one of them worth millions. and the other far more. this sunday, risky business. >> social distancing must continue, our economic shutdown cannot. >> some states reopening their economies. >> we're going to continue to see our cases go up but we're a lot better prepared. >> this as millions more file for unemployment. >> we can't hide in fear the rest of our lives. >> and as the u.s. death toll passes 50,000 -- >> you want to live, you stay home. my god, don't open up this country. >> plus, the president versus the scientists. on a coronavirus surge in the fall. >> also possible it doesn't come back at all. >> next fall and winter we'll have two viruses circulating. >> on testing. >> we're not in a situation

where we say we're exactly where we want to be with regards to testing. >> if he said that, i don't agree with it. >> and on injecting disinfectants. >> is there a way we can do something like that by injection inside or -- or almost a cleaning? >> or using uv rays inside the body? >> that is a treatment. >> my guest this morning, dr. deborah birx, head of the coronavirus task force. governor phil murphy of new jersey, infectious disease specialist michael osterholm, and former georgia gubernatorial candidate stacey abrams. >> also, the pandemic and the election. how the coronavirus will be a huge factor come november. joining me for insight and analysis are nbc news chief foreign affairs correspondent andrea mitchell, dr. vin gupta of the university of washington, and business correspondent stephanie ruhle. welcome to sunday. it's "meet the press" in our continuing coverage of the coronavirus pandemic. >> announcer: from nbc news in

washington, the longest running show in television history, this is "meet the press" with chuck todd. >> good sunday morning. to give you some perspective on how devastating the coronavirus has been, consider this. there have now been more than 900,000 confirmed cases of covid-19 in the united states, with over 53,000 deaths. look at that number of deaths for a moment. some time this week, we're likely to pass the 58,000 lives we lost in vietnam. that death toll took us more than a decade to hit. this has taken us about 12 weeks. in the past seven days, at least 17 states and washington, d.c. have registered their highest ever one-day total of coronavirus cases. the national curve may be flattening, but it's flattening at a very high level. what's now clear is that we as a country, particularly in the government level, have failed to meet the moment. there's not enough testing to understand the challenge we're confronting. 26 million people so far have filed for unemployment, wiping out the gains made since the

2008 financial crisis. money is not getting to the small businesses that need it to survive. and the president of the united states is floating ideas like injecting disinfectant into sick patients. it's against this backdrop that some of the nation's governors are taking the risky step of opening their states for business. behind that decision, a brutal calculation. that the unemployment, the hunger, the depression, and the social dislocations of a stalled economy are worse than the certainty of an even larger death toll from covid-19 as businesses reopen. health care experts acknowledge the necessity of getting people back to work but warn that moving too early could invite a second wave with disastrous consequences. meanwhile, president trump eyeing the election in november is grasping at any idea to stop the virus and get the economy back on track quickly. >> do you take any responsibility for these 50,000 deaths that have happened in this country? >> i think we have done a great job.

>> as the u.s. death toll continues to climb, on friday, the administration scrambled to contain the fallout from the president's suggestion that injecting household disinfectants might cure the coronavirus. >> and then i see the disinfectant where it knocks it out in a minute. one minute. is there a way we can do something like that by injection inside or -- or almost a cleaning? >> top administration officials tell nbc news that members of the coronavirus task force were shocked by those comments. >> no, i certainly wouldn't recommend the internal injection of a disinfectant. >> sergeant general jerome adams warned please always talk to your health care provider first before administering any treatment or treatment to yourself or a loved one. the epa warned never apply a product to yourself or others. the cdc tweeted, household cleaners and disinfectant can cause problems when not used properly, and mr. trump's former fda commissioner who advises the task force -- >> there's no circumstance where

you should inject it for anything. >> i was asking a very sarcastic question to the reporters in the world about disinfectant on the inside, but it does kill it and would kill it on the hands and that would make things much better. >> just the latest example of the president's desperate attempts to peddle treatments for a pandemic that is killing thousands each day. for weeks, the president touted the use of a malaria drug to treat the virus. >> hydroxychloroquine. >> hydroxychloroquine. >> hydroxychloroquine worked unbelievably. >> on friday, the fda issued a formal warning against the use of the drug citing heart problems and the president has broken with the scientists who advise him on the most fundamental questions on the response. on testing -- >> we absolutely need to significantly ramp up not only

the number of tests but the capacity to actually perform them. >> no, i don't agree with him on that. no, i think we're doing a great job on testing. >> and on the virus' timeline. >> it may not come back at all. >> we will have coronavirus in the fall. >> and joining me now is the response coordinator for the white house coronavirus task force, dr. deborah birx. dr. birx, welcome back to "meet the press." let me start with the issue of reopening. and that is the four states right now that are doing some phase of it. none of these four states are meeting the guidelines that you laid out about ten days ago of what these phased reopenings would look like. what metrics each state should be looking for before they begin this. this wasn't a mandate. they were guidelines. i grant you that. how concerned are you that we're up to four states not following these federal guidelines? >> we put out the gating criteria to be very clear about what epidemiologic pieces we thought were critical, what health care delivery pieces we thought were critical, and what

surveillance and monitoring pieces were critical. and we still believe strongly that those are the best public health recommendations to every state and every governor to follow. >> would you advise any one of these states that have reopened right now, georgia, south carolina, alaska, oklahoma, to be reopening right now? >> well, each state is different, and the reason we made the guidelines and gating criteria very specific was also, and i'm sure a lot of people have missed the asterisk, it said to look not only state-wide but also county by county, and i have been very struck by how different the outbreaks are from the metro regions to the rural regions to the county regions. and that's why we look at things in a very granular way and governors should be doing the same. because there are areas of every state that are much more stable and much more spared this epidemic than other areas of states. >> are you concerned, though, if you have already four states not

following the guidelines that you laid out, more states appear to be ready to possibly do that as well, that we end up losing all of the ground that we gained over the last six weeks? >> i have had really very good conversations with a series of governors, and they have really been very insightful of how they're looking at this. they understand the risk, and they talk about this not as turning on a light switch but slowly turning up the dimmer. very slowly, and that's why these are in phases. and each phase carries a very specific piece. and to all of the american people, please read those phases because it was very clear if you have pre-existing conditions or you're elderly with pre-existing conditions and have risk factors, we strongly recommended that you continue to shelter in place. and continue to be protected, and continue to follow all of the guidelines.

and anybody that you interact with, insure that they're also following the guidelines very carefully. >> well, now, that actually gets me to my next topic with you, the issue of testing. i actually, instead of me asking the question, i would like to get you to respond to bill gates. here's what he said to a colleague of mine yesterday on the testing issue. >> of all the things i'm most surprised about the federal government response, the unwillingness to get involved in test prioritization is the most amazing. we have 330 million people in our testing capacity is under 200,000 a day. >> dr. birx, i know you have had your own -- you worked with the gates foundation in the past, so i should set that aside there a second. how would you respond to him? >> i think he's very clearly -- there's a piece of us that have worked together to do two things. i think what's really important is for the american public to understand how we're doing these

tests right now. uniquely, we're using nucleic acid testing. what does tat mean? you're sampling for the live virus in people's nose or in people's throats. and then you have to expand that doing what we call nucleic acid testing. this is not like a flu test or a strep test. when we talk to the commercial testing companies almost seven weeks ago, eight weeks ago, we asked almost every corporation that had that testing capacity on their platforms, which is primarily hiv and hpv, and makes tests for those platforms, and in less than two to three weeks, every single one of these platforms are up and running. now, what we did with the states, and i think what mr. gates points out very clearly, is what did we do with the states to insure that we have identified all of those platforms? and you know over a week ago, we sent out to states every single platform where it was located, over 5,000 platforms across the states, and showing

geographically and by zip code where they're located. that's allowing us to work closely with the states to unlock that full potential and to prioritize first states that have had outbreaks but also states that need to do active surveillance, what we talked about asymptomatic surveillance, to really find cases before people have symptoms. and that's what we're doing right now with every single state. >> look, the debate about testing, and i know the president gets defensive and claims testing has been a success story. it does feel as if there's a hesitance to use the defense production act, whether it's swabs, whether it's getting these reagents, whether it's forcing these labs to process things faster, guaranteeing some funding for it. why the hesitance inside the task force? >> i think all of those pieces are discussed inside the task force from generation of swabs to generation of tubes and the media.

i think what people don't see behind the scenes is how fda have worked with corporations to really change the number of swabs that can be utilized. if you remember, just four weeks ago, we were recommending these nasal swabs, and we moved to multiple different swabs. multiple different extraction media. the intent is to continue to scale with the support of states and working with states to continue to scale testing. but at the same time, we have to realize we have to have a breakthrough innovation in testing. we have to be able to detect antigen rather than trying to detect the live virus or the particles itself and move into antigen testing and i know corporations and diagnostics are working on that. we have to have a breakthrough. this rna testing will carry us certainly through the spring and summer, but we need to have a huge technology breakthrough, and we're working on that as the same time. >> so essentially, what you're saying is we don't have -- you

don't think we have the capacity to ramp up the testing you would like because we need -- we basically need a breakthrough for easier testing? >> i think we have other technology that we think can come online within the next two to three weeks that will be a breakthrough in the rna-type testing, but i think also, just for ease of use, finding out how we can do antigen type testing like they do with flu. it could be used as a screening test and you could do the actual rna testing for a confirmatory test, just allows you to screen large numbers of individuals quickly. >> the vice president on friday said that by memorial day, in fact, i want to read the quote exactly here. that by memorial day, the epidemic, i think honestly, if you look at the trends today, that i think by memorial day weekend, we will largely have this coronavirus epidemic behind us. this memorial day 2020? is that realistic?

that it's behind us, can you explain what he means by that? >> i think he means that in the models and in tracking our actual data, because previously, we were using models based on data from around the world, and now we're very much tracking every single outbreak in the united states separately, and if you look at those outbreaks over time, and you look at places like louisiana, if you look at houston, if you look at detroit, and you look at how they have reached their peak and come down and what those cases look like as they come down, it gives us great hope when you project out boston and chicago and certainly the new york metro, which we're all very still focused on. i mean, they still have 45 or so percent of the entire cases in the united states, and the majority, about 40% to 50% of the mortality, so we continue to watch this very closely. but that's where the projections take us. and it's very much based on detroit, louisiana, and other

groups. and then looking at seattle that never really reached a peak and has never really had a large outbreak, and trying to understand what we can do as a people to insure social distancing will be with us through the summer to really insure that we protect one another as we move through these phases. >> dr. birx, help me understand what happened with the suggestion that the president made that the task force study disinfectant injections. you said he was digesting information at the time when that came out of his mouth. do you have any more information and are you concerned that people might take bleach because of what the president said? >> i think i made it very clear in how i interpreted that. i also made it very clear and so has dr. fauci and everyone associated with the task force and their clarity around this is not a treatment.

what was missed, and really i'm hoping the american people understand the reason why that study was important, the department of homeland security did, was when we came and saw what m.i.t. talked about as viral particles moving through the air is really important to figure out in the outside conditions, is there anything that decreases the half life of that virus? i think i was reassured personally to see what impact sunlight has on the virus and the viral half life. that should be encouraging to all of us. we should still social distance. we should still wear the masks to protect others as we work through this epidemic, but i think it's really important to see that sunlight, direct sunlight, may actually be able to kill the virus. >> are you concerned the credibility of the scientists on the task force get undermined when the president now with bleach obviously, you can't do that, and hydroxychloroquine, where the fda had to put out a statement. is this undermining the

credibility of you and dr. fauci and other scientists? >> i think all of us are very clear and very clear in our discussions with the american people how we're looking and utilizing data to drive decision making within the task force. every day, about 2:30 in the morning, i get every single piece of data coming in from every county where we triangulate where is the virus moving, how are people responding to the virus, are we considering absolutely everything to protect american people? and triangulating that data to come up with that day's work. where should ppe go? where should we be really talking with governors about a recent outbreak? how do we protect individuals that are in essential services? this is the discussion of the task force, and the physicians and the individuals involved in the task force are every day focused on what's the most recent scientific evidence.

and i think what really the american people should understand is in the guidelines that nih recently published really helpful, were put up this week to talk about how to really clinically approach this, but we had really critical data that has come to the forefront over the last few days about how this virus is interacting with people in the united states, and i think that's really critical. we need to constantly be focusing on what we're learning to save more lives and to make our treatment more effective. >> dr. birx, i have to leave it there. i appreciate you coming on and sharing the administration's view. stay safe and healthy yourself. >> thank you. when we come back, i'll talk to the governor of the second hardest hit state in the country. as well as to an infectious disease expert who says we haven't fully grasped how profound a crisis we're facing. and as we go to break, images of a pandemic beginning with a new look for members of the house of representatives. i'm a talking dog. the other issue.

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welcome back. next to new york, the hardest hit state in the country has been new jersey. there have been over 105,000 cases in new jersey, a stay-at-home order has been in effect since march 21st and the state is probably weeks away from jump starting its economy, and governor murphy joins me now. and governor, you have made note of these at your briefings. sadly, we just did the math. the death toll now surpasses the combined death toll of new jerseyans who died fighting in vietnam, korea, and world war i. i think the scope of this continues to set in. let me start with where you believe the state of new jersey is right now and how far away you think you are from phase one, incremental reopening of the economy. >> chuck, good to be with you. you're absolutely right. and we have suffered an extraordinary toll and loss of life. i think best understanding the data right now is that we're still a number of weeks away. the fatalities continue to be significant each and every day. our positive test curve has

flattened, and that's a good thing. more importantly, hospitalizations have started to come down. icu and ventilator use down a little bit. those are good signs. but we're not out of the woods yet. i think we're several weeks away, and the big mantra, and our state has done a good job of this, i have to say, i give a shout out to our residents, the mandate to stay home and stay away from each other is still very much in effect until we can break the back of this curve. >> have you decided if you're going to have a -- have a state-wide order that will essentially govern everybody the same or do you think you're going to cordon off, you have south jersey, you have the jersey shore that may have one set of timelines and reopening, and of course, northern new jersey with another. what path do you imagine taking on a reopening? >> yeah, you're absolutely

right. the metro new york counties up in our northeast part of the state have been crushed. but it's important to note that we've got positive test results in each of our 21 counties. sadly, we have fatalities in each of our 21 counties. so while we haven't made that decision, we have as a health care matter, a month or six weeks ago, separated the state into regions, north, central, and south. that has proven to be effective. we just opened up with the army corps a field medical station in atlantic city in the south last week. so i suspect, chuck, while we haven't made a decision on that, we're going to move as one state, recognizing you've got density issues in the north that you just don't have in the south. >> you're going to be needing some money from the federal government. it looks like it's going to be probably a little bit of a back and forth inside of congress. if you don't get a federal

bailout or federal reimbursement money, what are the first services do you think you would have to start cutting back on if the federal government either limited or didn't give you some money to deal with this pandemic? >> yeah, i mean, let me say this. we had constructive conversations and exchanges, and we're on with the white house morning, noon, and night on health care, on testing, on financial matters. i have to reiterate what senator mcconnell said about letting states go bankrupt is irresponsible and not factual. to your question, we won't go bankrupt, but we'll gut the living daylights out of educators, first responders, the folks we desperately need. we need states to be fully funded at the point of attack, being there for our residents, so we need a big slug. not just new jersey. there's a bill senator menendez and senator cassidy, bipartisan, have sponsored for $500 billion. that's exactly what the doctor ordered. >> governor, one of the challenges i feel will be unique to you and governor cuomo is this issue of when manhattan can

open up. and when, as somebody pointed out to me, you might be able to create office space that is socially distanced. you can phase people in, but how do you get on the new jersey trains with social distancing and run enough trains to make it work? how do you get on the subway and still have social distancing? this mass transportation issue in the age of social distancing, do you have an idea yet of how you're going to tackle this? >> i don't have a crisp one-word answer, but the next normal is going to be a new normal and a different normal than we had in the past, without question. and chuck, it's part of the reason why we have formed a regional council with six other states and most importantly our neighbors, in particular, new york in this case. we've got to figure this stuff out together. governor cuomo and i and others of our neighbors worked very closely together as we shut

things down. we have got to do the exact same thing as we reopen, and mass transit, commuting generally, what does a workplace look like, what are the new norms going to be? clearly, testing, as you discussed with dr. birx. these are all elements we need to deal with, not just within our state, but we have to deal with our regional partners and none more important for us than new york city and new york state. >> well, look, that's just one of many things that are going to be a challenge, i think, in the next months and perhaps years. governor murphy, thanks for spending a few minutes with us. democratic governor from new jersey, and sharing your views. i appreciate it. >> thanks for having me, chuck. >> and joining me now is dr. michael osterholm, the director of the center for infectious disease research and policy at the university of minnesota. and i want to begin, dr. osterholm, with you to respond to something dr. birx said earlier on the show. she essentially seemed to imply

that we can't ramp up testing as we know it and that the only way we're going to solve our testing problem is with essentially a breakthrough. is she right? is that throwing in the towel on testing too early? >> well, she's partially right, but let's be really clear. there are three major problems with testing right now. one, we don't have the reagents. our governor is not working with private sector companies as all the other governments of the world are seeking testing to best ramp up the reagents we do need. number two is we have the wild, wild west for testing. the fda has all but given up its oversight responsibility for tests we have on the market. many are nothing short of a disaster, and we got into that place because of had fact once cdc had a problem, the fda just opened the gate, and we have a lot of bad tests on the market right now. the third thing is these tests just don't perform well in low prevalent populations meaning that right now, if you were to test for antibody in most places in the united states, over half

the tests would be false positives. so what we need is a major new initiative on testing that gets away from every day just saying how many people got tests. we're misses the mark in a big way right now. >> is this, given what we have now, i mean, it sounds like -- does the federal government, does the president need to use this defense production act in order to force these private companies to make these reagents? >> well, that's part of the answer, but remember, the whole world wants these reagents right now, not just the united states. so we're competing against the world. what we haven't done is really just been clear with the public or with in many cases the people who are making these tests what we want. you know, there's far too much happy talk, not enough what do we need, what is it going to take to get us there and how are we going do it, so even today, it's all about excuses about what we're doing for testing or not. where is our strategic plan that lays out why we're going to use

the test, how we're going to use the test, when will it be available, and we don't have that. >> lay out the next 12 months. you have been basically a reality check for a lot of us over the last couple weeks. on as you just called it, happy talk. so vice president pence said this is going to be behind us largely by memorial day. my initial instinct was, memorial day 2021 or 2020? what is your instinct? >> well, first of all, let's just take the numbers. at most, 5% to 15% of the united states has been infected to date, with all the experience we had so far, this virus is going to keep transmitting. it's going to keep trying to find humans to do what it does, until we get at least 60% or 70% of the people infected. that's what it will take to get herd immunity. we're in the very earliest days of this situation right now. you know, if i could just briefly say one story here. right after 9/11, i spent a number of days up at your studios doing filming around the issue of what was happening. and your -- the predecessor here, the late tim russert, used

to say to me all the time, hi, doc. how you doing? is the big one here yet? i would always say, no, tim, it's not. if he would ask me is the big one here, is it coming? i would say this is the big one and it's going to be here for 16 to 18 months. people don't get that yet. we're just on the very first stages. when i hear new york talk about they're now on the back side of the mountain, i know they have been through hell, and that's an important statement. but they have to understand, that's not the mountain. that's the foothills. they have mountains to go yet. we have a lot of people to get infected before this is over. >> vaccine or herd immunity, what's more likely? >> well, herd immunity is clearly going to happen if we don't have a vaccine. i do think that we have a better chance of a vaccine than some. the statement that came out yesterday from the world health organization suggested there might not be immunity was misinterpreted to mean we don't

have evidence that you're protected from humans, but we have monkeys that have been infected intentionally and we had a new study that showed vaccine protected them. i think we'll have it, i just don't think it will be soon. we're on virus time now, not human time. what we can get done in the next 16 to 18 months, great, but if we don't, we won't have a vaccine in time to protect most of the people in the world. >> dr. osterholm, thank you for coming on and giving us your expertise, and frankly, a bit of a timeline reality check. >> when we come back, president trump says the u.s. response to the coronavirus pandemic is the envy of the world. is it? the panel is next. >> and as we go to break, if there's a good thing about this economic crisis, it's been the clean air and views we haven't seen for a long time. take a look. ir and views we hav seen for a long time. take a look.

welcome back. the panel is with us from their remote locations. nbc news chief foreign affairs correspondent andrea mitchell, pulmonologist vin gupta, and nbc news senior business correspondent stephanie ruhle. as you can see here, guys, i want to basically hit three big things here on the government's response on the economics, on health, and on politics. as of this morning, more than 53,000 americans have died. less than 2% of the population has been tested and even the trillions congress has approved isn't nearly enough and often isn't getting to the people who need it.

andrea mitchell, i want to start with the political response collectively. there's the president and then there's everyone else. and i don't know how much of it you believe the president is sort of coloring the atmosphere which is why it looks like congress is slow off the mark here or we're just got to be prepared for a polarized congress going forward. >> well, i think the president is going his own way with misinformation, with those daily briefings, which we now are told he's suspending. he's finally backing off i'll believe it when i see it after this weekend as to whether he resumes because he so needs to fill his own demand, his need for self-congratulation, really, and to show what he believes is leadership, that we have seen dangerous, toxic advice coming from the white house, and unfortunately, i think the credibility of the scientists really now is on the line. they have to decide whether to stay inside and be valuable or whether or not they have to see another alternative, like jim mattis, and quit, because when dr. birx said to you today that

sunlight does kill the virus, she is perpetuating an unscientific, untested, single study presented by a nonscientist from the department of homeland security, which led to the president, as she put it, not fully digesting the data. she needed to be very clear on disavowing it, and to this point, she still has not been even this morning. >> dr. gupta, are you worried that dr. birx is letting her credibility get sort of sucked into the trump vortex? >> i really admire dr. birx, and yeah, i have to say that whether it was not pushing back strongly enough on georgia's willingness to liberalize social distancing and especially when it came to tattoo parlors. i can understand if we want to liberalize the notion of how we think about what is essential and nonessential, to what is safe and not safe, but to not

push back on two parlors and that policy by the georgia governor to me was the start of a pattern. so i do think, as somebody who admires her and her history in public health, in our armed forces, it does appear that there's some degree of filter on what she says, and she is minding her words, instead of, as andrea says, coming out and saying the truth and just being direct about it. >> i want to stay with you here a second, dr. gupta, and ask you about the testing comments that she made. that really struck me as one of the headlines out of the interview, when she basically acknowledged maybe the wrong word because there may be disputes about this, but essentially saying the current situation we're not going to be able to ramp up testing under the current situation. do you concur with her on that

or do you think that's sort of just they're trying to come up with an explanation to follow the policy the president wants? >> i think she's right, actually. we need outside the box thinking, so she's spot on. under the current situation, dr. osterholm beautifully laid it out, that right now, every new technology that the fda is putting out there, largely, is constrained by the same supply chain bottlenecks that chuck, you and i have talked endlessly about. swabs, reagents, you said it, laid it out. that's why we need more of a focus on interesting new creative outside the box thinking. innovations like the rutgers scientist on saliva. by definition, circumnavigating the supply chain bottlenecks. you spit in a tube, you could mail it to a lab if you do it at home. that's not far off. the way we're thinking about it, the inside the box, constrained thinking, yes, i think she's correct. >> stephanie ruhle, i want to move to the economy here. and we saw the sort of what some said is an additional amount of money, and look, half a trillion dollars is not chump change.

but considering where we are, do you think it's sustainable for congress to look at this sector by sector when they come up with bailouts or this idea that a few members of congress have of covering all payrolls for a while, is that going to end up being the path we have to go down? >> we're getting closer and closer to that idea, chuck, because if this is a natural disaster, an act of god, and congress wants to say let's put a bear hug around the economy, because we have asked the country to basically shut down, then they're going to have to find a different mechanism to support all businesses, because right now, as you mentioned it, yes, the cares act is adding an additional over $500 billion, but you know it's not reaching every business. the head of the small business association says every hour another small business is closing. and even though there may be pent-up demand and everybody wants to get back out there and get to work, it's not going to work that way.

we're a consumer-based economy. people aren't rushing back to the store. >> and stephanie, the issue of sector by sector, i have been thinking about the politics of bailing out oil companies or the politics of bailing out casinos or the politics of bailing out athletics, for instance, and it can look bad politically, but there a whole bunch of jobs connected to that. how do you avoid that political winners and losers unless you cover everybody's payroll the same way? >> unfortunately, you don't. and those who are the have nots are going to be the ones who are furious that they're left out. we know from bill gates and a number of others, this is disproportionately hurting the poorest or those who don't have big lobbying efforts. so yes, you can see big oil demanding, saying we need to call this an account of god, you need to protect us or the cruise industry, but i promise you, small restaurants and barbershops don't have that.

so even if we're saying, well, the small business effort is to help those small businesses, there are 30 million small businesses in this country. and the first round of small business help only got 1.7 million loans out there. it certainly didn't reach everyone. >> you know, andrea, it is pretty clear that we're going -- that the campaign is going to turn into who do you trust to handle the pandemic recovery here? but we may not be through the health crisis at the same time. it's really going to complicate our politics. >> absolutely. and it is already who do you trust. we see it in the polling, that people, most people in our poll and other polls, don't want to reopen as rapidly as the president and some supporters, what could be a new emerging tea

party movement are pressing, but i think the american people are going to be very afraid. this economy, according to kevin hassett, who has come back into the administration as a top economist, people are going to see that it's not going to flip back on. it is going to be slow and in phases. and very concerned also that the president, what he did with west point, for instance, showing that he needs to go to west point, blindsiding west point just because he saw mike pence going to the air force economy. west point wasn't prepared to announce they were bringing all those cadets back. that's the kind of thing we have to be really worried about. >> where the president is worried about the president first anyway. thank you all three of you. >> when we come back, we'll take a close look at how some counties that may determine the 2020 presidential election are faring during the pandemic. but first, going around the country to say "i do" through a face mask. say i do through a face mask. >but first, going aro country to say i do through a face mask. >but first, going aro country to say i do through a face mask. >but first, going arod

welcome back. data download time. a good time to check in on the five battleground state counties we're watching in our county-to-county project to see how they're faring in the coronavirus pandemic. first, maricopa county, arizona, home to phoenix. as of friday, there were over 31 confirmed cases. that may sound like a lot, but on a per capita basis, the county is doing well, much better than the national average. that could be because it's a sprawling jurisdiction where social distancing is easier to achieve. compare that with kent county, mish mis, home to grand rapids, one we're looking for how establishment republicans may

feel about the 2020 matchup. it's closer to the per capita average. perhaps most striking in kent is the unemployment rate. it's jumped from 2.4% to 16% in two months. the rate of cases per capita goes up more when we look at beaver county, pennsylvania, near pittsburgh. 337 cases, 47 deaths. a jump in cases there came from nursing homes which we have seen in other aging blue-collar counties. milwaukee county has been particularly hard hit. as of friday, there have been roughly 2400 confirmed cases and 154 deaths. very close to the national average per rate of infection. finally, miami-dade county in florida, the hardest hit. the largest number of cases and deaths of our group and it has the highest rate of infection, well over the national average. this election may well hinge on president trump's response to the covid-19 crisis. and how these counties respond

themselves may tell us a lot about which way they tilt in november. >> when we come back, i'll talk to stacey abrams about her goal to become joe biden's running mate.

>> welcome back. stacey abrams became a national figure when she lost the georgia governor's race to brian kemp in 2018 by just over a percentage point. though she never conceded amid charges of republican-led voter suppression. she's high on a list of women joe biden is considering as his running mate and she's been

unusually candid in openly promoting herself for the role. she's also created the organization fair fight to combat voter suppression around the country. stacey abrams, welcome back to "meet the press." let nee just start with the situation in georgia right now. it's very possible you could be governor right now, making these decisions about when to reopen. do you believe any businesses right now are ready to reopen in the state of georgia? >> i think that reopening business until we have increased our testing and decreased our infection rate is wrong-headed. there's no logic to it. it defies the science that we know. and it ignores the fact that georgia has the 14th highest infection rate and the seventh slowest testing rate. those businesses that are being promoted for opening are the businesses that require contact. nail salons, hair dressing, tattoos. these are not places that need to be open. we need to be focusing on our front line workers who are in

essential businesses making sure we're testing those who need the help and then move to reopen when we're ready. >> you have called this decision by governor kemp a political decision. i'm just curious how you think this benefits him politically. he's taking grief from the president. you and the president are on the same side on this one when it comes to the speed of reopening georgia. it doesn't look like it's benefitting him politically, but what's your take on it? >> well, i give donald trump zero credit for backing away from this because he incited it with his liberation of the states narrative, i think brian kemp was responding to that call and decided to wrong-headedly move forward, and unfortunately, as a result, he found himself cross ways with the president, with mike pence nodding pathetically at the same time about ingesting clorox as the president gave more false information to the public, but i think all three of these men have misserved georgia and misserved the country.

>> how would you launch a national testing strategy if you were running the federal government right now? >> i think what congress has put in place, the investment in testing equipment, and funding for our frontline workers, especially for our hospitals, is critical, but i would also be encouraging states like georgia and the other southern states and midwestern states that have refused to expand medicaid to do so immediately. part of testing is making sure people trust that they can go and be tested. and right now, there's inadequate equipment and inadequate strategy. she would increase production, we should make certain it's not simply the testing that's available but the mechanics, the swabs, the vials, and we're funding people on the front lines to do this work to put themselves in harm's way to make sure we can test, trace, and track. >> i'm going to ask you the vp question. i have been interested in watching you, your answer on this question has evolved over the last year. you started with giving the very sort of careful answers, number one, i don't believe you run for second place. then you said a few months later, i would be honored to be

considered. then earlier this week, you made the case that you would be an excellent running mate. do you believe you would be the best running mate joe biden could find? >> joe biden is going to be the president of the united states, and he and his team are going to decide who should be his running mate. he's been very clear that he wants someone that he is compatible with, someone with the skills and the capacity to help him lead and help us recover from four years of incompetence and chaos. and i think a president joe biden will know the kind of team he needs. i am the daughter of two ministers. i was raised to tell the truth. when i'm asked a question, i answer it as directly and honestly as i can. growing up in mississippi, i learned if i didn't speak up for myself, no one else would. my mission is to say out loud if i'm asked the question, yes, i would be willing to serve, but i know there's a process that will be played out that joe biden is going to put together the best team possible, and i believe that he will pick the person he needs. >> do you worry that no matter

how qualified you are on paper, that the perception you have not run a large organization at as executive office holder or have not won state-wide is a knock against you? >> for the last year and a half, i have run three national organizations including fair fight 2020, which is in 18 states, protecting the right to vote. i have been traveling the country promoting a census that is accurate and that helps us prepare for the next pandemic and for redistricting. and i have been working to make certain that poor families, especially those in the south, but around the country, have the services they need. i believe in doing the work. i have been doing it since the day i did not become governor and i will continue to do so. i do so as a national level because while i understand i may be grounded in georgia and a daughter of the south, my responsibility is to do the work to make sure all of our communities are healthy and safe and able to participate in our democracy. >> would it be a mistake if joe biden didn't pick a woman of color to be his running mate? >> i think a president biden will do what he has always done,

which is respect and value communities of color. i think he understands that black communities and people of color are vital to the success of the democratic party. and i think he's going to pick the right person. i, of course, think a woman of color can bring certain attributes. we have to lift up marginalized communities, communities that do not trust that they will be served because they have been the hardest hit by the pandemic. in the state of georgia alone, while we're only 32% of the population, african-americans comprise 54% of the deaths. so yes, having a woman of color on the ticket will help to promote not only diversity but trust. but i trust joe biden to pick the person he thinks is the right running mate for him. >> stacey abrams, democrat from georgia, practicing her version of staying healthy, social distancing from your house, from my house to your house, thank you for coming on and sharing your views. much appreciated. >> thank you. take care. that's all for today. thank you for watching. and as always, stay safe, and we'll be back next week because if it's sunday, it's "meet the press."

good morning, everybody. it is monday, april 27th. we have a lot to cover this morning as the number of coronavirus cases here in the united states closes in on a million. concerns are growing over testing capacity. even as governors across the country are weighing plans to reopen their states. health experts are warning that while the united states has made strides over the past month, the level is nowhere near the level the president suggests it is. as the "new york times" points out the physical components of test kits like nasal