i will be reading axios am in a little while. you too can sign up for the newsletter at signup.axios.com. that does it for me on this wednesday morning. "morning joe" starts right now. i've expressed then and again is my concern that if some areas, cities, states, what have you, jump over those various checkpoints and prematurely open up without having the capability of being able to respond effectively and efficiently, my concern is that we will start to see little spikes that might turn into outbreaks. so therefore, i have been very clear in my message to try to the best extent possible to go by the guidelines which have been very well thought out and very well delineated. >> there's risk to anything, but the president, you know, carries the burden of the 30 million americans who have lost their jobs due to this -- due to this historic effort save lives. and think we've all come

together, we've saved a lot of lives by our collective action. >> the trump white house's push to restart the economy in contrast to that warning from dr. anthony fauci of serious consequences if states reopen too soon. good morning and welcome to "morning joe." it is wednesday, may 13th along with joe, willie and me we have white house reporter for "the associated press" jonathan lemire. more now from dr. anthony fauci during yesterday's senate hearing that if the economy opens prematurely it could lead to more cases, deaths, and a slower economic recovery. >> there is a real risk that you will trigger an outbreak that you might not be able to control, in, in fact, paradoxically will set you back not only leading to some suffering and death that could be avoided, but could even set you back on the road to trying to get economic recovery.

because it would almost turn the clock back rather than going forward. that is my major concern, senator. >> dr. fauci, you have advised six presidents. you have battled deadly viruses for your [ inaudible ] career. so i'd like to hear your honest opinion. do we have the coronavirus contained? >> senator, thank you for the question. right now it depends on what you mean by containment. if you think that we have it completely under control, we don't. if you look at the dynamics of the outbreak, we are seeing a diminution of hospitalizations and infections in some places, such as in new york city which has plateaued and starting to come down, new orleans. but in other parts of the country we are seeing spikes. so when you look at the dynamics of new cases, even though some are coming down, the curve looks flat with some slight coming down. so i think we're going in the right direction, but the right

direction does not mean we have by any means total control of this outbreak. >> you know, willie, donald trump and some of his more extreme supporters have been presenting a false choice to america, which is we can either worry about the virus or we can worry about reopening the economy. and right now we have to worry about reopening the economy because of the 30 million jobs that the president -- jared says the president feels responsible for. also, he should feel the burden of 82,000 deaths, not that he could have prevented all of those deaths, but that should also be weighing obviously on his mind. but, dr. fauci underlines such an important point that -- that i think is lost by donald trump and some of his more extreme supporters and some of those politicians on capitol hill and some of those militia members that are brandishing

military-style weapons or standing in front of barber shops to open early. and as dr. fauci says, yes, there's a risk that you trigger more outbreaks that cause more sickness and more death, but also on the economic side of things, y things, you risk future outbreaks that set economic economy back, set return to greatness back. you know, the white house used to understand actually for a time there after the study came out from imperial college that this was a medical crisis and that until medical crisis was taken care of there would always be an economic crisis. i think they still understand that, but they have a president who is so impatient that he's looking past the future

outbreaks. and there's an attitude, yes, people are going to die, as the president has said. he doesn't understand that's going to set us back more economically as we move forward. because americans aren't going to go get a hamburger if there's an outbreak and people are dying. it's just, again, it's not an either/or choice. >> no, it's not an either/or choice. and jared's right to say that the president has a responsibility to his 30 million americans. but that includes thinking about their long-term future. and i understand it's difficult to see the long term when there's so much pain in the short-term you want to rush people back to work. but dr. fauci's testimony yesterday actually wasn't anything different than he's been saying all along, which is that if we rush back too quickly he fears we trigger another outbreak. and, as you say, that doesn't just have public health consequence particulars has economic consequences.

you open, rush everybody back then you've got to close down again. that's doubly bad for workers and small businesses. jonathan lemire, we saw out in the open yesterday, this contrast, this divide between the president and his doctors. the president up in the rose garden two days ago talking about how we've got to get back, we have to get back to work, transition to greatness is his new line he's using on twitter, we've got to get everybody back to work. and dr. fauci in that senate hearing calmly explaining why he has real concerns. the president and governors get to make those decisions, but the advice of drs. fauci and beneficiaries will have to weigh heavily on his decision. >> you're right, the testimony we heard yesterday -- i'm working on it -- the testimony we heard yesterday, from all the officials, but particular dr. fauci, was like a bucket of

cold water on what the president -- his relentless tone of late to try to push the nation to restart and the economy to reopen on a number of points. and dr. fauci wasn't dealing with politics, he never once said in these words that the president was wrong, he didn't turn to any sort of attacks. in fact, he was very careful the way he spoke, as he always is, and he stuck to the principles and the guidelines, and the science, and the medicine. and there are a few clear warning signs. he suggested that a vaccine which the president has been suggesting suddenly might be available by year's end, he said could be a year or two or more away. he suggested that when pressed by senator rand paul in a rather contentious exchange, you know, he said that while the scientists believe if you have covid-19 you'll have immunity afterwards that you'll recover, that they didn't know that for certain just yet. he tried to pump the brakes on the ideas that schools could

resume this fall, universities in particular. and then on one thing that was particularly striking is that he talked about the death count. and we've heard the president, we've now well over 80,000, and the president privately has been suggesting he thinks that's too high. he believes those numbers are inflated. he's cast a little bit of doubt on this private publicly but privately even more so suggesting that the media were trying to pump the numbers up and make him look bad. dr. fauci went in the other direction saying we probably have a significant undercount number of deaths, that it's far higher than those that we know and that some american deaths will never perhaps ever be accounted for, but they were to be blamed on this virus. >> well, if you talk to doctors, if you talk to nurses, if you talk to people who are actually on the front lines and not politicians who are trying to score political points. >> yeah. >> they will all tell you that they think that there is an undercount. if you talk to local officials, they will say the same thing. ems workers will say the same

thing, that they found people dead in their apartments, dead in their homes that didn't come to the hospital because they were afraid to come to the hospital and apparently died of covid-19. >> some were turned away. >> and, yes, some were turned away, some were sent back home. but you know, mika, the president talks about how he's a war time president and this is like a war. >> yeah. >> you know, yesterday the dichotomy between what dr. fauci was saying and what the president was saying brought to mind that something ronald reagan's defense secretary came up with,a t and it was called t weinberger doctrine and talked about the things that were required before america went to war. cole len powell updated it later. you needed public support.

because if you didn't have public support you'd end up in a quagmire like vietnam. this is a war. and we're at the same place here. majority of the poles show that americans still understand it's not safe yet to go back into restaurants. >> for sblur ure. >> to go back into baseball games. as much as we'd all love to go to baseball games and flood in restaurants. americans aren't safe. you look at gretchen whitmer in michigan, she's doing extremely well. mike dewine doing better than anybody else in ohio, he's balancing this every day. he's not saying we have to kick down the doors and reopen the economy. and so while, again, the president's trying to rush this, again, he has to have support of the american people because if you don't, then, you know, you can look at the experience of

brian kemp in georgia who has extraordinarily low approval ratings for how he's handling this crisis. and part of that just has to do with the fact that georgians feel like he's rushing in there. so the president, of course, doesn't understand this. and i guess he's not going to understand this. but, without public support, without americans feeling like they're safe to going go back to restaurants, safe to go back to malls, safe to go back to baseball games, they're not going to do that. and it doesn't matter what a -- an isolated politician inside the white house or inside a governor's mansion says. >> right. so, willie, exactly what joe was saying is that what the president doesn't understand is that when you use phrases like transition to greatness and we have prevailed and you have a lockdown happening, you're in the face of a lockdown, everybody's in it together.

and it's invalidating to the people who are impacted. and whort peop and who are the people impacted? literally everyone. literally everyone is going through this and they need honesty. they don't need phrases that completely don't match their reality. >> yeah, and there were a couple of decisions yesterday, mika, that underline your point and that underline the point that it's not up to the president. they're both in the state of california state university system nearly half a million students, 23 campuses, announcing now in mid-may that they will not hold on-campus classes this fall. so these universities and institution dollars wi institutions will have to make their own decisions about keeping people safe. the other has the l.a. county health commissioner saying we're going to keep our stay at home orders in place for another three months with some phased-in, they hope, relaxing of the standards over that time. but these are places, these are localities, universities

deciding for themselves. we're not taking our cues from donald trump, we're doing what we have to do to keep keep safe. let's bring in a practicing physician, also a professor of medicine at harvard medical school. good morning. your take on the testimony we heard yesterday from dr. fauci from the director of the cdc as well. does it line one where you are in terms of opening? obviously politicians will make these decisions at the end of the day, governors and municipalities, but do you agree with dr. fauci? do you have his concern? do you share it about triggering some kind of an outbreak if there's a rush back to open society? >> good morning, willie. you know, what dr. fauci said yesterday, i think pretty much all health professionals agree with, is that the virus makes the timeline here. and you can't -- you know, you can't sort of happy talk the virus, you can't talk about prevailing against the virus unless you've actually managed to do so. and the evidence right now is

based on the president's own guidelines for opening up is that majority of states are not there. most states are not there. and if you decide you're going to blow by that and go ahead and could doh do it anyway, there will be a resurgence. this is not a political desire. this is not people trying to be critical of the president. this is the reality of the virus as we best understand it. and i think what we heard from dr. fauci was a real concern. and i think it was echoed by the others as well. not as clearly what's we heard from dr. fauci, but the others. essentially we're all saying the same thing. we have to let science drive this. >> so it seems like there's this focus on this controversy which the science just cancels out. if we don't want a resurgence, we can't have 80,000 people or 40,000 people dying again, dr. shaw. so what is the way forward to

safely reopen and high is it so ha hard to understand that when we're talking about basic science? >> what's really interesting is i believe, like, if you listen to the republicans and democrats, there was pretty wide consensus, again, the words were a little different between the republicans and democrats, but pretty wide consensus among senators that we really need a national roadmap. and in some ways you could argue that the white house plan for opening up america again was that, was a start of that and it was pretty good, it was pretty science driven. and i think you heard from was the frustration that the administration has abandon its own plans and gone off of where science is, and that be can only lead to bad places. so a new analysis by "the associated press" revealed that even as president trump urges getting people back to work and reopening the economy, thousands of people are getting sick from

covid-19 on the job. according to data compiled by the ap, recent figures show a surge of infections in meat packing and pouttltry processin plants and state prisons. there's been a spike of new cases among construction workers in austin, texas, where that sector recently returned to work. in the federal prison system the number of positive cases has increased steadily. as of may 5th, there were 2,066 inmates who tested positive up from 730 on april 25th. tennessee had the highest per capita rate, had nearly 1300 inmates and 50 staffers recently test positive at the privately run center. the number two county was nobles county in minnesota which now has 1100 cases compared to 2 in mid-april. the county seat is home to a

pork processing plant in employs hundreds of immigrants. dr. j requeha, the way the virus with people getting sick, when you have them working together, not wearing masks, this virus can't be contained unless it's isolated or what is the other route? >> so, you know, mika, when you see those case thas that you ju brought up, whenever you put large numbers of people together you're going to get outbreaks. especially if the underlying rate in the community is pretty large. right now most people are staying at home. but when people start going back to the office, what's been happening in meat packing plants, what's been happening at construction sites, you're going to see more of those happening in auftss in offices. how do we know that?

the white house has seen its own outbreak and they're doing testing every single day. the point is that we can't ever go back to work, we can. but we need to substantially lower the risk of outbreaks within offices, within factories, and that requires substantial testing. it requires low levels of transition. it requires people wearing masks. this is not rocket science, and we can do this, but we need a national -- the roadmap from the white house explaining what we need to do, not happy talk about how we've conquered the virus. we haven't. >> dr., thank you so much for coming on early this morning. very much appreciate it. >> and, jonathan lemire, i guess that's what's so frustrating and the frustrating actually to some republican senators and democrats as well certainly has to be frustrating to dr. fauci and other medical experts and scientists who are advising the president, they have a roadmap.

they laid out a national roadmap. the president went out and embraced that roadmap as his own. and immediately after doing that, he began undercutting it and is encouraging states to not follow white house guidelines. so what's the current status of those white house guidelines that anthony fauci talked about again yesterday that the president announced a couple of weeks ago? are they applicable? are they not applicable? has the president -- has the president discounted them openly yet? or is he discounting those white house guidelines privately? where do we stand there? >> jared's comment sort of tipped the hand, if you will, joe, where the focus has certainly been more about the economic impact of late than the public health impact. this is a president whose inner

circle both in the white house and his campaign team are very anxious and unhappy about where things stand with the economy. they were certainly dismayed by the jobs report, the unemployment rate that was released last week. and that is -- >> but, jonathan, excuse me for interrupting. i understand that's where the focus is. >> right. >> but do they not understand, is there anybody in the president's inner circle that is explaining to him that if he doesn't listen to dr. fauci, if he doesn't listen to health care experts, if he doesn't listen to doctors, if he doesn't listen to nurses, if he rushes in too quickly and if he ignores his own guidelines that he laid out to the public, then as dr. fauci says he causes another wave of infections which sets our recovery back even more. is there anybody in the white house that is explaining this basic reality to the president?

>> the short answer is not really. you are having some of the public health officials like dr. fauci and dr. birx are saying that publicly but also privately in the situation room in the task force meetings chaired by the vice president. meetings, mind you, the president himself usually doesn't attend. but those are happening less frequently. even within the building there's the focus towards the economy, less of the public health. there are some congressional allies and outside advisers who are still warning the president about how devastating it would be if there were a major flare-ups again over the summer or, indeed, that second wave that dr. fauci yesterday again said he believes is coming. that there will be a second wave this fall and that that, of course, would devastate the economy in addition to costing thousands of americans their lives. the president has, on occasion, bent to the public health advice. he did most famously of course when he backed off his idea of reopening the country by easter. instead he pushed it back a few weeks. but the cdc guidelines were

created. states haven't met the threshold to reopen, but the white house is not stopping them either. in some ways that's because the white house is putting the onus, again, on the states so if things go bad perhaps the president can blame others for what happened rather than himself. which is sort of par for the course throughout this particular crisis. but the -- while lastly as a key point, he's been told time and time again that they can't safely reopen until there is the widespread testing. and certainly that has improved, in that monday press conference in the rose guard than ended rather contentiously, there was certainly -- there is good news there, testing is better than it was. but it's not nearly high enough in order to really safeguard americans to go back to work. that's the point senator romney made yesterday during his testimony. he was very crit kaflt administraticritical of the nation's ability to test as much as needed. >> but the problem here when you have this controversy, it's

almost fauci versus the president's point of view on this. science versus the president. this argument over how to reopen is taking the focus away from trying to solve the problem or safely muddle through it. and it be always consistently highlights one thing, that the president is repeatedly wrong. that he's either speaking aspirationally or falsely or dangerously. and every time the controversy comes up and the white house counters the science and people inside the white house get sick because they can't even contain it in their own ranks -- >> they won't wear masks. >> -- because they're so busy focussed on opening that they get it, they're showing to the american -- and it just -- the politics of this is what i don't understand. because if trump is masterful at one thing it would be on branding and rebranding and just stamping on the truth to move forward for himself. and he's constantly tripping on himself and showing to the

american people just how wrong he has been every step of the way. >> well, and it hasn't caught up with him, not only over the past 3 1/2, 4 years, it hasn't caught up with him for his entire life until now. and because the president has been wrong so much, because the president's been lying so much in his briefings, because the president's been saying since january that there's nothing to worry about, that this is going to magically go away, jonathan brings up a good point. sometimes the president's lying and the president's magical thinking actually obscures the fact that we are making some progress over time. why? because we're america. because we've got the biggest economy in the world. because we've got the greatest scientists in the world. because we've got the greatest doctors in the world. because we've got the greatest universities in the world. we're going -- it does remind me of winston -- what winston churchill once again, which is

that americans will always do the right thing, will always do the right thing after they've exhausted all -- every other possibility. we're going to get there. testing is starting to improve. not because of the president, you know, they've been lying to us. mike pence and the president have good going o have been going out lying to us about how many tests we were going to have. but even with washington not working -- >> yeah. >> -- americans are slowly starting to catch up. but the president's lies are slowly starting to catch up with him. you can lie about robert mueller and can he lie about the fbi, he can call the fbi thugs, he can lie about ukraine, you can lie about that and people don't care. most people -- it's like, come on, that's washington stuff, i don't want to hear about it. that's -- that's the democrats benghazi. i'm worried about getting my kids to college, i'm worried about keeping my job, i'm

worried about all this other stuff. but when the president's lying about something that is so central to americans' life, health specifically their health, the life and the death of their parents or their grandparents or their children, and they focus. and there has been a tremendous cost. and you look at the cnn poll that came out yesterday, and only 36% of americans trust information that the president gives them about the coronavirus. 62% do not trust the information the president of the united states is giving about the most challenging crisis americans have faced since world war ii. and you see that in public and private polling. you look at wisconsin, a poll that came out yesterday, seniors by an overwhelming margin have abandoned donald trump and are now supporting joe biden. why? because donald trump's just not

telling them the truth about this health care pandemic. >> yeah, the spread in that wisconsin poll among seniors was plus 18 for joe biden over donald trump. >> that's amazing. >> here's the number right there, marquette poll. plus 18 among voters 60 and over. should open some eyes in the white house. but, yes, donald trump, the problem for him is that this has visited people's lives. and in that same cnn poll that you referenced, about 40% of americans say they know someone personally who's been impacted or contracted coronavirus. so he can't wish it away because it's in people's homes and hospitals and the businesses and their communities. and this is not up to him. he doesn't know what do because at the end of the day it's not up to him. he can put pressure on governors. he can tweet liberate michigan. but at the end of the day, the governors in those states are going to do what's best for their citizens, despite any pressure they might feel. governor kemp probably felt some

pressure in the state of georgia. he's suffering because of that. his poll numbers are terrible. his approval rating. so donald trump has something in front of him that he can't control by his actions really right now or his rhetoric, something that he wants to do, which is to reopen the country. it will be up to the american people to decide when that happens. >> all right. coming up on "morning joe," the speaker of the house nancy pelosi is our guest. plus, is vladimir putin well on his way to stealing the next election? we've got the author of that revealing new piece in the atlantic. and later, how american democracy is going digital from dr. fauci's testimony to joe biden's live stream. there's a major change under way. we'll talk about the impact straight ahead. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. so, no more tossing and turning... or trouble falling asleep. because only tempur-pedic uses proprietary tempur® material...

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atlantic. atlantic. we're on the campaign trail now and everybody says biden's

hiding. let me tell you something, we're doing very well. we're following the guidelines of the medical profession, we're following the guidelines of the experts, of the dr. fauci's of the world. we're doing very well. matter of fact, we're winning if you look at all the polling data. i'm not saying that's going to last till november, i don't know enough to know that. but right now the idea that somehow we are being hurt by my keeping to the rules and following the instructions that are -- that have been put forward by the docs is absolutely bizarre. i reject the premise that somehow this is hurting us. there's no evidence of that. i'm following the rules. following the rules. the president should follow the rules instead of showing up at places without masks and the whole -- the whole thing. >> i'm sorry -- >> he's just so -- >> he wins that every time. >> yeah, checkmate. >> he wins that. >> checkmate. >> every time. >> yeah. >> willie, i understand the president and people -- some people inside the white house, most of them understand they're

whistling past a political gr h graveyard. but donald trump snubbing doctors' advice in the middle of a pandemic that's killed over 80,000 people, we have new estimates it's going to kill 140,000, 150,000 people after donald trump snubbed doctors' advice early on and said this was nothing to worry about, he loses to a dude who says, hey, i'm going to follow the doc's advice. because guess what? most americans are following their doc's advice. following the advice of the doctors. i mean, joe biden's right. doesn't matter if you're republican or democrat, he's doing what most americans are doing. he's not showing one semiautomatic weapons and military style weapons trying to open up barber shops or not showing up in the michigan legislature with semiautomatic weapons to try to make a political show. he's not getting out in public,

not wearing a mask to make a political show of it. people understand, they see what happens to people inside the white house when everybody else around them's wearing a mask but they're not. guess what thaps happens to the hold on, hold on. guess what happens? >> wait for it. >> they get coronavirus. you have to follow your doctor's advice on the most deadly pandemic in over a century. it's that simple. willie, biden wins that contest every day of the week. >> yeah. and for people insisting that joe biden get out and campaign, it's not clear where they would like him to go out and campaign. go on a rope line in scranton there's not going to be anybody on the other side of that rope booin li line. he's doing what the doctors said he should do. the concerns, and they're from democrats, reflect the larger concern and the urgency they feel of beating donald trump and they want to make sure that joe

biden and his campaign are doing everything possible in every moment to make sure they win. because, jonathan lemire, despite the way the president has performed during this pandemic, he's going to be a tough opponent in the fall, democrats know that, and he has raised a ton of money quietly over the last few months, much more than the biden campaign and democrats have. >> no question, willie. the president's campaign manager brad parse sc scal said they'vet the death star and they're going to unleash a series of attacks against joe biden. perhaps he didn't see how the movie end and what happened to the death star, but what we're seeing here is they do have the financial advantage. although the biden kfrp dcamp de a good fundraising quarter. they've got a long way to go, trump had a huge start. but we are stheeg freeing that

biden. we talked about a story last night, she's saying voters don't give a blank where he's filming from, it's how they connect with voters. and we've been reminiscing about kinley's porch campaign the last few days and that's where -- >> yes. >> we have been. we've been talking about it perhaps more than we should. but that's where joe biden is right now. fe they fe they feel he needs to stay home. he's following the guidelines, taking precautions, he's taking his own safety seriously and those around him. but he's trying to set an example for the public, and of course, there's a political vance advanta advantage here. they realize the best thing they can do is get out of druronald trump's way. he went to arizona, he's slated to go to pennsylvania, allentown, not too far from

scrantton. but we saw after he occur taltd briefings, he had one again on monday, it devolved into myth truths. and the biden camp right now, they're very comfortable with where they. they're very comfortable with the vice president for now staying home. they know it will get harder. they know this summer and fall he'll have to engage more with the president who will be a tough opponent. but right now, they're happy to keep him in his basement. >> and, you know, willie, i remember, gosh, several years ago, maybe in 2008, maybe even earlier than that, peggy noonen was talking about how she would like to see a candidate do a front porch campaign and talked about why it would be so effective. alex reminds me that mike barn knack wil barnacle's campaign, his campaign is get off my porch campaign. not quite as effective yelling at the kids. >> he's been running that campaign for his whole life,

joe. >> yeah. >> i actually think joe biden's basement campaign provides such a stark contrast to the circus, to the ridiculous, horrific side show that the president puts on almost on a daily basis, consistently wrong, consistently dangerous, consistently mean, consistently often bullying people and even sometimes with a splash of racism just to distract. >> just a dash. >> just a dash. just a dash. and honestly arguing whether or not joe biden is doing enough, when he's doing exactly the right thing which is following the guidelines and truly wishing this president was doing a better job and was focused on the pandemic, truly from the bottom of his heart worried about this. what more can he do but step aside and let this ridiculous you know what show play out. because the american people can see it. it's the same argument about

showing the briefings. it's revealing to the american people what they've gotta as a president. >> tom nichols tweeted please, please keep doing the briefings every day, mr. president is one who fwoonts see t who wants to see the president lose. tom and a lot of others understand the truth, as do the president's white house staff, as do the president's campaign members, as do the president's financial supporters that him holding those briefings hurt him and hurt his political standing and hurt republicans as well. so, you know, campaigns are about contrast. >> yeah. >> right now you have a guy who's supposed to be in charge who has said he's like a war-time president thumbing his nose at all the rules. which maybe people thought that was cool during the 2016 campaign to talk about beating up people, having them beat up people and then pay for their legal fees. maybe they thought, oh, he's shaking things up. they don't feel that way and

they shouldn't have felt that way in 2016. they don't feel that way now when it's not some poor protester that's getting beaten up, it's their mom or their dad or their grandparents or their children or their own lives. >> yeah. >> that are at risk. >> the argument that the white house is making right now is we must open up the economy in the middle of a pandemic with no testing and no vaccine on a mass level. >> they should listen to dr. fauci -- >> great. >> they should listen to dr. fauci. >> i know but that's their position. >> follow the white house guidelines, and testing is improving. testing needs to continue improving. they need to do the testing and the tracing and the isolating and the treatment, all the things that people have been talking about for months. coming up on "morning joe." >> we don't know everything about this virus and we really better be very careful, particular whether i it comes to

children. because the more and more we learn, we're seeing things that this virus can do that we didn't see in the studies from china or in europe. for example right now, children presenting with covid 16 -- covid-19 who have a strange inflammatory syndrome very similar to kawasaki's syndrome. i think we better be careful if we are not cavalier in thinking that children are completely immune to the de immune to the deleterious effects. >> we'll talk about that next on "morning joe." >> we'll talk about that next on "morning joe."

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there are now more than 100 children across at least 14 states that have contracted a rare and potentially deadly inflammatory condition likely linked to covid-19. joining us now, "morning joe" chief medical correspondent dr. dave campbell. dr. dave, explain the connection that this condition has with covid-19 and how concerned should parents be about their children getting this? how prevalent is it? >> it's still rare, mika. this is a condition that comes on typically weeks after the symptoms of covid-19 go away. if there were symptoms at all. most of the kids that have this either test positive for the covid virus, for the coronavirus, or they test positive even more of them for

the antibodies. and this is something as even dr. fauci just mentioned, is similar to kawasaki syndrome which is a vascular disease. it's an inflammatory disorder of the blood vessels and it affects multiple organs at the same time. it's usually not fatal, but as we know now there are at least three children in the state of new york that have died and there are now nine more states that have patients, young kids typically, but up to 18 years of age have been identified so far that have this pediatric multisystem inflammatory syndrome associated with covid-19. mika. >> so i'm just curious, thinking outloud here, but the relationship that this has to covid-19, does that raise any questions about the coronavirus that there could be other sin dro

syndromes that will pop schnupp what do ? what does this tell us. >> this tells us there's an immune response that will target the blood vessels and organs in general because every or zban supplied by blood and has blood vessels, so it's an immune response that comes after the virus has typically resolved. it doesn't suggest that we should be thinking of other similar syndromes, but it does link back to kawasakis. and even toxic shock, does have some symptoms to it, although toxic shock is the aftermath of a bacterial infection. this is the aftereffect. it's telling us that children are not as immune to disease and problems even as we thought even a month ago. >> i want to ask you about antigen testing, but let me go over the symptoms for parents. it's prolonged fever lasting more than five days, severe

abdominal pain, diarrhea, vomiting, patchy blue, pale skin discoloration, trouble breathing and rapid breathing, lethargy and a fast heart rate. that's signs of the syndrome that have come up in kids and three children that we know of have died. the fda has given emergency authorization for new antigen testing to help detect the coronavirus quicker and cheaper. where does this fit in the grand scheme of testing and all the confusion out there? because we have so many different states and entities competing with themselves. >> this is a good natural progression of the scientific efforts. so this new testing that just got approved is allowing this particular company to take a look at pieces of the protheens co proteins that come out of or are part of the coronavirus. it is a rapid test and it's

extremely accurate. when this test is positive, you basically can are sure that you have covid-19. if the test is negative, you can't be sure and you still have to wait on the more sensitive test results from the pcr test. but that takes typically hours or even days. so this new test is very important because it's inexpensive, it can be scaled up rapidly, it can be showing test results within minutes. so if you need the information quickly for treatment purposes, you're in a hospital, you're in an emergency room, this test will come to be very valuable. but don't forget, if it's negative, you still have to wait on the pcr test result which is still the standard that's out there, mika. >> dr. dave campbell, thank you very much. willie. >> welcome. let's bring in dr. steven

core with corwin. doctor, good morning. it's good to have you back on the show. i would love a snapshot from you on your hospitals right now. obviously we were all so laser focused on the conditions in your ers and your icus over the last several weeks. if i walked into one of your icus this morning, how different would it look than, say, a month ago? >> well, we're a lot better. at our peak, we had over 800 patients in our icus. we're now down to about 400. which is still a huge amount, but it's half of what we had. and we're down to about 1100 total covid patients, down from a peak of 2,600. so we still have a ways to go, but we feel a lot more secure about this, especially as we see the curve moving down and continuing to move down. so much better. what we have seen, to

dr. campbell's pointed, is we now have seen 35 cases of this cmis, this multiinflammatory syndrome in children. 80% of those require icu care. interestingly, 70% of the cases that we've seen are caucasian children, which is unusual in terms of our usual demography. so we don't think this will have a high prevalence, but it's still very worrisome in kids carrying the virus. so we are seeing that. >> what is the connection for people not familiar with that condition that you're describing in children, what's the connection between coronavirus and cmis? >> every one of these kids either test positive for the virus with pcr, the pcr test, or have had the covid virus and test positive for antibodies. so this is clearly related to an inflammatory response to the

virus. and in the adults, of course, the hyper immune response is what happens in the lungs. this is a kawasaki-like syndrome. the heart, the kidneys, the brain. so it's very worrisome when these children develop this post covid. >> so if i'm a parent, doctor, and my child has tested positive for coronavirus and maybe recovered now, what am i looking for? because this will put up a lot of red flags for parents whose children have had coronavirus. >> fever, lethargy, abdominal pain, rash, shortness of breath in some cases because it can affect the heart. but typically high fever, led lethargy, rash, and ab dom nado pain. please get to your doctor if you

think your child has this syndrome. >> doctor, you've talked quite a bit over the last few weeks about some of the failures in preparation for this pandemic, the things we thought we were ready for, quick testing is one of them. ppe was another one. what now do we learn from what you all have been through and you continue to go through? what has to improve? what has to get better as we confront, perhaps, another outbreak in the fall, but in terms of the next big virus that comes to this country? >> well, a few things. we have to develop rapid and early testing. we've talked about this, because once you have a pandemic, testing and contact tracing is very, very difficult to do. you've got to get the infection rate low to do effective contact tracing. this antigen test will be helpful as we move into the fall. it's very specific. it's not as sensitive as we would like. but when you have flu and covid

together, the ability to determine both of those will be helpful. we clearly are going to stockpile ppe into a much greater extent than we did and we're going to make sure that our supply chain is much less fragile. and we're already stockpiling more ventilators in case this resurges in the fall because we know what our ventilator need was and will be. so those are the key things. and as you've talked about earlier, willie, you know, once you have this in the community, you can overwhelm the health care system. so if we opened on may 1st, you're going to see probably by june what the effect of this will be if we've not done it carefully. and that's, of course, what dr. fauci was concerned about yesterday. you can't ignore the scientific fact in the absence of a vaccine or an effective treatment. >> well, we are so grateful for all the work you've done and your doctors, nurses, your health care professionals over the last few months. we continue to wish you good

luck. we're thinking about you all in there. president and ceo of new york presbyterian hospital dr. steve corwin. thank you very much. meek archts coming up, a new column says president trump has one overarching goal when it comes to his financial records, slow walk the supreme court until the election is over. rl the justicwill the justices ? that's next. plus, our conversation with house speaker nancy pelosi. "morning joe" is back in just a moment. r nancy pelosi. "morning joe" is back in just a moment cancer won't wait.

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i'm going to take off for senator hassan spoke. i understand that politicians are going to frame data in a way that's most positive politically. of course i don't expect that from admirals. but yesterday you celebrated that we had done more tests and more tests per capita than south korea. but you ignored the fact that

they accomplished theirs at the beginning of the outbreak while we treaded water during february and march, and as a result, by march 6th the u.s. had completed just 2,000 tests whereas south korea had conducted more than 140,000 tests. so partially as a result of that, they have 256 deaths and we have almost 80,000 deaths. i find our testing record nothing to celebrate whatsoever. >> yeah. welcome back to "morning joe." it's wednesday, may 13th along with joe, willie and me we have chief white house correspondent "the new york times" peter baker. former u.s. senator now an nbc news and msnbc political analysts clair mccaskill. and donny deutsch joins the conversation as well. that was mitt romney just having a hard time with the way he felt the white house testings are, so to speak, sugarcoated the way

testing stands in the context of the world in the united states. >> well, you saw him with the president at a recent press conference. >> yeah. >> and he's learning to say the things that you need to say -- >> to survive. >> -- to stay in the president's presence. at the same time, willie, again, because this administration has said so many false things about testing, it is easy to overlook the fact that even without donald trump taking control of this situation, without him using the defense production act, without him using the power of the federal government to do in this pandemic what fdr did during world war ii, you've had great work from private companies. you've had great work from universities. and there are advancements in testing. now, the testing is still, like the abbott labs testing that we've heard so much about, there are reports that, you know,

sometimes 15% of those tests are inaccurate. that's a real problem. so we still have a long way to go. but we are making some progress, it would just help if the white house, if the president, if the president's aides would just tell it to the american people straight so they he would have a clear idea about where we stand and where we need to go. because we're event wlually goi to get there. as mitt romney said, the south koreans immediately came together. they had their first case the same day that we had our first case. and as mitt romney said, the results were so divergement testing, the results were so divergent when it came to death tolls there's no comparison between south korea and the united states in how we handled this out of the gate and no one

should ever draw those comparisons. >> and the president has moved on from this question. he said outloud two days ago at the white house, we have prevailed on the question of testing. we did it. they had signage made up talking about how they'd accomplished their goals on testing. >> mission accomplished. >> mission accomplished. we've got the most in the world. but as we've seen a million times on this show, as a per capita number we fall way down in world rankings. we just had dr. corwin on, obviously the icus and ers hit hardest by this crisis, he said the biggest failure as we go forward and learn from this was that we thought we could have testing very quickly and that be we would have contact tracing, we would know who had it and isolate those people and move on from it. he said it turns out we didn't. and i think hospitals thought state governments and certainly the federal government would have a quick program to deal with the question of testing. and the fact of the matter is, there was no testing program nationally. there remains no testing program

nationally. the president famously said what's the federal government supposed to do, stand on street corners and give out tests? well, it's been -- >> yes. >> yes. >> -- three months now since they had the chance to do that. the assistannswer is yes and ha done it. he's had the chance to use the production act. he's had the chance to launch a national program. but he says now we have prevailed, it's time to move on. >> the president didn't want to talk about this crisis. he didn't want to talk about it in january. he didn't want to listen to his advisers' concerns. he, of course, called the head of hhs -- said he was panicking. he got very angry when other administration officials in mid to late february started telling him the truth about this pandemic, became enraged and -- so we are where we are. and as far as the testing goes,

the cdc, president trump's cdc, the trump administration failed miserably when it came to testing. we've talked about it before, but, you know, by the end of february, the fda came in and said to donald trump's cdc, if you were a private company, we would shut you down. and at that point, the fda said, okay, we're going to have to throw it open since the federal government has failed so miserably that the, we're going to have to throw it open now to private companies. that's just for people who don't know, that's how we got to where we are. so when donald trump says this isn't the federal government's domain, he's either ignorant about testing and the history of it, or he's lying. this was in the federal government's domain and the trump administration failed at it.

so, again, they just need to start telling us the truth so americans can follow this. so we can figure out where we are in testing and tracing and treatment and isolation and moving forward and opening this economy. everybody knows you want to open the economy and you want to keep it open, because you can open the economy. >> right. >> you're going to open it. but can you keep it open? can you keep people coming to small business owners' restaurants, to family businesses all dotted along whether it's on pensacola beach or whether it's in des moines, iowa, or whether it's, you know, in northern california? can you keep it open? and we've said it, dr. fauci's said it, health care experts have said it, ceos have said it,

the president's heard it over and over again. if you want this economy up and running again, you have to have more robust testing. now, will that stop incidents of outbreaks? no, that's not going to stop that. testing's not the be all end all. vaccine's a be all end all. and we could still be 18 months away from that. >> but why is he holding off on using the tpa? >> i don't know. if we're going to do live with this, if we're going to live with the risk that most people are going to ultimately decide we have to live with, the only way to do that and isolate the outbreaks that are sure to come is to have expansive testing and tracing. we need the white house to be honest with us so we can get this economy kick started again. >> here is dr. anthony fauci in his testimony yesterday. >> what i've expressed then and again is my concern that if some

areas, cities, states, what have you, jump over those various checkpoints and prematurely open up without having the capability of being able to respond effectively and efficiently, my concern is that we will start to see little spikes that might turn into outbreaks. so therefore, i have been being very clear in my message to try to the best extent possible go by the guidelines which have been very well thought out and very well delineated. there is a relevant ri there is a real risk that you will trigger an outbreak that you ma you may not be able to control which will paradoxically set you back. not leading to suffering and death that could be avoid ready abo but could set you back on getting the economy going. >> dr. fauci, you have advised

six presidents. you have battled deadly viruses for your entire career. so i'd just like to hear your honest opinion. do we have the coronavirus contained? >> senator, thank you for the question. right now it depends on what you mean by containment. if you think that we have it completely under control, we don't. if you look at the dynamics of the outbreak, we are seeing a diminution of hospitalizations and infections in some places such as in new york city which has plateau and starting to come down. nurnss. b new orleans. but in other parts of the country we're seeing spikes. so when you look at the number of cases, even though some are coming down, the kirve loocurve flat with some slight coming down. so i think we're going in the right direction. but the right direction doesn't mean by any means we have control of this outbreak. >> peter baker, the science of

this and dr. faufrp whichci's t is easy to understand and most of it people knew before he testified before that senate committee. it's hard to reopen without mass robust quick testing and a lot more steps toward a vaccine. and it seems to me that the white house is consistently missing the moment, not meeting it, when it comes to where they could find unity and clarity and a way forward for this country. and that would be on nationalizing the efforts towards getting mass testing to the people. >> yeah, this is a complicated formula that we're talking about here between balancing these big imperatives, that being how best to prevent further deaths and at least minimize them as much as possible while acknowledging that the economy being closed down is also hurting a lot of people and is untenable in the long term. where you find that balance, how you manage to reopen, how you

manage to prevent another outbreak of the type that dr. fauci is talking about is the key question here. and what we don't see at this point is a national conversation led by the president really explores these complicated issues in a way that people have confidence in. this is unfortunately a poll lor raised political environment where even if whatever the president were to say, you know, there's not a lot of trust in him on at least part of the population, a lot of the population. and he doesn't seem interested in having that conversation, he just simply wants to be able to push forward and ahead. even though he himself has embraced the cdc guidelines that dr. fauci talked about, many of the states that are reopening are actually, you know, in compliance with those guidelines. they're opening up without the 14 days of declining caseloads that those guidelines call for. and the president has done nothing or said nothing about that. he simply cheer leaded the reopening as fast as possible, even taking elon musk's side

against california. wherever possible he is speak out in favor of loosening restrictions rather than maintaining them or finding precautions as you reopen. so he's not leading that conversation in a way that would give public health experts at least the confidence that this can be done without the risk of a major outbreak resuming. >> and, willie, he's not doing it in a way that gives him overwhelming majority of americans confidence. as we saw in a spade of polls. they just don't believe what the president's saying, the vast majority of americans, 63% in a cnn poll yesterday that came out shows that americans don't believe what the president of the united states is saying when it comes to the coronavirus. that obviously makes -- 62%, there we go. 62% do not trust what the president is saying, only 36%,

little more than one -- a little more than one out of three americans believe what the president's saying when he talks about the greatest health care crisis of our lifetime. >> yeah. 45% of the people in that poll approve of his job performance. that means a bunch of people who approve of the job that he's doing don't believe the words that are coming out of his mouth when he talks about this pandemic. pretty extraordinary. and we see people do trust their governors by in large much more than they trust the president of the united states. we showed that poll in wisconsin that showed a lot of older voters, 60 and older, are running from the president as they watch him perform. clair mccaskill, it was a real sign of the times hearing with your former senate colleagues yesterday. everyone from home, lamar alexander's dog in the background. we had quarantine beards. you had tim cane looking like he was going to rob a stage coach afterward wearing that bandana around his face. but more importantly, dr. fauci did something he's been doing now for a couple of months,

which is to go out and sort of artfully and somewhat delicately and diplomatically contradict everything the president of the united states is saying, the man who he effectively serves on that task force in the white house. he goes out systemically. he was asked about his relationship with president trump. he would have none of that. we get along fine, we have a great relationship, i'm focused on the science. but the science he's focused on and the science he testified about yesterday about the dangers of opening the society run exactly in contrast to the president's message. >> you know, willie, what struck me about that hearing, obviously fauci has gotten very good at delivering the facts and science in spite of the guy who occupies the oval office, not because of him. but what really was weird yesterday is that i think the president was probably pretty upset last night because he refused to let fauci testify in the house and said we'll do a senate hearing. and i think he expected the

republican senators to do warm and fuzzy stuff about him, to celebrate donald trump, to say donald trump was wonderful. and one after another alexander started out by saying our testing was insufficient. bird pointed out that they hadn't even filled the positions of cdc for a bio surveillance. kennedy pointed out that the phase two testing and the vaccine apparently doesn't include children. there was, you know, romney, obviously, took a huge swing at the misinformation coming out of the white house. so this was not all hail donald trump he is wonderful, he has got it contained. this really was, in some ways, an old fashioned senate hearing where everyone was making good points about the failures of this administration to do their job, even though it looked weird and it was very strange because you're used to in those hearing rooms being like this, you know. you're so close to each other up on the dais.

i thought it was also interesting, some of the senators stayed in their auftofs in the capital rather than walking down to the hearing room. what does that tell you how safe they feel? >> it is interesting. i love what clair just said, it was like an old fashioned senate hearing where, get this, senators were actually more concerned about their constituents than they were about whether donald trump was going to put out a mean tweet about them. you can survive the mean tweets, you can survive the lies, i promise. it's just a tweet. okay. so, donny deutsch, i want you to put on your ceo hat. i want you to put on your business hat, because, you know, through the years, of course, you love to hang out in the hamptons and talk about what a liberal you are because you think it impresses people in the hamptons. a lot of people and your friends

in the hamptons. but, i know the truth, and the truth is that you're a democrat, you're a loyal democrat, but you're more -- you're kinda like bill clinton democrat. you're more of a centrist. you're more like a reuben-type democrat. so we've got a balancing act to undergo here. so let's just put to the side what we know, what most americans know. donald trump's not doing a good job with the coronavirus. donald trump's not telling the truth about the coronavirus. we assume all of that, okay. but you know, we can't keep businesses shut down. in fact, we need to figure out how to start moving, get this economy moving again as safely as we can despite the white house failures. so, what does that look like to you? because -- i can just -- i can just tell you, i had a friend of mine saying -- a doctor friend of mine saying back a month ago,

i'm not going to be performing surgeries until september. i go, you're going to be performing surgeries in mid to late may. people are -- this is not going to continue. people are going to be patient to a certain extent. donny, i say the same thing to you. like, people aren't going to stay locked up in their houses forever. people aren't going to stay away from restaurants, from commerce forever. so as a ceo, balance this for us. what do we -- we hear dr. fauci and, yes, we have to follow the medical advice. i agree with that. but how do we open safely? how do we open sanely? how do we make sure that -- that a lot of -- that a lot of these absolutist positions are swept aside and we find a middle path forward here? because there is one. >> you know, first you start

with the reality of the consumer that i have to understand. it's interesting, an apple tracking showed two states, tennessee, kentucky, one opened, one closed. both have what they call a plus 8% mobility rate. so the consumers are going to decide in the end, that's an example of where one state's open and one's not yet people are moving away the same way, which is rvery, very light. 74% would rather deal with the virus versus 24% open business. understand i'm dealing with a frightened population. and the first thing i do there is honesty and say until there is testing, until there is absolute testing that's going to allow to us isolate the hot spots, we can't open. it's not going to be an interesting pill to swallow, but as a ceo i get my people together, i get my circle together and say, guys, there is no balancing act until testing.

south korea in march was testing at a 40 times rate that the u.s. was. so everything else is a discussion. official the end goal sis a vaccine. until then there is no balancing act without testing. that's what i do as a ceo. i say, understand right now even if i do open up, people are not moving. they've told us they're smart if not smarter than we are, get the testing done. >> okay. well the information that you -- you just provided us and the viewers about tennessee and kentucky, that's fascinating. and it really does go to the bigger point. i was talking earlier about the weinberger doctrine, you don't start wars unless you have public support of those wars. and colin powell followed up to adding on to that theory. what sure saying really underlines the fact that scientists can say whatever

scientists want to say. economists can say whatever they want to say. politicians can say what they want to say. but, donny, as somebody who's spent his entire life obsessing on what consumers think, you've just basically said everything we hear is noise unless it makes the consumer feel safe. unless the consumer thinks that he or she can take their family to a restaurant, sit outside, socially distance, wear masks, do -- if the consumers aren't happy, ain't nobody happy is basically what you're saying, right. >> right. >> put it on a bumper sticker. >> the definition of marketing is understanding where consumers -- is and plucking in your product. so if our product is getting the economy open again, working back to a consumer's mindset, until they feel safe, the only thing that's going to make them feel safe right now is testing, it's all noise to your point. >> and it's, at this point,

peter baker, i keep asking the same question, but is it upon the president? is it a possibility the president could be do more on this front by using a power that only he has? >> yeah, the defense product act, of course, allows him to, you know, mandate greater testing production capability in the country. but that doesn't seem to be his goal. his goal is, you know, to convince the country that we don't need anymore testing, they're already doing plenty of testing, mission accomplished as people said. and he is not adopting the view of public health experts who believe we need comprehensive testing. he's saying everyone who wants a test can get one. if you're symptomatic and sick, for the most part there are tests available these days. the question is what public health experts want to do is test people who are not symptomatic. people who do not show signs, but in order good to gto get a

sense of where the virus might be. they're testing the people that come close to the president every single day. that's in order to create a workspace in which they can control any possible outbreak before it spreads too far. most all businesses in the country are not able to do that. they don't have the capacity do that kind of testing if somebody is not symptomatic, not showing signs of being sick. if you can't control the virus in the most secure building in the country, then how are you going to do it in all these other workplaces in 50 states in that's what people are worried about. >> so, pete, let r, let me ask follow up as this story continues and mika's asking about the defense product act and why didn't the president take a more aggressive approach to these. >> he still could. >> what's your reporting over ma the past month or two on why he is so reluctant do that? why has he been so reluctant to

take a roosevelt-type approach to this pandemic that's already killed over 80,000 americans? now we hear is going to kill possibly as many as 140, 150,000 americans in this first wave. why has he pushed back so hard against a power that only he could implement that history suggests could make a big difference? >> yeah, it's interesting, of course, this is sa president wh doesn't shy away from asserting power in a number of scenarios and he does so he here. he's used it in a couple of discrete ways but on some occasions he's walked up to the line and pulled back. his argument is better to show you can use them to force them to do it without pulling the trigger. but he's shown a striking reluctance do so in a testing case. think what he's hearing from the advisers is we don't need to at

this pinoint, we're already succeeding. he likes hearing the words they're succeeding,s he's adoptd and embraced that. you willer that th you will hear that in the days to come that they've mastered this and they don't need to do anything further because they have all of the tests that we need. we are testing around 300,000 a day today. the harvard global public health initiative said a few days ago that we need to be doing around 900,000 a day in order to have the kind of mapping that the country could use to understand where the virus is, where it's not, how to confront it where we find it. >> hey, donny, it's willie. first of all, thank you for taking some time with us before the dental assistant calls you in for your teeth whitening at the dentist office. it's a wonderful white backdrop there, my friend. looking very good. [ laughter ] >> but let me ask you something

that we were talking about earlier today, which is the way that joe biden was running his presidential campaign. it's easy to forget we're in the middle of a presidential campaign. he's doing what all of the doctors have told us do, stay home. some reports are hammering in the democratic party that he's not visible enough and donald trump is owning the stage. what's your view of the way this is playing out right now? there is the one view that let president trump go out there and do what he's doing every day, which is, you know, putting out false information and hurting himself with these public addresses. >> that's it, you just nailed it. let him have the stage. as we all know an incumbent presidential election is a referendum on the incumbent, let him get out there. let him continually put his foot in his mouth. and the idealized version, i think the less of joe the better. joe biden, the ideal version of joe biden is as the best version

because when he goes out there, unfortunately, he does stumble a little bit. but we know he's comfort food, we can trust him. we know he's solid. even if he completely disappeared and just gave the stage to trump, that would be a win for him. so you combine his less than stellar on camera performance versus let him stay back, to your point, there's no road mines out there. where is he going? let donald trump have the stage. trump can't help himself. joe, i know he watches the show, you told him not to, but, donald, keep doing what your doing, brother. that's all you've got to do to handle the democrats. keep getting out there, opening your mouth, biden you'll be fine. biden, you stay in the basement. >> clair mccaskill, what do you think about your former senator joe biden and the way he's campaigning right now? >> i think it's perfect. he is consistently showing

empathy. he is -- has a message that is clear, remember he wrote an op-ed in january, in january laying all this out. so he has the high ground in terms of preparation. i agree, i think that donald trump, the more donald trump flails around with a chaotic message and the incompetence in this administration from top to bottom, i think the better it is for joe biden. especially for older voters. that's where he's really losing ground. and, by the way, the other important measure out there on polling that i noticed over the last few days, last time there was a lot of dislike of both candidates, hillary and donald trump. the people who dislike most of the -- both of them, most of them voted for donald trump. right now in polling, people who dislike both of these candidates, they're voting for joe biden. >> clair mccaskill, donny

deutsch and peter baker, thank you all for being on this morning. and still ahead on "morning joe." >> the people, my people, are so smart. and you know what else they say about my people in the polls. they say i have the most loyal people. did you ever see that? where i could stand in the middle of fifth avenue and shoot somebody and i wouldn't lose any voters, okay. it's like incredible. >> that was 2016 and last year donald trump's private attorney said even if the president were to shoot someone on fifth avenue he could not be arrested or even investigated for the duration of his presidency. our next guest says another trump lawyer, jay sekulow, stepped back from that yesterday, but only just a bit. we'll talk about the supreme court fight for trump's records. plus, house speaker nancy pelosi joins the conversation straight ahead on "morning joe." pelosi joins the conversatn io straight ahead on "morning joe." how about no no uh uh, no way come on, no no

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what it seems to me you're asking douse is put the ten ton weight on the skalcales betweene president and congress and to make it impossible for congress to perform oversight and to carry out its functions where the president is concerned. >> you argue there's no demonstrated need, no substantial legislative purpose. house is before us, and i'm sure we're going to hear from them, that there is substantial legislative need. why should we not defer to the house's views about its own legislative purposes? >> the job of the house and senate, in part, as the president, is politics. that doesn't bother me. but the clinton v. jones information does bother me. and the fact that what i hold today will also apply to a future senator mccarthy asking me future franklin roosevelt or harry truman exactly the same questions, that bothers me. so what i do?

>> the president got his day in the supreme court yesterday as his lawyers argued to keep from disclosing his financial records to house committees and a new york grand jury. joining us now, nbc news and msnbc law analysts and editor and chief of law fair benjamin wh wittes. and barbara mcquade. thank you both for being with us. >> ben, worried about his 0% review, he's dragged in a bookshelf in that blue mass. so congratulations. >> that looks good. >> congratulations. >> room raider, eat your heart out. i -- i revel -- i was told yesterday that the only other person who'd only ever got ann zero from room raider was mitch mcconnell. so i have finally found something that i have in common with mitch mcconnell.

>> there you go. well, let's talk about just absolute fascinating cases, the cases before the supreme court yesterday. and quite an interesting breakdown if you look at what justice breyer said, it certainly appears that this court is not going to lean on the presidents of u.s. v. nixon or clinton v. jones in this which were decided 9-0 and pretty clear cut. but as you described yesterday on your law fair podcast, the supreme court does not seem to be interested in following those precedents. >> i have to say under the relevant precedents which are not just those, but also a series of cases involving the scope of proper congressional oversight, this is not a hard case or neither of these is a hard case. and in order to make law that

would be more favorable to the president here, the supreme court is really going to have to, you know, kind of bob and weave between some pretty strong precedents that all seem to cut in the other direction, frankly. that said, i was surprised or maybe i shouldn't have been, but i was once again surprised by the fact that the supreme court seems to be pretty political. and, you know, yesterday several of the justices seemed quite entranced by the idea that they should do that and they should -- and, by the way, not just the conservative justices, as the clip you showed from justice breyer suggests. there seemed to be at least some interest in protecting the presidency from what several of the justices called harassment by congress. >> barbara mcquade, you're writing about this and looking

at a potential attempt to slow walk this to get past the elections. why would the president want to do that? what does that indicate might be hidden? >> you know, one of the arguments that trump's lawyers raised yesterday that actually seemed to have some merit to some of the justices was this middle ground, this idea that even if these documents need to be produced, they can only be produced after either the grand jury or the congressional committees show some kind of specialized need or heightened standard. that is, that these documents are essential and that the only way that they can achieve their goal is by looking at these documents that the president's documents. and i think the result of that would be to send it back to the lower courts for another round of briefing, work its way back up through the appellate courts which could take months. so this could be a strategy by president trump, even if he ultimately has to give up the documents or some portion of the documents, that it would get us

well past november. and so these documents could not be used in any way against him in the election. >> so i had a flashback, ben, to my days at the university of florida law school and being peppered with questions about my law teacher. so i'm going to just defer to you and since you're with me you can answer this question. what is your response to justice breyer who says what we require of donald trump now from this congress may be required of a future fdr when a senator mccarthy demands personal or embarrassing information from him? what's your argument to -- to brush that aside and tell justice breyer that this is not going to be bad precedent for future presidents? >> well, first of all, my first

reaction to him is, yeah, and that is exactly, you know, the court in some of the mccarthy era cases did set out a very cursory kind of limitation on the ability to -- of congress to subpoena things simply for purposes of exposure. but -- but by and large, yes, the answer is that the court has always acknowledged that congress has an exceptionally broad investigative power in its legislative activities, and that is potentially subject to abuse. and every recent past president in our adult lifetimes or maybe even longer than that, would be shocked to know that congress -- that the court is there to protect them against harassment by congress. i mean, did george w. bush not

feel ma hawa feel harassed by congress after 2006? did bill clinton not feel harassed by the republican congress after you guys took over? did barack obama not -- i mean, you know, the idea that congress harasses the president, including about his personal life, i had thought that was kind of the bread and butter of american politics. now, i will say that, you know, they're in a highly polarized environment like the one that we have, it is not crazy to worry about the concern that breyer outlines. but, i do think it's a little bit late for that. because the supreme court ruled nine to nothing and breyer, by the way, though he wrote a concurnco

concurrence was part of that ruling that paula jones could bring a case against bill clinton. and in that case the president was not immunized from that case and therefore would have to produce any kinds of documents and even sit for a deposition. and if that -- if a single citizen can drag the president into court and make him answer questions and produce documents, it seems a bit odd to suggest that the congress of the united states cannot. >> it is odd. and, of course, my personal belief is that this presidency is winding down and so what the court decides probably, you know, maybe donald trump will be able to run out the clock. but -- but having a president just decide on his own that he's not going to comply with any oversight requests from congress certainly does set a chilling precedent. so, barbara, let's talk about breaking news last night. fascinating news coming from the

flynn case. judge sullivan said he was open to hearing arguments from others, from third parties, arguing against the justice department's dismissal of charges against general flynn. what's it mean? >> yeah, so there is a local rule in the district of columbia that says thsays a meek cuss brf can be filed. that is friends of the court, groups of lawyers cho who can file briefs. i think this is a great decision by judge sullivan, because it's an unusual scenario where you have both parties seeking the same relief. the government has filed a motion to dismiss. most certainly flynn's lawyers are not going to oppose that motion. and so the judge does not have the benefit of hearing the other side of that argument. certainly there has been a lot of outcry in the public that this is highly unusual and even

diplomat politicized. and so by allowing emeke i can to file briefs, they can get the other side. these are common in the supreme court, but pretty rare at the district court level usually because the issues are more fact based and that legally based. but they're intended to help the court. so he has said he will issue a scheduling order so that he is not inundated with briefs. but briefs that he finds helpful to consider the issues in this case so that he can make a decision. because the ball really is very much in his court. judge sullivan is the one who gets to decide whether this case is dismissed or goes forward. >> barbara mcquade and benjamin wittes, thank you both very much for being on this morning. coming up, u.s. officials are accusing china of actions that some might consider an attack on american public health. specifically hackers targeting universities and pharmaceutical firms working on a coronavirus vaccine.

that new report is next. plus, house speaker nancy pelosi will be our guest at the top of the hour. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. you're watching "morning joe." we'll be right back. effortless is the lincoln way.

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they're targeting nufrts an effort that could hamper their effort to find a coronavirus vaccine.

u.s. officials tell this to the "wall street journal." the paper reports that this morning since -- this morning that since early january the two countries have waged cyberattacks against a range of american firms and institutions that are working the attacks raised the prospect that it could be viewed by the trump administration as a direct attack on u.s. public health and to an act of war because the attacks may have hindered vaccine research in some cases. such an interpretation will represent an escalation on how the u.s. government views cyberattacks against the country. they told the journal that china was the primary adversary amid the coronavirus outbreak with it's attacks more widespread and frequent. china and iran historically denied targeting the u.s. with cyber espionage.

nbc news has not confirmed the journal's report. joining us now, the president on the counsel on foreign relations he is the author of the new book out this week entitled the world, a brief introduction. and in this case, of cyberattacks, richard, this is obviously part of the next frontier in warfare which would be to try to debilitate countries, in this case, when it comes to public health. >> absolutely. there's no rules of the road in cyber space. and the idea that people would be out there trying to steal intellectual property, that would be in character with what china has done over the years.

we also have to think are there ways that we can push back? for example, why aren't we out there joining with others demanding investigations of all sorts of aspects of what china has done with the pandemic? why aren't we more critical of the arrest of democracy activists in hong kong? the chinese political leadership cares most about their position. about their prestige and i think that we ought to be relentless in zeroing in on that if they are doing things such as this, if this is in fact, true. >> and richard, the chinese have been such bad actors from the beginning of this pandemic. and pushing for transparency.

and i think it's critically important. and their actions actually show that system. if the united states doesn't lea lead this world it's not lead. we still remain whether we like it or not in 2020 the indispensable nation. >> there's only two ways. one is we have to lead by example and unfortunately we're

not. our response to this virus ought to be head and shoulders above everybody else's given our technology and our innovation culture here ands not. whether we're talking about testing or any other number of, you know, issues like protective equipment and then second of all we have to lead in the world diplomatically. we should be sitting with the europeans and others in a collaborative effort to develop a vaccine. these are global challenges. and neither one is the policy.

and in all sorts of ways. europe, the whole process of europe knitting itself together. it's moving in the opposite direction. north korea is using more weapons and more missiles. it's being more assertive against it's neighbors so we can literally hopscotch around the world and virtually everything that was going on is going on. in some cases it's accelerated and in some cases it's simply

worse because we have taken our eye off the ball because we're so focused on the coronavirus. so there's those saying i hope people come to their senses out of this and the worldc comes together and deals with the pandemic and deals with other issues. but it's quite possible that it will go in another direction. they'll get worse and we'll have all the challenges and what is worse, i think, what worries me is all of this will happen at a time that we and other countries will be devoting massive resources to fixing ourselves and all of our attention will be focused inward. >> and still ahead, what does $3 trillion buy you? we're going to ask speaker nancy pelosi about the new coronavirus rescue bill. the speaker joins us just

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to respond effectively and efficiently and we'll start to see spikes that might turn into

outbreaks. so therefore i have been very clear in my message. and it's a real risk that you will trigger an outbreak that you might not be able to control. not only leaning to suffering and death. and on the road to get economic recovery. 5:00 a.m. outwest. house democrats unveiled a sprawling $3 trillion coronavirus bill and the senate and the white house continued to clash over how to deal with the sputtering economy. if passed the new bill would be

the biggest emergency spending measure in u.s. history. sending aid to state and local governments, health systems and a range of other initiatives. however according to the washington post republicans have already rejected the bill before even seeing it describing it as a liberal wish list joining us is the speaker of the house. madam speaker, thank you for being on this morning.

it's scientific and it's fair. that's number one in our bill is how do we open up the economy. how do we get rid of this virus, this villain and that is testing tracing, treatment and isolation. second to that is the honoring our heros. that's why it's called the heros act. in no particular order provisions call for honoring our heros. our first responders, our health care workers for sure. our teachers, our sanitation workers, food, transit, you name it. those that are on the front line and we help them by sending the money to state and local governments and that's where they get paid and they did it in large measure and we had important assistance for

hospitals as well. so it's about testing. it's about honoring our heros and third it's about putting money in the pockets of the american people by some of the measures that you mentioned, unemployment insurance, direct payments, employment retention, tax credit, child tax credit and the rest. so this is -- whether they know it or not, the country needs to have this testing. and we have to have it so that we know the size of thiss challenge and we have to do it in a fairway so that we can end the disparities. when you see people of color, minority communities have a high rate of death it's going to say they haven't been tested or diagnosed or treated. so we think it's an answer and it's scientific in it's basis and fair to the american people as well as honoring our first responders. with hazard pay as well. it has other items that you

mentioned but everything that i just mentioned has the former bills that we passed. we passed four bipartisan bills and testing and direct payments, those things. and we can defeat and defeat this virus and help people in the meantime and again, honor our heros. >> so madam speaker, so republicans are saying this is a liberal wish list and also saying you didn't talk to them, didn't talk to the white house, didn't talk to the senate and this isn't an opening bid by the house democrats. house democrats are just trying to make a statement. what do you say to them and what is the possibility of striking a

compromise with this bill with the united states senate and the white house. >> yeah. well, of course. that's what we put down what we think this country needs. it isn't about politics. it's about humanity. whether they have to pause the out of work anger and pain that people are feeling. this is a time for us to really have a strategic plan to test trace, treat, and isolate. a strategic plan and doing so, to do so that will open our

economy scientifically and instead of helter skelter. we're long overdue. our first bill in the house, bipartisan, march 4th, testing, testing, testing. they really didn't do it. our most recent bill, $26 billion for testing, we still don't see the strategic plan that is called for there. this isn't -- again, this isn't partisanship, this is science, this is humanity, this is about the family of america caring for each other. sensitive to everyone's concerns but also determined to get rid of this very resourceful virus is taking, as you have shown this morning, some ugly, even uglier terms. it's a big ticket. it's a lot of money. american people are worth it. we see the administration with

the low interest rates. and we're thinking big and appropriately focused discipline. we have a plan, we have a goal. we have a timetable. we have benchmarks and we want to say let's open up the economy. it's all a negotiation but again, states, governors and mayors across the country republican and democrat desperately need this help. testing is so urgent, you keep showing that day in and day out and i thank you for that and again the american people need this help. but the key to opening the door is testing, testing, testing. >> thank you for joining us this morning. we appreciate it.

there was a lot of news out of your state yesterday. the public health director in los angeles county announced effectively three more months of stay at home orders although she said it will be phased and then hopefully we can reopen slowly over that time, the largest four year public university system in the country is already now in may saying no classes in the fall. do you agree with those decisions? there's a lot of people in los angeles county that are saying, whoa, three more months. i can't survive this as a small business. i can't survive this as someone that's out of work. >> well, of course i agree with the decisions of the people on the ground and their particular venue and location. because as dr. fauci said earlier and i wish the president would listen to him or hear him even that you cannot think or pretend this went away and go out there. so yes it's inconvenient and it's even more inconvenient if

you're going to be infected or worse. and that's the biggest fear. so that's the decision that the city of los angeles has made and the cal state system then i respect that. i'm very sad about september. i'm sad about september all hoping kids could be back in school. >> that hope is across the country. with your $3 trillion proposal comes on the back of four previous bills that amounted to $3 trillion. are you confident that this will go to the people that need it. and business owners that need it

to survive? >> that is not in this bill. we do have it and emergency assistance grants. and we're asking for the documentation and there's been a great deal of success across the country but not totally so we just want to see because we were succe successful on these bills. and in reverse and we were able to have an impact and testing and the unrest which really has not been fully addressed and then the third bill kaulted t--

the trickle down bill, we're very proud of that. so with that as well as the bill the president recently signed, not even having a chance to get one of those loans for smaller entities, women, minority, native american, veterans, rural small businesses to have their opportunity. but we still haven't seen the data to support what may have been done there. it is an appropriate. we want it to work but want it to work for everyone. this bill is not addressing the ppp. this is about a mitigation for what is happening. we have funds to offset the

attempt to fray the cost they have made in terms of the coronavirus. why have we not made a decision as a nation to do what we know is an answer by testing and i believe there could be some technologies and we'll speed up the test. and we're hopeful in that regard. this was said this morning by some of your guests. we have to stock pile. we have to stock pile. we have to have a supply chain we're not ready and it addressing the concerns in a positive way. by and large, against the post office and election by mail a few things that they're not supported by -- i hope that they'll be supportive of strong

osha provisions that enable people to go back to work safely and protect employers because they have honored the mandates of osha. so it is -- this is as dry in the eye as it can be. it's objectively what scientists tell us we need to do and what people need and a definite need for state and local to have these systems. they may lose their jobs in the meantime. >> it's always great to have you on the show. thank you for coming on this morning. >> still ahead on morning joe, despite warnings from top officials about reopening too

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>> half of americans think it won't be safe until midsummer. 1 in 5 say such gathers are safe by now or will be by the end of the month. when asked about reopening their state's economy nearly 6 in 10 say the current restrictions on restaurants, stores and other businesses in their state are

appropriate. while 20% say they're not restrictive enough. 21% felt they're too restrictive. >> that means that more than 3 and 4 americans believe the restrictions are either appropriate or not appropriate enough. and how about the previous poll, only 9% believe it's safe to go out and get back to life. americans are smart. they're watching, they're listening, they're paying attention. meanwhile, the new york times analysis of cell phone data found that tens of millions of americans already were leaving their homes in growing numbers. about 25 million more people ventured outside of their homes on an average day last week than during the proceeding six weeks according to the times and nearly every part of the country the share of people staying home dropped in some places by nearly 11%. no state saw a larger drop in the share of people staying home last week than michigan even though it's stay at home order remained in place. joining us now, nbc news science

contributor lori garrett. good morning. it's good to see you again. you have been a good barometer for us over the course of this. snapshot of where we are now as we sit here in mid may a couple of months into this staying at home. how are we doing? what do we need to do better? you can't give a response for the nation because we don't have a anti-covid reaction overall. it's out to the states and localities so the answer how are we doing depends on where you are physically. >> so what about the hotspots like new york city for example where hospitalizations are down. we talked to a hospital saying where we are today is much better and all the things that we focused on hospitalization cases and ppe.

so there can be the false sense of security that since new york has gotten better than where it was in a terrible place that the country is getting better. and considerably and i heard nothing but sirens 24/7, around the clock. sometimes 5, 6, 7 sirens at once and you can see and feel the sense of danger and death in the city. and that has dramatically changed. but because new york had so many cases and so many deaths we represent the majority of the database for the nation as a whole. if you take new york out of the equation and take the specific coast states. seattle area, portland area and the state of california out the

country's epidemic is still very much on the assent and quite frighteningly so in certain parts of the country. >> there's obviously a lot of debate right now about how to reopen the country, when to reopen but without a vaccine we're in this in some way, shape, or form. dr. fauci testified yesterday and there seems to be a sense that a vaccine could be less than a year away. let's take a listen.

you might be calling this committee that in january of this year, i said that it would take about one year to 18 months. if we were successful in developing a vaccine. the nih trial moved very quickly. on january 10th, the sequence was known. and develop a plan on the 14th of january we officially started the vaccine development. 62 days later we are now in phase one clinical trial with the two doses already fully enrolled. >> what would you say to the principle of the public school about how to persuade parents and students to return to school in august. let's start with treatments and

vaccines first dr. fauci. to facilitate the reentry of students into the fall term would be something that would be a bit of a bridge too far. >> all right. so on vacciens there's a race against time to try to produce something that can work. what are the realities though of actually getting a vaccine to the people? people are describing the most optimistic scenario

involving a revolutionary type based on this. vaccines are easier to make because you have the genetic blueprint of the virus that's circulating in china and you base your vaccine on the genetic blueprint. but the types of vaccines that you have had to yourself and you have given to your children are largely based on whole virus, the actual virus itself that's been killed and the immune system sees the spikes and things sticking out on the virus and reacts to it or on the

spikes. but now we're walking into unknown territory. we have no idea how rapidly the fda can approve the type of vaccine and we don't know what the side effects might be. we don't know how it's going to perform in people and most evidence right now indicates that this whole class of vaccines, do not provide very strong immune responses. if we want the kind of immune response that's going to protect people for years these may not be adequate to the task. the other types all take longer to develop. and are harder to produce and pose greater challenges. >> is there a better way to get it to the people as soon as possible?

the better way would be we had a form of testing that didn't involve getting a giant swab all the way to the back of your throat and then an appropriate that didn't require as many layers of technology all of which are running out of supply. you look right now and it's unbelievable what's going on in china and now they have six identified covid infections. they're trying in now fine remaining days to test 11 million people. or a pin pick of blood can be drawn that doesn't involve so many layers of laboratory work and that is like having a test

just a piece of paper that would change colors somehow when you put a drop of blood or saliva upon it or give a clear reading instantly upon sight. that's what we need. we don't have it. there's forms of that in a stage of development and we're praying that we're going to get there and have a rapid paper test if you will. available in a few months. >> thank you very much. >> and still ahead, states across the country are beginning to reopen and in rhode island there's a new effort to get the economy going with the help from top tech companies. companies a look at that new piece next on morning joe. morning joe.

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he's strong and powerful in his denial today. >> you don't really believe this. do you believe this? >> he said it last week? >> okay. bye. >> that was just two of the times president trump has publicly disagreed with his own intelligence officials over the fact that russia has and is continuing to interfere with u.s. elections. >> joining us now is the staff writer at the atlantic magazine. his new piece is entitled the 2016 election was a dry one and frank, you tweeted about the piece, quote, i have been working on this since january, russian interference is going to happen and it's a maddening account of trump undermining well meaning reforms. sorry to add to the anxieties.

>> there's concerns that many raised about the next election and undermining it in some way and then of course there's the entire issue of russia. what do you know about what they are doing at this point to interfere in the next election? >> well, in some ways it's not dissimilar from coronavirus where we have a big problem and we know that a threat is out there and likely to hit us. and the entire country knows the plan and the bipartisan consensus about the reforms that need to be in place to protect us and yet it's the statements like the ones that you read at the top of the segment where trump undermines everything that the bureaucracy is doing. he undermines all the bipartisan momentum for reform.

so we are left in this position where we saw what they did in 2016 and we have seen what they have done in elections since then and the midterm elections in 2015 so we know that their tactics have evolved. they have this map of the united states electoral system and people don't appreciate that they probed the voting systems of all 50 states and the vendors that sell to counts and the to state and there are countless vulnerabilities and the russians know them and in 2016 they stayed their hand. they could have gone further and the intelligence community is a little bit confused about why they didn't cause more in 2016 and given that had president has essentially invited it and shown

there's no price to be paid for it, what is the reason for them not to go further and they could probably do it in ways essentially undetectable to our intelligence services. >> frank. i want to ask you when the premiere league will restart in liverpool can be crowned the rightful champions of that league and of english football but that question can wait. i'm curious, you talk about the decentralization of our electoral systems. in florida, there's 67 counts and all 67 supervisors of elections can choose the way they're going to run. isn't that actually the united states best defense against widespread manipulations to the

chinese and jurouranians. >> i don't want to know if you're wearing liverpool pajamas. it's an advantage in that the russians can't strike one computer system and manipulate the aggregate tally which is what they tried to do with ukraine in 2014 but what they can do is that they can cause -- they can cause problems in places that create suspicion. he will seize on anything that could go wrong. so really we're vulnerable to a feather push from the russians. the danger isn't that they will

knockout the results or try to change the tally but they could hack into the wisconsin secretary of state office on election night and post fake results on there and those fake results will then cause trump supporters and trump himself to say that this whole election needs to be thrown out or that somehow the official results are illegitimate they're saying we have to stop this. they're starting to work on 2020. we have to put safe guards up so this never happens again and as you point out in detail in your peace it piece it's happening against and russians have gone around whatever safe guards were put in place. in fact when a representative of

the office of dni testified to congress in february that russia was up to its tricks again you'll remember that president trump quickly fired joseph mcguire, the dni at that point for putting that message out there. so are there safe guards? have anything been put in place? has anything changed since 2016 and what has president trump done to undermine some of that work? >> so states in 2016 didn't take the russian threat seriously and they accused him of trying to federalize elections but since then dhs has done various exercises and installed some sensors on some of the state computing systems to protect those and that's a positive.

and this should be extremely troubling to all americans which is when i went to talk to people on the hill on intelligence committees and you talk to people that served in the trump national security counsel, what they say is that the best russia hand in the intelligence community don't want to work on russia related issues because they're afraid of their work being politicized. they're afraid of getting fired for speaking truth and so they have asked to be removed from working on the russia issue. and when i ask senator mark warner, the ranking democrat on the senate select committee on intelligence he told me that he

couldn't be sure that he could trust the intelligence that he was seeing and the government was producing about russia and i asked him if the russians were executing a major campaign, would our intelligence communities report that? so that to me is the most terrifying thing about where we stand. >> we'll close by reading this. events in the united states unfolded more favorably than any operative in moscow could have ever dreamed. not only did russia's preferred candidate win but he fulfilled the potential it saw in him, discrediting american institutions. the seams of american culture and isolating a nation that styled itself as indispensable to the free world but instead of complacently enjoying it's triumph, russia almost

immediately set about replicating it. boosting the trump campaign was a tactic/democracy, rest in peace, remains the larger objective. vladimir putin dreams of discrediting the american democratic system and he will never have a more reliable ally than donald trump. a democracy cannot defend itself if it can't honestly describe the attacks against it. but the president hasn't just undermined his own country's defenses, he has actively abedded the adversaries efforts. keep that in mind. the piece is in the new issue of the atlantic. thank you very, very much. >> and frank, you'll never walk alone. >> all right you two. a key model is raising it's projection from the possible u.s. deaths from coronavirus and

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that suggest the number may be 50% higher than that. what do you think? >> i'm not sure if it's going to be 50% higher but most of us feel that the number of deaths are likely higher than that number because given the situation particularly in new york city and to the health care system that there may have been people that died at home who did have covid who were not counted as covid because they never really got to the hospital. so a direct answer to your question, i think that you are correct that the number is likely higher. i don't know exactly what is higher but almost certainly it's

higher. that's 10,000 more deaths than the models last prediction. a senior administration official tells nbc news that while they keep an eye on these outside models, the administration largely focuses on its own data, cdc guidelines and guidance from the coronavirus task force. joining us now, the governor of rhode island, very good to have you. >> i know. i know. >> keep going back to that. >> so great to see you governor. you're working hard to work with businesses and tech companies to begin testing and tracing in your state but what happens between then and now? then when all of that is in place and now when the economy is at a stand still and people are frustrated and worried about their economic security?

>> the story is really one of innovation. so i don't think that any of us -- i have never had to lead through anything quite like this which means that we have to move fast and also think differently. so what i have tried to do is reach out and ask for partnerships. we partnered immediately with cvs, a hometown company here to ramp up testing. reached out to salesforce very early in the crisis and said, hey, you guys have to help me develop a best in class contact tracing system, and reached out to amazon web services. we are flooded with unemployment insurance claims like every stay in the country. i had people hanging on hold or busy signals, which is exactly what they shouldn't be doing during the crisis. now we're able to process 1,000 calls a minute. my point in saying this is every day is different.

we have to be quick and react, but we have to be open and innovating and doing things differently. we do have to get people back to work. we have to do it thoughtfully, safely, slowly, but my focus has been flatten our curve, which we have done very successfully to taking aggressive and swift action, and then build systems, testing systems, contact tracing systems, symptom tracking symptoms, so people have confidence and feel safe, so that we can slowly get folks back to work. you know, we have an economic crisis here, as well as a public health crisis. when you're the governor, i've got a million people i need to answer to. they need to be both safe and healthy and slowly get back to work with confidence. >> governor, what about the bigger picture, though? as rhode island stands out in your ability to develop these partnerships, get testing and

tracing in place, proper distancing guidelines met by the people, as you said, we've got to get the economy back going, what about the fact you're just one state and a lot of people move through your state. doesn't it defeat the purpose if other states are not on the same page? >> first, i want to give a shoutout to my fellow governors in this region. they're all battling this every day and doing a terrific job of that. about three weeks ago, we came together -- seven governors in the northeast -- to collaborate and coordinate or efforts, including travel, as you say, including joint purchasing of ppe. again, constantly innovating, doing things differently to meet the challenge. you know, rhode island is a small state nestled between two huge hot spots of the crisis.

to the north boston, to the south new york city. so we have had to deal with that fact. i'm really quite pleased with where we are now. i was able to lift our stay-at-home order just the other day, but you're right, i'm in constant contact, and we're working together to protect our regional economy. >> governor, it's willie geist. good to have you with us this morning. you mentioned the slow reopening you started. some restaurants will be able to have outdoor dining, some retail with restrictions, of course. how are you weighing this balance that every governor and every municipality is having to look at right now, of wanting to get your people back to work, wanting to get your small businesses open and the public health questions that come with it. obviously the push from the president of the united states is let's open, let's open with greatness, to use his twitter term.

how are you looking it as a governor who has to manage the 1 million people in your state? >> look, it's tough. everything is a judgment call. the governors are absolutely on the front lines. i hear from people every day. the stories of economic struggle are real. you know, i hear from restaurant owners who worry they may not be able to reopen. they can't sustain two or three months of no business. having said that, i'll tell you how i'm dealing with it. i believe in the slow-and-steady reopening. my goal, of course, is to reopen once. you don't want to go too fast and then have to pull back and reopen again. so the approach that i have landed on, after great consultation with public health experts, my team, businesses is, guys, it's in everyone's interest to go slowly and steadily. let's take 14 days, study where

we are, and then take the next step. i'm leading with confidence. i truth the people of rhode island they're going to do the right thing. they know it's in their interests to follow the rules so they can reopen, but i never again want to have to pull back and shut down our economy. so we've landed in a place of slowly reopening, you know, like the dimmer switch, not the flick of the light, and hoping if you do that slowly, you never have to pull back. people get it. listen, they're frustrated. i get that, too, but we are where we are and i think we just have to accept it. >> governor gina raimondo, thank you, and we wish you the best of luck for this. >> thank you so much, governor. breaking news, paul manafort granted home confinement due to coronavirus fears. willie, i don't know that it will be popular what i say next. but good, what he did was wrong.

what he did was not a death sentence. a 71-year-old guy, obviously in poor health, should not be left in prison to die. that doesn't just apply to people who worked for donald trump. this is something we'll have to wrestle with right now. prisoners are dying. again, i know there are a lot of prisoners -- we need to get reverend al to talk about this tomorrow. he's been concerned about this for months now and, yes, it does look like, once again, two justice systems. a guy like manafort will get out and others who aren't politically connected aren't, but hopefully this puts pressure for other nonviolent offenders to be released from prison. >> paul manafort is supposed to be out november 2024. i think there will be more pressure on low-level

nonoffenders to clog up the jails. governor raimondo said it well there. my goal is to reopen once. that's the underlying statement of what dr. fauci was putting out in the hearing yesterday. if we go too fast, there will be trouble again when we go to the fall. that does it for us this morning. stephanie ruhle picks up the coverage after this quick, final break. final break. the men and women of the united states postal service. we're here to deliver cards and packages from loved ones and also deliver the peace of mind of knowing that essentials like prescriptions are on their way. every day, all across america, we deliver for you. and we always will. confident financial plans, calming financial plans, complete financial plans.

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hi there, i've stef new ruhle, it is wednesday, may 13th. dr. anthony fauci and the head of the cdc, dr. redfield, pleading with governors not to move to quickly. that is in stark contrast to the president, basically say the virus is now behind us. the number of deaths here in the united states has jumped to more than 83,000, although the rate of deaths has