because of all we've done, the disk to trising to the amern people remain low. the cdc is requiring the use of non-face cloth covering. i don't take responsibility at all. >> it's not racist at all. it comes from china. >> we had a broken system and now we have great system we did all of this work. when you read phony story, nobody acknowledges this everything we did was right. >> what do you say to american who is are watching now who are scared >> i say that you're a terrible reporter that's what i say. >> hundreds of thousands of

people are going to die. you know what i want to do, i want to come way under the model. supposing you bright the light inside the body. i see the disinfectant, is there way we can do something like that by injection inside or almost a cleaning. >> we're going to have a rough week we'll have maybe a rough little more than a week there's tremendous light at the end of that tunnel things are going really well light at the end of the tunnel >> welcome to tuesday. it is "meet the press daily. we begin with the show these days with sounds from medical workers on the front lines of this pandemic. today we begin with a look back at some of the president's comments from the daily coronavirus briefings in the spring because now they are back let's be clear here, the white house appears to be bringing back the briefings starting

today to address a political plastic surgery f political emergency for the president. the white house' plan is not to have public experts up there at the podium even though the country is still reeling from paa publ public health crisis we can't emphasize this, it isn't a public health emergency that's bringing the president back to the white house briefing room it's a political emergency due to declining poll numbers. with that said, we'll bring you the president's remarks as soon as they begin as the u.s. reels from a record setting surge in virus cases over the last few weeks. hospitalizations approaching record lows. death s have surpassed 140,000 as the economy faces a historic and now prolonger crisis, we'll make sure to bring you the proper context of these presidential remarks and be fact checking his comments in realtime the president has tried to down play the severity of this

crisis he's made a number of misleading claims that are refute by the data on the screen we'll be putting that up whey a of these claims. the surge in hospitalizations proves thi the rise in deaths is only expected to get worse. as we await the president, should be noted we do not know he's going to focus on the virus at the podium today. it's possible he decides to distract from the virus and focus elsewhere. undocumented immigrants from the century kus cousus count that ib challenged in court. he's threatening to send federal troops into cities run by democrats. his administration is threatening to tank a widely supported bill to fund the military because the president does not want them renaming

military bases that are named after confederate generals the president is once again baselessly claiming that mail in voting is being rigged against limb those are what he's been talk about today or the actions he's conducted today. we'll see how much the virus coming up. joining me from the white house is our own carol lee peter baker is the chief white house correspondent for the new york times i know i heard about an hour ago dr. fauci said he's not been invited to this briefing you reported this would be the president solo, is that still the plan >> reporter: that's still the plan but the plan could always change this is a president who is unpredictable, as we all know. even his own aides would not commit to what this is exactly going to look like i think the fact that dr. fauci

said he wasn't invited to this briefing tells you a lot about what the president is trying to do here which is to really turn around the perception of his handling of the coronavirus pandemic because he's been criticized for it widely his poll numbers are lag and he is trying todemonstrate some sort of leadership on this less than four months before his re-election. what hi aides would like him to talk about is very much the coronavirus and specifics about what he's doing and his administration is doing to respond to that. the president, as you just laid out has a lot of other things if you're off into any number of topics >> peter baker, the focus on sort of drawing a line here whether it's on the city's issue, trying to send federal agents into cities or what he's doing with confederate generals, it seems to be the exact

opposite of the reaction you would have expected of somebody pulling numbers on race relations are at 33% it seems like of all things to di tract from the virus on, these don't seem to be the issues you might normally pick >> yeah, i think we should ban the phrase doubling down he's going back to his base, his core supporters and laying out wedge issues that have an appeal to conservatives who fear for the unraveling of the nation's culture. the idea that liberal cities are in flames. these are retro tactics that we use to see he thinks they will have some residents, at least with the supporters been soured on his leadership over the coronavirus

making out idea it's not just these liberal democrat mayors as he puts it but joe biden would take the country down in the path of it wouldn't be safe. it hasn't worked so far. he is protesting it now. he has to make it in a referendum >> dr. gupta, let's take the white house and the president at his word this will be a coronavirus briefing an pretend we have not heard before what could help us with this virus right now, today, what could he say unannounced today that would make progress against the virus. >> we're going to do it for the country. we're going to mandate

enforcement masks so if you don't wear one, you'll get a fine if he were to do that, it would transform message and the nature in which we're approaching this virus. this nature between public health officials, ten feet away from the icu and the presence of that i have to say i'm concerned with the diagnostic ceo said. he said by come the fall, they're not going to have enough capacity right now every major organization relies on quest and lab corp. to some extent to run their tests. it takes about five to seven days to finalize we hear you. have tests that are development. we're going to scale up those point of care tests.

we talked about this we need the right type of turns to turn schools to normalcy and it needs federal funding these are the two things i love to say >> do you have an ink ling as to why. we follow the public health experts, we would be conducting 30 million tests a week right noi. i'm thinking now, we can't get the results of five million a week in a timely fashion is this an issue of us not scaling up sooner. is this what the defense production act would have done we got to put up tech rare labs in 50 markets in this country. we're going to do it now and here you go. is that what we should have done where did we miss the mark on the lab part of this >> chuck, it's a great question.

>> lots of potential empty capacity not being tapped. there's just labs sitting there empty that they have accebasic a could run these swabs. i remember having this conversation with you back in march. what is the right type of test it's like the flu test the rapid flu test you swab you get a result back in 30 minutes. that's the test we need. there's probably ten companies, i could name, that are trying to develop a saliva spit test or swab in your nose test that gives you a result in ten minutes. the fda is debating whether it should be a home test. we need federal funding. this company needs hundreds of millions of dollars. that support was never there the focus was never there. it was on states going their own way. reporting just indicated it's the priorities that were not on the right things when it came to testing.

>> i know we have the two minute warning. never mind we will find out from the president himself. let's take a listen. in >> response to the china virus and what my administration is doing to get the outbreak in the sun belt under control seems largely in sun belt but could be spreading my team is working capitol hill to advance the next economic relief package we're working hard on it we're making a will the of progress i also know that both sides want to get it done we'll call it phase four i think we'll get it down. we will protect our workers, our schools and families and protect them very strongly one family, we mourn every precious life that's been lost i pledge in their honor we will

develop vaccine and we will defeat the virus we're doing well with vaccine and therapeutic development. i want to thank our brave doctors and nurses and front line responders. the job they do is incredible and they are truly brave my administration will stop at nothing to save lives and shield the vulnerable which is so important. we have learned so much about this disease we know who the vulnerable are we are going to indeed shield them again, the vaccines are coming they are coming a lot sooner than anyone thought possible, by years. you look at the old system and the new system, i think by years. the china virus is vicious and dangerous. we have learned a great deal about it and wo who it targets we're in the process of developing a strategy that is going to be very, very powerful. we have developed as we go along some areas of our country are

doing well others are doing less well it will probably, unfortunately, get worse before it gets better. something i don't like saying about things but that's the way it is. it's the way what we have. you look over the world. it's all over the world. it tends to do that. the governors are working very, very hard. we're supporting them 100% everything they need, they get we are taking good care. we have tremendous supplies and great supply chains. just about anything they need. that's a big difference from inheriting very, very empty cupboards. roughly half of all death vs been individuals in nursing homes or long term care. in one study, 90% of those hospitalize hat had underlying

medical conditions whether it's hard or diabetes young adults may often have mild or even no symptoms. they won't know they're sick they won't have any idea they have a virus they won't have any idea at all. america's youth will act responsibly and we're asking everybody that when you are not able to socially distance, wear mask get a mask they'll have an affect 99.6 of fatalities are in adults that's much, much less than 1% for children, young people by understanding these risk profiles and learning how who treat the disease, we have been

able to greatly reduce mortality in the united states we'll show you a chart and how well we do compared to the rest of the world we have several treatments already available that's significantly reduce the severity and duration of the disease, including remdisicir which has opinion very successful in wildly available steroid treatment. we have learned best practices for treatment and have shared findings and medical providers the relationship with other countries have been very strong. we're all working together this includes ensuring all hospitals are aware of the importance of different approaches to oxygen treatment, including high flow oxygen the importance of steroid treatment for those on vent laters

we have learned tremendous about the use of the ventilator and at the beginning people never had an experience like this. the doctors have become incredibly and nurses and help become incredibly good at the use of vent later which is a very complicated procedure and allocated remdisivir to hospitals and that's something they have really started they are using it much earlier fatalities have fallen 75% since mid-april. it's a great number. cases and fatalities rise in certain hard hit states which you're looking at right now, we're surging personnel supplies we have tremendous amounts of supplies we are in good shape continue to decline and is lower

than the european union and almost everywhere else in the world. you'd think the united states only involved and suffering from the china virus. the world is suffering very badly. the fact is that many countries are suffering. very, very badly better than most and with the fatality rate at the lower rate than most, it's something we can talk about but we're working again with them because we're helping a will the of countries that people don't even know about. i get calls all the time asking for help especially as it pertains to the vent lailators. they are very hard to get. we're making thousands now things will get better and

better we'll be putting up charts behind me showing different statistics and different rates of success i guess you could say things that we can do better on but you'll see them. the average age of individuals who tested positive for the virus was over 50 years old. the today the average age is significantly younger. hospital length links of stay are almost half of what they were in april. the stays are about half the rate of cases requiring hospitalization has been reduced and mor faulty among those admitted to the hospital is nearly 1.5 of what it was in april. we have learned a lot. things are happening like the

remdisivir these trends could change without our continued focus. we have relentless focus it's been that way from the beginning. we have learned so much. as you know in recent weeks we have seen a concerning rise in the cases in many parts of our south. look at south, southwest and west this growth in cases first began to appear in mid-june primarily among 18 to 35-year-olds we're facing a challenge across the rest of the western hemisphere mexico has opinion hit very, very hard. you know the president, a great gentleman was here two weeks ago. they have really been hit hard we're successfully identifying more asymptommatic and mild cases. some cases so mild that you

really don't even treat them some cases they don't know they are real i guess they're not very real because they recover almost immediately. per capita the u.s. is conducting 50% more tests than europe we have conducted nearly three times as many tests as all of the other countries in the western hemisphere combined. over 50 million tests. this allows us to isolate those infected even those without symptoms we know where it's going we are working to reduce turn around time. my administration has been aggressively responding to case growth in the sun belt and we continue to do so working very close with all governors right noi in particular those governors. we're coordinating with governors. i sent senior officials into

nine states to meet with governor and provide recommendations to the various leaders of the state, including hospital administrators, et cetera my administration has zero unfilled requests for unfulfilled requests for equipment or anything else that they need from the governors no governor needs anything right now. we think we'll have it that way till the end it's helping us greatly. i want to thank them very much the military has been fantastic. other procedures so hospitals are open for elective surgeries. we want americans to get the medical treatments they need all of the goefs, we have spoken

with say they have enough bed capaci capacity that's great thing our initial shutdown was to prevent the over flow to allow us to meet the demands caused by this global pandemic it was never an option in terms of what we're doing. this would be completely unsustainable. we're very aware of this disease. we'll end up with a vaccine very soon, all three. we're asking americans to use masks, socially distance and employ vigorous hygiene, wash

your hands every chance you get while sheltering high risk populations. we are imploring young americans to avoid packed bars and other crowded indoor gatherings, be safe and smart we're surging testing capacity to identify and isolate cases. this includes a newly approved testing platform to nursing homes across the south we're being vigilant with respect to nursing homes because you know the problems we had with so many people. so sadly they were infected. all the staff can be tested to ensure elderly are more strongly protected than anybody else. that's the high hising people. their loves ones after taking it it's a big difference. our goal is not merely to manage

the pandemic but to end it we want to get rid of it as soon as we can. that is why getting vaccine remains a top priority two vaccine candidates are this was achieved in record time. it used to be years before you were in a position like we are now. four other vaccines will enter final trials the first approved vaccine will be available immediately we have military ready to go we have great people a wonderful general who is waiting for the vaccine so they can distribute it in record time that's what's going to happen. our military is all set to go. we will deliver vaccine, therapeutic, whatever it is that's necessary and defeat the virus once and for all i'll take a few questions if you'd like

i will say this, i want to thank all of the staff, the white house staff. all of the doctors that we have been working with so closely a lot of positive things are happening. it's nasty, horrible disease that should have never been allowed to escape china. >> we're going to pull out of here for a second and do a little fact checking on the president. one of the things he said is it will probably get worse before it gets better that's true. i want to bring in dr. gupta just on couple of the medical things dr. gupta, the claim that the president made that the fatalities have fallen 75% since prid mid-april. it's worth noting fatalities are up 65% in the past two weeks

it gets skew those two statistics sadly, because you get to treat more cases, we're exert at treating cases how would you characterize it. >> thanks for the opportunity. first of all, the president is cite things like remdisivir and all these therapeutics that will be broadly available maybe give people out of the icu more quickly he's selling a bag of goods that's not true. maybe there's mortality benefit. we don't know. number two, we have gotten

better get people out of the icu more quickly and likely save they've lives easily we need more icu beds. here chuck it's hard to get an icu dialysis nurse sometimes. that's the biggest light staffing is an issue getting military and nurses and do docs to help is so key >> i'm going to pause it there let's go back. he's taking a few questions. let's listen in. >> how you handled this pandemic so far >> i think the american people will judge us on this. they will judge us on the economy that i created and already we're creating we're setting record job numbers, as you know i think we'll have a very strong year next year i think we'll have a strong third quarter.

a very good fourth quarter i think next year will be a record year. i think they will judge me on the tax cutting and regulation nobody has ever done to the extent we have been able to do it on rebuilding the military and how we handled the va. nobody thought that would be possible it's been many decades they can go get a doctor if they have to wait in line for two weeks or five weeks or two days. no judgment in all the things we have done. we sure, it's never been challenged the first year the president said i don't think any administration, any president has accomplished so much as we have accomplished from energy to health

should have been stopped wasn't stopped we had to shut things down to save potentially millions of lives. we did that. now we have started them up. i think we really started it up successfully >> you're saying it will disappear and now you're saying it will get worse before it gets better if americans keep dying, are you responsible for that in. >> the virus will disappear. i always tliek say either way when you look at it, the governors are working with me. i'm working with the governors we're working hand in hand i think we're all responsible. i view it as team. very good relationships with the governors. very good relationships. one dap we had a virus come in and i closed the borders did a lot of things that were good tens of thousands ov lives when

i close border nobody wanted to do it i wanted to do it. we closed the border to china. we didn't want people coming in from heavily infected china. fairly shortly, i closed the borders coming in from europe. those were tremendous moves. if it's one person too much but we're at 140,000, we could have double, triple that number if we didn't we did a lot of things right we did a lot of things right, including with equipment >> two questions my first question is we have very quick testing platform here at the white house it's great you get tested you know very quickly. do you think that it would be easier to reopen and restart businesses if we could produce more of those. >> we're trying to do it we're trying very much to do that

rather than sending your tests in and through the mail one day, coming back another day, it's a day and day. that's two days already wasted i like it the best >> my second question it's a bit different topic but one a lot of people are talking about a lot of people want to know if she's going to turn in powerful people i know you talked in past about prince andrew and you criticized bill clinton's behavior. do you feel she will turn in powerful men how do you see that working out in. >> i don't know. i haven't been following it too much i just wish her well i've met her numerous times over the years especially since i lied in palm beach i guess they lived in palm beach. i wish her well. i don't know the situation with prince andrew. just don't know. not aware of it.

>> on unemployment insurance, how much below $600 are you willing to go. you said it's back to back so why do wroe need to cut it at all? >> the economy is getting stronger we have chance to have a very strong economy with some of the things i spoke about more money than they expected to make and the employers are having a hard time getting them back to work they did that. it still worked out well because it gave people a lifeline. now we're doing it again they are thinking about doing 70% of the amount. the amount would be the same but doing it in smaller initial amounts so that people are going to want to go back to work as opposed to making so much money that they really don't have to we were very generous with them.

yet we're producing tremendous number of jobs that was something nobody thought possible >> yesterday you said wearing a mask was an basic of patriotism. why dwroinon't you do it more frequently >> i carry it and i will use it gladly no problem with it i say if you can, use the mask when you can if you're close to each other. if you're in a group, i would put it on when i'm in a group. >> it's not their fault. they have to be in the elevator. i want to product them also. i put on mask. i have no problem with the masks. i view it this way, anything that potentially can help and

that can potentially help is a good thing i have no problem. i carry it i carry it you saw me wearing it a number of times i will continue. >> can i ask a quick follow up are you sending this message yesterday you tweeted out an image wearing mask and last evening we saw you not wearing a mask at your hotel >> i was pretty far away from people i explained it very well if your close together, i would put on the mask and if you're not, i would say if you're for instance, i'll see like here you've been all tested i'll be with people that are fully tested in theory you don't need the mask the reason think about patrioti patriotism we have experts that have said in the past aren't necessarily that if they changed their mind,

that's good enough for me. i wear it when appropriate >> a lot of mempbs are surprised at your change of tone embrace the mask, social distancing >> i've never fought either won. certainly social distancing. that's common sense. i'd like to say maybe make it a bit further. >> the idea that things will get worse, perhaps, before they get better here and perhaps the realization that this resurgence, if you will, is for real when you used to talk about it in terms of little fires being put bem bers and fires and little fires you have a great governor in florida. you have great governor in texas. you have people that are very

skilled people i think they are going to handle it well. their hospital capacities are holding up but texas is a big state. it's well run and so is florida. i think they will do a good job. >> yesterday a study by a chinese company showed promising results for its coronavirus vaccine candidate. if china were first in developing the vaccine or even if it weren't, would the administration work with china to bring a successful chinese vaccine to the u.s.? >> we're willing to work with anybody that will get us a good result i think we had a will the of -- the reason we're testing is they had good results now we have to see testing for safety have to make sure it's safe. i think see something over the

next fairly short period of time maybe short period of time having to do with therapeutics and vaccines that are good we'll be doing this quite often. we'll keep you abreast of this and talk about some of the other topics like our economy which is doing well the stock market had another good day a lot of positive things happening. thank you very much. >> a succinct, about 30 minutes in total maybe less than 30 minutes there. the president reading from an opening statement. making the case that this current surge is not as bad as march and trying to lay that out. obviously check those statistics as he took a q and a, it was perhaps a bit more reserved version of president trump let me start with big picture first with carol lee and peter

baker. carol, sorry let me go to pete r -- peter baker. i'm told we don't have peter let me focus on the medical front. dr. gupta, i guess we can say this he's gotten message on masks >> i guess so. what's interesting to me is even if he's gotten message on masks, there's lot more he could do when it comes to messaging the governors and mayors to implement mask policies, enforcement like the mayor i thought it was interesting this overly rosy picture on testing. only citing aggregate numbers as though that shows the true nature of the outbreak what matters is the number of tests per confirmed case and an

out of control outbreak like what's happening in texas. it's how many tests you have to do to find a positive hit. in the united states, it's 12 tests per positive tests in places in australia, it's 300. new zealand 300 until you get a positive hit that mean we're testing too narrowly and we have an out of control situation. that's the metric that matter, chuck. >> i'm glad you brought it up. the president had a lot of happy talk on therapeutics and vaccines give us a reality check. >> well, a few things. i think he started out saying some good things not good in the sense they're rosy pictures but realistic things he started out like he was

taking notes to one of our conversations, chuck he mentioned just writing it down here it's a vicious illness. that's one of the first times he's really been saying that we have to shield the vulnerable, which is right out of the things that we have been saying that we need a national strategy that's the first admission that i've seen that he's willing to even say that. that was good, but then degenerated into the usual stuff about that most of the time it's fine and we're a lot of this is due to testing and the case fatality rates have fallen he's failed to address the fundamental part to what's going on which is we're seeing a massive surge across the south hospital staffs are rising, icu admissions are rising and there's no federal plan. that continues to disappoint yes, we are accelerating

vaccines and therapeutics. we have made a difference in icu care we still have fo federal plan with numbers heading towards 225,000 people by the end of october. 300,000 by the end of the year still unable to get lids arms around that reality. >> i want you to ard something specific that the president said he seemed the enormous confidence that we had the plan in place to district this vaccine to as many people as possible very quickly. if we can't get 30 million tests a week and we can't get tests returned add qui eed as quickly, why should we have faith in this distribution network what do you know about this that

can make us feel confident this could work giving the testing promises have never come through in. >> we haven't heard a lot of details about any vaccine distribution network we haven't had detail about operation warp speed the bigger issue is this from my point of view which is not just the distribution the white house connally talks about the vaccines in the same context that they talk about ventilators or diagnostic kits they see it as a manufacturing problem. it is manufacturing issues it's first and foremost giving the yearlong period it takes to get all of this safety and i have efficacy to show the vaccines work and are safe we're not going to vaccinate our way out of this problem for the next few months. we need a plan right now to prevent us from getting to 225,000 deaths by october and

300,000 deaths by december we can launch the plan i put something out today released what we can be doing now. there seems to be nounsing or interests in saving lives right now. just getting hammered and no understanding of that. >> carol lee, i think i have carol lee back wus and joshua johnson is with us in nbc news carol, you know, it's funny watching sort of facts than we heard him deliver before somehow making the case for masks. he is also trying to rewrite history a little bit here. he's saying i have no problem with masks

just this weekend he said people should have freedom with masks he never fought social distanci distancing rierms. he thought governors were being too stringent. that's why he moved his rally. what was point is this to prove he can have briefing without causing alarm >> i think that is the point the point is for him to get out in front of the public and deliver the scripted message that the white house wanted him to deliver and he largely did that he held it to under 30 minutes which is pretty remarkable for trump. a lot of what he heard in his opener sounded very familiar in terms of things we heard him say in march and april going through the laundry list of things his administration has tone in terms of a response to coronavirus sochl the new things and he seemed to acknowledge them he said it's going to get worse

than before it gets better he said that's not something i like to say. when he talked about masks, kristen welker asked him why he said it was patriotic to wear a mask and a couple of hours later went to his hotel in washington and wasn't wearing a mask. he said i was socially distanced. we know from the images he was close to people. broadly speaking, this is a white house that saw a president come out and largely do what they wanted him to do. he was rather disciplined for president trump compared to the briefings we saw in march and in april. >> joshua, i guess it's okay he made it here pi it is interesting where we are there's part of me relieved he made a case for masks like we have this problem but it's like, it took four months for you to

get to this point. >> four months and some very bad polling data for the incumbent compared the joe biden you said this is not purely about public health. this is also about politics and the president knows that coronavirus is one of those areas that some polls have shown voters say they trust joe biden to deal with more than him on top of that, some poll vs shown that the president and joe biden are kind of eyeball to eyeball now or within the margin of error in terms of the economy which was always president trump's wheel house when it comes to polling the tone of this press conference is 180 degrees from anything he has ever said in a coronavirus press conference he said when you're not able to social distance, wear mask whether you like it or not he said that the government is in the process of developing national strategy. he's never said that before. we're asking americans to use

masks, besafe, be smart. he's never said any of those things before. did mention that dr. birx was nearby, in the hall. i'm in the sure why she wasn't in the room. i don't -- i wish i could think of another plausible explanation as to why the tone was so focused and was so substantive other than the polling data. hopefully this tone will persist. >> it was medicatiission here of messaging. it was the case he was trying to use statistics that were technically accurate as we discussed earlier, a bit misleading in trying to say the mortality rate but the mortality rate

he would kind of acknowledge that address issue of mortality rate. >> not at all. if anything the threat is more omnipresent now because we talked about masks at length right now we're at a more dangerous inflection point than we were five months ago. this death rate flattening is -- it's such -- >> dr. gupta, your audio, we're having a bit of an audio problem.

finish -- address the same question is the lowering mortality rate something the administration deserves credit for? >> well, only in the sense that the american scientific community was able to look at icu patients and figure out that giving anticoagulants and remdisicir can increase the likelihood you'll come off the ventilator that is still a small -- it's still tells a very tiny part of the story. here is the real story covid 1 was the single leading cause of death in the united states on daily basis. we brought it down to 600 deaths per day. the country couldn't organize

itself to create a national plan and prevent a massive resurgence that's new going back up to 1,000 deaths per day the deaths will continue to climb. because of that we're not accounting for the silent deaths at home which are about 28% more than that and the realization, the reality that it is not just the deaths anymore. we've learned so much about the permanent disability from this virus, we can't say permanent. it's only been a year, but it's been the fact that we are seeing longstanding disability to the lungs, the heart, the vascular system, long lasting disability. so there is a failure to acknowledge the massive morbidity and mortality and the predictive models. so again, it is part of what i'm

calling a disinformation campaign from the white house, taking facts and factoids and stringing it together in this narrative that sounds positive but in fact is false >> if there was one head scratching answer that he gave, and it is a reminder why news conferences, you never know what will be asked. was the decision he made to repeatedly give well wishes to a woman who is under arrest for involvement in a sex traffic ring involving underage women, and because he knew her from palm beach, he kept wishing her well i'm guessing that is not what political consultants on either side of the aisle would have advised him to do. >> absolutely not. it was a real head scratcher and frankly, one of the things coming out of this that is overshadowing other things the president said about coronavirus. and it is interesting, because this is, he didn't get a lot of

questions that were off topic in terms of things that weren't related to the pandemic. and this one, his response, you know, obviously, he was asked if he had any confidence about a confidante of jeffrey epstein. and repeatedly, like you said, wished her well and that's getting a lot of attention on twitter and likely to follow him beyond just this briefing. >> the new york tabloids, they call it the woods sometimes. i have a feeling i know what they'll be focusing on i appreciate all of your perspectives and expertise we'll be right back. don't just think about where you're headed this summer. think about how you'll get there. and now that you can lease or buy a new lincoln remotely or in person...

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stream live tv, on demand shows and movies even your dvr recordings. download the xfinity stream app today to stream the entertainment you love. xfinity. the future of awesome. welcome back joe biden revealed more details about his plan to rebuild the economy after this pandemic discussion in delaware the third plank, they call it

build back better. an agenda that will likely cost more than $3 trillion. he did not however reveal more details about who his running mate would be, a night after dropping some clues during an interview with our own joy reid. >> are you committed to naming a black woman as your vice presidential running mate? >> i am not committed to anyone except the ones i've named and among them, four black women so that decision is underway and by the way, black women have supported me my entire career. >> we carried the president and we carried joe biden right here today on msnbc let me focus on that comment about four black women people started doing the math and saying i thought there were five the music stopped.

who doesn't have a chair the assumption was that the four are supposedly kamala harris, susan rice, and stacey abrams that doesn't have a chair but then you got pushback. what do you hear >> reporter: that's right. within minutes of the former vice president's comments last night, it was stress that had this was not a definitive list number from the former vice president in terms of his running mate in terms of where the process stands, chuck, biden is going to have to weigh in he's getting presentations from his team on the vetting work they've been doing over the last six to eight weeks if he says there is one person not in the group, he'll have to say so there was some real question of whether stacey abrams would get into the first round i look at this another way which is to say, the fact that he went

out of his way to say that he wouldn't pick necessarily commit to picking a black woman says that there are other people very much part of the discussion and i would put elizabeth warren at the top of the list. so a lot that we learned from joe biden about where this stands and his campaign doesn't like to get into the details we'll be moving from this location very soon to see the comings and goings of who might be there you know how important that will be >> i thought that was an important piece of news, that not enough people focused on was that there have been no face-to-face meetings yet. another person that i think is much higher on this list that we ought to not leave out is tammy duckworth. i think that has gotten more real in the last couple of weeks from what i understand as well so i think there are a few others on the so-called short

list this looks more and more like a convention weekend before pick, doesn't it >> reporter: there's no time line that i haven't seen them blow past. we were waiting on a decision whether he would get into this race he himself a few weeks ago said i can't promise the first of the month but he said several weeks before the could not vention but joe biden knows he doesn't have to make a pick until the weekend he remembers he was chosen so let's look at august 15 more like i than august 1st >> yeah. >> it's more like reply running mates get announced the weekend before than not being that anyway, following the biden campaign that's all we have for tonight we appreciate you tuning in with

us we'll be back tomorrow with "meet the press daily. >> good evening. thank you very much. on a busy night, welcome to "the beat." i'm ari melber i'll begin now with the facts. there are over 1 million coronavirus cases in the u.s. and 50,000 deaths april 2nd, about three months ago tonight the u.s. is approaching 4 million cases and topping 140,000 deaths that's the problem you see there on the far right part of the screen a portrait of a virus winning as the u.s. government loses. the reason these dates stand out is because of what president trump chose to do today. holding his first coronavirus briefing since what you see on the left since april 27th the president's return to the briefing process telling the nation what's going on with the virus reflects more than one thing. that the virus i