fine. >> that was president trump back in february. the last time he was in arizona. today, he's heading back to the state as the u.s. death toll from coronavirus nears 70,000. dpm. welcome to "morning joe." it is tuesday, may 5th. with joe, willie, and me, we have washington anchor for bbc world news america, katty kay. and editor for the "washington post," david ignatius. he's out with his new spy novel, his tenth cia thriller entitled "the paladin." david will tell us all about that ahead. first, as president trump pushes states to restart their economies, new scientistic models are projecting sharp increases in the number of deaths from coronavirus over the next few weeks and months. one projection is from an internal trump administration document obtained by the "new

york times." the other is from a public university of washington model often cited by the white house. first, the government projections show the daily death toll there nearly double, from about 1,750 deaths currently to about 3,000 a day on june 1st. this is pretty dramatically different than where people were thinking. new cases are projected to go from about 25,000 a day to 200,000. the president was asked about the report in an interview with the "new york post." he said, quote, i know nothing about it. i don't know anything about it. nobody told me that. i think it's false. i think it's fake news. the white house put out the following statement. this is not a white house document nor has it been presented to the coronavirus task force or gone through interagency vetting. this data is not reflective of any modeling, any of the

modeling done by the task force or data that the task force has analyzed. the other set of data from the institute for health, metrics, and evaluation at the university of washington has been cited by the white house in the past. researchers there have also now doubled their projections to 135,000 deaths by early august. back in april, they predicted just over 60,000 by august. big difference. with the u.s. now approaching 70,000 deaths, we've blown past that estimate. it's only may, if you can believe it. the institute says the revised numbers are because people are moving around more and because social distancing guidelines are being relaxed. last night, dr. anthony fauci addressed these new projections. >> when you have a lot of virus activity, and you know you're able to contain it to a certain

degree by the mitigation, the physical separations, the kinds of things that we've been talking about, gateway, phase one, phase two, phase three, and you start to leapfrog over some of these, you're inviting rebound. rebound is going to give you spikes, and spikes are going to give you the kinds of numbers. i don't know if those numbers, because i have skepticism about models, about they're only as good as the assumptions you put into them, but they're not completely misleading. they're telling you something that's a reality. when you have mitigation that's containing something, and unless it's down in the right direction, and you pull back prematurely, you're going to get a rebound of cases. >> well, you know, dr. fauci said, you may want to look at these numbers. willie, of course, fascinating the president accused numbers that came out of this draft from the center for disease control. he dismissed it as fake news.

once again, the president looking only at rosy scenarios. i don't know if you've heard this or not, but in february, on february the 22nd, when asked about this pandemic, he said he wasn't concerned about the coronavirus. he said it was one person coming in from china. soon, it would be down to zero. by the end of february, a month later, when panic really was setting in over parts of the world, and certainly health officials very concerned -- that, by the way, was a month after joe biden's warning in late january, that this was going to get much worse. and donald trump is leaving us unprepared for a pandemic. in late february, donald trump said it's 11 people. going to be down to zero. 15 people, down to zero. kept saying during this time and in march that this was going to go away in april. don't worry about it, he told republican senators in march.

it's just like the flu. the numbers are just like the flu, he said in march. they didn't shut things down. so in april, he lied and said that there's no way. this was not going to come back in the fall. doctors, of course, very concerned. now, he's dismissing more estimates as, quote, fake news, when he has been peddling fake news, dangerous news from the beginning of january. let forget the cdc draft that talks about 200,000 people. let's just look at this university of washington study that predicted 60,000 deaths just three weeks ago. now, they've doubled that to 135,000, 136,000 deaths. let's look at the president himself. i know it drives him absolutely crazy that all of his lies and misrepresentations to the american people have made his numbers tank politically. just look at the president. he's revised the death count, i

think, by my last count, he's revised the death count, i think, four or five times recently. as recently as a week or so ago, saying it'd be 50,000 or 60,000. we're now, obviously, willie, moving towards the 70,000, 80,000, 90,000, 100,000 mark. >> yeah. we'll probably be at 70,000 by the end of the day today, joe. as you said, if you actually believe a report from the cdc, based on modeling from fema, as fake news, okay. we'll put that to the side. what about your own words? he said at the foot of the lincoln memorial the other night, "we are going to lose somewhere from 75,000, 80,000, to 100,000 people. that's a horrible thing." he, himself, projected more than twice what he said two weeks ago, that there will be 100,000 deaths in this country from

coronavirus. so this actually, as sophisticated as this virus is, it is actually not that complicated to understand how you slow it. as dr. fauci tried to say in his diplomatic way, when you ease social distancing, when you have this mobility of people moving between states and spreading the germs, you'll have more cases. the movement has been to slowly reopen economies across the country. we understand why. wince why everyone wants to get back to work. we understand why small businesses are hurting. as dr. fauci himself just said, if you ease up on soescial distancing, you'll have an explosion of cases. that was the warning we got yesterday from this, again, internal document put together by the cdc, based on fema modeling. then the public model, as well, showing you'll exceed 100,000 deaths from coronavirus. >> yeah. by the way, speaking of hazardous, the president's words, the president's assurances about this pandemic,

it's hazardous to your health. you can't listen. again, he's predicted time and again, starting in january, that this was going to magically go away. that the chinese were being transparent. that it'd magically go away in april. that it was one person, soon it'd be zero people. you know, in april, we lost as many people as were lost during the vietnam war, fighting in the vietnam war, u.s. troops. pretty soon -- matt lewis tweeted this yesterday. i thought it was chilling. pretty soon, more americans will die from this pandemic that donald trump told african-american leaders in february would magically go away, more americans are going to soon be dead from this pandemic than were killed in the battle of britain. british civilians who died in the battle of britain against the nazis in 1940, more americans will be dead from this pandemic that donald trump said

was nothing to worry about, time and time again. so as we've said all along, i mean, i'm a baptist. i believe in late life conversions. even if we're talking about a pandemic. i keep waiting for the president to wake up, grow up, be responsible. he just can't do it. instead of working through the weekend, he was rage tweeting. instead of working last night, he was rage tweeting. this is one of the things that he was rage tweeting against. again, it's the truth. he rage tweets against the truth. let's take a look. >> there's mourning in america. today, more than 60,000 americans have died from a deadly virus donald trump ignored. with the economy in shambles, more than 26 million americans are out of work. the worst economy in decades. trump bailed out wall street but

not main street. this afternoon, millions of americans will apply for unemployment. when their savings run out, many are giving up hope. millions worry a loved one won't survive covid-19. there's mourning in america. under the leadership of donald trump, our country is weaker and sicker and poorer. now, americans are asking, if we have another four years like this, will there even be an america? >> paid for by the lincoln project, which is responsible for the content of this advertising. >> you know, david ignatius, for those of us who are old enough to remember the original mourning in america ad in 1984, completely different time. i think what's so chilling about that ad, and all of these type of ads that come out, that by the time they drop the ad, the

numbers are old. they mentioned 60,000 dead in an ad that just dropped. we'll be up to 70,000 dead in the next day or so. i remember people putting out ads talking about 3,000 people dead. within a week, it seemed like it had doubled. and we're hearing from the government that this is going to exponentially get worse. by june the 1st, the number of deaths per day is actually going to double. even against that backdrop, even against all of the lies and the false assurances the president has given senior citizens, have given the elderly, have given the physically impaired, have given the rest of us who have family members, who have underlying conditions, even with all of those lies and false assurances, he's still at it,

saying, "don't trust this cdc draft that was made with the help of fema." basically, all the people on my task force and my government, don't trust that. he's trying to push people back out to open up their businesses before they meet not my guidelines, not your guidelines, not mika's guidelines, notguide sanders' guidelines, not the american marxist league's guidelines. donald trump's guidelines. his own white house guidelines, he's not even following his own guidelines. it's gotten so frightening, that even a lot of his close allies are condemning people that are going to rallies with guns and trying to intimidate legislators. this is a president who isolates himself more, not only from

reality, but from a lot of supporters, david. >> joe, that line, "mourning in america," with the sovereign music, as we think of this horrifying month we lived through as a country is painful for all of us. we want to look forward. we want to have some sense of how we're all going to come out of this. we look to the president for that kind of leadership. on the numbers, he doesn't know what the numbers are going to be. these are simulations and models. it's less that that bothers me, that the numbers change. that happens. it's that what the country desperately needs is leadership to mobilize the resources of government that are there. on the key issues of testing, tracing, even moving toward therapies, that leadership still seems to be lacking.

i've had a chance this week to talk with the ceo of ford motor company, who is trying as hard as he can to keep his business going, keep his workers safe and employed. what amazed me, joe, was he just said, "we're having to do this all by ourselves. we made a 70-page booklet about how to reopen production as soon as we can. we've got all the best practices." i said, "are you getting guidance from above? what agency do you talk to?" "well, we don't talk to any agencies. we're sharing with other companies." we're a dispersed, disorganized country, craving leadership and not getting it. again, we're going to have "mourning in america" as our theme for some months now. i just worry that we're going to begin to really tear the threads of the country apart in this period pause people are

frightened. they want to blame somebody for their difficulty. it's just a terrible period. one thing we say is we know it will change at some point and get better. >> well, let us hope and pray. mika, without washington, without the president running this crisis -- he said he was a war president. this was a war -- it's like he is putting 50 state militias out there and saying, "you decide how you're going to fight world war ii." >> yeah. >> "you 50 governors decide how you're going to land on omaha beach and scale the cliffs, liberate normandy, and liberate the rest of europe. you figure it out on your own." in this case, where every state is on their own, every company like ford are on their own, you don't have a government agency

talking about best practices when ford calls up. "interesting you're asking that question, we have a manufacturer in inform thnevada that did thi. also, your business might be more like the one in washington state, in seattle. they did these practices. you might want to give them a call. here's the booklet they sent out. we'll send you a pdf. you can look it over and talk to executives. here's what they're doing in florida. >> yeah. >> without that, it is literally every man for himself, every woman for himself, every governor for themselves. this is, instead, just a president who has been lying to the american people, who has been telling the american people from the start that this was just one person from china. it was going to go away. this was just 11 people. soon, it is going to be down to zero. this was 15 people.

soon, it'll be down to five and probably zero. this is going to go away magically. >> rage tweeting all night long. >> it is going away like magic. this is a guy that said, "hey, try hydroxychloroquine," or whatever it is. kept rattling on and on about that until his own government agencies had to say, "don't take that. it causes heart damage. consult your doctor." >> then he moved on. >> the next day, he moved to disinfectants. he moved to putting lights inside of people. the government had to say, "don't do that. this will cause danger." the same week, mika, he was saying, "oh, i don't think this is going to come back in the fall. this may not even come back in the fall. of course, the scientists and the doctors, the nurses, that was the same thing as the president saying it was going to magically go away in april. now, he's doubting the cdc. now, he's doubting fema. now, he's doubting drafts of

reports. we could look at the university of washington report that's just in the past three weeks. it has doubled the number, the estimate for the number of americans who are going to die from this, from 60,000 to 135,000. this is a president whose false assurances are hazardous to your health, especially if you're a senior. especially if you're a family member who has loved ones with underlying conditions. please be careful. please take care of yourself. the president is detached from reality. >> well, and it's honestly safe to say that if you listen to this president, and you do as he says or take his advice, that very much could be hazardous to your health and even deadly. catty, beyo t katty, beyond the fact that even though somebody who perhaps voted for trump can see with their own eyes that he's not focused on this, when he's tweeting through the night about

cable hosts or whatever, not the virus, and when he's saying things like, "put disinfectant into your body," you get a sense that perhaps he's not focused. can you imagine the potential if a president bush or an obama had to take the reins? they wouldn't be perfect, but there could be collaboration between companies that puts together concepts and ideas and moves forward together. there would be collab rieoratio between the governors and the states. there would be the defense production act to streamline the process. we would be in a different place for sure. there are so many and growing numbers of experts, especially in the science and medical fields, who believe we have wasted valuable time doing nothing or not enough or the wrong thing, in terms of dealing with this virus. what's fascinating to me is the united states usually helps other countries. we usually go in, and we're the

solution. at this point, the united states of america, especially given these new numbers, is still very much at its knees. the uk is doing badly, as well, but the messaging there from its leader, very different. >> yeah. yesterday, we had a global conference, virtual global conference on vaccine experimentation. the big country that wasn't there was the united states. all the european countries were there. china had a representative there, too. the u.s. didn't even attend that conference. i don't see what they had to lose by going and having a presence. why not collaborate on something as urgent as this? they weren't there. i think we are in a really critical couple of weeks right now. that's why the modeling is changing so dramatically and so much for the worse. as we start to move around, and we know from gps cell data that people are starting to move around in the u.s. -- i felt it.

i can hear sitting in my backyard in washington the noise of traffic again. i wasn't hearing that two weeks ago. what we need above all right now is clarity of message from the top. we need to be told, "we know you want to go outside. we know the weather is getting warmer. we know you're fed up with being inside, but we ask you, for the sake of yourself, your families, and those you love, everyone else, please do not move. please do not go back outside because that is when we are going to see these numbers really spike." right from the beginning, the message we've had from the white house is ambivalence. one hand, the president will say, "stick to the guidelines." on the other hand, he'll say, "i'm not wearing a mask. these are good people protesting. let's liberate michigan and virginia." that mixed messaging, giving with one hand and taking away with the ovther is the wrong

message right now. if we open up, we're going to see the numbers double as we've seen from the modeling. we can choose not to, but we need, as individuals -- it is a normal human thing to want to get back outside into the marks, shops, and get outside. we really need that leadership right now more than ever to say, "no, this is very clear. here's the clarity of the message. you cannot do that right now for the sake of you and your loved ones. you can't go outside. when i look around europe now, the message is clear. it's not clear here in the united states from the top. >> it'll be interesting to see from the top, as katty says, when the president goes to arizona today and visits an n-95 manufacturing plant. will he, in fact, wear a mask himself? mike pence, of course, did not wear one at the mayo clinic last week. i think, too, it is interesting when you hear new york, which has been the epicenter for a few months now, when you hear governor cuomo say "the worst is

behind us. when you see the ship leave, the makeshift hospital fold up, the country can be lulled into a false sense of security. in a memo, it said, there remains a large number of counties whose burden remains to grow. when you see new york getting better relatively, though 226 people still died yesterday in new york, it's not over in the rest of the country. that's the message doctors fauci and birx are trying to get out there. okay, we've done better. we mitigated in these places where it was worse. but it will be back. it will visit new parts of the country if we don't remain vigilant on these questions of social distancing and people moving between states. >> that's a great concern. if the president of the united states is giving americans false assurances, if he is lying about this virus, if he is still trying to bully this virus, if

he is spreading the lies in may that he was spreading in january and february about it magically going away, or now not magically coming back, that's dangerous to americans' health. no, not in new york city. you're right. new york city has figured it out. i mean, what has long been my fear, beyond new york city, of course, which was horrific, was what happened when this got into the area where i've lived most of my life. what happens when it gets outside of new york, gets off of the east coast, gets into the central time zone? what you find is that you find an older population. demographics trend older in rural america. the hospitals. i've talked to hospital administrators, people running rural hospitals across middle america. they're scared to death. they don't have the capacity to handle patients coming in.

some only have one or two ventilators in their entire hospital. they've been gutted over the past five to ten years by medicaid cuts that republicans passed, thinking they were being responsible. now, it's their own hospitals in red state america, in many places that are ill-equipped to handle even the slightest of surges. that's what concerns me about the coronavirus coming to middle america. the president delivering a very mixedmakes a lot of his supporters in middle america, places that can be so badly affected, it is making a lot of the people still call the coronavirus a hoax. i have heard it from friends who say many of their associates still consider this -- >> they say overblown in a big way. >> it's overblown. it's just not the case.

that's definite thinking. >> yes. >> that's thinking that has been promoted by the president and his allies. we ask, again, that the president of the united states start listening to his doctors, starts telling the trauth, and starts following the white house guidelines. california governor gavin newsom announced some retail scores can reopen with guidelines as soon as friday. the changes are part of a four-stage plan laid out last week to gradually transition. the businesses allowed to reopen under the phase two guidelines includes book, clothing, toy shops, as well as books, music, and florists. it won't include malls, offices, sit-down restaurantsment. j. crew filed for bankruptcy yesterday, pushing the brink of

the widespread closure in response to the coronavirus. the new york-based chain filed for bankruptcy in a virginia federal court under the terms it would eliminate its more than $1.5 billion of debt, in exchange for conceding ownership to creditors. in addition to closing more than 500 stores during the public health crisis, the ek noconomic fallout stemming from the pandemic also resulted in j. crew shelving plans for an initial public offering of its made well business. >> as you said, mika, the first of many of these companies that are expected to file bankruptry. we heard about niemann marcus. there's so many of these stores -- >> it is an absolutely impossible environment. >> they were already fighting retail online. they were already fighting amazon. >> yeah. >> so often, we found over the past several years, if you go to

the store to buy something for your kids, more often than not, you'd be told inside the stores, "we don't have it here, but you can order it online." they were in position because there was a decline in demand even before this pandemic. >> it's rough. still ahead on "morning joe," the whouite house wants t limit agency officials and task force members from testifying before congress this month. we'll get a take on that from the top democratic in the -- >> the lack of transparency. still remarkable. >> at a time when americans need information about this virus. chuck schumer will join us to discuss that and a lot more. plus, willie mentioned that fox news interview with the president, sort of staged out at the foot of the lincoln memorial. well, there are new details about the special permission the white house received to make that photo-op happen. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back.

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now to revelations about china's actions amid the coronavirus pandemic. u.s. officials believe that the chinese government covered up the threat of the coronavirus in order to stockpile medical supplies. that's according to a leaked document by the department of homeland security's intelligence service, obtained by nbc news. the dhs report says, quote, we assess the chinese government intentionally concealed the severity of covid-19 from the international community in early january, while it stockpiled medical supplies by both increasing imports and decreasing exports. china roreportedly increased th import of masks, gowns, and surgical gloves in january.

february, imports of the supplies significantly declined. the four-page dhs report claims that china covered up that trade activity by, quote, publicly denying it ever imposed an export ban on masks and other medical supplies, and delaying the release of key trade data. so far, there is no public evidence to suggest that china's missteps in the early days of the outbreak were part of an international plot to buy up the world's medical supplies. meanwhile, chinese authorities are clamping down, as grieving relatives and activists press their government for details on what went wrong in wuhan. the city where the virus killed thousands before spreading to the rest of the world. the "new york times" reports, kwoe quote, lawyers have been warned not to file suit against the government. police have been contacted by bereaved family members.

volunteers who tried to thwart the state's censorship apparatus by preserving reports about the outbreak have disappeared. the paper continues, the parties fear that any attempt to dwell on what happened in wuhan, or to hold officials responsible, will undermine the state's narrative that only china's authoritarian system saved the country from a devastating health crisis. >> katty kay, china's lack of transparency continues. continues even six months after the outbreaks, the initial outbreak. you remember the story, the doctor who worked in the hospital, who tried to tell china and the world about the virus, actually was attacked by state authorities. he ended up dying of the virus himself. but here we are, six months later. the lack of transparency

continues. >> yeah. and the problem with that lack of transparency is that you start getting theories and conspiracy theories emerging, and you just don't know which ones are right or wrong. because there are some indications that the chinese have tried to suppress the news of the virus within their own country and externally, as well, it's very easy to start believing every worst-possible case scenario. so the news now that they were stockpiling medical equipment then makes you start wondering, is it possible that this was actually produced in a lab? is it possible it was deliberately produced in a lab? is it possible it was deliberately released from that lab? we have no evidence of those things i was suggesting about the lab, but you can see why people start to believe that, right? because we don't know. there has to be some -- i don't know how you'd do it because i done know how the chinese would ever let you have access to the information, but there has to be

some clarity and investigation into how china has handled this, so that we know the degree to which china was culpable from the beginning when it came to this virus. was it -- did it come from a lab that had security problems near that wet market before, and it was a mistake that it got out, or not, and was there something more thnefarious? it is opening the door for people like mike pompeo to float theories that may or may not be valid. for china's own case, in a way, they need to get clarity so it seems more believable. otherwise, people will believe the worst scenarios. >> david ignatius, the president accused the media of, quote, going wild to protect china, which is ironic, given the fact that president has gone wild to protect china the last several months. going back to january, including late march, when he tweeted out

closely they were working together. he wrote, "much respect." january 24th tweet, now infamous, thanking president xi, in handling the pandemic. having talked to your sources in the foreign policy community, david, china did suppress information and silence doctors. it did manipulate the w.h.o. the u.s. intelligence services bl believe that to be true, as well. what are the implications, when you have a president whose reflex was to defend china, and china was running around the organizations early on, allowing this pandemic to happen, to spread this disease? >> willie, i think it's safe to say the world is watching the united states, our democracy, our disorganized, somewhat haphazard response to the pandemic, and watching china's

police state, authoritarian government, and trying to figure out which one seems to be doing a better job in protecting its citizens. i've been working the last six, eight weeks, trying to get to the bottom of what i call the origin story of covid-19, this virus that's swept the world now. what's clear to me is that in the beginning, the chinese deliberately sought to suppress information about the outbreak in wuhan. as joe was discussing earlier, arrested a heroic doctor who was looking at patients dying and saying, "there's something going on here. there's something new." he and his colleagues were imprisoned, denounced by the party. then in january, the chinese began to realize, there's something enormous happening here. a panic, ordering supplies,

sending the top party officials to wuhan. sent top chinese army officers in to take control of key places. even in this lockdown in wuhan, we had no idea, don't have any idea to this day, of exactly how this pandemic began. i think that's really the point that katty was making and we all should make. the world needs to know how this started. we're living through one of the great events of our lives. we need to know how it began. not simply to protect ourselves in terms of making a vaccine, but to protect ourselves against phu chfuture outbreaks, future coronaviruses or variants. that's why this information isn't simply a matter of political tit for tat. sometimes listening to pompeo and trump, you think this is really about global politics. no, it's about getting the world set to deal with the underlying

causes of what happened. couple things are clear from my conversations with intelligence sourc sources. first, there is no evidence whatsoever that this was deliberately engineered by the chinese in a laboratory. this is not a manmade, killer virus that they deliberately put together. that said, it is possible in the two virology labs in wuhan, where this started, was there was an accident. a material that had been highly toxic, that had been gathered for research, study, somehow got it. it was thrown in the trash accidentally. somebody carried it out unwittingly on their person. that is possible. the chinese need to help the world understand what happened in that case. this is either a natural accident, a jump from animal to animal, or it is an accident in a laboratory. we do need to know the answer.

it's only the chinese who can help us get it. >> so, david, let's talk briefly about what this says about the chinese government. it just celebrated their 70th anniversary. been projecting power across the globe. belton road initiative. trying to literally win over the hearts and minds of hundreds of millions of people across every continent. trying to show that their system was preferable to america's system. understanding that we would be competing together on the globe for supremacy over the next 50 years, mainly economic supremacy. what does it say about this government, that six months later, they are still acting more like soviet union in the

early 1980s than a country that many people expected to take the lead and -- in the economy. take the lead in diplomatic leadership across the globe in the coming decades. we've always talked about how china was looking 50 years ahead. now, we look at them, and they're acting like they're living in an alternate reality from 50 years in the past. >> is this the face of the future or the face of the past? i honestly think this period will be the great test of whether china is now poised to be a global leader, respected,coming into its own. we sometimes speak of the chinese century. or whether people will have seen the police state really can't maintain the trust of its own

citizens and the world, and respond to something dynamically. again, the evidence is ahead of us. with all the disorganization in the united states we talked about in the first half of the show today, all back and forth, confusion about numbers, poor presidential leadership. even so, in our chaotic, disorganized way, we are racing to get vaccines, other therapies, new things. i hear from my daughter, who is a fellow at johns hopkins, every day. just unbelievable things that they're trying, thinking about. this is a dynamic interplay in our crazy, disorganized society, that i suspect is our greatest strength. we'll know, you know, next year, maybe wait for historians to tell us, in this great test between the two systems, which one in the end worked p eed bet? chinese sup repressed tried to

curtail it. or our somewhat crazy stis yste. will we get it right like churchill says we do in the end? we'll see. the new report suggesting the daily death toll could spike 70% from where it is today. our chief medical correspondent weighs in on that. plus, a new york city e.r. physician who not only treated other people with coronavirus but also herself. she joins us straight ahead on "morning joe." l -- confident financial plans, calming financial plans, complete financial plans. they're all possible with a cfp® professional. find yours at letsmakeaplan.org. you're constantly weakening that enamel structure. pronamel repair allows more minerals to penetrate deep into the enamel layer and it repairs it. it is pretty phenomenal. and it repairs it. at t-mobile, taxes and fees are included.

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joining us now, medical contributor for yahoo! news, dr. dara cass. associate professor of emergency medicine at columbia university. incidentally, also a covid-19 survivor. i want to hear her incredible story in a moment. also joining us, "morning joe" chief medical correspondent dr. dave campbell. pull back, big picture, drft da dr. dave. this model from the institute of health metrics and evaluation at the university of washington, the white house uses this source, forecasting 134,000 people will die of covid-19. what's the reason for this dramatic increase? >> you know, this model actually had started to show some decline in the middle of april. now that we see increasing mobility of people across the country in certain states, and

decreasing social distancing, those figures are going into the revise, really doubling of expected deaths that are going to happen getting near the end of the summer. it's a tragic concern that everybody has now, as they got through a very nice weekend. to see that, in fact, increase in human activity is going to contribute to increasing spread of the virus. >> dr. cass, it's willie geist. thanks for being on this morning and thanks for all you've done, the sacrifices you've made. as mika mentioned, you contracted coronavirus. you are back in now the emergency room working after your recovery. can you just talk a little bit about how you contracted it, what it was like for you to have it, and what it's like now to go back? and just a snapshot of what it is like in a new york city emergency room right now. we talked a month, month and a half ago about the chaos and the lack of ppe, and the hospitals being swamped in some regards. what's it like now?

>> so i think first, i don't know exactly how i got the coronavirus. i was a new yorker, so i live and work in new york. i could have gotten it anywhere. most likely got it at work in the emergency department. probably, honestly, from touching a surface and touching my face in advertently. i think we forget how easy it is to contract the coronavirus from a surface alone. that's why we do encourage masks, even outside on a regular basis. as far as getting the virus myself, i was one of the lucky ones. i was able to recover at home safely. i was able to monitor symptoms, taking things like tylenol, motrin, drinking some fluids. i never really lost the ability to treat myself. i didn't need any oxygen. i didn't need to go to the hospital. in new york city, we're seeing the evidence of the social distancing and really the objective metrics that we're following to understand how to address this disease from a public health perspective. we're seeing our numbers of

hospitalizations do dow s go do. number of intubations are going down. we have to remember, this was always the goal, to flatten the curve, so we didn't overwhelm the health system. we could get our testing up to date. we can get our tracking up to date. so we can continue to start to relive this new normal. we always knew we would get a little overconfident, if you will, once we saw the numbers coming down. that's what we're seeing in new york. but i am so proud of the work the new yorkers have done in really addressing this virus as a true, public health, objective measure that's consistent, and allowing us to move forward to the next phase of treatment. >> so, dr. cass, as you've seen the hospitalizations go down, thank goodness. that's great news and because of the social distancing you talk about. what is the view from inside an emergency room? i have friends, some of them you may work with, who work in the emergency room, who work in the icu, who are texting me and telling me of the horrors they were seeing, that they were

totally unprepared and didn't have the equipment they need and everything else. i've seen those stories come down a little bit, that at least you have the equipment you need. what does it look like to you from inside that emergency room? >> when this virus hit new york, it hit us hard. it hit us everywhere. worse in communities of color and lowlower-income communitiesd hospitals with less resources. we were in a very, very bad place. we had limited capacity. we had to upsurge beds. we were wearing our ppe to the nth capacity, dealing with mask shortages, and making sure we never got to the point we didn't have anything to wear. we are past that now because we've been able to really get the number of cases down. that's why the new guidance is to have 90 days of ppe in your hospital. i don't want to minimize how close we got to true capacity. one of the things that the doctors in new york city are trying to get the rest of the

country to understand is you don't want to get to where we were. and we don't want to get back there again. because that was nothing we ever want to do ever again. >> dr. dave, i'm looking at how companies move forward, you know, given the fact that these numbers are jarring for a lot of people. they're going to be really scared. uber is going to soon be requiring drivers to wear face masks and riders. i know certain hair salons are putting, you know, literal barriers between them and the people their working with, and all wearing masks. they're going to have to socially distance these businesses. do you think this will happen across the board? will it prevent the spread of the coronavirus? >> it better, mika. i certainly see what you're seeing, which is face masks being worn everywhere, with some

exception. certainly, every doctor's office, every hospital, every patient encounter, every interaction between doctor's offices and their staff, everybody is wearing a mask. dpl gloves are common. surfaces are being wiped. if we don't take advantage of these opportunities, to mitigate the spread of this virus, with every possible means available, we may see ourselves paback to w new york was. down here, i'm 80 miles from miami. we certainly could replicate new york's problems in miami and other cities across the country. uber should be applauded. other companies, airports, airlines should be applauded for implementing these measures to mitigate spread. because the new modeling that shows increasing numbers of cases and increasing number of ca cases, as we decrease our social distancing and increase our

mobility, is to be very, very concerning. masks everywhere, mika. >> all right. doctors dave campbell and dara kass, thank you both very much for your insight this morning. coming up, what if the new normal is already here? what is this is it? eugene robinson tackles that in his new column. plus, former homeland security secretary jeh johnson is our guest. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back.

there's mourning in america. today, more than 60,000 americans have died from a deadly virus donald trump ignored. with the economy in shambles, more than 26 million americans are out of work. the worst economy in decades.

trump bailed out wall street but not main street. this afternoon, millions of americans will apply for unemployment. with their savings running out, many are giving up hope. millions worry a loved one won't survive covid-19. there's mourning in america. under the leadership of donald trump, our country is weaker and sicker and poorer. and now, americans are asking, if we have another four years like this, will there even be an america? >> paid for by the lincoln project, which is responsible for the content of this a adverti advertising. >> wow. >> yeah, that's a new ad from a grown up of conservatives, the lincoln project, which really made news because donald trump stayed up at 1:00 a.m. last -- well, this morning, actually. he was rage tweeting just before

1:00 a.m. this morning about that ad, about the specific people, the republicans, the lifelong conservatives who put that ad together. he's, of course, enraged not just at conservative news hosts, he's enraged at any conservatives, any republicans or former republicans that dare speak the truth to him. so he was up tweeting about that ad. >> yeah. >> we will probably play it again and talk more about what it was specifically about that ad that disturbed the president so much. by the way -- >> it is impactful and true. >> welcome back to "morning joe." it's tuesday, may 5th. we have willie, mika, myself. also, donny deutsch and pulitzer prize-winning columnist, from the ""washington postwoe"post,". still with us, david ignatius.

his tenth cia thriller entitled "the paladin" is out now. reviews over the top. >> exciting. congratulations. so great. >> exciting. >> thanks, guys. >> congratulations on that, david. i love the book. >> thank you. >> willie, as i said last hour, the most disturbing thing about that ad and all of these other ads that try to put the truth out about the president's lies and the president's inaction, his lack of leadership during this pandemic, is that they'll drop an ad on one day, and the death count will be too low the next. ad said 60,000 dead. heck, they dropped the ad, and we're going to be at 70,000 in the next day or so. somebody drops an ad this week, probably going to be around 80,000 the following week. same with unemployment numbers. they talk about 26 million people unemployed. those numbers are going to go up, as well.

most disturbing part is the president is still lying about the seriousness of this pandemic. the president is stifling his medical voices -- >> that's correct. >> -- in his administration. refusing to let them speak on capitol hill. the lack of transparency is chilling, that he will not let dr. fauci and dr. birx testify on capitol hill while he breaks the rules to go spout propaganda in front of the lincoln memorial. and you have a president that actually even calls reports inside his own administration, put together by his own administration and the cdc, using fema numbers, he is calling that fake news. just when you think it can't get worse, in the middle of the

greatest crisis of our lifetimes, the greatest crisis since world war ii. when you think the president's leadership can't get worse, when you think his temperament can't become more reckless and unmoored, he proves you wrong with 1:00 a.m. tweets. >> yeah. those tweets came through at 12:46 a.m., where he went through and itemized all the people behind the lincoln project who put together that ad. talked about their failures. he included the husband of his -- one of his chief aides, kellyanne conway, in a personal way. you can't fake numbers. you can't fake data. you can't fake those unemployment numbers. you can't wish those away. you can't wish away the cdc modeling that was presented, yes, to the white house, that shows 3,000 deaths per day on june the 1st, which would be an accelerant of 1,700 or so a day

right now. you can't fake that. the president is faced with new scientific models, predicting sharp increases in the number of deaths from coronavirus over the next few weeks and months. one projection from an internal trump administration document obtained by the "new york times," the other from a public university of washington model, often cited by the white house. first, the government project n projections which show the daily death toll will nearly double from 1,750 deaths today to about 3,000 a day on june 1st. new cases projected to go up 25,000 a day to 200,000 by then. the president was asked about the report in an interview with the "new york post," and he said, quote, i know nothing about it. i don't know anything about it. nobody told me. i think it's -- i think it's false. i think it's fake news. again, talking about a cdc report presented to the white house. the white house then put out this statement. quote, this is not a white house document, nor has it been

presented to the coronavirus task force or gone through interagency vetting. this data is not reflective of any of the modeling done by the task force or data that the task force has analyzed. the other set of data from the institute for health, metrics, and evaluation at the university of washington, has been cited by the white house many times in the past. researchers there now also have doubled their projections to 135,000 deaths by early august. in april, just a few weeks ago, that same organization predicted just over 60,000 deaths by august. with the white house now approaching 70,000 total deaths, we've blown, of course, past that estimate. we are still in may. the institute says the revised numbers show this way because people are moving around more and because social distancing guidelines are being relaxed. donny deutsche, that's the data. those are the numbers that the president has been presented with. those are the numbers that the white house has cited many

times. as we talked about in our last hour, there is some sense, as you see these navy ships leave new york city, i couldn't see the field hospital come down and hospitalizations go down in new york city, a false sense of comfort some people can get. what the cdc, based on modeling from fema -- these are government organizations -- told the white house is, "this is far from over. as it moves from big cities on the east coast, it is going to go into other counties across the country." >> speaking of going to other kountis, it cowa counties, it is interesting the perception is of the blue states verse red states. there has been an increase in red states versus 63% in blue states. that's interesting. i have to ask a question. one thing i can't figure out is, it's very clear from the cdc report that we're going to be doubling down on deaths come june 1st. why are we loosening? i can wa can't figure that out.

those two things don't make sense to me. this has been troubling news the last 24 hours, as we flatten the curve, that we're still looking forward, not in september in the second wave, but in june to this dramatic increase. yet, at the same time, we're starting to loosen. i can't goernegotiate and put t things together. the other thing to mention, first time i saw that number, you know, joe, you guys so articulately talked about trump's stumbles and patheticness every day. there was a study, 37,000 excess deaths. you wonder, how many deaths could we have stopped? obviously, it is not an absolute number, not a perfectly accurate number. but had we been doing things right. it is interesting. i'm not saying specifically every one of the deaths is blood on trump's hands, but that's a powerful, powerful number. final thought also, i wish trump once, once, would show a human reaction to what's going on. an empathetic reaction.

talk about a family. you even saw george w. bush with the video -- not once in 1,500 hours in television have we seen a slice of humanity, slice of decen decency, empathy from this man. never once. >> just no feeling. gene, in your latest opinion piece in the "washington post" entitled "we keep waiting for the new normal. it might already be here," you write, in part, "we are a community, whether we like it or not. self-interest and the common interest are one and the same. businesses that reopen without adequately making customers feel safe will fail. widespread recklessness will lead to new shutdowns and more economic pain. we are all in this together. some of us may not like that, but the coronavirus doesn't care. i've be and i've been wondering this,

gene, i don't see how our economy survives this. >> well, it will survive this, but it won't be the same economy. and for at least a couple years, we won't be the country that we were. we simply can't be. i mean, start at the top. the one problem is we don't have a president who can express empathy. donald trump isn't capable of expressing empathy. we don't have a president who is capable of providing the kind of strong leadership and sensible leadership that we need now. his scientific experts set out perfectly clear and cautious guidelines for reopening, for governors thinking about reopening their states. the governors are blowing through those guidelines, totally ignoring the requirement of, you know, 14 consecutive

days of declining cases, all of that. phase one, phase two, phase three. they're just blowing ahead to phase three. again, in response, you get this crazy reaction from the president, where he is sort of cheering against his own guidelines. cheering against what his own scientific experts say would be a safer way to reopen. so i guess the point of the column really is that we kind of are on our own. states are on their own. we as individuals are on our open. we're going to have to make a lot of decisions ourselves, individually, and as families, about what we think is safe, what we don't think is safe, according to our individual circumstances. we should do that with a

community spirit. i wear a mask when i go out because i know i am helping protect my community. we all have to take that attitude, that my helping guarantee the health of others in my community is a good thing for me. we just have to take this approach. >> exactly. we're going to be talking to david ignatius in one minute about this. first, let's go to the white house. hans nichols is there. i know the president is going to air his own, but i'm curious about the cdc draft that came to the white house. the president dismissing it as fake news, of course. basically saying his own administration is lying. the cdc, depending on fema estimates, and the task force came out, scircled the wagon, said, "you know, this is not ours.

we haven't had any input on it." of course, other studies showing a doubling of the deaths. is the white house going to clarify today about this draft? are we going find out whether this 200,000 number is a number that we as americans need to focus on? are they going to brush it aside and make sure that dr. fauci and dr. birx can't he have on ttest hill and try to bottle it up? >> reporter: i suspect more of the latter. what the white house is saying when this broke yesterday is this hadn't gone through the interagency process, that no one on the task force heard about it. i heard that dr. birx was trying to backdate and figure out where these numbers or how these numbers could make sense. but this brings us back to sort of late march, when there were all kinds of models that were coming to the president. the question was really, which model would the president seize upon to make these important public policy decisions? now, they seem to have settled on the ihme, model out of the university of washington.

that shows a doubling of deaths, at least an increase -- not quite a doubling, but an increase on where they were on the revisions a couple weeks ago. the numbers are fluid. what all the public health experts are saying, not necessarily the economists in the white house, but all the public health experts are saying is the more social distancing, the more you ease off on that, the more -- the bigger the increase is going to be. we'll see to what extent that filters through the president. last night in the "new york "washington pospost b post" interview, clearly dismissive of the data. >> why don't we talk about what's going on behind you. >> that's so much more fascinating. the president, of course, calling a cdc report, his cdc, fake news. the president up last night almost at 1:00 a.m., attacking, by name, people that are putting out addinsads. the president spending the last

weekend tweeting unmoored, obviously not listening to staff members. can you tell us, what's happening behind you in the white house? what are you hearing about the president's well-being? what are you hearing about the president's temperament at this stage of this crisis? for us, health care crisis. for him, obviously, judging by his tweets, a political crisis. >> reporter: on the issue of temperament and mood, we ask about that a lot. it's always interesting to see the deferent responses you get. a lot of times, white house officials don't have great visibility into the president until the middle of the morning, when he shows up. depending on when he shows up. it'll be earlier today because he's heading out to arizona. one of the aspects of this presidency is the free-wheeling nature of it. the president is constantly talking to people, both inside and outside the white house, and his mood, as a lot reported, does fluctuate. here is the issue, the main

frustration that they have inside the white house right now. that is, by overly focusing on the more negative models, that they're inciting and the press is leading to more public concern that will prevent the free from snapping back and opening back up when it may be safe to do so. the focus in the white house this week seems to be more on the economics of this, preparing for the jobs report number on friday. just thinking about the devastation that's happening out there in the economy. yes, obviously, there's going to be conversation s about the pu public health side. the focus seems to be on how you open up. sm something the president doesn't control, how do you inspire confidence in americans that it's okay to go out again, that they can resume their normal lives? >> well -- >> reporter: the powers of the presidency are enormous. >> testing. that's how you inspire. testing. >> everybody told him testing.

hans, this is what i don't understand. you say there are people inside the white house that are concerned the media may be overplaying this. sounds like january the 22nd, when donald trump said it was one person coming from china, then it'd be zero. donald trump end of february saying it was 11 people, soon to be down to zero. we've done a great job. that's donald trump end of february saying it is 15 people, soon zero. donald trump in march telling republicans not to worry about it, "this is going to go away." this is a president who said it would magically go away. it'd go away in april. now, more people died in april than died in the entire vietnam war. he also said in april there wasn't going to be a second wave. it wasn't going to come back this fall. there's not a single medical doctor, not a single scientist, there's not a single researcher, there's not a single epidemiologist, there is nobody -- >> of credibility. >> -- of credibility that is saying these things. i'm just wondering, you say

there are people in the white house that are afraid that the estimates pushed by doctors and the media and scientists are too high. they've been saying that for four months now. the question is, is there anybody inside the white house that's telling the president, "mr. president, we have been underplaying this for four months to disastrous results. we can't underplay it anymore"? >> reporter: you know, on the spectrum you're talking about, i don't know of anyone that's on the underplaying side and the president should ere rror on th side of caution. i don't have a good reporting answer for you on why in some places in the white house there's a prem yiumconomic effe health effects. you hear the echoes. it seems as though the focus is on the ek noconomics of this th

week and how you bring the economy back. as to your broader question, and are they underplaying or overplaying it, which model should that be listening to, i don't have great insight into that. i don't think a lot of people here in the white house have a great insight into which model is going to decide how the president responds to this. the answer may be the last model he's seen. he's models are shifting quite a bit, as well. they seem vaguely comfortable with the ihme model out of the university of washington. again, it's showing an increase. joe? >> yeah. >> thank you so much, hans nichols. stay safe out there. we greatly appreciate it. david ignatius, it is as tou astounding that inside the white house they're still bitching and moaning, only words coming to my mind, about doctors and scientists, overestimating the impact of this pandemic.

when donald trump said in january it'd be one person, then it'd go away to zero. one person from china. in february, 15 people, beginning down to zero. march, he said it'd magically be going away. kept saying it was going to go away in april when it warmed up. we know what happened in april. more people died in april than died in vietnam. in april, the president started talking about hydroxychloroquine or whatever. so much so that, fiebl e finall own government warned americans against taking it because it caused heart problem. the president then moved on to disinfectants and sticking lights inside of bodies. the government, the next day, had to warn people against that. the president was then saying this wasn't going to come back in the fall. there wasn't going to be a second wave. time and time again, they've underestimated the severity of this pandemic. that still is going on inside of the white house, david.

i just -- you've been around d.c. for a while. i've got to ask you, jon meacham style, is there historical precedent to this, that a white house, still five months later, 70,000 deaths in, still oblivious to the danger looming out there, and talking about the economy like the economy isn't going to be affected by doubling of deaths between now and june 1st? >> we've had terrible crises. obviously, the civil war, world war ii, the quality of leadership that we had then was extraordinary, not least in the ability of presidents lincoln and franklin roosevelt, to keep the public focused on its task. on the grim task that lay ahead. neither lincoln nor fdr ever tried to minimize the degree of suffering and sacrifice that was required. quite the opposite.

franklin roosevelt in 1942, really on his own, went to meet with his allies and said, "our goal in this war is unconditional surrender of our adversaries." that was at a time when the brits, others thought, maybe we can cut some deal with the germans and get out of this with some sort of settlement. fdr said no, unconditional surrender. everybody knew that was lead leadersh leadership. we knew what leadership felt like. president trump treats most things as if they're about him. as if there's bad news, it's the fake news media. if somebody put an ad out that he wants to attack them by name and impugn their character. it is about him. it's not about the crisis. i just would close by saying the obvious. we live in a democracy. in china, you've got to put up

with president xi jinping for life. he's got going anywhere. we live in a democracy. we get to elect our leaders. if they're not doing well, if governors are doing a poor job in managing this pandemic, the public in those states can find better leadership. same thing with us as a nation. as citizens, our behaviors are going to determine what the shape of this curve is. if people act responsibility ly social distancing, we'll keep the deaths down and hopefully it won't be as bad as these latest models. back to from gene said, it's in our hands in the new normal. we get to make the choices. we get to shape the country. we get, in a sense, to shape the future of the disease. >> it's in our hands, mika. and the economy will survive because we have no choice. our country will move forward. because we have no choice.

unfortunately, the pathway forward is doing that, as we heard earlier today, as a ceo of ford said, as we're hearing from governors, on our own. the president has abandoned us. he's abandoned reality. >> i don't think he was ever there. >> he's been lying. he's been lying about death counts since january 22nd in davos, in that cnbc interview. >> yeah. >> he continues to lie even now. we're on our own. i just want to say, and i know we disagree on this, i think americans are doing a pretty damn good job. with social distancing, you know, i see pictures. people take pictures in the air of new yorkers in central park, and they'll become enraged. then you go down and look, most people are social distancing. it's the same with a lot of the beach shots, where people are -- i know there's some beach shots where they aren't. same with beach shots, where people are enraged when the helicopter takes a picture. you get down low and see they're

clusters of families, 6 to 10 feet away. >> it was the spring breakers. >> obviously. i just want to say, i talked to a good friend in pensacola yesterday, a supporter of donald trump. we were just talking about a lot of thin things. concerned about businesses in pensacola. what i heard, i asked about how a lot of my friends with small businesses there were doing, if they were getting the ppp aid. the answer was no. the really big companies, the people that had millions of dollars in the banks, the law firms. >> law firms, yeah. >> they were all getting benefits. small business owners, people that owned family restaurants, people that were struggling bay check to paycheck, they weren't getting the help. at the end of the conversation, he said to me, "you know, joe, the thing that really has surprised me the most, sometimes in natural disasters, when hurricanes come through, you see the worst of people. everybody is fighting. they get people fixing their roofs."

he said, "this has brought out the best in people, whether they're democrats or republicans, whether they like trump or don't like trump. this has brought out the best in americans. we're all working together. people are respectful. i take my child out, and people are staying 6, 10 feet apart. we're wearing masks. we're doing what we need to do to protect our families and to protect others. i don't think we can ever overlook that fact. 70%, 80%, 85% of americans, 90% of americans are on our side. by ours, i mean your side and my side. it's a 5% or 10% that are going and trying to take over state legislatures with guns. sean hannity spoke out about it

last night. >>ry dridiculous. >> willie? >> i wanted to sprinkle in a poll that just crossed that supports what you're saying. among americans, not democrats, among americans, democrats and republicans, 82% of americans say they should not be allowed to open movie theaters in their state. 78% say don't reopen gyms. 74% say don't open dine-in restaurants or nail salons. you can go down the list. those are large majorities. again, of democrats and republicans, all americans taking this very seriously. understanding how serious this is. again, as you look at the small groups of protesters outside state capitols, remember, they're not representative of a big nurm mber of people. in fact, across the political spectrum, americans get this. they are being responsible. when we get through this, it will be because americans of all political stripes took it seriously and confronted what is a pandemic. let's bring in the former secretary of homeland security under president obama, jeh

johnson. good to have you on this morning. we're looking at projections. the white house is pushing back on cdc and fema report. president trump calling it fake news. this new ihme report, as well, showing just how big this is going to get now. the worst may not be behind us, even as it gets better in the cities. how are you looking at the next several weeks and months, mr. secretary? >> well, thanks for having me on, first of all. i have to pick up on the prior conversation. from the perspective of the white house, this is really not a complicated equation. we need to get a fully informed, fully coordinated, through the interagency process document that assesses exactly where we are and what americans can predict for the future. from the perspective of leadership, goal number one has

to be simply tell the american people the truth. tell us the truth. we can handle it. then tell us what our government is doing about the problem and what americans can do to support the government and solve the problem. those three things. i've learned that through a multitude of crises when i was secretary of homeland security. first and foremost, you have to start by telling the american people the truth. not off the top of the head predictions about overly rosy predictions. but an assessment from the u.s. government. the american people can actually handle that. it would be nice if we could know what our government thinks, not by leaked documents shown to the "new york times," but a fally accofall fully coordinated document that the science community, the health community, homeland security community of my government signs on to. unfortunately, we're not able to

get that right now. we have to look to governors and mayors for leadership through this national crisis. >> mr. secretary, we have been showing an ad put together by the lincoln project, "mourning in america." mourning our dead. in the ad, it talks about america growing weaker. what are some of the threats to homeland security that this virus, its impact on our economy, and the impact it's having on killing hundreds -- tens of thousands of american people, moving into the hundreds of thousands. what impact are you worried about most in terms of threats to our security, our homeland security? >> when i was at the defense department, mika, used to say that the u.s. military needs to be in a position to fight two major conflicts at once if they were challenged to do so.

i'm very concerned that because homeland security is facing a national crisis, as opposed to a regional national disaster, that we're not now in the position to deal with the next hurricane, the next tornado, the next border surge, the next virus, while we are also confronting this national crisis. we're being tested in ways that we've not seen before. the diversion of resources that are going to dealing with this problem may be at the cost of the next natural disaster. that's my concern. >> gene robinson? >> mr. secretary, quick question. we've seen states form kind of regional compacts in the absence, frankly, of national leadership from washington.

they form regional compacts to buy personal protective equipment for the medical workers, to sort of plan ahead toward a phased and safe reopening, as best they can. now, they don't have the resources of the federal government. do you think that's an important step? do you think that is a potential route back for at least many americans? >> gene, i think it is a good step. in fact, oi'm part of the workig group advising the seven states here in the northeast region. the power to quarantine, the power to tell people to stay away from their places of business, the power to close parks resides at the state and local level. therefore, the power to reopen our economy and our societies resides at the same level. the governors here in the northeast have realized that there has to be an interlocking

plan to do that. for example, i live in new jersey, but i commute to new york city every day during normal times. we've got to have a plan for those of us who live in new jersey, those of us who work in new york, for public transportation, new jersey transit, port authority bus terminal. there is an interlocking nature to our northeast region. i think this is a smart thing o to, and i'm glad we're doing it. >> former secretary, jeh johnson, thank you very much for being on the show this morning. >> also, thank you for wearing the "morning joe" vest. >> i like it. >> it's all in fashion. >> that's a good one. >> you know, one of the things that i've had a chance to do, now that i'm home so much, is go through my kids' closet and find things they borrowed from me four years ago. >> oh, yeah. >> that's where we are. >> oh, yeah. >> i love it. >> we feel you. >> we feel your pain, man. >> thank you, jeh. >> it happens when your kids get

a certain age and size. they go into your closet and borrow things, and you never see it again. >> they take everything. thanks, jeh. gene robinson, thank you, as well. we'll be reading your new column in the "washington post." david ignatius, before you go, let's take a moment to talk about your new book, out today, entitled "the paladin." i think a lot of people have some time on their hands. >> so excited about this. >> they can read a thriller. tell us about it. >> so, mika, i look for a way in this book to write about the thing that we've been living these last three, four years, which is this sense of being surrounded by disinformation, manipulation of truth to the point we wonder, what is truth? the hero of this novel, michael dunn, is a cia officer who is assigned to do something that he suspects is illegal. to penetrate a journalistic

organization in europe, headed by a young american. he's ordered to do this by the agency. he's hung out to dry. he's indicted, convicted. marriage is destroyed. his career and family are over. why was he sent on this mission? who were the people who were the manipulators abroad? what is the purpose to which they're doing this manipulation? that quest, on the part of my hero, michael dunn, is really the engine of this novel. i feel as if it's a quest that we're all on, trying to understand in this post-truth world, sometimes call it. what is real? what that we see and hear on the news is really happening, and what's manipulated and manufactured to deceive us? that's really what "the paladin" is about. >> wonderful. thank you, david. ahead on "morning joe," the lincoln memorial is one of the nation's most recognized national shrines.

most events there are banned. but we are digging into new reporting about how president trump bent the rules for himself. plus, the president's chief advivisor on immigration, mille long tried to have an impact on the country's border, then came the coronavirus. we'll talk about halting migration based on public health. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. of an outdoor grill indoors, and because it's a ninja foodi, it can do even more, like transform into an air fryer. the ninja foodi grill, the grill that sears, sizzles, and air fry crisps. ...little things... ...can become your big moment. that's why there's otezla. otezla is not a cream. it's a pill that treats plaque psoriasis differently. with otezla, 75% clearer skin is achievable. don't use if you're allergic to otezla. it may cause severe diarrhea, nausea or vomiting.

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president trump was granted an exception to host his fox news town hall at the iconic lincoln memorial over the weeke weekend. the monument, normally prohibited from hosting such events, was made available for the event by secretary of the interior, david bernhard, citing it as an exception, while we are in an extraordinary crisis. in a statement, bernhard wrote, given the extraordinary crisis the american people have endured

and the need for the president to exercise a core governmental function to address the nation about an ongoing public health crisis, i am exercising my authority to facilitate the opportunity for the president to conduct this address within the lincoln memorial. according to the "new york times," last tuesday, the white house had initially agreed to host the event on the steps of the memorial. however, the next day, it was updated to take place inside. a white house official told the "times" the decision to host the town hall at the memorial was a joint decision with the network, but three people involved with the planning said it was ultimaul ultimately the white house's decision. >> donny deutsche, what a joke. core governmental function. the president could have done it inside the white house, as he had done so often. i have to say -- >> you have to answer actual questions, too. >> to kids who want to grow up and, like, become president so you can actually have agencies lying about you, breaking rules

for you. if you're going to do that, you have to do a better job of setting up your shot. if you're too close to the actual statue, it makes you look small, weak, and pathetic, which is what the president looked like in that shot. also didn't help that he said he had been treated worse. look at that, been treated worse than abraham lincoln. but you'd actually want to have the shot take away further from you. good lighting on you. then you have lincoln in the distance. it's sort of over your shoulder, so your image is larger than lincoln. they had poor donald, donny deutsche, squat there, looking very short and, of course, just dominated by abraham lincoln, which actually is appropriate. here we have, again, a guy focused on attacking members of the media, attacking people that put out ads, all in the most personal way.

he's on twitter at 1:00 a.m. at night. he's on twitter all weekend. he's not working. he's saying that the cdc and fema are lying. they're fake news. this is -- i mean, we have always known this guy's weaknesses. we've talked about it since he's been president. we talked about it a lot when he was running for president. a lot of people who hate trump actually lie about us. because, well, they've obviously learned from donald trump. we warn people. donald trump just keeps getting worse. even for you, moce mika, willie people who have known donald trump a long time, his behavior, his temperament gets worse by the day. he becomes more unmoored every day. >> what a display by a little

man. desperately trying to look presidential. because he's been behaving anything but. you would think that every day, he gets to stand up in front of experts in a world crisis, no better opportunity to look presidential. we see the emperor has no clothes there. to me, was one more vulgar exploitation, reaching into his bag of tricks. it was so pathetic and, to me, i want people to really, really be sensitized and understand what's coming. we see a corner -- it is a metaphor. i don't want twitter to explode -- he is going to start to do bizarre thing. he's never been in this position in his life, and he is boxed in. he doesn't have a move at this point. he's -- he has already made his bed. that, to me, is a metaphor. what he zdid, sitting in front f the lincoln memorial, looking

like the small man he is. by the way, said he was treated worse than lincoln. i think lincoln was shot, by the way. when there is no trickery, no substance, when there is no steak,al y all you can do is si. 75,000 people are dying. sizzle doesn't cut it. this guy has sizzle. there ain't no steak there. you can sit in front of any monument you want. people see what they see now, a scared, pathetic, incompetent president. >> willie? >> donny, thank you very much. meanwhile, as soon as the covid-19 outbreak hit, countries worldwide implemented travel or entry restrictions. for the united states, some were already being drafted. the president's chief advisor on migration, steven miller, tried to halt migration based on

public health, without success. then came the coronavirus. the article wrote, quote, the pandemic has created an opening for some of mr. miller's longstanding policy goals, such as finding a way to quickly deport children who travel to the united states without a parent or other adult. mr. miller considered that category of migrants among the most difficult to stop. let's bring in the reporter on that piece. national immigration reporter for the "new york times," kaitlin dickerson. good morning. good to have you with us. how soon did miller start to think of the idea, sort of in the abstract, of closing down the borders to at least some people because of public health concerns? >> well, what i learned in reporting this story is that that idea was on a wish list that miller created within a few months of president trump taking office. so at this point, we know he has been the chief architect of the president's immigration agenda. what we did was when president trump was elected, he embarked

on an exhaustive study of the entire federal code to look for ways that the president would be able to bypass congress and block migrants. in his mind, hopefully large categories of migrants, from entering the united states. he found this obscure provision in title 42, the federal statute dealing with public health, giving the president authority in the face of a serious disease, to block certain people from entering the country. what he didn't have at that time was the right disease, right? so what we learned was that stephen miller tried multiple times, in 2018 and 2019, in response to mumps and flu outbreaks, to invoke this provision of the law. he couldn't get the support he needed. then as we wrote, coronavirus created an opening for him. >> yeah. you catalog -- sorry to jump in there. you catalog in 2019 when there was a mumps spreading through detention facilities in six states. he viewed that as a possible opportunity. tried again that year when the

stations were hit by the flu. he was taking the conditions he helped to create, putting these people in detention centers when theysaying, "look, the migrants are sick. we can't afford to have them here. we have to close down parts of the border." does he want to go further, as the numbers come in? we've been talking about the projections from the cdc, from other organizations showing that it will have an excess of 100,000 deaths as we move into the summer. what else does stephen miller have in mind, if he is willing to go this far? >> stephen miller absolutely wants to go further. he's talked openly about it. most recently on this private call with conservative supporters we reported on. he said the 60-day visa pause he wants to extend. it is the beginning of a broader plan. at this point, we know miller wants to limit family-based migration. he wants to limit asylum,

anybody coming to the united states because they need help. he really wants to lower the numbers of immigration across the board. we're definitely going to continue to see restrictions introduced. then, as you note, we know the pattern at this point. legal challenges follow and then workarounds come up in its place and in the place of these policies that are enjoying. one of the characteristics, the defining characteristics of miller that came up over and over again in my conversations in reporting the story was just his unwillingness to let things go, and i think that's really instructive for us and it's why we reported on ideas he's proposed that haven't yet been implemented such as one to designate coyotes or smugglers across the desert and paid to do so and are not by any means nice people, but the idea was to designate them officially as terrorists so that asylum seekers can be denied entry when they come to the united states on the grounds that they've aided terrorist organization.

we feel it's important to report the ideas that have been suggested because as we know once stephen miller gets focused on an idea he will suggest it again and again and again and look for a legal justification to get it through and implemented. more ideas from the wish list, from the early days of the trump administration are almost certainly going to be introduced including in the next few months while the country is still dealing with this pandemic. >> caitlin dickerson who covers immigration for "the new york times" such an interesting piece. we appreciate it. mika? >> still ahead, we are still waiting for major league baseball to return, but the season starts today in south korea. how that will help fans of the game here in the united states. mike lupica is next on the future of sports amid this pandemic. ♪ ♪ i know that every single

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has disrupted the world of sports, and leagues now are searching for a way to get the becames back on. nascar is slated to return on may 17th, but without fans at the track. the pga is set for a national broadcast on the same day as rory mcilroadwy, dustin fowler y in a skins game and no gallery allowed on sites. tennis is scheduled for new york with no fan, but it could be moved to california in november if shelter in place restrictions are lifted in the state and fans can attend matches there. the nfl announced its regular season schedule will be out on thursday after it hosted a virtual draft last week. major league baseball is working to start the season in late june, no later than july 2nd,

playing no more thanna regular season games. baseball fans can get their fix because espn will be airing the south korean baseball league whose opening day began earlier this morning. joining us now best-selling author and columnist mike lupika. his new book on sale today is "robert b. parker's grudge match," we'll get to that in just a moment and it shows how desperate we are, and espn says it's opening day in korea and a lot of us will be watching baseball because it's a game. it's a live sporting events and not just because the content is so good on the michael jordan documentary on espn, but because people want something that they can watch. how soon do you think we will have sports here in the u.s.? >> well, willie, i actually think i am cautiously optimistic about baseball right now. we've seen all of the various

plans get floated, florida, arizona and then they threw texas into the mix, but i think this three division, ten teams in east, east, central, west might work, and i actually think if we're hearing this much about this plan at this time that they might get started by july 1st in empty stadiums, and i'm just happy to be having this conversation about baseball today on the day before mr. willie mays' 89th birthday. it just seems that baseball is in the air again, and this can get sidetracked and there could be another surge. you don't know what's going to happen, but for the first time in months i actually think, willie, that your yankees might get a chance to win a world series this year. >> wow! >> there you go. >> with a huge asterisk, of course. >> big time. >> anyway, mike, let's talk about pandemic as we work certain things in.

let's talk about how that would look. what would the major league baseball season look if they did start it up? >> well, joe, there's no question that they have to start with empty seats. there's no way. i mean, this would become a television studio sports. remember that game during the problems in baltimore where they played in front of no fans and it was odd. i was talking to jim palmer about it the other day, how bizarre an experience that was to broadcast that game, but they want to get this game back on the field. i actually think that, you know, with all of the safeguards they can put in place, i think baseball would like to be first. i think somebody's going to have to take that first step, and i talked to rob manfred, the commissioner, a few weeks ago and he said they've had hundreds of different variations of plans over the last several months, but this story in "usa today," bob knight and gayle wrote it,

and this thing is starting to come together, but it is always subject to events on the ground and what the numbers are in may and june for the coronavirus because that could change. >> yeah. >> but i've been waiting for you and willie to call and say, do we want to fly to south korea for the start of -- of the baseball season there? >> will, you know -- willie and i are going to get on the plane. you can jump on if you want to -- >> so talking about your book. >> nope. >> we know very well because jack is such a huge fan, you'll write a book a week. your latest book is robert b. parker's "grudge match," tell us about it. >> well, robert b. parker was a giant of mystery writing. he wrote the spencer enoughels, jesse stone westerns. if you look in the front of these books his output was immense, and he was a friend of mine. i started reading the spencer

novels when i was in college, and a couple of years ago i wondered why the other his been resumed and westerns had been resumed and i asked why nobody had continued the story of sunny randall who is a boston public detective and just one of the great female detective, and they found out, and i got a call from my boss at putnam and said why don't you write a sample chapter, and i did and the first sunny came out about a year and a half ago. this is the second one that comes out today, and it's been such a privilege to continue on his work. he was -- anybody who knows him, mike barnacle would tell you, he was a force of nature, robert b. parker and his sons asked me to continue the series. it's been a ball. i'm getting ready to start number three, and there's lots of bad people that sunny outfits and mika, this is -- sunny knows her value as a private detective, let me tell you. >> i love it!

all right, the new book is "robert b. parker's grudge match: a sunny randall novel" on sale today. mike lupica, thank you very much. and the next hour of "morning joe" starts right now. i think it's going to work out fine. i think when we get into april and the warmer weather that has a very negative effect on that, and that type of a virus so let's see what happens, but i think it's going to work out fine. >> that was president trump back in february. the last time he was in arizona. today he's heading back to the state as the u.s. death toll from coronavirus nears 70,000. good morning and welcome to "morning joe," it is tuesday, may 5th, along with joe, willie and me we have washington anchor for bbc world news america caddy kay and associate editor for the washington post, david ignacious

and he's out with his tenth cia thriller entitled "the palladin" and david will tell us about that, but first as president trump push estates to restart their economies, new scientific models are projecting sharp increases in the number of deaths from coronavirus over the next few weeks and months. one projection is from an internal trump administration document obtained by "the new york times," the other is from a public university washington model often cited by the white house. first the government projections which show the daily death toll were nearly double from about 1750 deaths currently to about 3,000 a day on june 1st. this is pretty dramatically different than what people were thinking. new cases are projected to go from about 25,000 a day to 200,000. the president was asked about

the report in an interview with "the new york post" he said, quote, i know nothing about it. i don't know anything about it. nobody told me that. i think it's false. i think it's fake news. the white house put out a following statement. this is not a white house document nor has it been presented to the coronavirus task force or gone through interagency vetting. this data is not reflective of any modeling, any of the modeling done by the task force or data that the task force has analyzed. the other set of data from the institute for health metrics and evaluation at the university of washington has been cited by the white house in the past and researchers there have also now doubled their projections to 135,000 deaths by early august, back in april, they predicted just over 60,000 by august. big difference. with the u.s. now approaching

70,000 deaths, we've already blown past that estimate and it's only may, if you can believe it. the institute says the revised numbers are because people are moving around more and because social distancing guidelines are being relaxed. last night dr. anthony fauci addressed these new projections. >> when you have a lot of virus activity and you know that you're able to contain it to a certain degree by the mitigation, the physical separations, the kinds of things that we've been talking about, gateway, phase one, phase two, phase three and you start to leapfrog over some of these, you're inviting rebound and rebound is going to give you spikes and spikes are going to give you the kinds of numbers. i don't know if those numbers because i have skepticism about models, about their only as good as the assumptions you put into them, but they're not completely misleading. they're telling you something that's a reality, that when you

have mitigation that's containing something and unless it's down in the right direction and you pull back prematurely you're going to get a rebound of cases. >> well, you know, dr. fauci said you may want to look at these numbers and willie, of course, fascinating that the president accused numbers that came out of this draft from the center for disease control, that he -- that he dismissed it as fake news. once again, the president looking only at rosy scenarios. i don't know if you've heard this or not, but in february on february 22nd when asked about this pandemic, he said he wasn't concerned about the coronavirus. he said it was one person coming in from china and soon it would be down to zero. by the end of february, a month later when panic really was setting in over parts of the world and certainly health

officials, very concerned and that, by the way, it was a month after joe biden's warning at late january that this was going to get much worse, and that donald trump is leaving us unprepared for a pandemic. in late february, donald trump said it's 11 people, it's going to be down to zero. 15 people down to zero, kept saying during this time and in march that this was going to go away and april, don't worry about it, he told republican senators. in march, it's just like the flu. the numbers are just like the flu he said in march and they didn't shut things down. in april he lied and he said there's no way. this was not going to come back in the fall. doctors, of course, very concerned and now he's dismissing more estimates as, quote, fake news when he has been peddling fake news, dangerous news from the beginning of january. let's forget the cdc draft that

talks about 200,000 people. let's just look at this university of washington study that predicted 60,000 deaths just three weeks ago. now they've doubled that to 135, 136,000 deaths and let's look at the president himself. i know that it drives him absolutely crazy that all of his lies and misrepresentations to the american people have made his numbers tank politically, but just look at the president. he's revised the death count, i think by my list last count, he's revised the death count i think four or five times recently, and as recently as a week or so ago it was going to be 50,000 or 60,000. we obviously, willie, we are moving towards the 70,000, 80,000, 90,000, 100,000 mark. >> yeah. we'll probably be at 70,000 by the end of the day today, joe.

as you said, if you actually believe a report from the cdc based on modeling from fema is fake news, okay. we'll put that to the side, but what about your own words? he said at the foot of the lincoln memorial the other night and said we are going to lose anywhere from 75, 80 to 100,000 people and that's a horrible thing. so he himself projected more than twice, two weeks ago that there would be 100,000 deaths in this country from coronavirus. so this actually as sophisticated as this virus is, it's actually not that complicated to understand how you slow it as dr. fauci just tried to say in his diplomatic. and when you have this mobility of people moving between states and spreading the germs you're going to have more cases and the move will be to slowly reopen economies across the country, we understand why and we want to understand why everyone wants to get back to work and why businesses are hurting, but as

dr. fauci himself said if you ease up on social distancing you're going to have an explosion and this was the warning from this internal document put together by the cdc based on fema modeling and you will exceed 100,000 deaths from coronavirus. >> still ahead on "morning joe," chuck schumer joins the conversation plus a new take on an old ad that infuriated the president. what morning in america means in the age of trump, but first, here's bill karins with the check on the forecast. bill? >> you know what's perfect for 2020? a snowfall forecast on mother's day weekend. we'll get to that in a second. first we'll talk about the severe weather threat that we have throughout the day and let you know who is at risk. we had this crazy thunderstorm complex that started in kansas and right now it's about to exit over the top of wilmington, north carolina. it has traveled across 18 hours

across half of the country in tennessee and there was a lot of large hail and wind in this complex and it's just about overwith and as far as severe weather, areas north of atlanta and knoxville, asheville, greenville, south carolina. i don't think we'll see too many tornadoes today, but one or two is a possibility. now let's talk about the forecast and the cold air coming down and look at chicago today. rainy, 48 degrees and windchill feeling the low 40s. that's the beginning of this cold surge that's coming in. enjoy the nice day from new york up to boston because it will only get worse from here and keep an eye on the desert southwest. 103 in phoenix today and they're expected to be around 107 come tomorrow. all right. let's get into the bad stuff. saturday morning when you wake up in detroit the windchill will be 22 degrees. yes, here we're going into the second week of may and that cold, chilly air is not just going to be cold. it's going to be windy and we'll see snow with it, too, and as

far as the forecast goes in boston, we'll enjoy the freeze there and it will be a close call and the snow forecast will be the great lakes and up through areas of northern new england and here are the snowfall totals and again, this will be accumulating snow, northern and western new york to northern new england as we go through your saturday morning. unbelievable. what an ugly saturday or sunday. it will be slightly better for mom, but not exactly ideal. new york city, on saturday you could see ice pellets and it could be that cold as we go throughout the day on saturday. it's a beautiful morning right now. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. how about no

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it's going to disappear. one day it's like a miracle, it will disappear and from our shores it could get worse before it gets better.

it could maybe go away. we'll see what happens. nobody really knows. >> the president's words. the president's assurances about this pandemic, it's -- it's hazardous to your health. you can't listen because again, he's predicted time and again, starting in january that this was going to magically go away, that the chinese were being transparent, that it would magically go away in april. that it was one person and soon to be zero people -- you know, in april, we lost as many people as were lost during the vietnam war, fighting in the vietnam war. u.s. troops. pretty soon matt lewis yesterday tweeted this, i thought it was chilling. pretty soon more americans will die from this pandemic that donald trump told african-american leaders back in february would magically go away. more americans are going to soon be dead from this pandemic than were killed in the battle of

britain. british civilians who died in the battle of britain against the nazis in 1940. more americans will be dead from this pandemic that donald trump said was nothing to worry about. time and time again, and so as we've said all along, i mean, i'm a baptist. i believe in late-light conversions even if we're talking about a pandemic, keep waiting for the president to wake up, grow up, be responsible and he just can't do it, and instead of working through the weekend he was rage tweeting. instead of working last night he was rage tweeting, and this is one of the things that he was rage tweeting against. again, the truth. he rage tweet against the truth. let's take a look. ♪ >> there's morning in america. today, more than 60,000 americans have died from a deadly virus donald trump

ignored. with the economy in shambles, more than 26 million americans are out of work, the worst economy in decades, trump bailed out wall street, but not main street. this afternoon millions of americans will apply for unemployment and with their savings run out, many are giving up hope. millions worry that a loved one won't survive covid-19. there's morning in america, and under the leadership of donald trump, our country's weaker and sicker and poorer and now americans are asking if we have another four years like this, will there even be an america? >> paid for by the lincoln project which is responsible for the content of this advertising. >> david ignacious, for those of us who are old enough to remember the original morning in ad in 1984, a completely

different time, i think what's so chilling about that ad and all of these type ads that come out that by the time they drop the ad the numbers are old. they -- they mentioned 60,000 people dead and an adjust dropped. we're going to be up to 70,000 dead in the next day or so. you put -- i remember people putting out ads talking about 3,000 people dead. within a week it seemed like it had doubled. this is -- and we're hearing from the government that this is going to exponentially get worse, if by june 1st, the number of deaths per day is actually going to double and even against that backdrop, even against all of the lies and the false assurances that the president has given senior citizens, have given the elderly, have given the

physically impaired and the rest of us who have family members who have underlying conditions and even with all of those lies and false assurances, he's still at it saying don't trust this cdc ad with the help of fema. basically other people of my task force and my government, don't trust that, and he's trying to push people back out to open up their businesses before they meet, not my guidelines, not your guidelines and not mika's guidelines and not nancy pelosi's guidelines, not bernie sanders' guidelines, and not the american marxist lead guidelines, donald trump's guidelines. his own white house guidelines, he's not even following his own guidelines, and it's gotten so frightening that even a lot of his close allies are now condemning people that are going to rallies with guns and trying

to intimidate legislators. this is a president who isolates himself more, not only from reality, but from a lot of supporters, david. >> that line, it's mourning in america with sovereign music as we think on this horrifying month of april that we live through as a country is painful for all of us. we want to be looking forward. we want to have some sense of how we're all going to come out of this. we look to the president for that kind of leadership. on the numbers, he doesn't know what the numbers are going to be. these are simulations and models. it's less that that bothers me, the numbers change that happens, and it's what the country desperately needs is leadership to mobilize the resources of government that are there and on

the key issues of testing, tracing, even moving toward therapies, that leadership still seems to be lacking. >> coming up, it's a stark reminder for the trump administration. don't forget how we got here. we'll talk to the harvard physician who says you must fix the testing situation before you open things up. that discussion is just ahead on "morning joe." ♪ ♪

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you can count on us. >> now to revelations about china's actions amid the coronavirus pandemic. u.s. officials believe that the chinese government covered up the threat of the coronavirus in order to stockpile medical supplies. that's according to a leaked document by the homeland department's intelligence service obtained by nbc news. the dhs says, quote, we assess the chinese government intentionally concealed the sevity of covid-19 from the international community in early january while it stockpiled medical supplies by both increasing imports and decreasing exports. china reportedly increased its import of masks and surgical gowns and surgical gloves in january, but in february imports of these supplies significantly

declined. the four-page dhs report claims that china covered up that trade activity by, quote, publicly denying it has ever imposed an export ban on masks and other medical supplies and delaying the release of key trade data. so far, there is no public evidence to suggest that china's missteps in the early days of the outbreak were part of an international plot to buy up the world's medical supplies. meanwhile, chinese authorities are clamping down as grieving relatives and activists press their government for details on what went wrong in wuhan, the city where the virus killed thousands before spreading to the rest of the world. "the new york times" have been warned not to file suit against the government. the police have interrogated bereaved family members who connected with others online and volunteers who tried to thwart

the state's censorship apparatus have disappeared. the paper continues, the parties feel that any attempt to dwell on what happened in wuhan or to hold officials responsible will undermine the state's narrative that only china's authoritarian system saved country from a devastating health crisis. >> china's lack of transparency continues, continues even six months after the outbreaks, the initial outbreak. you remember the story, the doctor who worked in the hospital who tried to tell china and the world about the virus and actually was attacked by state authorities. he ended up dying of the virus himself, but here we are six months later, the lack of transparency continues.

>> yeah, and the problem with that lack of transparency is you start getting theories and conspiracy theories emerging and you just don't know which ones are right or wrong and because there are some indications that the chinese have tried to suppress the news of the virus within their own country and externally, as well it's very easy to start believing every worst possible case scenario. the news now that they were stockpiling medical equipments then makes you start wondering, is it possible that this was actually produced in a lab? is it produced it was deliberately produced in a lab? is it possibly that it was deliberately released in a lab and we have no evidence of those things i was suggesting in a lab, but you can see why people would start to believe that because we don't know and there has to be some -- i don't know how you would do it because i don't know how the chinese would ever let you have access to that information, but there has to be some clarity and some investigation into how china has

handled this, so that we know the degree to which china was culpable right from the beginning when it came to this virus. was it -- was it -- did it come from a lab that had security problems near that wet market before and it was a mistake that it got out or not or was there something more nefarious than that, and it's opening the door for people like mike pompeo to float theories that may or may not be valid, but to paint china in the worst possible case and for china's own benefit in a way it needs to be more believable on this because otherwise everyone will start beleaving the very worst case scenarios. >> david ignacious, the president accused the media to protect china which is ironic that the president has gone wild fro te to protect china, when he

tweeted out when they were working closely together and much respect, there's the february 24th tweet thanking president xi saying it will work out well, talking about it on january 24th. you having talked to your sources in the foreign policy community, david, china did suppress information. it did silence doctors and it did manipulate the w.h.o. and they believe that to be true as well. what do you think that the president's reflux was to defend china and china running rup shot over all of these organizations allowing to spread this disease? >> i think it's safe to say that the world is watching the united states, our democracy, our disorganized, somewhat haphazard response to the pandemic and watching china's police state authoritarian government and

trying to figure out which one seems to be doing a better job in protecting its citizens. i've been working the last six, eight weeks trying to get to the bottom of what i call the origin story of covid-19, of this virus that has swept the world now and what's clear to me is that in the beginning the chinese deliberately sought to suppress information about the outbreak in wuhan as joe was discussing earlier, arrested a heroic doctor who was looking at patients dying and saying there's something going on here. there's something new. he and his colleagues were -- were imprisoned, denounced by the party and then in january the chinese began to realize there is something enormous happening here. a panic began, ordering all of the supplies, and sent top party

cadres into wuhan and sent the top chinese army officers to take control of key places, but even in this lockdown of wuhan, we had no idea, don't have any idea to this day of exactly how this pandemic began, and i think that's really the point that katty was making and we all should make, the world needs to know how this started. we are living through one of the great events of our lives and we need to know how it began and not simply how to protect ourselves against future outbreaks and future coronaviruses or variants and that's why this investigation isn't simply a matter of political tit for tat. sometimes listening to pompeo and trump you think this is about global politics. no. it's about getting the world set to deal with the underlying

causes of what happened. >> coming up on "morning joe," one of our next guests says covid-19 cases could surge in the fall with the pandemic lasting up to two years. we'll speak to renowned epidemiologist michaele osteorholm on "morning joe." you wouldn't accept an incomplete job from anyone else.

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the white house is seeking to limit agency officials including coronavirus task force members from testifying before congress this month. the white house sent new guidance to congressional staff directors yesterday citing these unprecedented times. a copy provided to nbc news states for the month of may no task force members or key deputies of task force members may accept hearing invitations. the guidance notes that some exceptions may be made by white house chief of staffmark meadows. one exception may be a senate health committee where dr. anthony fauci is slated to testify. lamar alexander said that dr. fauci will appear along with several other members of the coronavirus task force. joining us now, the top-ranking

democrat in the u.s. senate, minority leader chuck schumer of new york. senator schumer, thank you so much. we'll get to the scientists and the doctors potentially testifying in just a moment, but first, senate democrats are putting together a letter that they are sending to the president asking for what? >> well, over 40 senate democrats have signed a letter saying we need to do much, much better on testing. mika, and you've said this on the show repeatedly and thank god you have. until we get adequate testing we're not going get a handle on this virus. two months ago, two months ago today the president said everyone who needs a test can get a test. the fact of the matter is we are way short. we should have 2 million tests a day if we were at the level of south korea and every country that has beat this virus that has had a decline has done strong testing and contact tracing. we've been recommending for a

month the letter re-emphasizes, put a military czar in charge. get them to manufacture enough tests and get the supply lines to supply everything for enough tests and we put money in the covid-35 bill to administer the tests and to do contact tracing. there is a pattern of success now in south korea, in germany in australia and new zealand. for some reason we're not following it. the president will invoke the production for meat plant, but not for testing. i will say to president trump directly until you get a handle on testing this crisis will continue to go on and on and furthermore, if we don't have enough tests for the future, when it comes back and most skie scientists say it will in the late summer or fall it will be much worse. testing is the key and they are so derelict in testing it has created many more cases and many more deaths than we could have

had if we would have done it right. we must do it right now. >> you used the word derelict. i wonder, could it possibly be considered negligent to -- >> yes. >> -- to continue to use the defense production act to try to streamline testing? >> mika, we used to think well maybe they had an ideological objection. they don't want government telling industry what to do, but they just did it with the meat plants. i haven't heard of one good reason and i've talked to the president directly about this, why they haven't invoked the dpa and the testing regime is still willy-nilly, scattershot, our governors, our hospital, our mayors are searching for enough tests. it is the key. scientists tell us it's the key and this administration doesn't listen to scientist. president trump says something that's totally false and somehow he seems to believe it and you made a second point it, and then they muzzle the truth. we came back this week and it's

a disgrace that we're not having hearings this week, not only with fauci and let's hope he stays. they pulled him back from the house. i'm not certain he'll be allowed to come to the senate next week. what about birx? what about mnuchin? what about powell and these other experts? we need to have intense hearings where they're asked question after question. you know, at the white house a rotor asked a good question and the president just belittles him and shuts up the people behind him. we cannot have that. there's too much at stake. >> willie? >> senator schumer, willie geist. >> hi, willie. >> the point you're making is not a partisan, and dr. fauci points to the importance of testing. so what do you suspect -- >> willie, let me just say this. >> why is it willy nilly and not state by state. >> i wouldn't use willy nil toe you, willie, i'm sorry. but the bottom line is -- [ laughter ]

the bottom line is no one can quite figure it out except it's the president's ego. the president seems to think this is all about him. he thinks he says something and it's true. that's been his pattern his whole life even before he was president, but it just isn't. to say everyone will get a test does not mean that everyone will get a test. to say it will go away in a month, doesn't mean it will go away in a month and it sure as heck didn't. no one can figure out -- look, i want to save lives and i want to get over this crisis and get us all back to work and that's the key, and the president himself would help himself if he did this. he's hurting himself. the projections and you mentioned it in the show of the number of people who will get corona and the number of people who will die is going up. many states, it's not going down, mine it is, with real avoiding contact and in many states it's going up. it's hurting everybody including the president of the united states. he's hurting himself, but no one

can figure out why and here's one other problem and it relates to what mika said. no one speaks truth to power. they all say yes. leader mcconnell brought us back to bring us a divisive, right-wing judge who said that the aca should be repealed and criticized justice roberts this week, and that's what we're doing this week when covid is raging? leader mcconnell along with president bu president trump does not want to hear the truth. the only way you solve this problem is with the truth, mr. president. >> the curve is flat edge in the state of new york, particularly in new york city where it's been the worst, obviously the epicenter of this crisis, you don't want to get too optimistic and too comfortable at this point. as the numbers come down, what do you tell to the people of the state that i see the numbers are coming down and you have to get back to business and i have to

reopen my shop and reopen my business and i want to start coming back to life and the message to this state. >> my message is health has to come first and the economy will not improve, if people -- that's another reason testing is so important. if people are afraid, you can give money to the store owners and say open up. if no one will go out on the streets and they don't have customers, what good is it going to be? we have to be careful and you have to err on the side of science and of caution. that doesn't mean you shut down everything all of the time and new york has issued a careful plan, but when the president importunes to go protest and say open the government regardless of scientific information that will hurt all of us. >> senator, just curious, i hear you on the record about this, can american citizens trust their government and their president to get clear, salient

information and advice on this pandemic? >> well, there are certain people we can trust and that's why we want to have hearings and that's why we want to ask them questions. i mean, fauci has been muzzled at times, but at times has spoken the truth and so has birx. we can bring in experts who are not part of the government to tell the truth. the president has been wrong so often and has belittled this crisis so often and incompetent so often such as producing the testing that we need to hear from a multiple variety of sources to hear the truth. >> senate minority leader chuck schumer, thank you for being on this morning. >> thank you, mika. also in new york, three non-clinical hospital workers that gave out masks at one new york hospital died within days of each other from the coronavirus. wayne edwards, derek broswell and priscilla carel held some of

the most vital jobs at elmhurst hospital, and managing ppe as supplies quickly dwindled. by april 12th all three died from the complications of the coronavirus. at least 32 non-medical hospital workers in new york city have died during the pandemic according to an analysis by "the new york times." these staff members include security guards and chefs that made meals and patients alike, patient transporters as well as many other roles critical to the hospital's operation. in the early days of the pandemic when ppe supply was critically low n95 masks were reserved for clinical employees who had direct patient contact while everyone else was offered less protective surgical masks, a decision many health care systems say was based on

government guidelines. there are so many ways in which the government could have done better in the leadup to this. still ahead, governments and organizations around the world have pledged $8 billion to find a coronavirus vaccine. there was a noticeable absence, though, the united states. we'll speak to health experts about the growing number of coronavirus deaths in the u.s. even as more and more states begin to open. keep it right here on "morning joe." ♪ [ siren ] give me your hand! 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. ♪

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we still have a lie level of infection in this country. we've reached a plateau but haven't seen the kind of declines we were expecting to see at this point. cases are likely to go up, not down. we're likely to see the case counts start to increase. the mitigation steps we took were an attempt to prevent the health care system from becoming overwhelmed, and they worked to do that. the hospitals never really

became overrun, but they were a bridge. they weren't a solution. they're not going to end transmission of this virus, but we did think we'd be at lower levels at this point when we started to contemplate reopening aspects of this economy. as we go through may, we're likely to see the case count creep back up. >> former fda commissioner scott gottlieb speaking this morning. joining us now, director of the harvard global health institute, dr. ashish jha, professor of medicine at harvard medical school. also with us, director for the center of infectious disease research policy and a professor in the medical school at the university of minnesota, dr. michael osterholm. he's the author of the book "deadliest enemy: our war against killer germs." i'd like to ask you both if you are surprised by these new projections, for example, from 62k last month to 135,000 dead

by august 4th. this by the institute for health metrics and evaluation. dr. osterholm, were you surprised in hearing about these new projections? >> well, i can't say i'm surprised. i don't put a lot of stock in those projections because i don't believe the model reflects the information that we need to get or they are using to get. but i think that the general thrust of what they said is correct. we're going to continue to see transmission for some time like this, and it's going to go on for many, many months after this. >> dr. jha? >> yeah, i'm very much with mike on this. the ihme model that the white house has been using has really consistently, i think, underestimated what's going to happen, and so, again, i was pleased to see them updating it. i think they're still underestimating. somehow this sends it over --

through the summer it's just going to disappear, the disease is not going to disappear over the summer. so we're in for a bumpy ride. unfortunately, a lot of people getting sick and dying over the upcoming weeks and months. >> dr. osterholm, last time you orp the show, you talked about us being in the second inning of a nine-inning game. are we still in the second inning and, number two, when do you think businesses can truly safely reopen, by the way, only at half level with social distancing in place? >> well, first of all, we have to understand again that typically, a pandemic like this, a virus, is transmitted by the respiratory route which influenza is the one we most know about. this is acting like an influenza virus. the only thing that's going to stop this is a vaccine that's able to then bring us immunity or the fact it marches through the population until it gets to 60% or 70% and only then when

that many people are infected does it start to slow down. there's nothing else that's going to change this. now we can alter potentially how to get to 60% or 70% with our distancing and what we do in everyday life but even that's not going to stop this transmission. when you ask me, when can business open safely there is no safety right now. there's just a relative degree of what's happening. and i think what we're going to be into is a situation of constantly monitoring week by week to know, when do we hit the accelerator to try to slow things down by locking down more and when do we let it up and say, okay, go back at it. but there's not going to be one day that we're going to be able to turn the switch on and say it's okay. >> dr. jha, it's willie geist. on that point about opening up, you have said consistently since the without put out its guidelines that they are directionally right. the idea is good but some of the specifics you quibble with.

i was talking to a guy who develops vaccines for a living and he says by opening up even a little bit we're embarking on a grand national experiment as if to sairny, we're going to push people in in small doses and crossfingers. what do you think it means, this new optimism that people can go outside and go about their lives? >> willie, i certainly am sympathetic to the idea that people want to go back out into the community and start engaging in economic activity. i think we're all feeling a little fed up being inside. but the question isn't, do we want to go back? the question is, is it even remotely safe to do so? and you know what would have helped a lot in terms of getting us ready to go back is if we had a great testing and tracing and isolation program. but we don't. we basically wasted the last month quibbling about whether we need testing or not when every expert believed it. so even now, if we can make testing a massive priority, it

will make it safer for us to go back and engage in economic activity and kind of start getting our lives back. this is the grand experiment and the cost of getting the experiment wrong is people are going to lose lives and we'll have to shut our economy down again. so that's what i want to try, too void. >> dr. os osterholm, as they le people out to get a haircut go to beaches and go to parks, what does that grand national experiment look like to you as we go through the summer and into the fall? >> first of all, we have to have a lot more humility as humans with regard to this virus. think about 1918. new york and chicago got hit very hard with that influenza virus in the spring way. minneapolis, detroit, baltimore. new york and chicago didn't have any cases for almost four months and then it came back with a

vengeance. everybody got hit. we may be in the same situation, even if we see improvement, which i hope some of it is due to the -- what we're doorks and i believe it is. but also, nature itself may make this quiet. but i'm promising you that we're going to see a major, major tsunami of activity somewhere down the road and so what we're really doing is getting ourselves from stage to stage to stage. and i worry that we somehow think if we just get over this hump, we're there. and again, i have to remind people, we have maybe infected 5% to 15% of the people. we now have a disease that's the number one cause of death in this country with just that number. wait until we get to 60% or 70%. you realize what we have to go through yet? that's what we have to prepare americans for, prepare our economy for. that's what we have to prepare our leadership for and we're not doing any of that in any meaningful way. >> so i guess -- i mean, i know that our viewers desperately want the answer to this

question, and everyone is trying to answer it as much as possible. but if testing is one of the key ways to get safely back, testing or a vaccine, dr. jha, how long is it -- other countries have this. they have figured it out. how long will it take for the united states to have testing in place or will we ever get it? >> we're obviously making bits of progress. sort of week by week. and a lot of it is because states have come to realize that the federal government is not going to help. and so they're sorting this out on their own. let me be very clear that 50 states all competing with each other for a testing program and strategy is not the optimal way to fight this pandemic. but we are, i think, going to muddle our way through. we're going to make progress. i'm hopeful that by the fall, a lot of states will make a lot of progress. but, you know, none of this is necessary. we could do this so much smarter

and cheaper if we just made it a national priority. >> so that's the defense production act. dr. osterholm, do you agree with that, and does august look likely in this bit by bit, piecemeal way we're doing it? >> i wrote an op-ed in "the new york times" almost seven weeks ago saying we're going to have a shortage of reagents and the swabs for testing because there was no coordinated federal approach. companies by themselves are not leading us out of this because they don't want to invest millions and millions in making new reagent manufacturing capacity only to have it not being used 18 months from now. this is where we needed a marshall plan, the key federal leadership. and just as dr. jha said. if we had that coordination six to seven weeks ago, we'd be in a different place. i still don't see it today. i hope we'll have reagents. i hope we'll have the kinds of sampling tools we need. as i've said before, mika, hope is not a strategy. we're running out of time to get these kinds of things. so we clearly need a major

marshall plan initiative to bring the public and private sectors together to get the reagents, to get the test kits. then the states can test and we need to do that desperately but it won't happen until then. >> come on. all right, doctors ashish jha and michael osterholm. that does it for us this morning. stephanie ruhle picks up the coverage right now. hi there. i'm stephanie ruhle. it is tuesday, may 5th, and this morning, we're get something stunning new projections about the price this country may have to pay as we try to get back to business in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic. here are the facts this hour. new york and california have announced plans to begin loosening restrictions on businesses over the next ten days. washington state begins phase one of getting back to work today. even so, the numbers keep ri