hello, everybody and welcome to msnbc's special coronavirus coverage. i'm peter alexander here in washington. as of this hour there are 1.1 million confirmed cases of coronavirus across the united states. nearly 65, you can see the number growing. 66,000-plus deaths at this point. but that is not stopping many states from easing their restrictions on stay-at-home orders. new jersey is one of those states, opening its state and county parks, as well as golf courses today. those social distancing measures are till being enforced. protests to reopen the country are scheduled for this weekend as well after a major demonstration took place in california friday with social distancing measures there being ignored. and there also appears to be

hope for a treatment for coronavirus. the fda has granted emergency use to the drug remdesivir that will be used to treat critically ill patients. that drug is being produced by pharma giant gilead. and it is the first treatment for the virus to have its success backed by clinical data. dr. anthony fauci, director of the national institutes of allergy and infectious diseases, says the drug could set a new standard of care for treatment. meanwhile, dr. fauci is caught in the middle of a fight over his upcoming testimony. the white house has blocked fauci from appearing before the house appropriations committee to answer questions about the administration's response to the crisis but the white house says it will allow fauci to testify at a senate health committee hearing on may 12th. of course the senate controlled by republicans, the house by democrats. we will have more on that in one moment. but we start this hour with a

look at washington state. one of the states hit earliest by this deadly virus. washington's governor jay inslee has now extended the state's stay-at-home order until may 31st, through the end of the month, and plans to reopen state businesses following what he describes as a four-phase plan. joining me now for more on these measures is seattle's mayor, jenny durkin. mrs. mayor, i appreciate your company. i lived in your good city for a long time, so i'm a fan of western washington. i appreciate you being here on this evening. i want to get right to what you and your state's governor are doing at this time. we know there was another round of protests in recent days outside the state capitol in olympia. the governor now saying in spite of a decline in hospitalizations and deaths toward the end of april that it's necessary for people to hunger down for another 30 days. your thoughts on that and why you think it's so crucial at this time in spite of some good data we're seeing there. >> so peter thanks for having me on. i'm very proud of the way our

governor's handled this crisis. and we've worked very closely torkts the governor with mayors and county executives throughout the state regardless of whether they're republican or democrat. we ground our decisions based on the science, and the science told us we were not ready to open up completely but we will turn the dial to open as we're ready. we really have to watch this virus because as soon as we start to open up we know there will be more cases and we don't want to lose control like we saw in italy and to a lesser extent in new york. >> as you've described there as being sort of two economic scenarios that could take place here. there's sort of an expedited, a fast recovery as you describe, it a rapid recovery, or a slow recovery. what factors will dictate if it's one versus the other where you live? >> we really have to make sure that as we open we don't let the virus go out of control because then we'll have to shut down again and that will hurt the economy even more. so we're going to be really smart working with the governor

and others to start opening those businesses that can open and both their workers and their customers can be safe. we're telling businesses to get ready, to get their plans ready, and we know now that we can come together in some ways. we've had grocery stores and things like that where you can implement safety standards. but it's going to be tough. very few people in washington state have actually been exposed to this virus because we shut down so quickly. and that means that there's more people who could get sick from the virus if we don't do this right. >> mayor durkan, a lot of this comes down, of course, as you know well to testing and contact tracing at the end of the day to prevent a resurgence of the virus or even prevent an extension of what we're already seeing at this time. are you satisfied that you guys now have access to the testing that you need and that you have the bodies that you need to accomplish contact tracing? is the federal government doing enough to satisfy the needs of your state? >> we don't have either yet.

the governor has put in a request to the federal government that has promised more testing capacity, and we're building up the capacity to have those contact tracers go so we can actually get everyone who gets infected, isolate them so the virus doesn't spread. but we are woefully underresourced on testing right now. we need more tests. we are not even able to test all of our senior facilities where like in washington state as across the country we've seen more outbreaks there. so one reason the governor held back is he's looked at a bunch of the metrics and one of the metrics is when you open you don't miss the virus again. and when people get sick, they can get the treatment they need at the hospital or isolate at home. and that relies on broad-scale testing, which we just don't have here in seattle or washington state yet. >> i know you've described it as like a scavenger hunt right now trying to find these tests and the other resources you need in this fight that you're presently in the middle of right now.

for places like seattle, washington you guys benefit by a lot of people who work in the tech community. they can do their work from home. but obviously without business taxes, without sales taxes. seattle like a lot of major cities is getting hard hit by this. can you survive another 30-something days of being locked in place? >> we will survive. and as we open up seattle will come back and we'll thrive. but this is going to be a long haul. we know that this is a marathon, not a sprint. we've got to do it right. and if we don't do that, we'll be back in the same position, which i think would be so much more devastating for our community and for our economy. so we want to get things back open but we want to do it smart. we know that this virus has no cure. we know that there may be some promising treatments. remdesivir is in a trial right here in seattle. but it's not ready yet. so we have to have better treatments and a vaccine and

until then we have to have social distancing. we have to have a whole new normal for business, society, and community. and that's going to take some time. it's hard on people. so many people have suffered through this. i understand how everybody wants to get back to new normal but our normal's going to be very different going forward than it was in february. >> seattle mayor jenny durkan. we wish the best to you and the people of western washington. good luck. thanks so much for your time. >> peter, thanks. and if you want to come back to the better washington, we'll have you. >> i appreciate the invitation. we look forward to seeing you again very soon. president trump, by the way, here in this washington has no scheduled public events today, but a fight is unfolding behind the scenes between lawmakers and the white house after the white house blocked fauci, dr. anthony fauci, from testifying during an upcoming hearing with the house appropriations committee. nbc's monica alba is standing by at the white house on the north lawn with more on this new back and forth over dr. fauci's

testimony scheduled -- well, some of it was scheduled to take place as early as next week. monica, give us a sense of the difference for the white house between the house's desire to speak to the doctor and the senate's interest in talking to him. >> reporter: yeah, peter, this is really sort of the politics of the pandemic at play here. dr. fauci was scheduled to appear before the democratic-led house panel and committee on may 6th, but the white house has said in their words that that would be counterproductive given that he as an important member of the coronavirus response is working on other things. but that comes at the sam time as he is scheduled to appear before the republican-led senate health committee on may 12th, the following week. so the white house here, press secretary kayleigh mcananey talking to reporters said she feels this is a publicity stunt from democrats. she went as far as to say they couldn't provide specifics on what they would want dr. fauci to talk about when clearly he's an expert in this matter and he's been taking questions on the administration's response for the better part of two

months. but they say they much prefer to see him in a senate venue. and this comes amidst a diminishing role of dr. fauci. we've really seen him in far fewer appearances and as we've seen those briefings now dwindle he continues to do media interviews but this is the latest example of the white house now trying to control how he appears in public and exactly in what manner. now, the white house said they are willing to continue to negotiate with democrats on capitol hill to see if there's a further appearance that may work better for both sides but at the current time he won't be appearing next week. he'll only be appearing the following week before the senate as something they feel they have a little bit more control over, peter. >> nomonica alba reporting for on a gorgeous day in the d.c. area. thank you very much. i want to get to my panel right now. nbc news digital senior white house reporter shannon pettypiece. wbur public radio senior correspondent and msnbc contributor kimberly atkins. and former health policy director for the obama white house and msnbc contributor dr.

kavita patel. shannon, let me start this conversation with you and sort of pick up where monica left off there, which is the sort of changing face of the white house messaging in recent days. as you and i have both witnessed. we have the consistency of the 5:00 p.m. briefing where the president went out, he delivered remarks, sometimes extended for more than two hours. republicans and other allies were saying to the president, hey, this isn't helping you, it's not helping your poll numbers and it's also not helping you in terms of misrepresenting the facts on occasion here. now they're trying to focus on the economy, what the president thinks is closer to his wheelhouse. will this work, and what does the strategy look like? >> well, we're about one week in to this new strategy. and as one senior administration official cautioned, nothing is forever in the trump white house. so we will see what goes from here. but as you laid out, peter, and i know your reporting has indicated, the president's advisers have been trying to get him to back off of these two-hour-long daily briefings

for quite some time now. things seemed to come to a head last week when the briefing on thursday of that week spiraled into this public musing by the president about disinfectant and uv light being used as a treatment to coronavirus patients. so since then we have seen the president only make one appearance last week in these briefings. kayleigh mcananey, the new press secretary, has been out there as a public face responding to this. but of course she's not a public health expert. she is a press secretary and a political operative. her last job was as a spokesperson for the political -- the trump campaign. so i think to the point monica was just raising, when are we going to have the opportunity to hear more from these public health officials? the white house has indicated that the president may continue to do some briefings when there is some news, when there is a big development, they could have a briefing with all the public health experts. but i think that's a question that's still trying to be resolved. when are you going to have the health officials out there answering questions? because as much as the president wants to turn this to the

economy of course, we still have between 25,000 to 30,000 new infections a day. so this virus is certainly very present from a public health standpoint in everyone's lives. >> yeah, i was struck by the conversation i just had with the mayor of seattle saying that there are nowhere near the number of tests they need to safely open up their community there. and they're one of the communities that has seen a decline in recent weeks. kimberly, to you if i can. shannon was talking about the new white house press secretary kayleigh mcananey, who held the first briefing, literally cobwebs were appearing on that podium in the briefing room as it relates to press secretaries, for more than a year. finally a press secretary took to the podium. and here is part of her first day and one of the questions that she was immediately asked. take a listen. >> it's been more than 100 days since a press secretary stood up there. i just want a better sense of what your plan is. are you planning to do these on a daily basis at this point? and also will you pledge never to lie to us from that podium? >> i will never lie to you. you have my word on that. as to the timing of the briefings, we do plan to do

them. i will announce timing of that forthcoming. but we do plan to continue these. >> of course within moments of that comment independent fact checkers called out the press secretary, saying that she misrepresented the facts as it related to the former national security adviser to the president michael flynn. kimberly, this is a tough position for any press secretary here, especially when you work for a president whose relationship to the truth is, well, oftentimes distant i guess at best. >> that's exactly right, peter. i mean, you know that the job of any press secretary of course includes spinning, making the facts in light -- presenting the facts in a light that's most favorable to an administration. but when you have this administration, led by a president who according to a count by the "washington post" has made more than 18,000 false, inaccurate or misleading statements since taking office,

the job of a press secretary becomes a lot tougher when it comes to trying not to spread those same falsehoods and misrepresentations. and kayleigh mcananey's first press briefing she was unable to do that. you pointed out her mischaracterizing fbi notes when it comes to the michael flynn case. there are also other things that were a lot more easily identifiable. for example, she said that a $40 million in taxpayer money had been wasted on the mueller investigation. the disclosures from that investigation put the total cost at $32 million. but the amount of fees and penalties that stand to be collected from those convicted in that stand to exceed that. paul manafort alone could lose as much as $40 million in fees and penalties from his convictions in that case. so it will be at best a zero sum investigation. also, when she talked about the president's tweet supporting michigan protesters who stormed

the state capitol there, she said the president was expressing the fact that they have a first amendment right. americans can read the tweet themselves. it said nothing about the first amendment. but what it did say was that some of these protests were "very good people." these protests, as you could see from the coverage, included people carrying long guns, people who were carrying signs that were threatening to the michigan governor, and people carrying confederate flags. so it was not support for the first amendment. we can see that rocky start means that this will be a difficult job for her to stand at the podium and say only truth. >> dr. patel, if i can ask you about some positive news that we've seen in recent days as it relates to this emergency use approval by the fda for remdesivir that's a treatment that is shown that's having a significant impact on some people, most critically ill with the coronavirus right now.

give us the pros and cons here. obviously, it can make a difference. it's emergency use, though. this isn't approval, sort of broad approval. what's the difference in terms of that? >> sure. an emergency use authorization means that there's still going to be some readout, some analyses. this trial is not done. but that the results were significant enough that it compelled the food & drug administration to offer this authorization which really opens up access to the drug. prior to this organization you really couldn't get access to this drug unless you were a participant in the trial or some specific case cans of compassionate use. but peter, to your point, here are the pros. the pros are that we know that using this drug in hospitalized patients can result in a decreased length of stay. that means less time in the hospital, more time for hospitals and doctors to treat other patients. there was another finding about a decrease in mortality, but it was not statistically

significant. which leads me to the cons related to remdesivir. this is certainly not a silver bullet. it's certainly not something that we can kind of all breathe a sigh of relief and go outside and not practice hygiene and social distancing. but it is something significant. and it reminds me of early hiv, where we saw some promising effects with first-time drugs. and it took further trials and unfortunately more years in order to really kind of come to some measure of success, which we have now. >> and dr. patel, when we get back to you, i want to get you to weigh in on the "operation warp speed" as the white house is describing its effort to sort of accelerate the process through private and public partnerships to find a vaccine. obviously, that's one of those things that is challenging to accelerate. we'll get you to weigh in on that in a little bit here as well. shannon pettypiece, kimberly atkins, dr. ka vooeta patel i know you guys are sticking around. i thank you on this saturday. there is a lot more to discuss right here after the break. coming up my colleague reverend

al sharpton will join me to discuss his recent interview with former vice president joe biden. they covered a wide range of topics including who the apparent nominee is considering as his running mate. you're watching msnbc live. >> when it comes to the vice presidency, looking for someone to be a partner in progress who's simpatico and ready to be president on day one. vision toe and save in more ways than one. for small prices, you can build big dreams, spend less, get way more. shop everything home at wayfair.com doctor bob, what should i take for back pain? before you take anything, i recommend applying topical relievers first.

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of the more than a dozen women that we're taking an initial look at there are significantly more than one black woman that's going to be considered by this group. first and foremost. number one. secondly, this administration, god willing, if i win, is going to look like america. it's going to look like the country. and it's going to represent every hue and color in the country and almost in a proportional sense because it's long past time. long past time. but when it comes to the vice

presidency, looking for someone to be a partner in progress who's simpatico and ready to be president on day one. >> that's the apparent democratic presidential nominee, joe biden, in a new interview airing within the last hour, shedding some light on his vice presidential selection process during that wide-ranging conversation with the reverend al sharpton. the conversation taking place yesterday. you saw it just aired in the last hour. a former vice president himself, biden promised to make his administration reflect the diversity of this country. joining me now is reverend al sharpton. he of course is host of politics nation right here on msnbc. and the president of a national action network. rev, appreciate your time on this saturday evening. let me get right to it. obviously, joe biden owes a lot to congressman james clyburn of south carolina for in many ways reinvigorating, maybe resurrecting his campaign. certainly clyburn is so

influential with african-americans in that state right now. clyburn now says that it is not a must that an african-american woman be the number two on his ticket, serving as his vice president. do you get any sense from your conversations which way the vice president, former vice president is leaning right now and how critical do you think it is not just for him to make that decision but ultimately for what is a significant bloc within the democratic party that there is a person of color on vice president joe biden's ticket? >> well, in both the interview and in my private conversation that i had with the former vice president i think the issue to me was for him to understand the sensitivity of it. and i think he gets that. i get no indication what he's going to do one way or another. and i think that people are not trying to raise it as an ultimatum that his opposition would use saying he had to do

something or that he was threatened but raising it saying that this has got to be something that we see taken as serious consideration. which is why i raised that the democrats in the '80s had geraldine ferraro on the ticket. and the republicans had a sarah palin. we've never had a black woman raised to that level. and we have qualified black women. stacey abrams, senator kamala harris, congresswoman val demings and others. what i thought was very interesting, and i thought something i'd not heard him say before, is he said there will be more than one black woman on the list considered. and i think that we can clearly say that he made that statement and that people are going to watch that. you have an african-american, very qualified african-american congresswoman on the committee, a congresswoman in rochester,

from delaware. so i think it was very interesting to me how he responded. i also took very serious note that he committed an attorney general that will continue to work -- that former attorneys general eric holder and loretta lynch had made. what i wanted was to deal with some substantive issues that deal with the very community you raised that james clyburn was so influential with in south carolina. and i think we got some substance there. and all of us respect jim clyburn nationwide, not just in south carolina. >> certainly that's true. among the names being floated as possible vice presidents, for joe biden, val demings of florida, kamala harris of course of california, stacey abrams of georgia. but for now we watch and we wait. you also in your conversation talked to joe biden about the sort of unique challenge he faces of campaigning in the midst of a pandemic. and you got his reaction to what's been taking place in the

state of michigan where frankly another possible vp pick, governor gretchen whitmer, has been dealing with significant criticism from conservatives in that state to her strict stay-at-home orders. here is part of your conversation. take a listen. >> the idea of trying to intimidate a legislature and a governor by sitting on the grounds and in the hallways with armed -- rifles and they're loaded with ammunition is just outrageous. such an attempt to intimidate is just beyond the pale. and the president should be speaking out and saying it is totally inappropriate to try and directly intimidate, in this case directly intimidate a governor who is doing one heck of a job. >> rev, joe biden says president trump is mishandling this crisis. but how does joe biden break through when he doesn't have the bully pulpit, he doesn't show up at a white house podium every day? he's effectively stuck at home doing this. >> i think that one of the

things that, peter, was significant about him making that statement is you must remember that president trump said yesterday after this demonstration with weapons they had, military-style weapons at this demonstration, in the state capitol on the steps, on the grounds of the state capitol in lansing, michigan, the president said some of those were good people and that the governor of michigan should sit down with them and work something out. work something out with people that obviously are coming in a threatening way. why else would you have arms going to the state capitol unless you were trying to infer some type of intimidation? you certainly are not out there hunting you're certainly not even dealing with a gun rights issue. so i think joe biden is the only figure i know nationally and certainly being the assumed democratic candidate to take the president on in this. how do you say sit down and deal with people like that and that

some of them are good people? i think it was a very strong statement from biden. >> msnbc's reverend al sharpton joining us on this saturday evening. rev, we appreciate your time. thanks so much. >> thank you. to further discuss the reverend's interview with joe biden i want to bring back in my panel, shannon pettypiece and kimberly atkins. on shannon, we start with you. joe biden obviously has another challenge right now given these new accusations that date back to 1993 from a former senate staffer, tara reade. he answered questions about this allegation that was made against him by reade, and here's part of what the former vice president said. >> would you please go on the record with the american people? did you sexually assault tara reade? >> no. it is not true. i'm saying unequivocally, it never, never happened. >> do you remember her? do you remember any types of complaints that she might have made? >> i don't remember any type of

complaint she may have made. it was 27 years ago. and i don't remember nor does anyone else that i'm aware of. >> part of joe biden's conversation with "morning joe" on friday. and nbc news having been in contact with tara reade is now reporting that she "filed a complaint regarding sexual harassment and retaliation" but she says "i am not sure what explicit words on that intake form until we all see is it again." that's a quote from tara reade, who's accusing joe biden of a sexual assault taking place more than 25 years ago. this is obviously a complicated and challenging circumstance for joe biden. he was vehement in his denial, shannon. how does this challenge his candidacy as he tries to put this to rest all at the same time, saying that women should be heard and their allegations should be vetted? >> well, i'm hearing from democratic strategists that

while they wish this wasn't a topic that had come up they are glad the vice president is now on the record very forcefully denying it. and also the timing isn't the worst because so much of the attention and the focus of the national news media and the focus of people in their everyday lives is on the coronavirus and not so much on the campaign. from a timing perspective it might work some way in his favor. there are still i think a few pieces, though, to continue to come out from this. one of those being this question about this form from the complaint she filed. is that going to resurface at some point? are the vice president's records that are now at the university of delaware going to be reviewed at some point? so i think there's a few more, you know, screws that could be turned here on this story. but you know, in general the president has tried to capitalize on this. he will continue to try to capitalize on this. of course he has a history of so many allegations of sexual

misconduct against him. quite a list of those accusations have been made against him. it's something that then the biden campaign can throw back at him. it i think remains to be seen how much of a campaign issue this gets to be in the coming days because i think women voters and particularly suburban women voters are going to be key to this election and time's only going to tell how they respond to this story and how the biden campaign handles it in the coming weeks. >> yeah, kim, that leads me to you. and that's the very question i wanted to ask. key to a biden victory this november are those suburban women right now, many of whom have become disillusioned by what they've seen from president trump. does this risk or even just the former vice president's handling of this issue risk undercutting his relationship to that community or do you think that he's handled it well and may be able to sort of put an end to this early on in the campaign season?

>> yea. you know, i've talked to democrats too and i've heard similar things to shannon in that there was a desire for joe biden to speak on this. some thought -- hoped he had done it before now, but now that he is finally doing it, that had to be done. that was the first step in moving forward in dealing with this situation. we'll have to see what happens. the more we learn about it, if that complaint is unearthed, then the more facts that we find out about it. e but you're right. suburban women will be a key constituency in this election. and joe biden has to do his best to appeal to them. it seems that some of that support has softened when it comes to president trump, who won white suburban women in 2016. but joe biden has a really tough job right now, that he has to bring together all kinds of people, not just suburban woernlgs not just progressives, not just folks who backed bernie

sanders in the primary. that's just one of a multifaceted factor. he also has to be prepared for donald trump to come at him on this issue very hard. recall in 2016 that donald trump brought accusers of bill clinton, women who accused bill clinton of misconduct, to a press event before a debate. i really doubt this is going to go away. the trump campaign and the rnc have treaded very lightly on this but joe biden has to be prepared for donald trump whatever he might do. >> and it's worth noting that the lawyer william jeffress who led the obama campaign's vetting of joe biden has now spoken to nbc news and said the team that investigated then senator biden, eight to ten lawyers i believe it was, found in their words no records of any complaints of harassment, sexual harassment, discrimination or misconduct of

any kind against then senator joe biden. shannon pettypiece, we'll ask you to stay with us as we are on msnbc. still to come as the coronavirus outbreak begins to take its toll on undocumented immigrants in i.c.e. detention centers, democrats in congress are now calling for a review of the agency's policies. we're going to speak to one of those lawmakers pushing for reform. we'll be right back. you're watching "msnbc live." iv. i can save you... lots of money with liberty mutual! we customize your car insurance so you only pay for what you need! only pay for what you need. ♪ liberty. liberty. liberty. liberty. ♪ what do we wburger...inner? i want a sugar cookie... wait... i want a bucket of chicken... i want... ♪ it's the easiest because it's the cheesiest. kraft. for the win win.

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there is much more news coming up here live on msnbc. up next i'm going to speak with maryland senator ben cardin, the ranking member on the small business committee, about the latest missteps with distribution of that ppp, that money that's supposed to be going to small businesses. why it isn't getting to the businesses that need it most. and coming up at the top of the hour, my clear chris jansing takes a look at the particular toll coronavirus has taken on the state of ohio. from local and state governments to its economy, even to sports. that's at 7:00 p.m. eastern right here on msnbc. we are back after a short break. yes.

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the senate is set to return to capitol hill on monday may 4th. it will be the body's first full return since stay-at-home orders were enacted and will happen 11 days before that order is set to expire in d.c. on may 15th. joining me is the ranking member of the senate small business committee, the senator ben cardin of maryland. senator cardin, i appreciate your time on this saturday. it's nice to visit with you. i want to get your sense if i can right now about what we're hearing from these snaul

business loans. one bank official called the sba administration loan process including slowdowns and lockouts "entirely predictable." what is being done right now to resolve this for so many of those small business folks who are waiting to get that money, desperate to protect the businesses they've spent years building up? >> well, first, it's good to be with you. on the first round of funding it was very clear that many small businesses that didn't have a priority relationship with a bank were left out. they could not get their loans processed. so when we reauthorized the funding, we insisted that there be carve-outs for mission lenders that would reach the underbanked small businesses. and it looks like that's working. the most recent numbers show that we are getting more loans into the underserved communities. we're using smaller banking institutions. we're using minority deposit authority institutions and cdfis. and it seems to be working

better. but we need to see the numbers. and one of the frustrating parts is the small business administration has not been able to give us the information as to who has gotten these loans. and that's one thing that we'll be insisting upon as we start our oversight in the united states senate. >> there's a concern right now that those who have cozy relationships either with the banks or perhaps with the trump administration, those small business owners, right now are getting the benefits of ha. they may have lobbyists that work here in washington, d.c. who are able to, you know, grease the wheels as it were to make sure they get their money first. you know about this administration and the fraught relationship it has had with inspector generals and the like. how satisfied, even as the administration says it will investigate -- or take detailed looks into loans of more than $2 million, how satisfied are you with their doing that process and that some people aren't taking advantage of the system? >> well, we want the administration to do oversight. but the united states congress

must do its own oversight. we have the independent inspector general must do oversight. and we must have transparency so the american people can see who got these loans, which banks made the loans, the geography of where these businesses are located and any connections that they may have had. but your first observation is correct. the initial loans is those who had a pre-existing relationship with banks and they were more likely to go to the larger of the small businesses. that happened. it was preventible. but that's how the banking institutions arranged their loans. so what we have to do now is have total transparency. yes, we want accountability for anyone who did not fill out their forms properly or were not entitled to loans, there must be accountability. and yes, i hope the administration does that. but congress must exercise oversight and we must have

complete transparency. >> senator cardin, you're one of 25 senate democrats calling for investigations into i.c.e.'s policies and practices as it relates to covid-19 outbreaks in detention centers. what do you fear is going on there right now, and what is not being done to satisfy your concerns? >> well, i'm greatly concerned. we're talking about desperate families. and we know that the way they are detained that it runs a great risk of the spread of covid-19. we have not been told what precautions are being taken by i.c.e. in order to protect those who are detained. so we are very concerned that this has not been a priority of this administration at all to deal with those that are in desperate situations and we are worried that they are being mistreated from the point of view of protecting them from covid-19. >> senator ben cardin, who is joining us from maryland today.

senator, we appreciate your time on this saturday. thank you very much. >> great to be -- coming up, there are mixed feelings across the country as a handful of states try their hand at reopening in spite of coronavirus. but could it be too soon? of course only time will tell. we're going to show you what states are doing, next. ♪ in nearly 100 years serving the military community, we've seen you go through tough times and every time, you've shown us, you're much tougher your heart, courage and commitment has always inspired us and now it's no different so, we're here with financial strength, stability and experience you can depend on and the online tools you need because you have always set the highest standard and reaching that standard is what we're made for ♪ and reaching that standard is what we're made for when you think of a bank, you think of people in a place. but when you have the chase mobile app, your bank can be virtually any place. so, when you get a check... you can deposit it from here.

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started discussing how to reo n reopen in the wake of coronavirus, georgia is a week into its ambitioambition. georgia did create a spike according to the department of public health. the state attributes the spike in a doubling in the testing in the last week. governor gavin newsom sparked a political firestorm as he tried to close all beaches in orange county. he was met with protests and demonstrators ignoring mandates, calling with the beaches to be reopened, with some claiming the closures infringed on their freedom. then in new york city, governor andrew cuomo has halted

overnight subway service for the first time ever in order for trains, buses and stations to be disinfected. my panel joins me again, they are all back here right now. shannon, throughout this we've seen the president initially, the president said i have the authority effectively, i can tell the governors what to do. then he said it's up to the governors to make the decisions for themselves. this mixed messaging has posed some real challenges for some of these states obviously. how has it complicated their efforts to reopen right now? the multiple phases from the administration say you have to have a decline over two weeks. very few of these stutes thates are reopening have seen that decline in cases. >> yeah, and even when the president sort of flip flopped and came back at the governor of georgia and said that he disagreed with what that governor was doing, a governor he really helped get elected, you still saw the governor of georgia go ahead with his plans,

which were out of line with the guidelines that were laid out by the cdc. the president is in a bit of a difficult spot here because he really doesn't have any sort of legal authority over the states when it comes to reopening. there's a possible argument that could have been made when it comes to getting the states to close certain services because it was a public health emergency and there was a public health reason to do it, but getting them to open them back up, he doesn't have much control over that at this point. the president and the administration publicly have obviously been trying to push this narrative that it is time to reopen, you have the vice president saying that he says things will be getting largely -- or we'll get this virus largely behind us by memorial day, jared kushner said we'll be get being back to normal by june. the numbers certainly indicate we are not heading in that direction. the president and administration are signaling to governors that they want to see a shift towards reopening the economy, but if there is a second wave or cases

continue to rise, a lot of that blame is also going to be coming back on the administration and they will take some criticism, too, for their response. >> so dr. battel, reality check is here. where are we in the timeline of this virus? it varies by region and even by community but how long before we safely can start to return to life as usual? >> well, unfortunately we're still several weeks from even seeing declines, as you mention. in many regions we have increases. overall as a country we're kind of in a plateau. until we see those decreases, at least several weeks and as you mentioned, we're now seeing some spikes, it could be incredibly dangerous to have these patching reopenings and we're really

going to challenge the timing. we have very little input on tracing, isolation. those are all still phases, which even after phase one we're not ready for. >> we talked about trying to, you know, reduce the flatten the curve. we may be at this for quite a long while until there is a vaccine. a great panel with us on this saturday, i appreciate your time, all of you. that is going to do it for this hour of msnbc live. thank you for watching. after this break, my colleague chris jansing picks things up on how things have adversely affected ohio, the buckeye state. >> when we come back, sports in the times of coronavirus. when a stadium like this, progressive field, be full again? we'll talk about it when we come back. again? we'll talk about it when we come back hold my pouch.

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hi, i'm chris jansing live in cleveland, ohio. this state is home to 11.5 million people, the seventh most populous state in the nation, and all of them, just like you, have one single pressing question -- when are we going to get life back as normal? we've taken you to a lot of places over the last six or seven weeks, to both coasts,