you're seeing. i don't see it any differently. who? >> nazi flags. >> that i totally would say no way. i didn't see that. i see all -- of course, i'm sure the news plays that up. i've seen american flags all over the place.

i have never seen so many american flags at a rally as i have at these rallies. these people love our country. they want to go back to work. please, go ahead. >> paul manafort and roger stone are not exclusive -- >> i'll tell you this. roger stone was treated unfairly. paul manafort, the black book turned out to be a fraud. we learned in the weeks and months. they had a black book out of ukraine, turned out to be a fraud. they convicted a manage. turned out to be a fraud. general flynn was a highly respected person and it turned out to be a scam on him. the fbi said he didn't lie. and mueller's people wanted him to go to jail, okay. so what am i going to do? you'll find out what i'm going to do. i'm not going to say what i'm going to do, but i will tell you the whole thing turned out to be a scam and a disgrace to our

country. it was a takedown of a duly elected president. these people suffered greatly. general flynn. i mean, what they did to him. nobody a bigger fan of the fbi than me at the level of the people that really matter. but the top of the fbi was scum and what they did to general flynn -- and you know it, everybody knows it -- was a disgrace. he was in the service for over 30 years. he ends up being a general, respected, respected. almost his first day in office, they come in with papers. they want to investigate him. never happened before, and now the tables are turned. investigate the investigators, i guess. these were crooked people. these were bad people. these were dangerous people. you know what they are, though? they're scum. they're human scum.

>> do you have one in the back? >> yes, mr. president. the cdc had profound test kits from the outbreak. is this an oversight from the obama/biden administration? >> we had problems early on and we straightened it out. i told you, we inherited a lot of garbage. they had tests that were no good. all the stuff was no good. came from somewhere. whoever came up with it. i'm proud to tell you, we went from having a lot of bad things happening in cdc to having great things hatching. they're doing a good job now. no, initially, look, our stockpiles were empty. we had horrible stockpiles. we had horrible of ventilators, too. and so did the states have very few of them. now these things are at a level -- same with our military. the military is the strongest it's ever been.

we spent $1.5 trillion on the military. it's never been in this pox. we even have space force. mike and i were talking about what an achievement that is. first time in 72 years we have a new force. so, yeah, cdc had obsolete tests, old test itself, broken tests that are a mess. but they've done a very good job. they've done it under pressure. the pressure, they had to do this under pressure so we're very proud of the job they've done. please, go ahead. >> mr. president, you set swabs that are easy. and they said hospitals, are saying there are shortages for more than a month now. why wait to use the defense production act until now? >> we have one company we are forced to use it with. probably by tomorrow we won't be. you know it's a tremendous hammer. probably by tomorrow, we won't be. but we have millions of them coming in. they're very easy, by comparison. in all fairness, governors can get them, themselves, they really could. all of this, but we're going to do it.

we're going to work with the governors, if they can't do it. we will do it. if they can do it, we will do it maybe cheaper, better. we're getting high quality with us. with us it's all quality, too. even if it takes a little longer, we want the highest quality in all of it, including the ventilators. so, yeah, we have millions of them coming in, very soon. many of them have already been ordered and the governors don't know quite where they are, but they'll be finding them fairly soon. >> mr. president. >> go ahead. >> president xi, you now talk about the missteps that china made early on in this crisis and how you -- the united states -- >> based on an investigation, we're going to find out, sure. >> so when you repeatedly praised i in january and february. >> got this. >> you said he will solve the problem, were you duped by president xi? >> oh, no, no, no, i made the a deal that was phenomenal for the

united states. you know who was duped? you and president obama was ripping off this country in the history of any country, nobody has ripped off like the united states by china and we stopped it, and many countries. we stopped it and we've done a deal, they are buy theing $250. they didn't do anything for us. you know we didn't even have a deal. it was so bad. >> the deal -- >> no, no, it is about the deal. ba us the deal started a long time ago before anybody heard about this. the deal was finished a number of months ago, very happy. i was very happy. i hoped they were happy. billions of dollars came in, in tariffs. billions of dollars, they're going to be purchasing billions. then all of a sudden long after that, i find out about this around i told you, i told you. >> listen cnn. >> it's a big problem. >> i told you, i'm not happy about it. and this was after the deal. so we have this wonderful deal and i was very, nobody has been tougher be every the deal ever

on china than trump. then i made a deal, i was very happy with the deal. it's a great deelt. great for our farmers. our farmers have been paid a fortune already. then what happens, no mistake, we made a great deal. now i find out after the deal, now after the deal. i find out. i'm not happy, you people are so pathetic at cnn. let me just tell you. >> on the 23rd -- >> i was very happy with the deal, very happy with everything, then we find out about the plague. right, since we found out about that i'm not happy. but i closed it up long before pelosi. listen, long before pelosi, you know, she was having parties in san francisco, let's all go to china town and that was a long time after i closed up the country. >> go ahead, please. >> the first about this -- >> that's why your ratings are so bad, because are you pathetic. your ratings are terrible. you got to get back to real

news. go ahead. >> the first of the month, for people that are worried about whether or not they're going to get a check next month, will there be another stimulus -- >> we're looking at it. the delivery has been very good as you know, people are getting them, they're saving lives. we will let you know when it's appropriate. but weal we're not going to let our people suffer. you've seen that better than anyone. and you people have actually covered it with you know, within, okay. but you've seen what's going on. and we got those checks out to people, it saved their lives. nobody else could have done it. nobody else could have done it and i'm very happy. >> will you plan ahead -- >> if we get this new check out to the workers and essentially to the workers of these small businesses, the ppp, we are going to be, we are going to be very happy. because as we open, those businesses are going to open along with us. yeah, go ahead, please. >> mr. president -- >> mr. president, you start reopening the country, do you plan to coordinate with mexico and canada to ensure that --

>> we are coordinating right now with both. i spoke with the president of mexico yesterday. i spoke with prime minister of canada a lot, justin, and weesh in very good -- we're in very good coordination right now. >> the supply chains. >> it's not going to affect trade. that's a part of trade. it's not going to affect trade. and if it does, i will tell you, if a supply chain based in mexico or canada interrupts with our making a big product and an important product or even a military product, we're not going to be happy, let me tell you that one or two more. go ahead in the back. two are you with? >> i'm with the salt lake tribune. >> okay. >> on thursday the white house announced a congressional task force for reopening america. it included every republican senator but mitt romney. >> yeah. >> does that show you are holding a grudge? >> no, i'm not a fan of mitt romney at all. i have 52 republican senators.

>> as a governor -- >> i just don't think, i'm not a fan of mitt. >> reporter: my. i don't clearly want his advice. please. go ahead. >> why on that task force, the kelly law firm, there are some questions. >> she's the senator from a great state, a state that i love, georgia. >> is there training? >> that, i don't know about that. but she's a senator from georgia and she was included in the list, absolutely. go ahead, a couple more. go ahead, please. >> yeah, mr. president, you said -- [ inaudible ] . >> many of the leaders. >> many countries are on the coronavirus in their countries, which ones are you talking about? uk? >> you mean some of the ones that didn't do well? i don't need to say that. you have to look. some of them just got hit hard. when i closed up our border, when i did the ban on china, they say a lot of the people that didn't come in here went to italy. you heard that.

that's why italy was hit so hard. i don't think it was because of government. i will say italy is locked down probably more than any other country right now. it's absolutely locked solid down. they got hit very hard because people that were coming to the united states couldn't come because i closed the country in january and they went to italy, they say it had to do with trade. it had to do with the purchase of certain materials. italy was another alternative. so many, many people went to italy instead of coming here. and italy has suffered greatly. no, i spoke with the prime minister, a lot. he's a great friend of mine and what's happened to italy is very, very tough. thank you all very much. we appreciate it. we'll see you tomorrow. thank you. president trump concluding a rambling news conference, a very defensive news conference in which he defended what they have done on testing. he did announce he's using the

defense protection act to produce what he said would be 20 million swabs a month to help the governors, who have been complaining they don't have the ingredient, the swabs, the reentry, excuse me, the chemicals that they need to do the tests. robert costa, you have been with us as well throughout all of this news conference. he did not answer what he did in february. he still is not answering questions about what happened in february when he still was not energizing the country and getting the country mobilized. he keeps referring to the late january ban on visitors coming in from china. it was really only on chinese nationals. the washington post is reporting 40,000 people came in from china even after that ban. he also praised the protesters, saying the protesters that he saw against governors were standing 6 feet apart. when we saw video from michigan and other states, where people got out of their cars, were congregating together and

according to governor, such as governor whitmer, endangering themselves and ought people to spread the virus. i'm not sure you at other point as well in this very defensive news conference in the q&a after he gave a very rosey projection of how much they had achieved in the administration. and he was only reminded by one of the questioners that 40,000 people have now died in a number that was categorized by, counted by the administration, itself. 40,000 people and more than 750,000 people having become infecte infected. >> summarized in terms of accountability, what went on or did not go on at that news conference. not a lot of news was made at all. i would add another element to your list. the president weighed in on this ongoing congressional deal about small business loans, whether that program will be expanded. and he said he was optimistic at

the top of his remarks. -- he didn't offer many details. it shows the president removed negotiations, he did not have any sort of relationship based on my reporting with speaker pelosi. he has farmed out the negotiations in most respects to secretary mnuchin, the treasury secretary, who is working with congressional democrats and congressional republicans. >> and there is, of course, an obvious deadline with the money having run out and with so many people needing help from these programs. he also said, he pushed back or did not say what he was going to do about michael flynn, when asked about previous comments that he's made that he was considering a full pardon for michael flynn, but talked about howdad bad live he was dealt with. he pled guilty to lying to the fbi, it was this february that he withdrew that guilty plea 57d there have been questions raised about a pardon. thanks, to robert costa.

monica alba, you also having watched this entire news conference,tive tones at different moments talking about being bipartisan praising cuomo, praising some of the other governors, also not explaining how he is also advocating for them to lift these shelteri shelteringiate home guidelines -- sheltering@home guidance. >> there is a clash, those are set to expire on april 30th. next week with many states looking to get into that phase 1 of meeting that criteria of a decline in cases for what looks to be about 14 days. but then you see states that have been so hard hit that have continued those stay-at-home orders through the month of may or in some cases some even talking about june so we are here seeing some opposing viewpoints from the president telling states that might be

ready, they have the green light. while other governors are saying we need to wait for the testing. one quick fact check there on the president who said swabs and re-agents are in his words so easy to get. that's no what we have been hearing from republican governors across the board, democratic, ones as well that said that's not the case, they may have the tests. what is difficult the other piece of the other supply that would make the whole testing kit come together. that itself what we heard repeatedly from ohio's mike dewine and governor larry hogan of maryland. i thought that was quite striking. because the president is trying to appear to say this is quite simple, that the governor's requests are not founded when that simply doesn't line up with the reality of what we are hearing from the states themselves, andrea. >> very important points, thanks to you as well. and that's our coverage of the president's news conference, kasie hunt is there for kasie d.c..

casey, you have been watching as well. i know you will be following very closely what is happening on the negotiations for this very important package of more than $70 billion that is being negotiate as we speak. >> that's right, andrea. thank you, i am kasie hunt. welcome to kasie d.c.. we have been listening to president trump as andrea points out. we have a deal to send smore help potentially to small businesses coming as soon as tomorrow. we also have been fact checking the president who used that lengthy news conference just now to make a series of pretty political arguments, including showing clips of andrew cuomo talking about the response and coordination with the federal government to seem to prop up his own response. joining me now to talk about all of this, we have pbs news hour and msnbc analyst, yamiche

alcindor and jake sherman and white house reporter eli stokeles. thank you all for sitting through this watching went vp minute to minute as we were. eli, let me hear from you. we heard some of the fact checking from our colleague there is from andrea and monica am ba on some of the things the president said. but what struck out to you in broad brush here? i mean, there was not a lot of news made at this news conference. he did suggest he might try to use the defense production act to demand these swabs be produced. even then he seemed to think if i put this hammer down rhetorically, i might not need to do it. what stood out to you? >> that and the fact thewasn't aside from that any news with the president at the podium congratulating himself, i thought jeremy dimonday's question was the most pertinent one. we have 40,000 dead americans. the president is up there playing clips of governor cuomo

praising himself. people continue to say this hasn't changed the way the president goes about his day. he sits in the executive dining room, watches the news koufrage and reacts to it. you can see he was doing that in front of everybody, nodding at that clip of governor cuomo praising him and when one of the two clips didn't work, he even came back to it afterwards. it's just remarkable the president's need for aformation for praise and also his nan cha lance about -- none cha lance about the questions and alarms coming from the states. as monica pointed out a few minutes ago, there are a lot of governors, including republicans, who are crying out for the federal government to take more of a role in making sure that the tests are processed by the cdc and that they can get to the states the re-agent and everything else. and when trump got pressed about that specifically, his answer was, just basically to shrug it off and say oh those things, those swabs are easy to get.

we will be in great shape soob. the soon. the officials and the public health officials who are on the front lines of this crisis. >> and, in fact, eli, those swabs and those, the pieces of the test kit are really what governors were speaking about this morning. both republican and democratic governors saying that's what's preventing them from giving all these tests. if you guys can just stand by for me, with me for one second. i think we have new york mayor bill de blasio standing by with us. and consider wack we saw there, where president trump did show clips of the state's governor, mr. mayor, i am hoping to get your reaction first to what the president had to say there. but then also answer the bake question, what does new york need right now and are you getting what you need from the federal government? >> yeah, casey, we are not. it's as simple as that. you know donald trump spent months turning his back on his

hometown. we pleaded for the testing before this crisis really hit. we got nothing. and now, when we are in the middle of this horrendous, you know, painful reality, i've talked to him directly multiple times. i've said, look, new york city will not be able to provide basic services. we are not going to be able to ensure that we've got police, fire, san takes, auflt things that we -- sanitation, all the things going forward after we just lost $7 billion in revenue. we are not going to be able to take care of the basics. so we're not going to be able to restart and we're not going to be able to recover. that's horrible for our people. also, if he wants to see this country back on its feet, it's not going to happen without the largest city in the country. he has ignored that entirely. here's the bottom line. he hasn't lifted a finger. he could have told mitch mcconnell there had to be money for municipalities in this stimulus debated right now.

the president literally walked away from his obligation and had nothing to say, including that press conference. he acts like someone else is president and he doesn't have to comment on it. she leaving new york city high and dry and also cities and states all over the country. there is no way in -- we can recover. we have giant holes in our budgets. we can't provide basic services. >> mr. mayor, as i've talked to my source coming together and you underscore a good point, one thing congressional democrats had wanted is money for state and local governments in this package. but it's not there at this very moment. a part of the reasoning seems to be potentially that well, it means that states won't take all of the actions that they could to try and keep the economy stabilized, potentially to put some pressure. it could also be simply these negotiations are too thorny, they take more time. it sound like your message is if you don't get this money right now the damage is not going to

be able to be undone? >> right now we are not able to do the thing we would normally be doing to support our people and we're in the midst of a crisis. so i'm talking about hospitals that have been week-to-week on whether we even had enough of the personal protective equipment for our healthcare workers. and i'm talking about a city that right now has no capacity to recover if we can't provide basic services going forward. so, look, we haven't heard a word from the president. if he said, i absolutely support aid to cities and to states and we got to make them whole because they're never going to be able to replace this revenue. they're never going to be able to keep their work force together and provide services without it. if he says this must happen and there will be another stimulus in may. that will be a different drugs. he has literally ignored the entire issue and acts like somehow there will be a recovery without the places that are the economic engines of the country. i mean it's an absolute

disregard for his responsibilities. so, i understand the legislative process goes up and down. but my problem is, the senate republicans will not move if they don't hear donald trump's voice and he's absolutely silent on what's happening to our cities and our states right now. we are bearing the brunt. >> well, we certainly have seen plenty of evidence that when the president speaks or says he'll support something that republicans in congress have certainly gone right along with it. mr. mayor, we had a pretty grim milestone just before we started having this conversation. 40,000 deaths, 75,000 -- 750,000 cases, excuse me, in this country. 40,000 people dying. the curve overall ticking upward as some localities have had some success in fighting this. where do you feel new york's needs are most pressing right this moment on the testing front? are you among those that is

concerned about sort of the materials that are going into these tests as we heard some governors say this morning or what are your concerns in that area? >> yeah, so, we're the epicenter and the only way we can get out of this phase of this pandemic is if we have truly widespread testing. the president is simply lying about the availability of all those components of testing. the swabs. you can't get those things. you cannot get them. so, right now, for me to get a city of 8.6 million people out of the thick of a crisis and on to a point where we can start to restart our economy, it will take testing on the scale that's nowhere near our reach right now. and we have tried to look all over the world for the test kits and all of the elements we need in the quantity we need, which is probably going to be something like hundreds of thousands of tests per day for a

city this big to really eradicate this disease, to really be able to control the situation and track everyone who might be infected and all the contacts and make sure no one goes to a workplace who is sick. you need really widespread testing. we've learned that from other parts of the world that have had some success fighting it back. we're nowhere near that right now and the federal government has no plan to provide it. no time line, no vision for it. so this was the beginning of this crisis, where testing was what we kneaded to try to stop the coronavirus from overtaking us. the federal government is absent. they're still absent on the testing issue. i think this is donald trump's last chance i really mean it. he blew it on the first instance on testing. he is blowing it again on testing. he is nowhere to be found on support for the cities and states that bore the brunt of the crisis. history is going to judge him very harshly if that, the last chance he had to make things right and let the country

recover, he was absent and missing in action again and you know the final word on donald trump will be, he saw this crisis coming, he did nothing about it. when he had a chance to help the country recover, he did nothing about it. >> certainly some of the president's critics have suggested that he is looking to shift responsibility to governors to avoid accountability for himself. we will see if it plays out as you outline here. new york city mayor, bill de blasio, our thoughts, of course, are always with those healthcare workers on the front lines in your city and across the country. please our hearts are with them. thank you for joining me. joining me now is the chair of the house, of course, democratic caucus, congressman hakeem jeffreys of new york. congressman thanks so much for being here. let's start with the state of play here on these negotiations. small businesses waiting for money as that paycheck protection program ran out. i know democrats have been

supportive of that, have also been pushing for more money for hospitals. als as you heard from the -- also as you heard there, for state and local government, it sounds like that is out. the hospital money is in, where do you stand? has a deal been reached yet? and what do you expect it to look like in this regard? >> well, a deal hasn't been reached yet, speaker pelosi and secretary mnuchin indicated earlier today, we believe we are close. the original $250 billion that mitch mcconnell sought without any guardrails whatsoever was not acceptable in this from the standpoint of making sure that the money from the paycheck protection program actually got to the people who need it the most. small businesses like women-owned businesses, minority-owned businesses, veterans-owned businesses, mom and pop shops and those with scores of point of view years or less, not hundreds of employees

or more, which is entity was disproportionately were receiving the support. so what it looks like will happen moving forward is that in addition to the $250 billion, which we all support, as you have indicated, there will be an additional $120 billion for small businesses, particularly a significant amount allocated to community development financial institutions to make sure that it goes to the smaller businesses on main street who need the relief. it also looks like we will arrive at an agreement for an additional $100 billion in the public health space, $75 billion for hospital support and another $25 billion for testing, which is needed in order for us to be able to -- >> so what -- >> well, i think -- >> what are you --

>> nothing is agreed upon until it's agreed upon. that's probably a question that should be directed at secretary mnuchin and the senate republicans presumably have to sign off on anything that many nuchen has agreed upon. then, of course, we're going to have to deal with the state and legal issue at some point soon on behalf of our first responders, transit workers, our firefighters, our police officers. it's extraordinary to me as mayor de blasio indicated and as governor cuomo consistently indicated that republicans want to walk away from americans in these states and municipalities. >> do you think, are you confident that that money will get out to state and local governments in a later bill, if it's not included in this one? >> yes. from my stand, we have begun to see some bipartisan agreement on this i believe that senator menendez is working with one of his republican counterparts to push the idea to have an

additional $500 billion for states and municipalities. in c.a.r.e.s. 2.0. i strongly believe it will have support on the house side of the equation. we recognize these states and localities, their budgets have been decimated. wet also have to make sure there is an appropriate formula. >> yeah. >> that is corrennected to how s allocated. is baaed on loss of revenue not just population. >> one final question for you, sir, the leader hoyer sent out a notice that you may need to vote in person on this bill coming up on wednesday. do you expect that you will have to be here in washington? is that safe? or do you think will you come up with and pass a plan that will let you vote remotely by proxy or in some other way to try and keep folks safe? >> well, i expect to be in washington either on tuesday or wednesday to be able to vote on

the legislation. steny hoyer has indicated that he expects that nothing will pass, based on unanimous consent. there is no mechanism that exists right now to vote remotely. perhaps that is something that is dealt with in the future. our responsibility to the greatest extent possible in terms of safety is to be present in washington to act on behalf of the people we serve. i will be more present this week. >> all right. congressman hakeem jeffreys. thank you very much for your time tonight. we hop you and your loved ones stay safe. we want to continue this conversation now with our panel that has been so patiently waiting. jake sherman, one of my colleagues who covers capitol hill every day, jake, you heard what congressman jeffreys said there. let's talk a little about how we got here. this negotiation has dragged out longer than perhaps many people thought. it's been in many ways colored stymied by personal relationships, inside the come, among the leadership that have not necessarily -- you can call

a lot of them flat out broken. it does look like, though, they are prepared to do something going forward? how did we get here? and do you think that the stuff that they are kicking down the road, the money that's going to be needed for states and localitys, you think they're going to be able to figure out how to come together and get behind that or not? >> here's a crazy thing here, i was just thinking about this when listening to this whole thing. everybody agreed on the baseline of the issue here, which is this ppp, this small business lending fund needed to be refreshed. now, they disagreed on what it would ride with, what other things would be included in that bill, but even the things that they kicked the can down the road on, they all agree on. this is an argument about the order of operations of things on which everybody agrees, with i to me is just astounding. i mean it's astounding it took this long. but we're in a situation in which no congressional leader wants to concede that they've won or lost, which is just to

me, it's in a crisis of this magnitude. it's quite stunning. now the thing that i took away from this briefing, i am sure your ears perked up too, to this. the president said actually he is for the state and local government money. that is not where republicans are. i don't -- it's just not. they are not for this money. they believe it will incentivize states and localities to stay closed for longer, because they have money in place of the tax revenue they would get for opening the government up so this is -- if the president is for the state and local money, i'm not entirely sure why they're kicking the can down the road any further here, because as many jeffreys just indicated and you were right, bringing people back to washington is literal lay matter of life and death or it could be. so it would make sense strategically to pile as much stuff on this legislation as possible. they didn't do that. they got a modest package which everybody will agree on.

it will be stouf to pass. we expect it will pass. >> it's kind of clakra ez to co -- crazy do come to this modest package, that's the face of the scale to fight coronavirus. but this is no small amount of money. yamichal insin door, jake -- alcindor, you have been in the seats on the receiving end of the president's wrath many a time and kept your cool quited a mir raebl in the face of it. there were several, i notice several women. although he argued with a male cnn reporter. he had some pointed jabs back and forth with the press corps, seems to be part of this kind of performance and the way he shapes these briefings to be about him versus the media. which of course is sa way of doing business that is very familiar to the president's base that puts him on a footing that he seems to like to be on. what was your reaction to watching how he handled those

exchanges today? >> i think watching this entire briefing, both his exchanges with reporters but also that 30-to-40 minute session where he was talking about all sorts of things like trade and praise for himself and not really talking about the news of updating americans about what's going on with the virus, it reminded me of a campaign rally. it reminded me of president trump out before millions of people arguing with people, lashing out at his opponents and giving his base this red meat that he loves to seb them. that's what i was thinking about. it's this idea that the president is clearly eager to get back on the campaign trail. he is using the white house briefing increasingly like campaign rallies. he is showing videos. he is reading an article that he thinks are favorable for him. but the other thing that's, of course, really sticks out to me. it was that great interview bill de blasio pointed out, this crisis began with the issue of testing. now we are now in april and people still cannot get tests. it's incredible that i'm talking

to people on the ground, interview somebody who today said 15 family members got sick. one person died. only one person could get tested. testing is still the story. it's still the scandal essentially of what is going on right now so many people are scared. they can't get the tests. so my biggest take away was the president didn't have clear answers for testing. he didn't have clear answers for what he was doing the entire month of february as he was holding rallies. >> and the only way that we have to repeat this over and over and over again, the only way to safely open and stay opened is if this testing question gets solved and it's a very good point there still. governors are staying it out loud over and over again. they do not have what they need despite what the president said from the program. thank you guys very much. it's always great to have you on the program. we've got much more to come tonight as businesses grow anxious to reopen, illinois faces its deadliest day yet with

125 deaths in a 24-hour period. i will talk to senator tammy duckworth about her state. first senator chris coons joins me live. i will ask him whether america is ready to vote by mail. let's be honest. quitting smoking is hard. like, quitting every monday hard. quitting feels so big. so try making it smaller, and you'll be surprised at how easily starting small can lead to something big. start stopping with nicorette.

starting small can lead you can't always stop for a fingerstick.betes with the freestyle libre 14 day system, a continuous glucose monitor, you don't have to. with a painless, one-second scan you can check your glucose with a smart phone or reader so you can stay in the moment. a

. welt come back to kasie d.c.. joining me now, democratic senator kiss coons of delaware, snofr, it's always greats to have you open the program.

let's start where we left off in our conversation with the panel and the congressman from the other side of the capitol. film us in on how we got here. do you feel good about the deal that seems to be coming together to help small businesss in this difficult time as well as to help hospitals but leave that state aid for later? what's your sense of where things stand? and are you supportive of this? >> i am very optimistic that the deal that has been put together this weekend is something that all of us can support. it's gone roughly the same architecture as the bill that we passed unanimously several weeks ago. aid for small business. aid for hospitals. support for lots of the critical parts of our economy happened our public health system that need more resources. one of the big problems with the small business administration's ppp or paycheck protect program

that was in the c.a.r.e.s. act was there was no funding available for the smallest business and non-profits. many of them struggle to connect with a bank ready and willing to lend to them. i am happy provisions will include provisions to encourage community banks and credit unions and so-called cdfis or community developed finance institutions to make sure that a broader range of businesses, not just the larger of the businesses, some of the very smallest will be able to get help. i really wish we had replacement for lost revenue for states and local governments in this bill. that's what's been holding it up, much of today. in the end, i am hopeful that will either happen in this bill or very soon here jafafter. i ham hearing our revenue shortfalls here in delaware are striking. and if we can get more aid to states, that impacts the teachers and police officers and firefighters, it's not just some

faceless bureaucracy. it's the folks we count on to help keep us safe. >> yeah. and the people that we are asking literally the most of right now. they are putting their lives on the line day in, day out. do you get the sense you will be able to pass. is the senate going to be able to do this by unanimous consent or will we see congress bam back into town and do it? >> i don't think we should be bringing all 300 senators to cast a vote in this context if we can avoid it. that's the subject of a letter that senator klobuchar aroundwide weiden and i have been leading and an effort to appropriate more money to make sure that the average american citizen also isn't forced to go and vote in person while we still have shelter in place orders. as you saw in the state of wisconsin, we don't yet have a clear plan for how to deal with

voting in the age of this pandemic. so senator klobuchar and we'dp and i have been -- weiden and i have been advance anything bill and funding to allow states to begin planning responsibly now for how they will carry out their delayed primaries and the november election. we shouldn't put the average american, and in particular seniors and those immunocompromised in a position of having to choose between exercising their sacred right to vote and keeping themselves and their families safe from this virus. so i think this is an important step forward. it would ask us to give some flexibility to states in terms of match requirements and some dramatic additional resources, 3.6 billion. we've heard both republican and democratic secretaries of state, heads of state, parties and local election officials calling for this. in every election, hundreds of thousands of americans vote by mail from overseas. folks in our armed forces and our diplomatic core, president

trump has requested an absentee ballot for this election. if it's good enough for our troops and diplomats and our president, i don't see why a vote by mail shouldn't be a feature for every election in this state by november if people request it. >> and yet, had the president already when talking about similar types of measures, universal voting basically say he then doesn't believe a republican would ever get elected. do you think that you have a good shot at getting this money in the next c.a.r.e.s. package, not necessarily the one this week but one that is sure to follow in may or june or do you think it's going to become politically criticize ed? it shouldn't be a partisan issue. there are five states that conduct it entirely by mail. oregon and utah. oregon is majority democrat in terms of who they send to congress. so toeng i don't think you can predict what the partisan

outcome will be based on whether folks have the ability to cast their votes by mail. a number of states have developed thorough security measures to make sure they've can track every single ballot and they can confirm that the person casting that ballot is, in fact, the registered voter by 60 match and lots measures. we ought to be able to do this to vote securely, if necessary, by mail if there is an ongoing pandemic problem with us in the fall. and, photographically, the -- frankly, the lack of planning around several aspects, being able to vote by mail and have enough testing tracing resource us available too public health organizations around our country is a lot of why this pandemic keeps being such a challenge for us. i, frankly, also think it's why my friend and predecessor joe biden has the right mix of experience and attitude. she someone who knows to listen to the experts and his own experience as vice president in helping deal with the ebola

pandemic in west africa and deal with the recovery from the '08-'09 recession makes him personally qualified to be the person to carry out stronger plans than we are currently seeing from our federal leadership. >> a studied surrogate for the former senator from delaware, now the democratic presumptive. >> yes, ma'am. >> or parent nominee for president, senator chris coons, it's always good to have you on the show. be safe this week. we will, of course, be tracking all the of the developments in the deals there. while the president claimed total authority to take credit for reopening the country, he doesn't actually have the power to tell states when to open back up. notably, base he didn't actually issue an order to close them, but most notably because of the constitution. joining me now is nbc news presidential historian michael beschloss, the author of the book "presidents of war."

it's always great to have you on the program. thank you for being here tonight. >> thanks. >> the president has really waffled back and forth on the extent of his own authority. we've seen him on the one hand claim to have powers that he doesn't, based on the constitution. >> viet. >> on the other hand, we've seen him try to insist the states are responsible for all of this. he doesn't seem to want to take the credit for it. we are obviously living through an incredible moment in not just history but presidential history have you so carefully documented for so many years. we have been in a whirlwind of moment to moment here. let's take a breath and look at the past week, the climbs that have been made, what this president is claiming he is able to do and where he stands stwr from a historian's lens. >> well, you know, a historian writing about all this 100 years from now will say there was exactly one person with power over a decision over, to a great extent who survives this

pandemic, who lives and who dies, and that's donald trump so in that sense he has a lot of power that presidents oftentimes do not have. to say he has total authority. you are absolutely right under the constitution as you well know, the constitution makes it very clear that we've got other branches of government and governors and local officials who are there to check the power of the president. that having been said, we're seeing things now that we have not seen before. even just tonight. we saw donald trump on the air for what? 90 minutes? on a sunday? you know, night after night. sometimes two hours. that's a degree of influence that most presidents don't have. franklin roosevelt fighting a global wore, world war ii gave us a fireside chat every once in a while. had a press conference around his desk in the oval office, gives the president an enormous amount of influence to get his story out night after night like this in a way we have not seen before.

he is going to have a lot of influence over those trillions of dollars you have been talking about tonight, how that's spent. that's something you don't see with normal presidents. the other thing is this is someone who loves power, loves to expand his power, is always talking about it. remember last year he gave a speech saying, article 2 gives me all sorts of power but i don't even talk about that as if it's almost a mystery that we should be worried about. >> it's a good point. and i'm informed that we actually have a pretty good outline here of how the president has talked about his own authority, his kind of back and then forth about. >> right. >> just exactly where the buck stops. and it does team like it's a bit different than the man that you referenced fdr or even many truman, who, of course, followed him and had the famous quote on his death. i think we have show that to our viewers. with you feel. >> the buck stops --

>> the president of the united states calls the shots. when somebody is the president of the united states, the authority is total. and that's the way it's got to be. it's total. authorities know that. the governors will do a good job. if they don't do a good job, we're going to come down on them very hard. we will have no other choice. we will be working very much with the governors of the states. we want them to do it. we're not going to be running a parking lot in arkansas. governors will be empowered to tailor an approach that meets the diverse circumstances of their own states. if they need to remain closed, we will allow them to do that. the guidelines provide governors with the factor and science-based metrics they will need to make the decisions that are right for their own particular state. i just think that some of the governors have gone carried away. >> so, we went from total authority on monday. >> right. >> as to we will allow the

states to make their own decisions. what itself reality here? >> i this i the reality is, unfortunately, he's claiming total authority, which would have completely shocked our founders. they were terrified some president of the united states would say he has total authority. the reason this country was built was because we were rebelling against a king who did those kind of things. that's why the constitution is so careful about trying to constrain presidential power. the other thing is it's one thing if he wants to say, he's got a lot of authority in a crisis. that is true of war time presidents. other presidents like lyndon johnson dealing with civil rights in the 1960s. ba but all of those presidents took responsibility. they basically conveyed to the american people, you can be sure that i know that the buck stops with me. i'm here to keep you safe. i'm here to protect you 24 hours a day. and you know when you see him sort of giving a different story

night after night in talking about governors and not giving that kind of sense, that's one reason why i think a lot of people are very nervous and anxious even more than they need to be. >> and it is, of course, already an incredibly anxious time. michael beschloss, thank you very much as always for your perspective. we hope you and your family stay safe. coming up next, i will talk to congresswoman tammy duckworth about the next wave of relief and small businesses he at this time hardest. coming up later, the biggest tran sit system in the country has seen the death of 68 employees. a 98% decrease in ridership and a loss of $10 billion in funding. i will be joined live from the chairman of new york's mta.

♪ this virus is testing all of us. and it's testing the people on the front lines of this fight most of all. so abbott is getting new tests into their hands, delivering the critical results they need. and until this fight is over, we...will...never...quit. because they never quit. . the state of illinois has surpassed a grim milestone. there are now more than 30,000 confirmed coronavirus cases across the state. saturday matched the deadliest data so far. new data shows one in four of the coronavirus deaths are tied to nursing homes. joining me is senator tammy

duckworth of illinois. thanks so much for being on the program. this is clearly a significant, you know, the state is having an unbelievable difficult. time. it is arguably one of the centers to watch in the united states, particularly in chicago. what do you need right now in the state of illinois from the president of the united states from the federal government in terms of testing? in terms of other needs? do you feel as though the state is getting what it needs from the federal government? >> well, we need the test kits and the president long promised test kits. and he has not provided them per his promise. time and time again he said he will send us these test kits. we haven't received the sufficient quantities. that's the key to actually test people in a widespread manner and to be able to do contact testing. contact tracing i mean to know where people have been. we also need ventilators. the president has been promising

us ventilators and ppe. my goodness, in fact, our governor had to fly an aircraft to china on our own to go purchase ppe and bring it back into illinois. we had to actually keep that secret from the federal government for fear the federal government will actually come in and confiscate our ppe that we desperately need for our front line folks in nursing homes, hospitals and first responders. it's really criminal what this president is doing when it comes to failing the provide the resources all of our states need. >> the president and his team have been talking about states and their plan for reopening, this idea that some might be ready for a phase 1 move toward reopening. is illinois anywhere close to that yest? >> we are not anywhere close to reopening. one of the things that we did, we did well actually was to put people into a shelter-in-place fairly early on. we have actually bent the curve. i was into the quad cities,

mccormak place which is our additional site for additional hospital beds. we have actually made a lot of great progress there. we are nowhere ready to start reopening the economy in the way the president wants. if went to do that, first we need more testing, more contact tracing. we need to make sure we open the economy, we do it in a methodical way. not just because of the president's word about polling or what his friend and business and ceos are telling him. i'm worried about individual illinoisans right now for fear of dying. >> where do you stand on the emerging agreement that seems to be developing among the leaders in the senate and the house and apparently with the administration to send more money to small businesses? it goes far enough, it seems like the money for state and governments are left open the table or punted to a future bill. what is your response to how this is shaping up? >> well, i do think that we need to send more money to small

businesses. in illinois, small businesses are 95% of our employers if our state. they desperately need this money. i have no quarless with accepting more money to small businesses. i just want to make sure we get money to hospitals and first responders. all those folks on the front lines. i've heard from my hospitals both in big cities in chicago and rural communities that say they are on the ropes. they need a cash infusion in order to keep fighting this pandemic. so i want to make sure the money gets to them as well. then, of course, i do want money to go to state and local governments, directly to the municipalities barely hanging on, themselves. they've bore the brunt of the cause of fighting this pandemic. they've lost revenues from taxes and sales tax and all sorts of places. but they're still out there fighting every single day. >> let me ask you, senator, and we are, of course, thinking of the first responders in your states and across the country alzheimer's we talk about the

challenges, every state and locality is facing. but also more personally, at home, you know, you're at home all of us are trying to work in some cases with small children around balancing all of that i know you are also a relatively new mom. that's not a terribly common thing in the u.s. senate. how are you balancing all of that and trying to figure out your work-from-home scenario? >> well, it is every day, it's a team effort. my -- i am very fortunate that my mother lives with us. i decided that my mom is sheltering in place with us. she is 79-years-old. she helps. and i don't know if you can hear, i can hear in the distant background, she actually has the child who is crying. my husband just took the 5-year-old into timeout, because she wanted to turn my little pony on high blast. my mommy needs ten minutes. she in timeout. she threw a fit. my husband took her upstairs.

>> well, please tell her that we appreciate the break for my little pony, i'm so sorry to have intruded into your family life. mothers are such sa blessing. h. senator tammy duck worth, thank you very much. we will be checking in with you as congress continues to wind towards a deal. meanwhile, the subways and trains that run through new york are as iconic and essential as the city itself. 68 mta employees have died from covid-19, and the agency is now asking for an additional $3.9 billion in federal aid to, quote, stem the immediate financial hemorrhaging in the mta's 2020 operating budget. ridership has declined 93% on subways, 95% on the metro north, and 97% on the long island railroad. these are, of course, commuter railroads that bring people into new york city from outside states and localities. joining me now is the chairman & c.e.o. of the mta, patrick foye.

sir, thank you very much for being on the program tonight. we've been talking a lot about the help that congress is trying or working on sending to states and localities. and obviously the subway system and all of the railways that support the new york metro area are absolutely critical, not just to the city itself, but to a hub of commerce that's very economically important to the entirety of the united states. let's talk first about your employees, the people that work for you, who drive the trains, who fix the trains, who are doing all of the things to keep everything running every day. how at-risk are they if you can't get more funding to stay afloat? >> well, kasie, first, 68 of our colleagues at the mta have succumb to the virus. every one of those people had a family and a story and a future, and that is tragic. and we mourn their loss. the mta employees are acting as heroes now. they're heroes moving heroes.

you noted that subway ridership is down by 95%. that has very severe revenue and financial consequence. but the people that we're moving are doctors and nurses and utility workers and those working in grocery stores and pharmacies and fellow transit workers. and it's a question of heroes moving heroes. as far as the financial situation, it is dire. we get about half of our revenue from fare and toll revenue. the subway is down 95% as you noted. metro north and long island railroad consistent with that. we also get a package of dedicated subsidies and taxes from the state and the city, and those are experiencing precipitous declines as well. we were lurkcky enough to get $3.8 million of funding on the first round. ridership, for instance, when we asked for the first round of federal funding was down by 60%. subways is now down by 95%. we hired mackenzie, the

internationally known consulting firm. and they came up with a total loss of revenue and subsidy between $7 billion and $8.5 billion. they said $3.9 billion is the amount we need to make our books balance this year in 2020 due to pandemic financial damage. >> i'm glad that you underscored the toll that this has taken on your workers. our hearts and thoughts are with all of them. my understanding, were you also personally diagnosed with covid? do i have that right? >> you do. i tested positive. this isn't about me. i was very lucky to have a mild case. i'm fortunate and blessed. >> what are you doing day in and day out to try and protect workers? do you feel as though you've figured out a way to try and

protect those who are going to work every day by wiping down the trains, or do you still feel as though workers are really out there in a situation where they're risking getting sick every day? >> no, our first priority, kasie, has been the safety of our customers and our employees. since march 1st, when the first case was reported -- first covid-19 case was reported, we distributed 1 million pairs of masks and 2.9 million pairs of gloves. we've also used about 75,000 gallons of disinfecting, disinfecting station cars and subway buses. we minimized contact between passengers and our employees. we've implemented rear door boarding on our buses. and that, again, has a significant revenue impact, but that also minimizes contact between bus operators and the public. we put a temperature brigade in place, which is check the

temperatures at this point of well over 20,000 employees. we expanded it. we also announced a partnership with north well health, which is the largest and the leading health care system in new york, which has been leading the way on the coronavirus pandemic to get our employees tested. we had sufficient inventories of gloves and masks when the first case occurred on march 1st. we continue to have sufficient inventories. just took another million-mask delivery, mask and glove delivery last week, and we're going to continue to be solely laser focused on customer and employee health. >> well, we certainly are wishing you all of the best in that fight. both you personally, your family, and those who work for you. and i know all the rest of us here and the rest of the country are -- we will all very much be

looking forward to seeing the subways back to some day where they were when all of this is normal. mta c.e.o. pat foye, thank you. that will do it for us on "kasie d.c." we'll be back with you next week from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m. eastern. in just a moment, my colleague chris hayes takes over our coverage with a special look at the coronavirus pandemic. he's going to talk to senator chris murphy and also look into the biggest coronavirus study in america involving 10,000 major league baseball employees. but for now, good night from washington. there's skyrizi. ♪ things are getting clearer, yeah i feel free ♪ ♪ to bare my skin ♪ yeah that's all me. ♪ nothing and me go hand in hand ♪ ♪ nothing on my skin ♪ that's my new plan. ♪ nothing is everything. keep your skin clearer with skyrizi. 3 out of 4 people achieved 90% clearer skin at 4 months. of those, nearly 9 out of 10 sustained it through 1 year. and skyrizi is 4 doses a year, after 2 starter doses. ♪ i see nothing in a different way ♪

♪ and it's my moment so i just gotta say ♪ ♪ nothing is everything skyrizi may increase your risk of infections and lower your ability to fight them. before treatment your doctor should check you for infections and tuberculosis. tell your doctor if you have an infection or symptoms such as fevers, sweats, chills, muscle aches or coughs, or if you plan to or recently received a vaccine. ♪ nothing is everything ask your dermatologist about skyrizi. ♪ and i don't count the wrinkles. but what i do count on is boost high protein. and now, introducing new boost women... with key nutrients to help support thyroid, bone, hair and skin health. all with great taste. new, boost women. designed just for you. new, boost women. why accept it frompt an incompyour allergy pills?e else. flonase sensimist. nothing stronger. nothing gentler. nothing lasts longer. flonase sensimist. 24 hour non-drowsy allergy relief

and sometimes, you can find yourself heading in a new direction. but when you're with fidelity, a partner who makes sure every step is clear, there's nothing to stop you from moving forward. a partner who makes sure every step is clear, and i like to question your i'm yoevery move.n law. like this left turn. it's the next one. you always drive this slow? how did you make someone i love? that must be why you're always so late. i do not speed. and that's saving me cash with drivewise. [mayhem] you always drive like an old lady? [tina] you're an old lady. the worlwhat?miere of "trolls -what?tour"... oooo!!! is now in your home. pinky promise. ♪ a pinky promise. dang. watch now on the apple tv app.

good evening from new york. i'm chris hayes. as we enter another week of america staying at home to battle the deadly coronavirus pandemic, the president and a small group of very loud allies making the case we have to, quote, reopen the country. more or less immediately, at least some parts of it. the experts, however, along with a clear majority of the american people according to polling understand just what a disaster that would be. the virus has now taken the lives of more than 40,000 of our fellow americans and has become the nation's leading cause of death. the past few days before the weekend we've seen around 2000 or more new deaths reported every single day. that's more deaths per day than we average from heart disease or cancer or anything else. while there are pockets of good