senate intelligence committee pending an investigation into potential insider trading as senior law enforcement official confirms to nbc news the fbi executed a search warrant for burr's phone as part of that investigation. we'll have more on that decision in a moment. the ousted top vaccine expert, dr. rick bright is still testifying on capitol hill. he's been telling congress that he believes the worst is yet to come for the united states and without proper planning, quote, gent 2020 could be the darkest winter in modern history. two administration officials say the cdc is expected to release new guidelines today for states to reopen schools and businesses. parts of the plan were initially shelved by the white house over concerns they were too restrictive. joining me is my co-host for the next two hours, katy tur. she has a look at the numbers again. a compelling and busy day, katy. >> no doubt about that. there are now more than 1.4 million confirmed cases of covid-19 across the united states. more than 85,000 people have

died. nationally, the number of new confirmed cases is trending downward over a five-day average. but the number of new infections every day is still staggering. more than 20,000 new cases were confirmed in the united states yesterday. and those are still only the people who were able to get tested. according to the covid tracking project, close to 10 million tests have been issued in the u.s. and a country with a population of over 328 million people. that accounts for just 3% of the population. experts are still concerned about potential hot spots popping up across the country with an eye on the states opening up their economies. and the nation's top vaccine expert is still testifying before the house in person. dr. rick bright says he was ousted from his position after he pushed back against the president's desire to fast track the drug hydroxychloroquine as a treatment for covid-19.

and he warned congress that without a comprehensive national response, the worst is yet to come. a warning for our viewers, bright uses some strong language. >> if we fail to improve our response now based on science, i fear the pandemic will get worse and be prolonged. there will be likely a resurgence of covid-19 this fall. it will be greatly compounded by the challenges of seasonal influenza. without better planning, 2020 could be the darkest winter in modern history. the window is closing to address this pandemic because we still do not have a standard centralized, coordinated plan to take our nation through this response. i believe with proper leadership and collaboration across government with the best science leading the way, we can devise a

comprehensive strategy. if you can imagine the scenario this fall or winter, maybe early next spring when vaccine becomes available. there's no one company that can produce enough for our country or for the world. it's going to be a limited supplies. we need a strategy and plan in place now to make sure that we cannot only fill that vaccine, make it, distribute it but administer it in a fair and equitable plan. >> i'll never forget the emails indicating that we are a mass supplier -- the supply was decimated and he said, we're in deep [ bleep ]. the world is. >> joining us from capitol hill is msnbc correspondent garrett haake. he was inside the hearing room. garrett, dr. bright spoke clearly. he spoke calmly. he didn't have a lot of flourish. but his assessment of the way this administration has handled this pandemic was, at times,

devastating. >> yeah, it was. there were three different tranches of problems he laid out. problems in the past like not having enough ppe, not taking early warnings about the disease seriously enough. which got into the partisan back and forth as republicans were quick to jump on him for those arguments. problems in the present like a lack of a national testing strategy which i would say is probably dr. bright's single issue that he appears to be trying to put forward as the need for national strategy now. and then the concerns about a vaccine development in the future both by pointing out, as you heard in the sount bite there the distribution model for vaccines is something we've barely scratched the surface on and could be a huge issue. and also throwing cold water on an overly optimistic time frame for the production of a vaccine, pointing out that many cases, vaccine development takes a decade. if a vaccine is possible at all. so a pretty grim picture here presented by this doctor.

>> garrett, what was the -- give us a -- it did seem like it started as if we've seen in other house hearings, not necessarily senate hearings where it seemed as if some house republicans wanted to take more issue with the house democrats and the logistics of the hearing and why this hearing versus perhaps the larger issue. >> yeah, there was sort of speed bumps on procedural issues. is this a whistle-blower hearing? is this an oversight hearing? what protections are implied. one question from a republican congressman which was either in bad faith or just bad prep suggesting the witness has to be sworn in when as a member of congress, lying to members of congress is against the law. so that kind of drama isn't necessary. look, this is a congress that's still feeling out how they'll handle these in the future. being in the room, most members

were wearing masks. they took them off to speak. some were not wearing masks at all. the variance in the degree of seriousness on the topic at hand versus the willingness to delve into what dr. bright's salary is at various positions, it spanned the gamut which frankly can be the case in the house sometimes. >> yeah, absolutely. >> garrett, there was one part of the hearing that stood out to me. this was his warnings to his superiors that we needed more n95 masks in this country. he said he brought it up quite a few times. and one of his superiors told him, and i'm paraphrasing here, that the cdc will just be clear about who needs to wear a mask and who doesn't. dr. bright's response was, i cannot believe you can say that with a straight face and then he added that lives were lost because of that decision. there was a moment where the cdc did tell americans that not everybody needed to wear a mask

and they reverted only a few weeks ago to saying, to recommending that most people wear a mask. that was a moment that really stood out to me. >> yeah, me, too, but we should be careful and separate what we're talking about here. the cdc guidelines about people wearing masks on the street aren't referring to n95 masks. the idea was to never have lay people be wearing those masks in part because they are so important for those frontline workers. and it was they who were not getting enough of these masks, in hospitals in doctors' office, at your local emt or fire department where they are actually out on the front lines treating people. so, yeah, the cdc guidelines on mask wearing for the general public has been confusing, at best, over time but bright's concerns, especially early on about the lack of that high level personal protective gear for those who will be physically hands-on in treating this sirs is an absolute concern and may go back to something that chuck and i talked about on this

program. the degree to which the cdc has become a punching bag for the way that their response to this has been. i think it's fair to say in the eyes of dr. bright and others who testified, botched. >> garrett haake from capitol hill, thank you much. chuck, thank you very much. over to you. >> now to the other big breaking news, at least for washington folks. senate majority leader mitch mcconnell announced republican senator richard burr has stepped down as chairman of the intelligence committee. this comes after the fbi seized burr's cell phone. senior law enforcement official tells nbc news it's part of a federal investigation into possible insider trading. the search warrant comes nearly two months after it was revealed that burr and three other senators sold stocks following a january briefing on the coronavirus outbreak. let's bring in nbc's capitol hill correspondent and host of "kasie d.c.," kasie hunt and justice correspondent pete williams. pete, i want to start with the seizing of this phone with

richard burr versus what kasie has been reporting about, the back and forth with dianne feinstein. did they have to issue a search warrant because richard burr was not cooperating? is this the implication or is this -- does this come across as standard procedure? >> well, more the latter than the former, i think. we haven't gotten the details about why the government chose to get a search warrant. what we're told, it was served on one of the -- burr's lawyers who then notified the senator the fbi was coming to get his phone and went to his house last night. you're looking at video of him today on the hill. this is where he said he thought it was a distraction for him to stay on the committee as the committee chairman. but he wouldn't answer any specific questions about whether the fbi took his phone. he said it's their investigation. i don't want to talk about it. but in order to get a search warrant you have to show that there is -- you have to go to a judge and say that there's probable cause to believe that

the thing you want could contain evidence of a possible crime. so that's the significance of this. it just sort of shows that the investigation has moved into a new phase here. and in order to get a search warrant for a member of congress, it has to have sign off from pretty high levels in the justice department. now some former prosecutors i've talked to today say, instead of just asking nice, can we have your phone, you might want to get a search warrant if there's certain kinds of electronic communications you're looking for or perhaps just as a formal matter to make sure you've gone through all of the -- you know, you've dotted the is and crossed the ts. it may be more that than anything else. >> kasie hunt, you've been calling around to see how many other folks that we know had potentially been caught up in some sort of stock trades are also part of this. and i understand you have an update about dianne feinstein. what about kelly lofler?

>> we're reaching out to kelly lofler's office. our pool reporters tried to ask her questions about this and she ignored their questions. obviously if we get an update, we'll bring that to you. dianne feinstein's office confirmed on the record the fbi did or law enforcement officials did reach out, ask her some questions. she answered them. this was in regards to some stock trades her husband made. her office says she turned over toumts that show she had no involvement. there's a couple reason yes we're focused more on burr and why these events have unfolded underscore the investigation into burr is further along than it may be in some of these other cases. burr is the only one of these lawmakers who did his trading himself. the others all had some additional layer, whether in the

case of feinstein, a husband or a broker or through a trust or something like that. so that's one reason. the other reason is that burr traded somewhere between $600,000 and $1.7 million worth of stock. we don't know exactly because that's the nature of these reporting forms that come out. but that's a significant portion of his total net worth, which, while kelly loeffler made trades much higher in number, she's the wealthiest member of the senate. her husband owns the new york stock exchange. essentially worth $500 plus million or they were estimated to be worth that before this pandemic happened. while her trades on paper look bigger, they are a smaller portion of her overall financial picture. so that's why the focus has turned on burr. and then there's the reality as the intelligence chairman, a member of the gang of eight, they see much more information than even the intelligence committee itself or than any other member of congress. but i also think, chuck, it's important and i know you've focused and done reporting on

this, that there's a serious political context for this investigation and i think i have certainly had sources in both parties raise that and the reality of his committee's investigation. the fact he's allowed the russia probe to continue as potential areas of further conversation around what's unfolding here. >> look, put it this way -- >> one quick question. i heard you say this earlier, kasie, and i concur with it. a lot of trump allies are not shedding any tears for richard burr today and that's probably the cleanest way to talk about it for now on that front. katy tur, i know you have a question. >> she covered my question about the intelligence committee and the investigation, but kasie, are any other committee positions, feinstein's committee positions at risk here or potentially kelly l owe ffler's? >> there's not a chairmanship at

take where you have this seizure or search warrant. the precedent for somebody stepping down and part of why, frankly, burr's decision to step down says to me the seriousness of this has really escalated is that the precedent is that it takes criminal charges basically to get a ranking member or chairman to step down from this kind of a position. that was the case for bob menendez on the foreign relations committee. he was under very serious pressure during an investigation into his finances with a florida ophthalmologist. he stayed in his position and there are some senate rules as well that say that it takes an indictment to force a ranking member or a chairman in the senate gop to step down. so this signals to me that burr is very concerned about this and my question is, is it criminal exposeure? is it politics? is it a fear the two will mix together in a way that will be damaging for him?

we don't want to speculate too much on that, but suffice to say, this wasn't necessarily a thing he was pushed into doing by outside forces. >> very quick, pete, number one, do we know much about the fbi's interview of dianne feinstein? and is this definitely a criminal investigation, and what is the crime specifically that they would be potentially charging richard burr with? >> i know nothing about the feinstein interview. in terms of what they're looking at with burr, we assume it's insider trading. the problem with that is that insider trading is classically somebody in a company that trades on information that they have by virtue of some relationship with someone else in the company. the courts have broadened that out a little bit, but if they are trying to make a theory of insider trading based on information he received as a member of congress, sort of generally about what was going to happen to the economy, that would be quite a stretch. maybe they are looking at the

stock act. that's the law that says members of congress cannot use any information that they gain as a result of their official duties in order for private profit but that's not a crime. that just involves a civil penalty. so, frankly, we assume it's insider trading. that's what we're told, but specifically how that works, we don't know. >> kasie hunt, pete williams, both on top of this story. i imagine it's going to continue to unfold as the day progresses. thank you both. katy, over to you. >> chuck, more on the blockbuster hearing on capitol hill. dr. rick bright today told lawmakers that even if a vaccine for the coronavirus becomes available soon, he is concerned that the federal government lacks a plan to distribute it. >> you can imagine the scenario this fall or winter, maybe even early next spring when vaccine becomes available, there's no one company that can produce enough for our country or for the world. it's going to be a limited

supply. we need to have a strategy and plan in place now to make sure we cannot only fill that vaccine, make it, distribute it, but administer it in a fair and equitable plan. we don't have that yet and that is a significant concern. >> joining us is professor of epidemiologist at the ucla fielding school, dr. rimoin. let's get into the timeline for a vaccine. dr. bright said it takes ten years. i've read other accounts it takes as many as 20 years. if we're looking at an expedited timeline of 12 to 18 months, what can we reasonably expect? >> i think that the -- what dr. bright said, what dr. fauci has said, what we've seen other commentators like dr. hotez, people who know a lot about vaccine development, they all

say that the best case scenario could be something 12 to 18 months but the reality is that as dr. bright said, that would be, if everything goes right, and everything -- i don't think there's been an example of everything going right. we do need to have optimism. we have good scientists, people who are working on this problem. however, there is so much more than just identifying a vaccine. and i think that's what dr. bright was highlighting in his testimony today which was, we can have a vaccine that may be effective, potentially safe, but now we're going to have to worry about the distribution of it. public health is about planning and having a very good system in place. and this has been the problem all along. we do not have a good national strategy and once -- if we do have a vaccine that's available, we better have an excellent plan, a plan like we have never seen before to make sure that

this vaccine can get out safely and effectively and the distribution is not something that is just thrown out to the states because we will have big problems. >> well, how about giving -- how about this. give us an example of how you think a streamlined vaccine distribution would work through cvss, universities, things like that. what would you envision? the good news is they're looking into doing preproduction of the vials. that's been a concern of a lot of folks on that. but what would this look like? what would this distribution network look like in your mind? >> it all depends upon how much vaccine we're able to manufacture and get out there. so, you know, i would say that vaccine is going to need to be distributed first to first responders and to people who are on the front lines and then to the most vulnerable communities

and to work outwards. whether that is done through private networks or through a national program, which i think really is going to have to happen. we're going to have to have a national program that is really dictating how this works so that it is fair, equitable, straight forward. all of us remember back in 2009 when we had a flu pandemic that we really needed -- getting vaccine was difficult and it took time and there were lines for hours. so, you know, we have to be thinking about this carefully. i don't personally have the answer. thank god that's not my job right now. and i just really hope that there are -- there is a very well coordinated national strategy that will be considered and that we're thinking about this way ahead of time. not just when we do have a vaccine. >> one more question for you, anne, which is, i imagine demand for a flu shot this fall is

going to be unlike any demand we've ever seen, and we know people are going to be encouraging of it. what are the potential problems that could create as we are trying to, you know, we have therapeutics, trying to develop vaccines and trying to create a flu shot that's distributed, it's probably going to have more demand than we've ever had before. >> chuck, that's an excellent point. i am so glad that you're bringing this up. frankly, this is going to be a good dry run for what it's going to be like to distribute vaccine widely. right now only 40% of the population generally gets the flu shot, but i think people will be actively getting flu shots this year which will be really important. and so i think we need to be thinking about this right now. excellent point. i hope that people are thinking about this as a dry run. >> that's why we have segments like this so hopefully the right people are watching as we throw

out reminders of what perhaps not everybody is thinking about in the right moment. anne rimoin. >> congratulations for thinking about that. >> i think a lot of others have been thinking about the flu issue, too, in fairness. anne rimoin, thank you. katy, over to you. >> more on the breaking news. dr. rick bright testifying before the house subcommittee on health. how the white house is reacting. you're watching msnbc. staying a, many of life's moments are being put on hold. at carvana, we understand that, for some, getting a car just can't wait. to help, we're giving our customers up to 90 days to make their first payment. shop online from the comfort of your couch, and get your car with touchless delivery to keep you safe. and for even greater peace of mind, all carvana cars come with a seven-day return policy. so, if you need to keep moving, we're here for you. at carvana-- the safer way to buy a car.

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the white house is reacting to the testimony of the administration's ousted vaccine's expert dr. rick bright. for more we're joined by shannon pettypiece at the white house. i would say there was certainly some rhetorical pushback by secretary azar on rick bright's whistle-blower report and some of the things he said. but the piece of news that came out of there was something i think was news to a lot of us. kayleigh mcena looeg mleigh mce have the sound. >> everything he talked about was done. he talked about -- he says he talked about the need for respirators. we procured respirators under the president's direction. he said we need a manhattan project for vaccines. this president initiates a vaccine manhattan project. diagnostic manhattan project. therapeutic manhattan project. >> nothing more than a really

disgruntled, unhappy person. and i'm not just talking about alex because alex said it strongly, but there are a lot of people that do not like the job he did. i don't know him. i never met him. i don't want to meet him. >> now, shannon, what i was referring to, there was a point kayleigh mcenany spoke to the press. she said they had a pandemic preparedness report, and she said we did a whole exercise on pandemic preparedness in august of last year. we had an entire after-action report put together. the obama/biden paper pocket was superseded by a trump-style pandemic preparedness. so i guess they're making the argument that everything they've implemented is part of a pandemic plan they put together last august? >> which we have never heard of, chuck. and i'm, obviously, still looking into this and so are my colleagues. we've never heard of any pandemic preparedness plan.

this was the first time they are mentioning it that she brought out these binders. we're going to try to find more details. it seems unusual that here we are in mid-may that they'd now start talking about what their preparedness plan was. >> and listening to secretary azar, that was -- look, that seemed -- there was some anger in there from secretary azar. it's clear -- do we think we know the whole story here? it's not personal. >> i don't think we know the whole story here but to raise -- to get to one of the points he's raising that everything that dr. bright was saying the administration should have done, they did. well, eventually they did it. for example, this issue of ppe that dr. bright says he raised. yes, you know, they have procured billions of masks but the issue dr. bright is raising at the beginning of the pandemic you had doctors in new york city without ppe, many of them getting infected and some dying because of a shortage of ppe. on the vaccine, yes, they do

have a manhattan project for the vaccine, but that's really something that only came about in the next month -- in the past few months. and just yesterday did they bring on two people to really head that. so, you know, it's true there are some -- there are a lot of things they've done now but rick bright's point is these are things that is have been done in january and february and march that was lost time that resulted in the loss of thousands of lives, he says. >> all right, shannon, go find the pandemic preparedness report. i think we're all anxious to see what that report is because i'm glad you were able to confirm the same thing. it seemed new to me as well. hopefully we'll get an idea of what it was and when it was prepared. katy, over to you. >> chuck, coming up, close to 3 million americans filed for unemployment last week. it's the eighth straight week of job losses in the millions. will those jobs come back? we'll talk with the former labor secretary hilda solis. you're watching msnbc. wayfair has way more ways to renovate your home,

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the economic toll of the pandemic is getting worse by the week. new weekly jobless claims today show another 3 million americans filed for unemployment last week. and that brings the eight-week total to over 36 million people. joining us now is nbc news business correspondent jo ling kent. when you look at all of those

numbers and break down the jobs by industry, do we have an expectation of which of those jobs or how many of those jobs are likely to come back once the economy is reopened? >> yeah, it's hard to quantify exactly which jobs are going to be coming back. but we do see that the -- in 43 different states, applications for unemployment actually dropped. that's the silver lining in these staggering numbers. you see 3 million unemployment claims filed in just one week, that's so many times what we saw in terms of pre-pandemic levels. the other thing that i'm seeing that's worth pointing out here is that pandemic unemployment assistance, that's the federal assistance being offered to freelancers, contract workers, gig workers like uber or lyft driver. that's not been instituted in more than a dozen states right now so you'll still see benefits and applications on that front as well. we also have to take a look at who is being hit the hardest. we do know that 55 plus are

being dispurporoportionately affected by jobless claims and also the low-income communities across our country. according to a new fed survey, 40% of households that make less than $40,000 a year experienced at least one job loss. so this is some pretty significant economic data that is going to hit hard for a long time. even if you have economies reopening and people going back to some of those jobs. the furloughs we saw, especially in the retail sector of expected to become permanent in some cases. then you also have the complicating factor of consumer confidence. retail sales and consumer confidence down. so what does that mean for the stores that are open or the companies that are doing business now. you don't just bounce back in this direct way. there's a lot of structural issues we're seeing play out in these weekly unemployment claims. so the good news is that things are getting better but they continue to get worse at the same time. and some of the top executives

that i've been talking to on the phone about this issue, the real concern now is what happens in the fall? will there be federal aid in place to keep a lot of these people employed. keep these businesses going. more federal aid is needed. a top executive say that testing and tracing is really the only way to avoid another economic downturn that could be worse than what we're experiencing now come this fall and winter. it's not just the here and now. this economic crisis is about what's going to happen into the fall and winter. >> confidence is so important because when we look at the economy, much of it is driven on consumer spending. jo ling kent, thank you. chuck, over to you. to talk more about this, let's bring in a former u.s. secretary of labor under president barack obama, hilda solis. she's currently an l.a. county supervisor. she's also a surrogate for former vice president joe biden's presidential campaign.

and hilda solis, you've got interesting experience right now that's got to be very helpful as l.a. county makes these decisions about how to reopen, when you do it and all of those things. and it seems to me, let's -- that the communities that may be most desperate to have the economy open are the same communities that are most at risk from covid. this, to me, has got to be the challenge that you're thinking about in l.a. county. what is your thought on balancing that issue? >> well, i believe that it's really critical that those folks get tested, particularly the african-american community and latino community. their participation rates in testing overall, i think, has not been what we expect. so we have to really dive down and get into their communities and we're doing everything we can here to pop up testing centers and also providing the kind of educational campaign in various languages because it's -- we have many, many

language minority groups. but the ones impacted the most are african-american, native american, alaskan and also the asian pacific community. and i think it's going to continue -- those numbers are going to continue to rise because we're just barely, i think, reaching the level of testing that we are comfortable with. we can now test about 20,000, and that is -- and that's still short. we do need help from the federal government. we do need to have what the defense production act applied to here because we're going to be caught, i think in the fall with a greater epidemic if we are not in front of this issue. and you can tell, even here in l.a. county, a million people are unemployed. 4 million in the state. the numbers today showing the unemployment folks that are now applying for this aid is going to keep growing because, as you know, these numbers lag a couple of weeks. and people are having a hard time just getting online on the

internet to be able to apply for assistance. and couple that with a lot of the small minority businesses ownered by latinos, african-americaned. they did not benefit from the ppp. so we need this extra tranche of money that i know speaker pelosi and senator schumer are also pushing for right now to get $3 trillion back into our economy but focus on testing. focus on the first responders and making sure that we make counties like ours who are in charge of health care whole as well as our local cities and municipalities. otherwise, you're going to see more unemployment. you'll see a greater number of public servants, firefighters and public safety out the door. and that's not where we need to go in preparation for the fall. >> right. let me ask you this. l.a. county, you guys -- i know we're trying to -- you have your own public health. you sort of run your own decision-making when it comes to

reopening. you have said you don't have enough testing. contact tracers. is that something l.a. county is going to recruit? is that something you want the federal government? is that something the state is going to be in charge of? >> it's going to be both -- >> you've talked about testing. what about tracing? >> it's going to be an effort with the state as well as with our local employees and volunteers and folks that we can get into that, you know in that track. and i know it's critical because that's how we're going to be able to identify where the virus is and hopefully put people in isolation, if necessary, and get them treated and get them the appropriate care. especially in communities of color where we see that this is a continual concern that we don't have enough availability of health care services to begin with. and people are scared because of the public charge that has been made. those statements by the trump administration against latinos and other immigrant groups.

many of them do not want to seek, you know, health care assistance knowing that fully this is a paid for program. fema will help pay. states are going to pay. the county is putting in money and we're expecting to get hopefully reimbursed for all of this. >> and you're introducing an added sensitivity that contact tracers have to be aware of, i think, when we move forward. katy tur, i know you have a question. >> thanks for being here. at what point does this turn from an economic labor crisis into a housing crisis? i know you're already dealing with that in los angeles and you were dealing with that before this came around. but as people stop being able to pay their rent and as landlords stop being able to pay their mortgage because of that, how do you prepare for the ripple effect of people losing their homes? >> well, we here in l.a. county put very quickly together a moratorium on evictions. both for tenants as well as commercial businesses.

and we are doing that. we're going to extend that. we just voted on that this week. >> no, i understand the moratorium on attents but let me interrupt you because a lot of landlords are not big businesses. they are just landlords who own a couple of buildings or a building and they won't be able to pay their mortgage. their mortgages aren't going away. is there talk of any mortgage relief out there, any rent relief that goes up and down so that one sector is not bailed out while another sector is left twisting in the wind? >> you have it absolutely right. it's a parallel decision that we just made here at the county board. just this week. just tuesday. so we know that we have to provide assistance to those small mom and pop landlords, particularly the elderly widow who maybe is living off two or three rents and can go broke and lose all her property because she has no income coming in from her renters. we get it. we just passed a motion to provide protection for them. and some of it will come in the

form of tax credits relief. some in the form of actual funding that we'll make available. so we just are opening that up again and we do need more help because we don't have an endless slew of money. we do need the federal government to weigh in, to help us because we don't want to go through the disaster of 2009 and during the great recession. >> hilda solis, former labor secretary under president obama, currently an l.a. county supervisor. thanks for coming on and sharing your views. we appreciate it. >> thank you. >> let me echo that. thank you as well. >> katy? >> up next, the latest from dr. rick bright's ongoing hearing. the nation's top vaccine expert said the best scientific guidance was not related to the american people in the early days of this crisis. you're watching msnbc. now. whether you're facing unemployment.

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we continue to follow the breaking news at dr. rick bright is still testifying before the house subcommittee on health. dr. bright told congress that lives were needlessly lost because the united states was not prepared for this pandemic. he also conceded that the american people were not given the best information in the early months of this crisis. >> i believe americans need to be told the truth. i believe that the best scientific guidance and advice

was not being conveyed to the american public during that time. i believe by not telling america the truth or being fully transparent regardless of where the information was coming from, people were not as prepared as they could have been and should have been. we did not forewarn people. we did not train people. we did not educate them on social distancing and wearing a mask as we should have in january and february. all of those forewarnings, all those educational opportunities for the american public could have had an impact on further slowing this outbreak. coming up, we'll hear from new york governor andrew cuomo in just a few minutes, as he gives his daily news briefing. and wisconsin's governor likens it to the wild west. just hours after the state's supreme court overturned the state's stay-at-home order. the bars opened up and the customers came in quickly. you're watching msnbc. no

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the debates about when and how to reopen the country highlight how divided this country has become. a threat like war or natural disaster usually brings people together to set a course of action and response. somehow we let this one drive us apart. the stark example of this is playing out in wisconsin. state supreme court struck down the governor's statewide stay at home order on wednesday. governor joined us last night and expressed alarm over the court's ruling. >> we're the wild west. there are no restrictions at all across the state of wisconsin. the tavern league in this state sent messages, e-mails to their members saying we're open tonight. >> and that message was received after the ruling folks in wisconsin ventured out to local bars. ben jordan from our affiliate wtmj went out and spoke to some

of them. >> reporter: inside this pub, drinks are pouring and patrons are enjoying the company of long time friends. for customer katie kowski, it's a much needed stress relief. i have a toddler at home and full time nurse. it's stressful and hard to not be able to go out and would be my friends and family at the bars. >> reporter: the owner reopened after she learned about the state supreme court's ruling striking down the state's safer at home order. >> i waited for the tavern to send out information. as soon as we got that, waits awesome. >> reporter: she is reminding patrons to keep a social distance and limiting capacity to a third the bar can hold. she said she doesn't have any concerns. >> very few people in here are wearing masks. >> yep. >> are you concerned about possibly getting coronavirus from being inside the bar tonight? >> no, i don't think that the risk presents any higher than me going to a grocery store. >> cheers. >> reporter: a similar scene can be found a few miles away at the buzzard's nest. regulars rushing to get back to

their favorite pub. >> the first thought, we flipped right to the parking lot and, yeah, we have to get in and have a first trindrink. >> reporter: the owner says it can be short lived if they place restrictions on local taverns. >> they can call us like they did march 17th and say you have to shut down by 10:00 or shut down immediately. >> ben jordan from our affiliate wtmj, thank you for that report. katy, i will just say this. here's the concern. i think when you go into a bar you have every intent, you have your faculties total and complete. but as your filter wears away as the night goes on, are you going to be as rigid about social distancing? i mean, that's the realistic reaction that i'm concerned about. i think people would intend to follow the rules when they go out. but as we know, after you've had had a few perhaps you're not going to be as diligent. >> you get looser. but here's the thing, nobody in

that bar, either of the bars were social distancing or taking from the looks of it any precautions. surprising to hear from the nurse she wasn't worried at all. all right. well, chuck, thanks very much. we're minutes away from andrew cuomo's daily coronavirus briefing. stay with us. you're watching msnbc. with us u'yore watching msnbc. when you take align, you have the support of a probiotic and the gastroenterologists who developed it. align helps to soothe your occasional digestive upsets twenty-four seven. so where you go, the pro goes. go with align. the pros in digestive health. and if stress worsens your digestive issues, try new align digestive de-stress. it combines align's probiotic with ashwagandha to help soothe occasional digestive upsets, plus stress that can make them worse. and try align gummies with probiotics to help support digestive health. we hope you find our digital solutions helpful to bank safely from home. deposit a check with your phone or tablet.

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good afternoon, i'm chuck todd. it's 11:00 a.m. out west, 2:00

p.m. in the east. here are the facts as we know them that hour. on capitol hill, top vaccine expert just finished testify brg house lawmakers. he warned the small window the united states has to address the coronavirus pandemic is closing. republican senator richard burr stepped down after they seized the senator's cell phone as part of a federal investigation into possible insider trading related to the pandemic. andrew cuomo will be speaking in a moment on the latest coronavirus numbers in his state and the push to reopen in his state. and the cdc is expected to release detailed guidance for states on how and when to reopen establishments like schools, restaurants, and parks. part of the recommendations were shef shelved by the white house reportedly because it was too restrictive. katy tur, it is fascinating here

and we're about to get more to it, but i thought you put it best when you said, you know, rick bright may be a very compelling witness because of how straight forward he's being, how almost bureaucratic and not a pejorative way but a very, like this is a government scientist that you're hearing. there is a sort of joe friday just the facts man kind of demeanor of his that may actually breakthrough. >> yeah. he didn't have a the lo lot of rhetorical bells and whistles. he wasn't loud. he didn't stand out really. i mean, he just said exactly what he knew, what he experienced and why he thought the pandemic response by this administration was confusing and in some cases dangerous. and that made the testimony, i think, quite compelling. let's talk about a certain

moment. he told congress in no uncertain terms that country was not prepared for this crisis, chuck. and without naming names, he said some federal leaders ignored crucial early warning signs. and, again, a warning to our viewers, he does use some strong language. >> initially our nation was not as prepared as we should have been, as we could have been. some scientists raised early warning signals that were overlooked. and pages from our pandemic playbook were ignored by some in leadership. we've known for quite some time that our stockpile is insufficient and having the ppe so once the virus began spreading, i felt concerned we didn't have the supplies. i began pushing urgently in january along with industry colleagues as well and those urges, those alarms were not responded to with action. i'll never forget the e-mails i

received from mike bowen indicating that we are mask supplier was completely decimated. and he said we're in deep. [ beep ] >> now the white house press secretary says the administration was prepared pushing back a bit at rick bright's description and she says thanks to president trump. >> the obama-biden plan that has been referenced was insufficient, wasn't going to work. so what our administration did under the leadership of president trump is do an entire 2018 pandemic preparedness report. beyond that, we did a whole exercise on pandemic preparedness in august of last year and had an entire after action report put together. the packet was superseded by a

preparedness response plan. >> for what it's worth, our nbc news white house folks, we have not been able to confirm the existence of either of those reports. we have not seen them in public or anywhere. we continue to do more reporting on that. but for now, andrew cuomo is beginning in syracuse, new york. >> 75 days since we had our first case. you can see so far so good in terms of the continuing decline in the total number of hospitalizations in the state. on the three day rolling average also. the number of intubations is down. that is really good news. the number of new cases which is what we're watching. people that test positive or walk in the door and test positive, it's much of, much better than it was. the number of lives lost is also

down. headed in the right direction. so all the arrows are pointed in the right direction. and we're basically right back to where we were before we started this horrific situation. the question then becomes reopening. it's not a question of reopening or not. everybody wants to reopen. they have to get back to work. people need a paycheck. the state needs an economy. people have lives to live. so everybody wants to reopen. the question is how do you reopen? and from the national experts, global experts, make sure you don't reopen too soon. what they mean to be saying by too soon is you have to reopen intelligently. and you have to renopopen in a

calibrated way. be intelligent about the way you reopen. follow the data. follow the science. follow the facts. follow the metrics. we know enough now to know what happens that every action has a reaction. if we do this, then this will happen. we lived this enough. so based on what we know, make sure we're being intelligent. not emotional, not political, not based on feelings but based on facts. learn the lessons of other people that have gone through this. other countries have gone through it. there are experiences that we can learn from, educate yourself. and be smart. be smart. check the data on daily basis. and we have the data on a daily basis. we put together a very elaborate

reporting system on testing data, on hospital data from all across the state. that data is now available on a daily basis. and you can track that data and know exactly where you are. it's like taking your blood pressure every morning. it's like getting your cholesterol count every morning. you can know exactly where you are every morning. and not just for the lekted official elected officials, not just for government this is all about what people do. this is about what citizens do. and what the elected officials are trying to do, what i'm frying to do is inform the citizens so they can better protect themselves and they know what decisions they should make. and that's why all the information we're accumulating, we're making it in a very transparent way and i hope people get up in the morning, they have their cup of coffee and they go online to find out

where their county is, how are they doing? and calibrate their behavior that way. the state developed a very elaborate dashboard of relevant local information. they told me they were designing a dashboard. i got very excited about it. i sent them an iconic dashboard, 1967 corvette. arguably the most beautiful dashboard. they came back with this design. new york state dashboard. how it in any way mirrors the dashboard from 1967 corvette, i have no idea. how can government be expected to have the same artistic design that we had 50 years ago. so here's the state dashboard. you notice the iconic design and

curves and art that was used in it. but it has all the information. even if it's not the most artistic. and it has all the information for all the regions statewide. so every region can compare themselves to where other regions in this state. right now by the criteria that we have which is basically from the federal cdc, we have certain regions that are poised to reopen tomorrow. other regions where the numbers do not suggest they're in a position to reopen. and this is all baseded on the numbers and how many hospitalizations do you have? are they going up? are they going down? do you have testing in place? do you have tracing in place? we have different rates of infection across the state. hence, the variance in opening times. the big responsibility is now

going to fall to local government, to manage this situation. and my advice to local governments are in terms of priority, daily monitoring of numbers. daily monitoring of numbers and daily monitoring of numbers are the first three priorities. right? know the facts. know what you're dealing with. you no he what activities you engage. you know how you increase the level of activity. we're measuring the effect of that activity. make sure you monitor it every morning, every morning. make sure the businesses that open are in compliance with the guidelines that are opening. make sure individuals comply. you know, you're going to say it's a reopening. people are going to say hallelujah. run out of their house. the they're going to want to get out. they're going to want to do things. reopening phased reopening does

not mean the problem is going away. it means we have controlled the problem because of what we did and because of our individual responsibility and individual actions. and that has to be maintained. and i would urge local governments to be diligent about the business compliance and about individual compliance. and then if you see a change in those numbers, react immediately. react immediately. if you allow this virus to get ahead of us, we'll have a problem. so we'll have the data. react immediately. at the same time, the states need help from the federal government. and that's a topic that is being discussed now. washington must act. new york state is a $61 billion hole. when you shut done the economy, you obviously create an economic hole for the state.

what does the state fund -- the state funds local governments, funds schools, funds health care. if the state has no budget, then schools get cut. hospitals get cut. local governments get cut. if local governments get cut, then you cut police and firefighters. why would you ever want to cut essential front line personnel at this time? makes no sense. washington is already acted. they've done a lot of business incentives. great. but we need our health care institutions. we need our schools. we need our police and firefighters funded. i spoke with president trump this morning. we spoke again about the state funding issues. he heard me out. i also asked him to expedite certain payments. and he's expediting $3.9 billion payment to the mta which is very

large transportation agency in the state. which desperately needs funding because the ridership is way down. and the president cut red tape and actually sent the first installment today. i'm grateful for that and i thank you. the house meantime proposed a bill. the bill does a lot of good. it funds state and local aid, $500 billion to make up for those short falls. it funds testing. everybody keeps talking about testing, tracing, testing, tracing. the operations have to be put in place. new york state will wind up hiring thousands of tracers. we need funding to do that. i understand it's our obligation. states are in charge. governors are in charge. we need help with funding. and the house bill repeals the salt tax change that was made in washington about three years ago. and that tax change that they made cost new york state

billions. the house bill repeals that change which is a significant, significant benefit to this state. and ironically, the states most hurt by s.a.l.t. are the states that have the most pain from the covid-19 virus. so repealing s.a.l.t. actually is in, my opinion, best thing you can do to help the states that are now battling the covid-19 virus. in new york state, the s.a.l.t. repeal increased our taxes 12 to $15 billion. just new york state. we now pay 12 to $15 billion more every year to the federal government, believe it or not. so that would be a major boost. but washington has to act. no delay. no special interests getting

priority or special treatment here. and when we're doing the corporate bailouts, make sure we don't make the mistake we made in 2008 where we gave corporations large bailouts and the corporations took the money and paid themselves with the money. why should the american taxpayers now bail out corporations unless they're going to rehire workers. i'm afraid you're going to see corporations that will not hire back the same number of employees. they're going to use this pandemic as a way to restructure or get lean. if a corporation is going to take government money, they should rehire the same number of workers they had before. i did an op-ed in "the washington post" to that effect.

but i believe that should be a condition across the board. any corporation that gets money from the government, from the people, should hire back the same number of workers. if you want to lay off workers, don't expect the tax payer to subsidize you laying off workers. and it is a moment in our modern history where we can get out of this partisan gridlock hyper political moment. now is the time. my position of funding for state governments is not a democratic position. there's an organization called the national governor's association. it is democratic governors, republican governors, chairman is a republican governor. i'm the vice chairman. and the nga, national governor's association in a bipartisan way is urging washington to pass the relief for state and local governments.

there's no red or blue here. it's red, white, and blue. also at the same time, we went through all this pain. people talk about reopening. i don't want to just -- i want to set the bar higher. it's no the about just going back to where we were. let's use this as a moment to grow. and to get better. let's learn from the pain that we went through and i talk about reimagining new york and let's use this as a moment to reimagine our education system, our teltelecommuting and take t experience and grow from it. right? life will knock you on your rear end. that's true. but do you get up and do you get up smarter?

we should never be in a position where we don't have medical equipment. we're facing a major public health issue and dwoent even have basic equipment for nurses and doctors? and so much of it came from china and governors such as myself are trying to figure out who do we know in china to get masks for nurses in our hospitals? i mean it was terrible what we went through. it's a matter of national security. and i want to make sure we in new york are leading the way. let us start manufacturing here in this country, in this state, masks and gowns and drugs and the ventilators and tests we need and let new york start. and we already have. but we should never again as a nation have to scramble the way we scrambled. we're now aggressively courting

businesses, incentivizing businesses to build, to manufacture medical equipment here in this state. and the state will partner with corporations to do that. st so if you want to grow your business, expand your business, manufacturing masks and gowns is not the most difficult situation. tech know tech knowledgicly. we must remain vigilant. we're still learning. facts are in many ways still continuing to change on us. and while we're learning, the virus is still learning also. we have a situation that is serious and concerning which is

these individual-related illnesses in children. the department of health is now looking at 110 cases of a covid-19 related illness in children. it's similar to the kawasaki disease or toxic syndrome. we lost several children to this disease. department of health is at the forefront nationally if not internationally in looking at this. and the department of health, good work of dr. zucker, they had a number of telephone conferences, web conferences. 16 other states now see case that's they're investigating once the department of health explained what they've been looking at. six european countries are now looking at the same situation. and i expect this is only going

to grow. parents should beware and parents should be informed of this. the key is prolonged fever and then you see on the chart the other symptoms that parents should look for. also it tends to present in children who were exposed to the covid-19 virus and now have the antibodies from the covid-19 or still test positive for the covid-19. so if you have a child who has a fever who you think may have been exposed to the covid virus, a person that had the virus or you found out later came down with it and you see these symptoms, then you should take action. new york state has published today online the first in the nation criteria for health care professionals to isolate,

define, identify this syndrome and test for it. but it is very important. right now we have it affecting children from less than 1 year old. so instanfants to 21 years old. okay? when you look at over the 100 cases, that's the span. that is obviously a very frightening development. there is more information on the website. last point, a personal opinion. i'm the governor of the state of new york and i take that responsibility very seriously. i'm honored to be governor. i work at it seven days a week, 24 hours a day. but in many ways before being governor i am a son. um a broth i'm a brother, father and uncle.

as a father, i want to make sure that i'm communicating this last situation to the people of the state and beyond. this virus has been ahead of us every step of the way. i can't tell you how many facts i was told that then changed. right? when the virus started, the virus was coming from china. everybody was looking at china. turns out invite us athe virus europe and nobody told us. when this first started, if you had the disease and recovered, you then had antibodies. and you were immune. my brother had the virus, recovered. so he had the antibody. we were told you're immune from getting it again. and we had had plans to have people who tested for the antibodies, they could go back to work because they were immune. the facts changed. you know what? maybe they're not immune. maybe they're only a little immune or partially immune.

then we were told children are not affected by the virus. that was the only good news by the way in the whole first evaluation. churn are not affected. okay. now maybe children are affected. and we just didn't know it. okay. but what coudo we know now? we're stud ying 100 churn from to 21. my daughter is 22. we only have people up until 21. so she's okay. yeah, until we have someone that is 22 or 23 or 24. so the facts change. i have done my best to give people the information that i know. but you want you to have the

same caution flag that i live with. the facts on this virus have changed. and i believe they will continue to change. so take this all with grain of salt and my basic point is do not underestimate this virus. it has beaten us at every turn. and it has surprised us at every turn. don't take it lightly. don't underestimate it. i believe the facts will change as we go forward. the more we learn about the virus, the more the facts change, and the worse it gets. there has been no news since we started this where we were actually two cautious or too concerned. all the news has been bad as far

as i'm concerned. so with all this information, with all government is doing, hearings in washington, all this, you know who is going to protect you? you are. you know who is going to protect my daughter? her being informed. mccayla understanding. like to think with a little advice from parent which she discounts 99%, but maybe 1% of the advice communicates. mccayla is graduating from college this year. they closed the college. she said, you know, a lot of people are having parties and they're having graduation like events. should i go? you know, 22, you can't tell them anything at 22. i couldn't tell them nianythingt 21, 19. it is worth the risk to do it?

and mccayla made all the right decisions. but every parent, every child, it's your job to understand and protect yourself and i just urge caution. because everything i say, i tell you everything i know. but i'm also telling you there are things dwoewe don't know ye. how do you protect yourself from those things? just be cautious, be diligent. wearing a mask, wearing gloves, staying way from gatherings. i know they're inconvenient. but god forbid, you know, just god forbid. i talked to too many families that lost people. i talked to too many families that lost people that were not supposed to be lost to this virus. this started this was just about vulnerable people, senior citizens.

yeah, but then how do you lose a 40-year-old that had no symptom of anything? children were not affected. yeah, until children are affected. so caution to everyone. and whatever i know, i will communicate. but again, it's about you protecting you and i encourage diligence. >> they imposed guidelines, a break down of industries for phase one. and basically an agreement businesses have to fill out. would you explain that process? speak to business owners across the reopened regions across the state about what they need to do? >> yeah. let me give you the general outlines. >> we've been listening to new york governor andrew cuomo who did ask citizens to check on children that were exposed to the coronavirus is the most important part of the briefing to day of sort of action that he's asking new yorkers to take.

and, frankly, i think nationwide given what we don't know about the relationship between covid-19 and this child issue, he does seem to be concerned about it enough to make the call to new yorkers. >> yeah. so far i believe the number is 13 states and the district of colombia were the syndrome has shown up. we've been talking about it now for weeks or over a week. you're a parent. i'm a parent. he said it right there, we initially thought that this virus wasn't going to affect kids. and that made you breathe a little easier, made you feel better about leaving the house with your kid and going on walks. maybe even taking him to the playground before playgrounds were shut here in new york city. but now knowing that there are a number of cases and the case numbers are rising where there's an after effect potentially from this virus. it's putting people on edge. and here are the symptoms we

have them on the screen. prolonged fever, severe abdominal pain, diarrhea, patchy blue or pale skin. rapid breathing, lethargy or rapid heart rate. we tell people to call the pediatrician if they see something wrong with their kids. i think there is a portion of the population that gets left out from that though. there are people that don't have a pediatrician standing by. don't have easy access to one. either because they don't have insurance and the question is what do they do? do they go to the emergency room with their kid now? that doesn't sound safe. i'm still waiting to hear from some officials about catching the people that might be falling through the cracks on this. >> and, katy, talk about complicating the reopening of schools and i keep coming back to it. i do -- i think that one of the things we learned is figuring out how to do testing and tracing so that schools can open up is frankly to me, if you sol

of that puzzle, you solve that entire puzzle and now throw this in there. one way i describe this when i try tell family members of mine that are not necessarily abiding by some of the orders, i'll say this is a lottery you don't want to win. this is not a lottery you want to win. you know, is it this lottery ticket? yeah. you probably are going to be okay. but do you want to risk winning this lottery? i think that was the point that governor cuomo was making very well. we don't know what we don't know. now let's go to the white house where shannon is standing by. we've got the president already left. it comes -- i want to bring it back here a little bit. we heard from governor cuomo who praised president trump for making good on the essentially the first down payment to the subway system, the mta. there it does seem that the white house that does want to push back big time against rick

bright who testified today on capitol hill. >> yeah. they're trying to. at least they came prepared. when the president came out to head to they vent in pennsylvania, they had the binders that said pandemic crisis action plan on them. and she said she would be detailing tomorrow the whole plan that the administration had together and she was trying to contrast that with the plan she says was left with the obama administration. now i will say, chuck, since i talked to you about this about an hour ago, myself and my colleagues, we've been reaching out to white house aides to see if we can get any more information on. this a number of people we talked to said they're still not sure of what this preparedness plan is that they had. there was some reporting from the new york tombs, some docume documents that "new york times" posted that referenced this document. they're trying to push back against bright but not doing it today with any sort of details. i haven't been able to get an

answer from the press sector anyone else what they're referring to. so maybe we get a fuller response. of course, that will be a full 24 hours later. >> shannon, if they had this plan all along, why are they showing it to us now on may 14th? >> that's another key question to ask. we do know that there were areas of the government that, you know had, been preparing for this. that was part of their job. rick bright, part of his entire job is preparing vaccines. and there was a national stockpile and people in charge of that and other areas of the government that carry out exercises. certainly from our reporting and others efforts that were going on in the broader government. but at the center of the white house, they didn't have an official in charge of public health crisis like this. we know they down suessized thef

that managed these types of things and we're hearing about the numerous warnings given to the administration that weren't followed up on until we got into the march, april time frame of this rather than being tackled back in january or february like some officials like rick bright were calling for. >> not too much in the president downplaying it for so many weeks and mos months. shannon, thank you very much. as we mentioned, president trump arrived in the battleground s t state of pennsylvania. joining me now from allentown is nbc's mora barrett. so, more yashgs wha, what you a out there? >> hey, katy. to the president's motorcade rolled through as he arrived to the medical distribution plant:obviously choosing pennsylvania for this location for this official visit comes as campaigning has been put on hold

due to the individual pandemic. trump narrowly carried pennsylvania. he's looking to win again in november. joe biden is pulling ahead. hillary clinton carried it. it's more of an urban area but surrounded by a lot of manufacturing and is a big coal and steel production area. all of the demographics and industries are ones that the president appealed to in 2016 but have faced a lot of impact. so it caused a lot of high unemployment rates here in pennsylvania, katy. >> mora barrett, thank you very much. chuck, over to you. an update on the breaking news in the senate. what that's about. that's about richard burr, so stick with us. richard burr, so stick with us.

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how do you gaveeno® happy 24/7? with prebiotic oat. it hydrates and softens skin. so it looks like this. and you feel like this. aveeno® daily moisturizer get skin healthy™ got news that broke early this afternoon. republican senator richard burr stepped down as chairman of the intelligence committee. this comes after the fbi seized burr's cell phone. a senior law enforcement official tells nbc news it's part of a federal investigation into possible insider trading. joining us now is nbc's capitol hill correspondent, kacie hunt. always good to see you. senator burr is being criticized by the junior senator of his state of north carolina. fill us in on what's going on and how politics are coming into

play with this. >> sure. i think that the senator's decision to step down as chairman of the intelligence committee underscores the seriousness of what's going on here. there are several precedence that have been set previously that would have allowed him to remain in this position if he had wanted to. there hasn't been a demand that people step down in congress until or unless charges are filed typically that has sometimes generated a different outcome. but this obvious senator burr said to reporters earlier today he doesn't want this to be a distraction. and there are a lot of questions about the politics around this. now tom tillis from north carolina was quoted as saying that burr had a lot of explaining to do. tillis is in a tough race as are a number of senator burr's colleagues. and from talking to sources who are, you know, familiar with how the thinking has played out on this, there is a recognition

that it is difficult to answer questions about burr's stock trades for some of the vulnerable senators. i certainly think that is playing a role to a certain extent in this. now there are also questions about the politics of how burr handled the senate intelligence committee investigation into russian interference in the 2016 election. this is something that president trump is very focused on. he maud a series of decision that's put him at odds in some ways with a lot of president trump's supporters including, you know, having it go on the way that it has, including sending subpoenas to members of the president's family to testify as part of this notably donald trump jr. these are things that people are looking to as this starts to play out. the facts of the matter that he did trade a significant portion of the network in stock before

the market tanked on coronavirus fears and they're looking whether did he that properly or improperly. it is very difficult to prove this type of a case. insider trading laws are very specific and have to deal with specific stocks. this was a large amount of money. he was privy to a lot confidential information. dianne st dianne feinstein answered questions through the fbi about the husband. stock trades provided to show she was not involved in this. this is going beyond chairman burr. he is in the most serious trouble, katy. >> kacie hunt, thank you very much. chuck, over to you.

well let's get on to the countries the president is in pennsylvania. there is a political divide in the state over how quickly to reopen. by tomorrow phase one of the state's reopening process is underway in all counties except one. he kept beaver county because of an uncontrolled breakout. he plans to get the entire state up and running. joining me now from beaver county, pennsylvania. she is there. beef county beaver county, it's one of our county to county coverage. this is a county we are covering because this was ba big trump county. so keeping it closed in a county that trump won by 20 points. how is that playing, dwrasasha?

>> it's not playing well. they tell me that they are extremely disappointed to see beaver essentially left behind. they say now they have to watch the residence here. the their neighbors, their customers, their clients take their dollars to the surrounding counties that have been allowed to reopen. and they are struggling. they don't know what the future holds. the i want to introduce you to one local business owner. her name is kristen stanzak. she talked about the challenges people are facing right now. >> there is one outbreak at a nursing home which is terribly tragic. but it's crushing our economy. if the businesses don't start opening up and we can't have a restaurant back open, i don't know how much longer we can survive at this rate. >> do you have any idea how can you hang on? >> it's week by week. if something changes and we go back to red, who knows?

efrgz is everything is so up in the air. >> as you mentioned, there is the politics here. the president one pennsylvanian but he swept beaver and right now he's in the state he's talking about reopening as jobless numbers top 36 million and there's a protest planned at the capitol tomorrow against the stau at ho stay at home orders. the action on behalf of the democratic governor wolf may not be so good for joe biden and the democrats. chuck? >> yeah. dasha burns, this is becoming a clearly part of the culture wars, part of our well known political divide in this country. dasha with reporting on the ground in beaver county, pennsylvania. thank you. katy, over to you. chuck, ahead, a reminder of just how contagious coronavirus is. a member of the nbc family and expert on how viruses spread was hospitalized with covid-19.

tells us how he thinks he got it. it is something few of us get to experience, a journey to iran. we turn on the camera as our reporters travels back from london to tehran. he'll bring you his story in just a moment. he'll bring you his story in just a moment. i just love hitting the open road and telling people

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on wednesday we here at nbc news learned that another member of our team had fallen ill. a contributor for msnbc news announced that he had been hospitalized with symptoms of the coronavirus. he believes he caught the fires on a flight to new orleans despite wearing a face masks and gloves and suspects he was infected through his eyes. >> we tend to focus on the nose and mouth because that is the most common route but droplets landing on your eyes are just as

infection and of course i wasn't wearing goggles on the flight. savannah reported yesterday and it's very true, airlines said they were social distancing but they really weren't on my flight at all and instinctively i probably should have gotten off the flight when i saw that but they had us packed in like sardines. definitely not ideal, you know, when you're trying to combat a pandemic and trying to slow it down. >> katy, for those that don't know the doctor's background, this is a man who has tackled ebola, who understands every precaution in the world how to avoid a virus and we know he's taking extra precautions all the time. i'll be honest, this was a punch in the gut to a lot of us when we found this out. >> yeah. that he thinks he got it through his eyes is scary. i don't know a lot of us walking

out of our house wearing goggles. i might wear my glasses when i go to the super bomarket. >> i take my contacts out and wear my glasses on the outside. the best thing it does is keep you from touching your eyes as much. >> that's a really good point. also i'm still surprised to hear that airlines are packing people in. this is not the first that i've heard of this. a doctor went viral for posting i think his -- i think it was a united flight. they said they were going to take out middle seats and that's what he believed and when he went in, everybody was on the flight, a bunch of doctors, and in the pandemic the idea of getting into an airplane, a packed airplane right next to somebody, i can't think of anything more anxiety inducing than that right now, chuck. >> for sure. >> let's move on. for those who still have to travel internationally by

planes, the coronavirus outbreak has changed everything. our colleague, ali arouzi, documented his trip from london to teheran. >> i'm in my seat now, spent probably the last 15 minutes disinfecting everything with wipes. it's such a weird way to travel these days. i just arrived in doha at the airport here. this is usually a hive of activity, this airport, but as you can see, this place is deserted as well. not a soul in sight. everything is empty. on board this flight from doha to tehran, they've left a form called a coronavirus form. although the airport was pretty empty, i have to say the flight is fairly full. it has the capacity of around 280 passengers and they sell me that there are 165 people on board. >> joining us now from iran is ali arouzi. how packed was that flight? you were saying that a number of seats were empty?

>> reporter: yeah, not many of them, katy. a little over half the flight was full which was quite surprising for me. the airports were totally deserted, not a soul in sight. usually you hear the ambient sound of thousands of passengers speaking. all you could hear in the airport were the birds chirping. everything was closed, restaurants, lounges, duty-free. it was like being at school during a vacation. it was very surreal. but the airplane was fairly full. everybody was wearing a mask on board. most people were disinfecting their seats. they were trying to socially distance but it's not very easy to do on a plane. the airline didn't put in any measures for people to social distance, so it was an uncomfortable flight sitting there with your mask for 8 hours. the few people i did speak to were only traveling out of

necessity, either a business trip they couldn't avoid or they were trying to reunite with family they had been separated from for a long time. nobody was traveling out of pleasure, katy. >> chuck, do you have a question? >> ali, what was it like after you landed and what kind of process did you have to go through since iran's had such a rough outbreak? i assume they're pretty tough on travelers coming in. >> they were, chuck, and i was quite surprised at the measures they put into place. it was quite a novel experience. you have to fill out a big form before you landed full of questions about where you had been, who you had interacted with, your medical status. once you arrived in the airport you had to go through this weird machine which would spray you down with disinfectant. then off to another official who would ask you more questions and you would have to fill out a second form. then you were sent to this kind

of medical station where a medic would insert a swab in your nose, test you for covid-19. the swab was labeled, put away, and you were told that if you test positive for the virus, the authorities will get in touch with you within 48 hours and give you further guidance as to what you should do, whether self-isolate at home or go to a hospital if your condition was much worse. and then even when you were leaving the baggage collection point, before you could pick up your suitcases, they were all being sprayed down with dis disinfecta disinfectant. they've taken a lot of measures and it moved swiftly which is quite surprising as well. >> ali arouzi, you're there to see what else is going on covering this there and i'm sure we'll check back in to see how iran has been handling this outbreak. we know they've been struggling under the pressure as well as a lot of countries have. that is it for katy and i today.

thank you for watching and trusting us. nicolle wallace and brian williams right after a quick break. ace and brian williams right after a quick break. the way it works best for you. even the big stuff. you get a delivery experience you can always count on. you get your perfect find at a price to match on your schedule. you get free two day shipping on things that make your home feel like you! wayfair. way more than furniture. that's why usaa is giving payment relief options to eligible members so they can pay for things like groceries before they worry about their insurance or credit card bills. discover all the ways we're helping members today.

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good day. brian williams here with you. 3:00 p.m. here in the east, 12 noon out west. nicolle wallace here with us momentarily. first, a look at the headlines and facts as we know them at this hour. over 85,000 americans have now died from the coronavirus, nearly 1,500 more than when we

came on the air at this same hour yesterday. the death toll, sadly, is on track to reach 100,000 some time next week. president trump is in pennsylvania, a suburb of allentown right now. he visited a manufacturer of face masks and other medical equipment, notably not wearing a mask himself. the trip comes as the president is pressuring the state's democratic governor to move faster to re-open the economy instead of in regions. north carolina republican senator richard burr says he will step aside as chairman of the senate intel committee one day after federal agents seized his cell phone as part of an investigation into stock trades he made at the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak. here's what burr had to say about why he made this move. >> this is a distraction to the hard work of the committee and the members and i think the security of the country is too important to have a distraction. california democratic

senator dianne feinstein's office says the fbi asked her questions about her stock trades which she says were made by her husband. and we've been watching it throughout the day, dr. rick bright, the ousted head of the coronavirus vaccine told the house panel the country was not prepared for a pandemic and the administration's early inaction may have cost lives. dr. bright says he was removed after he raised questions about this push to use hydroxychloroquine, the anti-malaria drug, as a treatment. at this point i am joined by my friend and colleague, nicolle wallace, host of "deadline: white house." nicolle, i note that prior to leaving for pennsylvania, prior to getting on the chopper on the white house lawn, kaleigh mcenany brandished a binder today which she said was their pandemic planning, though we need a lot more details. it does beg the question why

then the pre-pandemic denial and why were they so quickly and totally overwhelmed by the arrival of covid-19. >> i think her arrival at the white house, if that's when the binders were made, it was already too late. just ask every single scientist the world over. i think the real image of a person brandishing a binder are the people that were brandishing the binders that left during transition during the weeks and months donald trump was elected in 2016. susan rice and ron klain and ben rhodes and the people that would have been involved in brandishing said binders have talked about the plans they made which really built on the expertise and the experience they gained in fighting ebola, but they were plans with dr. fauci's fingerprints all over them because they were made during the h1n1 planning that happened two terms before that in the second term of the bush

presidency, so i'm not sure what she was carrying around but the idea that any sort of planning took place on their watch, that is exactly what the public is holding them to account for, that they either ignored the plans that were given to them or didn't make any of their own. this dr. bright testified today president trump has decided at this point his best strategy for fighting this pandemic is to attack the planning and attack the scientists. he criticized dr. anthony fauci after fauci told a senate hearing yesterday that schools should exercise caution as they bring back students. >> i was surprised by his answer actually because, you know, it's just -- to me it's not an acceptable answer, especially when it comes to schools. the only thing that would be acceptable, as i said, is professors, teachers, et cetera, over a certain age. i think they ought to take it easy for another few weeks, five weeks, four weeks, who knows, whatever it may be. i totally disagree with him on schools and we will have -- i

call them embers, i call them spikes. he called -- i noticed he used the word spike. >> the president's allies on fox news and elsewhere have also launched a steady stream of attacks against dr. fauci, but those efforts may not be having much of an impact. a new cbs news poll finds that 62% of americans trust dr. fauci when it comes to information about the coronavirus. that's compared with just 38% who trust the president. all that comes as dr. bright tells congress that if the administration doesn't get its act together soon, things could get much worse. >> i believe with proper leadership and collaboration across government, with the best science leading the way, we can devise a comprehensive strategy. time is running out because the virus is still spreading everywhere. people are getting restless to leave their homes. >> when you look at the first four months of this year, would

you describe the government's and the administration's response as a success or a failure? >> i believe we could have done better. i believe there are critical steps that we did not take in time. >> nbc's garrett haake joins us now from capitol hill with more on today's hearing. garrett, it's the sort of thing that still stops you in your tracks, even with an avalanche of headlines like we have today. just take us through some of the most powerful blows that he delivered to the narrative donald trump is trying to get to take hold, at least among his supporters. >> reporter: starting even before the hearing, the president handed dr. bright a microphone. it's the way he's uniquely able to amplify the voices of his critics before congressional hearings. the president tweeted essentially attacking dr. bright saying he had never heard of him and to the degree that he had heard of them, he heard he was a

problematic employee and that's why he testified in the first place. being in the room and listening to bright over those several hours, he's a techno krat, a government scientist and wonk, and i think when he was most damning is when he was being most dry and talking about the specific areas in which he's an expert in which the government failed. on the front end it's the procurement and distribution of ppe which he described in pretty damning clarity as being a failure, and one thing that has not happened yet but certainly scared the bejesus out of me was talking about the way that the government is not prepared to distribute a vaccine even if we get it on the rosie timetable that the administration is presenting. he suggested it could be years until we get a vaccine. we only started ordering supplies to distribute it within the month of may. overall he described a situation in which they are putting out fires within the administration, but they don't really have a plan. take a listen.

>> there's no master coordinated plan on how to respond to this outbreak. we don't have a strategy or a plan in place that identifies each of those critical components, and we don't have a designated agency that is sourcing those critical components and coming up with a strategy to make sure that we have those supplies when we need them. we need this comprehensive national strategy, this end to end, that includes every component to make sure we can respond and protect american lives. >> reporter: supply chains and sourcing and long-term planning isn't sexy but it's why these bureaucrats exist in the government, brian, and we're learning today exactly the degree to which at least this one bureaucrat feels like the broader government has let the rest of us down. >> may explain why kaleigh mcenany brandished a binder at the south lawn prior to the helicopter departure today to say we've planned for this all along. garrett haake, our man on the

hill, thank you as always. joining our conversation at this hour, rick stengel, former undersecretary of state for public diplomacy and public affairs during the obama administration, also happens to be former editor of "time" magazine, these days a distinguished fellow at the atlantic council, and a professor of global health and social medicine at harvard medical school. doctor, i'd like to begin with you. you've been monitoring our conversation. what worries you? >> brian, thanks for having me on. i'm worried about the lack of an evidence-based strategy. we know that the public space is going to have to open at some point and to see the president not wearing a mask worries me because that's really the lowest aspect of the strategy, wearing a mask, targeted testing. we should be planning as a country about the different parts of the strategy. should we be putting upper room germ sidal lighting in places.

should we be thinking about nonspecific vaccinations that boost your immune system or layering different things on each other to act in synergy with each other and make the public space safe. i'm worried that that's not part of the discourse right now and i think that's where we should move. we need to move in that direction. >> rick stengel, listening to the doctor and other experts and just looking at the clips we air because we want to hear the substance of the speakers like dr. bright, pause for a moment and look at the atmospherics. you have one part of the country who feels it's their patriotic duty to get out and live their lives and huddle together again. you have another part of the country that feels quite the opposite. it's their patriotic duty not to do that, to stay home, to stay out of circulation. these hearings on the hill, dim lighting, people spread apart,

members of congress wearing masks, even the microphones they speak into covered in germ-free foam rubber, it's a lot to take in, saying nothing of the substance of the conversation. >> yes, brian. just looking at that math is disturbing in the sense that trump is pitting one half of the country against another and it has this symbolic form of those who would wear masks and those who wouldn't. so it's as though wearing the mask is a sign of weakness and he's pitting that part of the country that regards that as a kind of a liberal hoax. it's very disturbing. it's the way he's divided the country from the very beginning. he's never tried to enlist the whole nation as a source of support. to go back to dr. bright's testimony, i think one of the things that's disturbing is, yes, i completely agree with him, we need a whole of

government national effort to fight the virus but the horse is out of the barn. it's just too late for that. part of the reason is that trump doesn't want to actually take the accountability for having a plan. despite his press secretary brandishing a phony binder, he is devolving it and sending it to the states and saying it's your problem, and now that he's opening the country when there's this resurgence of the virus -- i hope there isn't but when there is, he's going to blame local authorities and governors for it. >> doctor, there's a parallel track at this point. you're talking about infrared lights and layered vaccinations to boost immunity, and donald trump is cheering armed protestors and refusing to wear a mask. how do you bring the conversations together? as a trump ally told me, we only have one president, at least for now, but the kinds of things

that doctors are talking about to save us aren't even, it would appear, on donald trump's to-do list. >> yeah, i guess if i were giving advice to the president i would say with the right type of science, with an evidence-based approach, you can have your cake and eat it too. if we can create safe public spaces through the layering of different technologies, we can open public spaces. the president specifically talked about schools in the piece that you ran. well, of course you have to have schools open so that parents and others can go back to work. you need campuses open so universities can function and university towns can get back to work, but that's not going to happen by magic. we have to be thinking what do we need to put in place and what will make these places safe. and we have some of the best scientific minds in this country. i'm telling you let's layer ppe, targeted testing, uv lights and nonspecific vaccination. somebody else may come up with a different answer. i just think that's where the conversation has to be moving, and that's not where i see it

moving right now and that worries me. >> rick stengel, to the doctor's point, the conversation is moving -- could be moving further from that. i think a week ago donald trump disbanded and then because of their poll ratings reconstituted the coronavirus task force. he's now sort of called in the code red against fauci, got fox news in primetime unanimously smearing him and maligning him. donald trump joined their chorus yesterday. we are moving towards, sadly, the likelihood that dr. bright's prediction about next winter could be true when it seems like a prediction like that would stop all americans in their tracks and demand a plan. what do you see as a possible offering from this trajectory we're on now? >> it doesn't look good, and even hearing you talk, nicolle, it sort of depresses me. it's kind of a war against data and a war against science. you'll have those death

statistics. next week we reach 100,000 people, that's indisputable. you can't do that. i think the most alarming thing that dr. bright said and garrett alluded to it is when we actually hopefully have a vaccine, there's actually no plan for the manufacture of it. there's no plan for the distribution of it. you can have people fighting in the streets and have the masked states versus the unmasked states competing for the vaccine. people need to be planning for that now. people need to be planning for when there is a spike again in the fall. dr. bright said the combination of just the traditional flu with coronavirus could create a nightmare scenario. people need to be planning for that. that was created during the bush administration, those are precisely the people that should be doing that and i'd like to see him back in his job doing that.

>> rick stengel, in part because people are so generous during home confinement to invite us into their homes, in looking at your beautiful home, a guy drove up and came to the door while you've been talking. i just thought i'd give you a heads up and let you know you can attend to that. rick stengel, our thanks. doctor -- >> one of my son's friends. >> okay. as long as it's friendly. doctor, thank you as well for your time and expertise. let's take a break in our coverage. when we come back, the former director of the central intelligence agency, john brennan, he will join us after being named by trump's intelligence chief and his republican allies in the senate who are trying to create a scandal against the previous administration. plus, the pictures are being called gruesome by some. taverns full of people in the great state of wisconsin after

the state supreme court strikes down the governor's stay-at-home order. all of it when we come back. s se order. all of it enwh we come back. tempur-pedic's mission is to give you truly transformative sleep. so, no more tossing and turning. because only tempur-pedic adapts and responds to your body... ...so you get deep, uninterrupted sleep. during the tempur-pedic summer of sleep, all tempur-pedic mattresses are on sale! during the tempur-pedic summer of sleep, - [female vo] restaurants are facing a crisis. and they're counting on your takeout and delivery orders to make it through. grubhub. together we can help save the restaurants we love. ♪we ain't stoppin' believe me♪ ♪go straight till the morning look like we♪ ♪won't wait,♪ ♪we're taking everything we wanted♪ ♪we can do it ♪all strength, no sweat

. we turn now to a developing story in washington, and let's be clear, forces loyal to the president are trying to make sure this develops further. the president's acting director of national intelligence, richard grenell, declassified and turned over to the department of justice a list of

obama era officials involved in pointing out that former national security director michael flynn was having conversations with the russian ambassador, sergey kislyak. these are the same conversations that flynn later lied about to the vice president and then to the fbi. grenell also passed that list to three republican senators who have since made those names public. as "the washington post" reports, quote, the list includes the names of more than three dozen former obama administration officials. among them are biden, former white house chief of staff dennis mcdonagh, former fbi director james comey, former cia director john brennan, and former national director of intelligence, james clapper. national security experts have raised alarms about this move as it's an attempt by the trump white house to shift the narrative on the russia investigation. former cia director brennan said the president's, quote, propaganda and disinformation

machine which operates according to a despot's playbook is the most aggressive and odious in history. it far surpasses even russia's ability to trample the truth. with us now is john brennan who served as director of cia from 2013 to 2017. he is now a national -- senior national security and intelligence analyst on this network. director brennan, i note that fox news has turned over the equivalent of hours of its programming to what they're calling this unmasking. for people just coming to it, for people who may encounter this p.r. effort, can you once and for all explain to people what it is they're seeing. >> good to see you, brian. what they're seeing right now is the politicalization of the intelligence community and an effort by the trump administration, as you said, to divert attention from the --

sorry. from the ongoing covid crisis. sorry about that. let's get straight what unmasking is. the national security agency which is responsible for collecting intercepted communications and then pushing them out to the intelligence community, the professionals, when they see these intercepts of national security value, they distribute these reports, and if there's a u.s. person's name in it, they will conceal that name for privacy purposes as well as for counterintelligence investigative purposes. so the report will say something like u.s. person number one, u.s. person number two, u.s. person number three. when these reports are sent out, there are individuals within the government who have the authority and responsibility to find out who might be engaged in discussions with foreign government officials, whether they be intelligence officers or foreign government officials or whomever. so there have been thousands upon thousands of cases in this current administration where there have been unmaskings of

these names which means that the individuals with the proper clearances can request the identity of the individual who was engaged in some conversation that was collected in this intercept. so therefore, it doesn't mean that they be declassified. it doesn't mean that it's going to be revealed publicly. it just means that the people in positions of authority and responsibility in fact are going to have the ability to understand who might be involved in these very sensitive conversations that could, in fact, be designed to undermine our security. so when i've heard some of the comments today like senator paul whose comments he has no understanding of the intelligence profession and he makes these innan comments that really misrespect. people are carrying out their responsibilities the way they should have. >> director brennan, let's try to get some of those facts into

the record. by nature when you ask for more information about a transcript that's been transcribed from an intercept, do you have any idea who the other person is? i guess i'm trying to get at, did the people that asked who kislyak was talking to have any idea who name would be revealed when they saw that information? >> generally not, unless within the context of the conversation it seems to be apparent that an individual may be affiliated with a certain group or organization, but generally the reason why you ask for it to be unmasked is because you don't know the name of that individual. so it's not as though obama officials were saying give me everything about michael flynn. absolutely not. quite interestingly, the number of reports that were in december '16 and january '17 that were declassified by richard grenell, i was surprised at how many dates and reports there were

there. maybe what mr. grenell should do is to declassify and then release the contents of those reports ain terms of what individuals were involved with. what he's doing now is just releasing the names of individuals who again were carrying out their authorized responsibilities. >> and remind people why the united states government was listening to ambassador kislyak. what had just transpired that we wanted to know, if anyone had wittingly or unwittingly been involved in what the russians were doing to our country and our democracy. >> i'm not going to talk about any specific individuals that might be the subject of u.s. intelligence collection activities or nsa capabilities itself. i think just say that the intelligence community and the fbi are keenly interested in understanding what our adversaries might be doing, especially inside of the united states and particularly whether or not they're working with u.s. persons to try to undermine our security. as we know, the russians were heavily involved in trying to

influence the outcome of the 2016 election, and so it would stand to reason that the intelligence community would have its collection capabilities focused on those individuals or entities or governments that played a role in that type of subversion of our democratic principles. >> director brennan, we know -- and you and i have had lots of conversations about this, that since the first weeks of trump's presidency he asked jim comey to see to it to let flynn go and he's wanted to reach his hands deep into the intelligence community and had two of the most subservient political i will lies in jeff sessions and mike pompeo, the cia director, your predecessor. this didn't happen, even under sessions' rule, the justice department and under pompeo's rule of the cia. what does it say to you that we now have a doj who saw to it to

let flynn go by subverting justice and a head of dni that saw to it to release names of people who sought information on the kislyak intercepts? >> nicolle, i think our country is in very serious trouble. when you have such blatant political corruption at the highest levels of the u.s. government, something i never thought i would see in my lifetime, but when you have an administration, white house, the attorney general, the acting head of the intelligence community all acting in concert to try to advance the personal interests of mr. trump and to misrepresent the facts and abuse the authorities within the intelligence community and in the law enforcement community in order to continue to perpetrate this egregious abuse of authority on the american people which is what it is. i think this is very, very serious. in my tweet i mentioned that mr. trump is playing by a

despot's playbook and i really believe that and despots do anything to obtain power and do anything possible to retain power and that means undercutting enemies and adversaries and co opting government, the judicial system, law enforcement and intelligence and security services. we see that right now playing out in our own country. again, i am aghast at what i'm seeing here when i witnessed this around the globe over the last several decades. until mr. trump came into the white house we never, ever had this type of egregious abuse of the instruments of government and the instruments of our intelligence and national security organizations that keep this country strong and safe. the fact that they're being manipulated and exploited by individuals who don't have the principles that are needed to lead our great country, i really am very worried about what's going to happen in the coming months.

>> director brennan, to our viewers, two quick reminders. number one, barack obama warned incoming president donald trump not to hire flynn. number two, chris christie who, despite having locked up jared's daddy in federal prison, was as loyal a member of the trump circle at that time, warned the president-elect that general flynn was, quote, a walking car crack. and then director brennan, i wanted you to react to this. former fed who's now fiaffiliat with yale law school tweeted, i love that the foreign intelligence the nsa was monitoring can reverse engineer the channels they were using on the dates they were in contact with flynn that was just released by the dni and if they are still using those channels, stop. she puts it, so that's fun. any reaction from you, director

bren