>> not for cause? the man was impeached. they have been fighting him for four years. >> we are as you know out of time. if you come back next time, focus on the questions, don't attack the questions. i appreciate you being here. thank you, we're out of time. that does it for the beat. bye to everyone. see you tomorrow at 6:00 p.m. eastern. keep it here now on msnbc. good evening from new york. i am steve kornacki. president trump disclosed today that he is currently taking an unproven drug as preventive measure against the coronavirus, meeting with restaurant industry executives at the white house. he told reporters he has been taking hydroxychloroquine for more than a week now. this is the anti-malaria including that he touted as a potential game changer in treating covid-19. >> did the white house doctor

recommend you take that? >> white house dr. didn't, i said what do you think. i said i would like to. a lot of front line workers are taking hydroxychloroquine. i don't take it because hey, people said oh, maybe he owns the company. no, i don't own the company. you know what, i want the people of this nation to feel good. i don't want them being sick. there's a very good chance this has an impact, especially early on. >> last month, the food and drug administration warned about the dangers of taking this drug outside of hospital settings or in clinical trials. today, the president downplayed those warnings. >> i get a lot of tremendously positive news on the hydroxy, and i say hey, you know the expression i have used, john, what do you have to lose, okay? what do you have to lose. i have been taking it for about a week and a half. >> every day? >> every day.

i take a pill every day. at some point i'll stop. what i'd like to do is have the cure and or the vaccine, and that will happen i think very soon. >> the president's comments come as he continues to push full speed ahead to reopen the country, with most states now in some form of reopening, with the weather warming up over the weekend, crowds began to flock to some beaches and parks after a number of governors eased stay at home mandates. pictures made the rounds showing crowds not always following social distancing in some places. moves towards reopening come after several weeks of encouraging new numbers as well, showing a curve that is flattened in many states and even begun to decline significantly in others. nationally, the number of cases is slowly, steadily dropping. for the 14 day period, new cases down 19%. testing up 40% with all-time high of 411,000 tests conducted sunday. right now, there are more than

1.5 million confirmed cases of covid-19 across the united states, more than 90,000 have now died. today, the governor of massachusetts announced phase one of his state's reopening plan, manufacturing, construction, places of worship can reopen with social distancing restrictions in place. underscoring concerns about the economic toll of all this, in a 60 minutes interview, jerome powell suggested it could take the united states economy more than a year to recover. >> it is going to take awhile for us to get back, but i would just say this, in the long run, even in the medium run, you wouldn't want to bet against the american economy. this economy will recover. it may take awhile. it may take a period of time, it could stretch through the end of next year. we really don't know. >> meanwhile, "the washington post" writes as the country moves into a new phase of the pandemic, trump appears poised to reside over the eventual

transition more as a sales and marketer than decider. i am joined by a reporter for "the washington post" and dr. john torrez. ashley, let me find out what exactly we know about the announcement from the president today that obviously took folks in the room by surprise. he allowed to that as well. he said he has been taking it about a week and a half. what do we know about the circumstances under which this decision was made? >> i think you're right, it did surprise everyone. the president as you said was sort of gleeful, i have been waiting to watch your eyes light up. he knows this is a controversial drug. i think there's some speculation. i want to be clear, we don't know this for certain. if you look at the time frames he said he has been taking it for, it tracks back until about a week and a half ago when both his personal valet and vice president pence's press secretary both tested positive for the virus, and we know

during that time it was a time of great anxiety and fear inside the west wing, despite their precautions, coronavirus had come there. people were incredibly nervous. the president was in a bad mood. it does track back to that period, but we don't know specifically if that's what finally prompted him to take what he had long been pitching to the american people, but had actually for awhile stopped talking about it until the surprise announcement today. >> dr. john, let me bring you in on that, it is interesting the time line on this. there was a lot of talk from the president and from others at the beginning of all this about the potential for hydroxychloroquine potentially to play a role in all this. but just as the president had stopped talking about it publicly until today, there hadn't been much discussion from anybody about this until today. what is the current state in terms of doctors prescribing this, using this. i understand they can use it

inco in compassionate use setting. is this being used at all any more? >> steve, i don't think it is being used nearly as much as the president alluded to the fact that a lot of front line docks are using it. a lot of doctors i talked to, friends and colleagues i know, none of them are taking it. i think what happened is a couple weeks ago, month and a half ago we saw results come out from observational studies and other issues where they were saying there is some problem with this. number one, it is not showing any benefit. there's a couple of studies, observational studies out of new york city, 3,000 patients found didn't cut immortality or the fact you may need to be put on a ventilator. then the va study showed it may increase your mortality rate. and there's no good study showing it does anything for prevention. i think that's when you hear people stop talking about this, and doctors in particular stopped using it because they're saying it doesn't seem to work well, it does have issues with

heart arrythmia. >> i am curious, gif enwhven wh fda has said, it is allowed under compassionate use standpoint, for the average patient out there, what would it take to get this? is this something that's unusual for a patient, especially p preventively to get? >> compassionate use is in hospital. that's where the fda is saying it should be used only for serious, critical cases, in hospital cases, not for people that are not in the hospital, but this is an fda approved drug, used to treat malaria 60 plus years. since it is fda approved, it can be used off label. this could be considered off label use. if a doctor prescribed it, a patient could get the prescription filled and use it for that, that's theoretically possible. right now, you hear a tide of doctors saying i'm not prescribing it, there are some, but vast majority say it doesn't work. it has issues and side effects

that we're worried about. let's wait and see what happens. again, it is approved for malaria, can be used for other things. the fda has come down with a warning saying only for compassionate use. don't use it outside the hospital. >> everybody that hears this, all the news about the virus making into the white house, into trump's circle basically. what is your sense over the last week of the level of concern that's existed in the white house about the reports of cases within the last couple of weeks? >> well, initially there was tremendous amount of concern for the health of the people that worked in the white house, especially the west wing, it is not as large as it looks on television, it is cramped more, there was a sense it could spread easily throughout. there also emerged a past system

of haves and have notes, people more senior, in close contact with the president received more frequent tests, felt like other people that weren't around the president as much but still asked to come to work were not getting the same level of precaution, so there was health anxiety. there was also a more political messaging psychological anxiety that came up in briefings where it made it harder for the white house to plausibly say to the american public it is safe to go out and reopen if the virus had invaded what should be the most sacred, protected space of all, the 18 acres of the white house. that said, someone today, senior white house official made the point that it might be hard to message it, there was a sense that the white house ecosystem worked as it should, which is that there were cases, the white house was able to do what the country is not able to do yet, test everybody, do contact tracing, isolate the infected person, isolate people that came in contact with the effected

person, give maximum flexibility to work from home. it has gone from anxiety to spin it as a success story. >> thank you both for joining us. i appreciate it. >> thank you. florida is another state taking additional steps toward reopening today. it moved to full phase one of reopening. this allows restaurants and retail shops to operate at 50% capacity. it had been 25% capacity. gyms are allowed to begin operating with similar restrictions. the state has not seen the spike in cases so far that many warned about at the outset for the current two-week period compared to the previous two weeks. new cases in florida are down 3%. testing is up 30%. joined by the mayor of miami, francis suarez. thank you for joining us. appreciate it. let me ask you about the big picture in florida. i know your city and part of the

state are the last in florida to begin the reopening process. you begin it this wednesday. we can talk about that in a minute. big picture here, when your state's governor ron desantis announced he was moving to phase one of the reopening, there were certainly lots of dire predictions about what this would mean. when you look at the statistics, so far you have not seen any of this spike. would you say it has been a success so far? >> i think it has, and i think the reason it has been successful is he has done it in phases. he hasn't forced local municipalities or counties to go at his pace, he has allowed them to go at their pace. we saw in the first phase one opening he eliminated palm beach, broward, miami-dade. he reauthorized reopening of broward and miami-dade that opens monday. we as a city are going slightly slower than miami-dade because we are the densist part of the

county. we are taking it in a cautious manner. >> right. talk about what's going to happen in miami on wednesday, in terms of what's going to be open, and as the mayor, what in particular are you looking at as a first alert system on whether there's a problem with how this is working in terms of an increase. >> the first things that are opening monday, i'm sorry, on wednesday, businesses up to capacity load of 25%. a week from wednesday, we open our restaurants up to capacity load of 50%. we're looking at the data every single day. two critical pieces of data we look at is new cases and also looking at hospitalization. obviously the criteria requires new cases diminish for a 14 day consecutive period. we thought we met that, entering to phase one. we're still monitoring that.

there are counter trends to worry about. looking at the data every day, and getting with statisticians and mayors of cities that we discuss this with on a daily basis. >> curious what your experts tell you, what your sense is when you start to talk about warm weather, people getting outside, south florida, people going to beaches. there were pictures of folks getting out there, going to beaches. some cases on the beach. they don't have masks on. what are your experts telling you, what is your sense about safety of folks being on the beach where you're open air, sunlight, got some breeze. are they telling you there's a difference in safety as opposed to being in a restaurant? >> mayor of miami beach decided not to reopen, a decision i agree with for now. not going to be open until early june. we have seen images through the

united states of people flocking to beaches. obviously beaches as you mention are warm weather, they're outdoors. the concern is that images you're displaying now show that people for whatever reason have a hard time socially distancing. that's the big issue. i think we have seen that unfortunately in some parks as well. we didn't line up completely on park openings, saw a rush to people wanting to go to city parks and had to be closed down. major cities, miami, hialeah, miami beach are going to not create rushes. >> what do you sense the economic impact of this will be? we have seen the statistics of unemployment claims going up, businesses not able to, threatened to going out of business, losing everything they have. having a partial reopening with restrictions, with folks at least ideally being more

cautious, what do you think that does to the economy? how far back do you think that gets it? >> i think the economy has been devastated. this is unprecedented what we had to experience not just in the united states but throughout the world and i think what we're trying to do is we're trying to make the best of two things that don't necessarily interact with each other. epidemiologists say the virus doesn't care about the economy, and the economy doesn't necessarily work in the context of a pandemic. so we're trying to do the very best we can working with business owners and experts and epidemiologists to be sure as we open we do it safely so we don't have to go back. the fear is that we open, if people don't take the responsible path, that we would be forced to have to go in the opposite direction. that's something we want to avoid at all costs. >> mayor francis suarez from miami. appreciate that. >> thank you, steve. hopeful, preliminary

developments when it comes to a potential vaccine. the latest where things stand and what the summer could bring. and senate democratic leader chuck schumer joins me on the purge of inspectors general, new reporting on what the ig was pursuing. stay with us. i love audible because it's a lot of stress relief, it's a great escape. so many great stories from amazing people... it makes me want to be better. it changes your perspective. it makes you a different person. see what listening to audible can do for you. sprinting past every leak in our softest, smoothest fabric. she's confident, protected, her strength respected. depend. the only thing stronger than us, is you. there's no better story than your story. and ancestry can help you discover it. you might just find the more you learn about your family history the more you'll want to know.

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welcome back. earlier today, u.s. based company moderna says a vaccine trial has early results. according to them, 45 people received one or two shots of the vaccine, and 8 healthy middle aged volunteers produced protective antibodies. it is important to caution the vaccine is in very early testing here. these results are only from the first of three stages of testing that they normally undergo. there are more than 100 under

development. in april, they received a $483 million grant from the u.s. government that would allow them to supply millions of doses per month in 2020 to americans if the vaccine proves successful. today's news sent their market value soaring, contributed to a big rise in stock prices. for more on this drug and future of the quest for a vaccine, joined by the chief medical adviser for bipartisan policy center and former deputy assistant secretary of health at hhs. thank you for joining us. appreciate it. let me start on the news, every time i see one of the headlines or read one of these, i get a little encouraged. we're all looking for some sort of hope here. tell us that news that the eight folks developed antibodies, how significant is that, what does it mean to you? >> steve, it is proof of concept. it is 8 people. looks like the vaccine was safe. it elicited immune response.

we're going to want full data on all 45. we're looking at future studies. we of course want to see how the vaccine does in more people, more people that get the vaccine, more clearly we can assess for adverse effects. we want to see not just healthy and young people getting this, but those that are vulnerable, the elderly. there are open ended questions here, also dosing is critical as well. again, this is a first step of a multi phase process assessing safety and efficacy. >> whether it is this case or we read another headline like this in a couple of weeks, if this is the first step, if it goes well, what is the next step? where do they go now? >> the next phase would not be just 8 or 45 individuals but hundreds of individuals. and it would also assess again a variety of different doses. if that goes well, over the summer they probably want to see

how this does in thousands of individuals, again, to assess for adverse events. it is about the number of people that get this, for how long they get this, make sure it is a generalized population. that gives you confidence that this is a vaccine that can work for the broader population. >> so this is the moderna vaccine, it got wall street excited. there's another potential vaccine getting attention, researchers at the national institutes of health here say they're seeing positive signs in trials from proposed oxford vaccine, currently conducted on monkeys. cbs reports when they were exposed to coronavirus, the monkeys that weren't vaccinated developed pneumonia. but those that got the vaccine, developed protective antibodies had no pneumonia, no virus in the lungs. the oxford study, there are headlines about this. folks running that study have been bullish in public comments.

you've got the example now, the nih says it sees in monkeys, human trials under way here, preliminary human trials. are they a little further along? is this one encouraging as well? >> well, i think all of these are promising but you have to be cautious. again, the vaccine development process is always fraught with complications, sometimes many of which are unexpected. again, it is all about safety, efficacy. even after you get through that, it is all about manufacturing, scaling, and distribution. i think it is positive that we're seeing so many different vaccine trials under way across the country and around the world as well, and again, the hope is that several of the candidates can demonstrate safety and efficacy and be scaled up. this is exactly what you want to see. you want to see activity all around the world. we're going to keep on hearing headlines like this. i think these are positive developments, but again, we have

to understand that it is important to be cautious, take this one step at a time, and follow the process as it moves forward. >> dr., great information, appreciate it. thank you. >> thank you. up next, the senate democratic leader chuck schumer of new york joins me to discuss the trump administration going after inspectors general. stay with us. her you're caring for your family at home or those at work, principal is by your side. we're working hard to answer your questions. like helping you understand what the recently passed economic package can mean for you. we're more than a financial company. we're a "together we can get through anything" company. now, more than ever. ♪ ♪

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well, sports fans going through withdrawal finally had something live to watch this weekend after two months of empty race tracks, nascar returned with a 400 mile race at the darlington raceway in south carolina. stands were empty. it was held without fans. but cars were on the track. the race followed guidelines from the cdc with mandatory protective equipment, social distancing, screening of individuals that entered the track. professional golf also made a return this weekend with a competition at seminole golf club in florida, it raised millions of dollars for coronavirus relief charities. featured two two-man teams. golf is one of the sports it is easy to do that. germany's soccer team became the first to return. it was a match played to an empty arena, got record television ratings in the united states. maybe more hope on the horizon for televised sports.

today, new york governor cuomo asked professional sports leagues to start planning for a season, a season without fans albeit. speaking of new york, back in a moment with the senate minority leader, new york democrat chuck schumer.

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welcome back. president trump late friday abruptly fired the inspector general of the state department, steve linnick. the firing at the urging of secretary of state mike pompeo prompted alarm from democrats that say it may be an act of illegal retaliation. before he was removed, he was investigating secretary pompeo's decision to green light arms sales to saudi arabia against the will of kongcongress. he was also reporting whether they used staff to run personaler anlds, walking his

dog, dry clieeaning, making dinr reservations. pompeo said he didn't know he was being investigated when he recommended the firing, saying he wasn't performing a function in a way we tried to get him to. here's what president trump said of the firing today. >> i think we have been treated unfairly by inspector generals. i can go into instances, but i'm not going to do it now, but the inspector generals when they're put in by obama, just like it could be if they were put in by me and it was somebody else's administration, especially the other party, it could very well be that you would be treated unfairly. >> what was he doing that was treating you unfairly? >> i don't know, i don't know anything about him. i don't know anything about him other than the state department and mike in particular, i guess they weren't happy with the job he's doing or something, because it is my right to do it, i said sure, i'll do it. >> he is now the fourth inspector general that the president fired in less than two months. and i am joined by the senate

minority leader chuck schumer of new york. good evening. thank you for joining us. >> good evening, steve. good evening. >> we've got reporting. first coming out over the weekend that he was looking into pompeo having staff do personal errands. there's now reporting this involved getting aid to saudi arabia. what is your understanding? do you have a cleesh sense whar he was looking into? >> no, i don't. but one thing we know for sure, this president has an aversion to truth. inspectors general are put in to find things wrong, bring them to the president's and public's attention to be corrected. when the president hears truth from someone, particularly a truth he doesn't like, he fires them. as you said, this is the fourth inspector general in the last few months, and it has happened over and over again. it happened with the head of

barta. when you have a presidency founded from running from the truth when you don't like to hear it, you know it will be a failure. one of the reasons it has been such a failure fighting the covid-19 crisis. again, they ran away from the truth. oh, this is a hoax. this will go away when the weather gets warm. oh, we don't have to worry about it. you cannot hide from the truth, you cannot run away from the truth. this is another rather glaring example of the president's aversion to truth which hurts the american people. >> let me ask you about the effort under way from one of your colleagues, republican colleagues, trying to get more information on this. the president earlier saying he doesn't know how linnick had been unfair. in a letter sent by chuck gra grassley, he was asked for detailed reasoning by june 1st. this follows a similar letter after michael atkinson's firing last month, another inspector general. according to grassley, he hasn't received a response. the way it works, there are 30

days until the firing takes effect. do you expect senator grassley, all of you in the senate to get response from the president, and if not, is there any step you can take? >> well, the president always stonewalls. greatest pressure can be exerted by senator grassley who always stood up for the inspectors general. that's been part of his career. let him put public pressure on the president, let him rally some of the other republican senators, most of whom seem to bow down whenever the president wants them to and get something done. that's our hope. >> we mention there are democrats, i think nancy pelosi out there saying there could be an illegal aspect to this. let me ask about the argument you hear from some republicans, it essentially says the president, any president, shouldn't be getting rid of an inspector general if he is looking into somebody in his administration, but the president can get rid of any inspector general. >> that's something, steve, i don't know the answer to that. the lawyers will have to look at

it. >> what would you look for in terms of the senate, in terms of your role in the senate, i know you're not the majority party. >> well, our role is to put pressure on the president to respect the truth, to keep the truth tellers in office, and to let the public know when he's doing what he always does. even what he said about hydroxychloroquine. who knows if it's true. he may not have been taking it for all we know. he likes to make a splash. i want to make a comment on that, steve. what the president did with hydroxychloroquine was reckless, simply reckless. the experts say, every expert that looked at it says it doesn't help you against covid. so he is giving people false hope. he may have people take it instead of going to the doctor, but it is worse than that. his own fda says it has bad side effects, whether it effects the rhythm of the heart in many bad ways. for him to say this is reckless,

shows no regard for the public. then you have to ask yourself, steve, why did he say it? does he have a friend or member of the family that might be benefitting? trying to divert attention from his failure at covid? maybe he likes to make a splash, regardless of the consequences. as i mentioned, one thing you don't know, maybe he is really not taking it, he lies about things characteristically, and when he hears the truth like with the inspector general, he runs away from it, fires it, pushes it aside. that's happened throughout covid, recently with the head of barta. >> when you say maybe the president isn't taking it, do you have information or have you heard something? >> no, i don't. i just know he seems at the press conferences to go into flights of fancy, make things up. i don't know whether he is taking it or not. i know him saying he is taking it, whether he is or not, is reckless, gives people false hope, has people avoid real medical attention, and can actually cause them trouble.

it is just dangerous what he did. >> want your reaction to news that came out today, there's a congressional oversight commission set up to oversee the cares act funding starting to go out the door. there's a $500 trillion treasury fund set up to get loans and guarantees to main street. reports today say about 37 billion of 500 billion, a very small share, has gone out the door. what is your reaction to that? >> well, we need a great deal of oversight, and the person i appointed has been leading the charge, they asked a whole lot of questions about the $37 billion. you know, when trump proposed this and the republicans put it on the floor, there was no accountability. you wouldn't know who got loans, what loan terms are until months and months later. we require that within -- we required in the legislation, had to fight them and won, within 14

days, every contract issued must be published in full, and every contract that's rejected should be shown as well. we'll get some real insight from the oversight panel as to what's going on here, and if it is done with the straight and narrow or some things going amiss. it should be the merits of the case, not who you know. >> this gets to another question surrounding the debate playing out there where you are now about another round of stimulus, certainly the house, democratic controlled house moved on that front. i know you want the senate to move on that front. one thing you're hearing from republicans, including mitch mcconnell, they're saying they want all money from the stimulus already enacted, including presumably the rest of the 500 billion to be out the door, to be disbursed, to measure impact of that before moving to another round. what do you say to that? >> it is absurd. it all won't be disbursed for months and months.

sometimes it takes months. unemployment insurance goes to july 31st. as we speak, there are miles, distressing miles of cars lined up at food banks, families that can't feed their children. people are being kicked out of their houses, losing their jobs, small businesses are going out of business. even if you listen to chairman powell, he says do something now or we'll create a much worse problem. the republicans' idea of waiting, sitting on their hands as we have the greatest crisis since the great depression is outrageous, it is outrageous. we are pushing them hard. if they're interested in where the money is being spent, why aren't we having ten hearings where the money is being spent. we had to push them to do a few hearings. they're not doing them. they're not interested. they're hard right people, say don't spend money, are hurting america dramatically. don't ask me, ask chairman powell. i look forward to his being

finally coming before us, three or four weeks after we democrats asked tomorrow before the banking committee. >> minority leader chuck schumer. thank you for joining us. >> thanks, steve. thank you. still ahead, the politics of covid-19, including eric trump sounding off, and president obama's take on his successor's response to the pandemic. stay with us.

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president barack obama gave his most public critique of the trump administration's handling of the pandemic. obama delivered two virtual commencement addresses saturday, though he did not refer to trump by name, his comments appear directed at his successor. >> doing what feels good, what's convenient, easy, that's how little kids think. unfortunately a lot of so-called grownups, including some with fancy titles, important jobs still think that way, which is why things are so screwed up. more than anything, this pandemic has fully finally torn back the curtain on the idea that so many of the folks in charge know what they're doing. a lot of them aren't even pretending to be in charge. >> and earlier this month in a leaked private call with alumni from his administration, obama referred to trump's response as, quote, an absolute chaotic disaster. on his return from camp david yesterday, trump told reporters he did not hear the graduation comments from his predecessor, but had this to say.

>> i didn't hear it. look, he was an incompetent president. that's all i can say. grossly incompetent. >> following those comments, the president sent numerous tweets, retweets attacking obama. back in february, trump accused democrats of politicizing the coronavirus, claiming the outbreak is, quote, their new hoax. over the weekend, the president's son eric attempted to push that claim further during an appearance on fox news. >> the democrats are trying to milk this for everything they can and it is sad. milk it every day between now and november 3rd, and after november 3rd, coronavirus will magically go away, disappear, everybody will be able to reopen. >> and as we begin to get closer to the presidential election, some republicans are growing very concerned about the president's standing now, what it could mean for him and for them in november. does that sound familiar at all? maybe it should. that's coming up next.

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welcome back. we are less than six months away from the presidential election. several recent polls show donald trump trailing the presumptive democratic nominee. this is true nationally and the most important swing states and with polls showing high unfavorable ratings for trump, his pension for erratic, inflammatory and polarizing outbursts show no signs of slowing down and behind the

scenes his party is reportedly getting nervous. look at these articles from "the washington post" privately, republican members of congress are bracing for defeat and acknowledge the election could be a landslide victory and from politico, they believe trump's path to 270 electoral votes are shut off. those headlines are not from the current campaign, they are from the last one and surely, you remember it well. almost nothing in 2016 seemed to go right for donald trump until he won. and right now the setup for the current race feels a little similar and once again as politico reports there is wide spread apprehension about trump's standing six months out from the election. for more, i'm joined by donna edwards a contributing columnist for "the new york post" and a

contributing columnist for t"th new york times". how 2016 and memories of it impact the how we think about 2020 is interesting. donna, let me start with you on that question. i could give you a long list and i'm sure you could, too, of the ways that 2020 is different than 2016. trump is an incumbent now running against joe biden, not hillary clinton. we're in the middle of a pandemic. there are big differences now but i'm wondering as somebody that wants to see him out of office and somebody who lived through 2016, what gives you pause? is there anything that givers you pause when you look at the polls that now show joe biden ahead as hillary clinton was four years ago? >> well, i think one of the things that's very clear is the level of disinformation there is out there in the social media and surrounds. i mean, i think that's a concern because it's something that we didn't learn how to combat in 2016 and we've got to really learn that lesson to fight for

2020. we had a problem with, you know, sort of generating the kind of turnout that we needed in very key states and i think democrats are learned that lesson but they can't get complacent and of course, we have a different candidate in this election and that obviously makes a difference, too, especially the way donald trump responds to joe biden. joe biden seems to really get under donald trump's skin, and he doesn't really know how to fight him, and i think, you know, donald trump was used to running against this system. well, he is the system because he's the incoumbent president. >> the president and allies appear to be dusting off the old playbook how to handle the opponent. the a.p. says their strategies are accusations of a deep state conspiracy, allegations of personal and family corruption, painting an opponent as a washington insider not to be trusted but the ap does note

that big difference from tour ye four years ago. the outsider is the sitting president of the united states. there is that difference and the attacks in 2016 were against hillary and bill clinton. the attacks in 2020 will be against joe biden. is the outcome going to be different given the target is different? >> well, i mean, i think it's obviously impossible to say and one has to weigh the polling data that we've seen with some of the betting odds that we've also seen that has trump up nine points. i point out just i think we need to be very cautious but also acknowledge that trump for all of his weaknesses and for all of his catastrophic failures in dealing with the coronavirus pandemic has a number of advantages that joe biden simply doesn't. he has the powers of income b t

bents and huge social media the incumbents haven't been able to match and considerable advantages in fundraising. it's true hillary clinton had great fundraising advantages four years ago and that did help her in the end. but those advantages are serious and democrats would be foolish to think this election is theirs to lose. this election is theirs to win. >> donna, let me ask you about what brett is saying and another advantage the trump folks think they have in this throughout the pandemic the president's approval rating is stable. it's in the mid 40s according to real clear politics and thesligr than when he came into office and despite depression-level unemployment. trump has a net positive approval rating on the economy. that's on your screen now. according to the latest cnn poll last week the president leads biden on who would handle the

economy better? that's what you hear from trump folks, from a lot republicans, as this country is looking to dig what came with the pandemic, those numbers, trump and economy, trump versus biden on the economy will work to his benefit. what do you say when you see those numbers? >> look, i think it's always troubling when you have, you know, greater support among people around trump's handling of the economy but the fact is there are 36 million people unemployed today. it's not really clear to me that there's going to be a recovery in those 36 million jobs between now and november, and really, the president's incompetence is what is challenging him right now, and i think that anything that the biden campaign and that democrats can do to get out of the way of demonstrating the president demonstrating on a daily basis how incompetent he is at the american people are

looking for something different. they want a leader. they want somebody who can handle a crisis and they want somebody whose word they can trust and find that in joe biden and look, i agree that this isn't just about getting out there and running against donald trump. we've got to do that. what we also have to, you know, build up our support among democrats to encourage democrats to get out to the polls and to make sure that people can safely cast their vote in november and confident cast those votes in november and i think that joe biden has an advantage there and especially when it comes to competency. >> brett, let me ask you the flip side of what you were saying a minute ago. you laid out what you see are the advantages trump brings to this versus biden and the possibility that that could put him in a good position but there's the argument, too, i'd like you to respond to this that if you look back at 2016, it was just this confluence of dramatic

once in a lifetime circumstances. a net margin of 75,000 votes across three states while losing the national popular vote by millions in an election where the opponent was historically unpopular and at the center of the political stage for a generation and now you put joe biden and incokucome -- incumbei and maybe he's in the game. >> i hope donna is right. let's remember donald trump's stock and trade is the politics of resentment and you can expect that's what he's rooting on now and it could work for him again. >> brett stevens and donna edwards from maryland. appreciate you both and i have a feeling this is one of those conversations we'll probably be returning to quite a bit over the next six months because i was thinking how to set this up. we can make all the cases why 2020 is different than 2016, and yet, we still don't know.

that's the one thing i think 2016 taught us. we can go into an election thinking we know and find there are currents we weren't aware of. we can talk about it a lot but won't know until election day. thank you both for joining us and thank you for joining us at home, as well. that does it for us now. "all in with chris hayes" up next. as the world moves on without america to work on a global coronavirus response, trump's plan for us get back out there. new dangerous messages coming from the white house with laurie garrett and dr. marry bassett. then, the political price of trump's coronavirus failures, will his job performance matter in november? plus a president who brags he learn aed a lot from richard nixon is dismantling safeguards from watergate and how big oil is benefitting from the treasury's massive corporate rescue fund