good afternoon. i'm katy tur. it is 11:00 a.m. out west and 2:00 p.m. here in the east. the united states topped 4 million confirmed cases of covid-19 today. that is roughly the size of the entire population of los angeles. and that is only the cases that we know about. all of that, too, in just six months. meanwhile, another 1.4 million americans filed first-time jobless claims last week. but senate republicans can't even get on the same page to officially present a proposal to begin negotiations with the democrats, who have had a bill ready since may. more on that in just a moment. also on capitol hill in a fiery speech on the house floor today, congresswoman alexandria ocostio cortez admonished

tedio hoe for calling her a sexist, derogatory name this week. she said it's evidence of a larger systemic problem, not just in congress, but across america. >> and michael cohen will be released from prison again. the president's former fixer was sent back into federal custody two weeks ago after refusing to sign a gag order, which would prevent him from speaking about his case to the public. a judge overturned that decision, calling it retaliation for his tell-all book. we have got a lot to cover this hour. so let us begin where a lot of the action is, over on capitol hill. that's where republicans' covid relief bill has yet to materialize. as of now, we believe the package contains incentives for schools to reopen, and some form of direct payments to families. but it's clear senate republicans are not yet all on the same page. steve mnuchin, who is representing the white house in the negotiations, admitted the president's desired payroll tax likely will not make the cut.

the white house also wants to significantly reduce the expanded unemployment benefits, keeping many households afloat. house speaker nancy pelosi argued today the proposals do not go far enough. >> when you see what they have on paper, you see what they don't have on paper. so when they say a trillion dollars and nothing for state and local, nothing for food stamps, feeding the hungry, nothing for helping with rent and the rest of that, nothing, so many things they don't have, then you realize how they're at a trillion dollars, how unacceptable it is. >> joining me now from capitol hill is nbc news correspondent leann caldwell. i'm curious why there is suddenly a brick wall in front of this. the democrats have had their bill ready since i believe may. republicans are just trying to come up with something now. and are not on the same page. bring us behind the scenes and

tell us what's going on. >> that's right, katy. a lot of these republicans are not getting on this legislative train, and mcconnell is trying really hard to push this train out of this station. they're meeting, the republicans are meeting behind closed doors right now at their weekly closed door lunch, and a lot of members walking in acknowledged they're not still supportive of the parameters of this legislation. despite the fact that secretary mnuchin, chief of staff mark meadows, met with some top republicans last night, emerging from that meeting saying that they actually have a tentative agreement. when i asked senator cruz just moments ago if he was warming to the idea of this legislation, he said, quote, hell no. so mcconnell has a really difficult task. he was supposed to release legislative text this morning at around 9:30 a.m. he was expected to speak on the senate floor about the bill,

too. none of that has happened because he's still trying to get his party on the same page as far as this legislation is concerned. meanwhile, democrats, they are kind of basking in the problems that republicans are having right now, as you mentioned, they have had legislation passed in the house of representatives for more than two months. here's what senate democratic leader chuck schumer said earlier this morning. >> now that senate republicans have finally woken up to the calamity in our country, they have been so divided, so disorganized, so unprepared that they have struggled to even draft a partisan proposal within their own conference. they can't come together. even after all this time, it appears the republican legislative response to covid is ununified, unserious, unsatisfactory. >> now coming up with all sorts

of trial balloons and ideas, perhaps a smaller piece of legislation, perhaps yesterday they floated just doing unemployment insurance extension. but what's clear is that there is no clear path as far as the republicans are concerned, katy. >> well, and the people who will suffer from that are the americans who are relying on that extra unemployment or relying on more money for the federal government as people continue to lose their jobs, they continue to go on unemployment. and yet their bills are still due. remember, rent and mortgages, loans due again on august 1st. leann caldwell, thank you so much. president trump is going to hold his third consecutive coronavirus briefing this evening. if the last 24 hours are any indication, the president will likely spend much of the event defending his administration's response to the pandemic. in an interview with fox news yesterday, though, he once again blamed covid tests for the increase in new cases across the

country. and he called testing overrated. >> to me, every time you test, you find a case. and you know, it gets reported in the news, we found more cases. if instead of 50, we did 25, we would have half the number of cases. i personally think it's overrated, but i'm totally willing to keep doing it. >> joining me now from the white house is nbc news correspondent carol lee. it sounds like the president is reverting back to form, talking about how it's only the testing that is making this pandemic such a big deal. i know there was a lot of hub bub over him staying on script the last couple days and delivering remarks that the white house had prepared for him. but again, in these interviews, carol, you can see him undercutting his own message. >> yeah, there's a bit of a contrast, right? when you look at what the president says, when he's at the podium these last two days, and he'll hold another one in a little bit of time at the white house again. what he says there, he largely

stays on script. the white house officials that we have spoken to say they're happy with the way things are going. these briefings are relatively short. you remember they used to stand there for sometimes as long as several hours, and now it's under 30 minutes. and for the most part, he stays on script. and then you see him in this interview saying that testing is overrated and it's worth pointing out that is something that obviously a number of experts vehemently disagree with, including experts who work for the administration and are part of his administration who say it's key to getting the virus under control, and one of the questions i think the president is going to face today is how he's doing that, why there still isn't a national strategy on testing and why there is this persistent problem where you have people who get tested, and then have to wait days, sometimes a week or more, to get their results. that's also, according to experts, something that's hurting their ability to get the virus under control. and as we see it spreading in states and cities across the country, katy.

>> carol lee at the white house, we're going to be watching tonight. and the state of texas is struggling to get a handle on its own outbreak. houston and san antonio are both seeing significant surges in the virus. and according to a new quinnipiac poll, nearly two thirds of texans now think the virus is spreading out of control. joining me now from houston is nbc news correspondent morgan chesky. so morgan, how do those numbers translate into behavior out there? >> reporter: yeah, it's funny you ask that, katy, because that same poll also came back with another statistic that really paints the picture how the mood has shifted here in texas. in june, that poll asked people, do you know someone personally impacted by covid-19? and only 30% said yes. however, whenever that question was reasked this past week, 65% of people said that they were personally impacted, either they had a friend or a family member who had contracted the virus.

so the mood is definitely shifting. we are seeing troubling signs here in texas, as officials try to contain it. but if there was any sort of glimmer of hope, if you will, it would be that hospitalizations appear to have at least stabilized. and that new cases in the state of texas, particularly here in hard-hit houston and up to the north in dallas, have started to drop off. now, all that said, city leaders and local agencies are stressing to everyone now is the time to keep doing what we're doing. in fact, i passed a billboard on the way to this testing site in houston that said too soon to stop. keep your mask on. and that is certainly the message from those we have spoken to, including houston mayor sylvester turner who had this to say about his city's current plight. take a listen. >> we still have a long way to go. okay. though we're seeing some slight improvement in hospital admissions and in the positivity rate, some slight improvement,

we still have a long way to go. and we're needing people to be very focused in keeping their masks on and engaging in social distancing. >> reporter: and the mayor mentioned that positivity rate, katy. right now for houston, it's sitting at around 25%. compare that to new york city, sitting at 5% or lower right now. they want to see that number starting to trend downward. that's why they have expanded testing sites across the city, and really across the state, in urban areas. there is still a bit of a lag time. we know labs are still backed up. people are having to wait days on end before they get their results back. and on top of that, there's another problem here, katy. that's that contact tracers aren't really even able to keep up with the problem. in some cases, not even calling people who contract the virus until two, two and a half weeks later. katy. >> well, that is completely

useless. morgan chesky, thank you so much. and florida is continuing to set the kind of records you don't want to set when it comes to this virus. it reported 173 new deaths. the highest single day total yet for that state. that is in addition to more than 10,000 new confirmed cases. but in an interview with fox news today, governor ron desantis disputed his state's death toll. >> i think the public when they see the fatality figures, they want to know who died because they caught covid. if you're in a car accident, and we had other instances in which it was no real relationship, that has been counted, so we want to look at that and see how pervasive that issue is as well. >> also in a brand-new quinnipiac poll, released just a couple minutes ago, 79% of florida voters say the state should have a mandatory face mask rule, as so many other states continue to have.

70% say the virus is spreading out of control. with me now is dr. eileen marty, professor of infectious diseases at florida international university. she helped miami-dade write its reopening rules. can you shed a little loit on what the governor was talking about there? are there people who are dying in car accidents being counted as covid deaths? >> we haven't seen anything to that effect in our county, and i cannot verify any validity to that statement. however, we do have to be very careful about who's collecting the data and to assure that the data is accurate. >> floridians are now saying that there should be a mandatory mask order. they're also saying the virus is out of control. are you seeing more people take their own behavior, what they can control, into their own hands and social distancing, wearing masks, in a way that would mean that they don't need to rely on the governor if he is

so unwilling to act? >> well, it's very different in different counties of florida because the mayor of each county makes the determination for his or her county. so in miami-dade, we have a mandatory mask order. and we also have civil fines for individuals not wearing masks. on top of the miami-dade rules, each individual city in the league of cities imposes their own mask rules. so for example, in miami beach, they're even stricter with mask regulations. the bottom line is, as you know, the surgeon general is here today talking with mayor jimenez from miami-dade, and encouraging everyone to use masks and use them properly because invariably, they are one of the tools that are in our toolbox right now that everyone can use to really help bring down the case numbers. but whatever tool you do use, you always have to remember it's one of the tools and we have to

use all of the tools, and we have to do it in a coordinated and proper way so that we can truly make an impact on this horrific outbreak. >> if everybody did start wearing masks, and the governor reverses himself and makes a mandatory mask order and say people actually listen to it, could you avoid shutting down areas of florida again? >> so, you know, i'm not the oracle of delphi, but if in fact people did all consistently wear masks, it would have a very significant impact on this outbreak. and if in addition to that they also made sure they practiced hygiene and respiratory etiquette and all of the physical distancing, all of the other caveats we have been telling people to do and took this virus seriously, yes, we could get this thing under control without having to have further lockdown.

but whether that will happen, well -- >> you know, we have been having the same conversation since march. you would think at this point, as the virus spreads, as more people are affected by it, as the science becomes clearer, even now as the president is somewhat endorsing masks, that people wouldn't be arguing about it any longer, that it would just be something we all did, like putting a seat belt on, it's not infringing on your freedom. it's keeping you and others safe. doctor, thanks so much for joining us and offering all of your expertise and giving us clarity about what's going on there. we appreciate it. and a little later this hour, i'll be speaking with new mexico's secretary of state about the president's decision to send federal agents like we have seen in portland into other cities across the country, including new mexico. plus, a judge has ruled former trump fixer michael cohen was wrongly sent back to prison. they called it retaliation, and

they ordered that cohen is to be released again. also, apology not accepted. for what it's worth, if you call it an apology. alexandria ocasio-cortez delivered a powerful speech on the house floor, slamming what she calls abusive language from her colleague, ted yoho. here we go. lift and push and push! there... it's up there. oh, boy. hey joshie... wrinkles send the wrong message. help prevent them before they start with downy wrinkleguard. hey! bud. hey, pop pop! so you won't get caught with wrinkles again. [woman laughs]

some companies still have hr stuck between employeesentering data.a. changing data. more and more sensitive, personal data. and it doesn't just drag hr down. it drags the entire business down -- with inefficiency, errors and waste. it's ridiculous. so ridiculous. with paycom, employees enter and manage their own data in a single, easy to use software. visit paycom.com, and schedule your demo today. what do we wburger...inner? i want a sugar cookie... wait... i want a bucket of chicken... i want... ♪ it's the easiest because it's the cheesiest.

kraft. for the win win.

ordered the release of the president's former attorney michael cohen back to home confinement. in a telephone hearing this morning, cohen's lawyers argued their client's forced return to prison was an act of retaliation for a tell-all book he plans to write about president trump. the judge agreed and cohen is expected to be out of prison again and back home tomorrow afternoon. joining me now is nbc news investigative correspondent tom wi

winter. michael cohen went back to prison just the other day, thinking he was going to sign home confinement papers. when he was there, he was presented with a bunch of paperwork saying he couldn't talk to anybody. why did the judge rule this was retaliation? >> so, essentially, that key clause, the clause he had eight conditions presented to him, as you said, when he went back to the courthouse the other day. it's first clause he couldn't post on social media, he couldn't talk to reporters, he couldn't write a book. it was the first clause that caught the judge's attention and the reason why we're here today, because michael cohen filed his lawsuit and sought the temporary restraining order. what happened here is the judge says, look, in my 21-year career, i have never seen a clause like this, and i find that it violates michael cohen's first amendment rights. so the judge said look, if we can come to agreements on points 2 through 8 and both sides said yes, we do, and michael cohen agrees to them, let's release michael cohen now. originally federal prosecutors working on this on behalf of the

justice department were presenting in court said look, over the next couple days, we'll work it out with the defense, we'll figure out clause one, and michael cohen can come out of jail. the judge said no, michael cohen is sitting in jail. he deserves to be home for the rest of his home confinement. tomorrow at 2:00 p.m., no later than that, he'll be on his way back to manhattan here and he will be able to serve out the balance of his sentence likely here in new york city. >> he's not a free man. it is home confinement, but even if he was sitting in prison, he would be allowed to talk to reporters and he would be allowed to write a book. tom, thank you so much for that update. we appreciate it. >> new york congresswoman alexandria ocasio-cortez had a powerful moment on the house floor today. she called out republican ted yoho of florida for a derogatory word, a couple of words, he used to describe her when he was talking to her on the steps of the capitol earlier this week. >> in front of reporters,

representative yoho called me, and i quote, a [ bleep ]. these are the words that representative yoho levied against a congresswoman. this is not new. and that is the problem. mr. yoho was not alone. he was walking shoulder to shoulder with representative roger williams. and that's when we start to see that this issue is not about one incident. it is cultural. it's a culture of lack of impunity, of acceptance of violence and violent language against women, and an entire structure of power that supports that. >> it was a strong rejection of the explanation and quote/unquote apology that ted yoho offered yesterday. which ocasio-cortez and others have just called an excuse.

>> having been married for 45 years with two daughters, i'm very cognizant of my language. the offensive name calling words attributed to me by the press were never spoken to my colleagues. if they were construed that way, i apologize for their misunderstanding. i cannot apologize for my passion or for loving my god, my family, and my country. >> joining me now from capitol hill is nbc news correspondent kasie hunt. it was that moment i think at the end when he said i cannot apologize for my passion. that's what set off aoc. tell me more of what happened there on the hill today. >> i think you got it, katy. that line at the end really seemed to repudiate what the congressman was supposedly going to the floor to do, which was ostensibly to apologize. and that led to alexandria ocasio-cortez first of all

confirming on the record for the first time that these are the words that she heard. she had kind of resisted doing that. there was a reporter from the hill newspaper who witnessed the moment and who published it, and while alexandria ocasio-cortez had acknowledged that they did in fact have two heated confrontation and that she heard him calling her names, she seemed reluctant to actually confirm this. and it wasn't until after yoho went to the floor and you played it all, said i'm sorry if i was misrepresented. he denied saying it, that oic y ocasio-cortez felt the need to go down with the women's caucus and defend herself. and nancy pelosi backed her up. take a look at how pelosi put this. >> they have called me names for at least, at least 20 years of leadership. 18 years of leadership.

i don't know. you know, it's so funny. you say to them, do you not have a daughter, a mother, do you not have a sister, do you not have a wife inwhat makes you think that you can be so, and this is the word i use for them, con condescending. >> he did say he had a wife, he has daughters. ocasio-cortez's response is having a wife, having daughters doesn't make you a decent man. acting in decent ways is what defines that, katy. >> let me play a little bit more of what she said addressing that. let's listen. >> what i want to express to mr. yoho is gratitude. i want to thank him for showing the world that you can be a powerful man and accost women. you can have daughters and accost women. without remorse. you can be married and accost

women. you can take photos and project an image to the world of being a family man and accost women without remorse and with a sense of impunity. it happens every day in this country. it happened here on the steps of our nation's capital. >> the reason why this is resonating so much is that there are a lot of women out there, i would imagine a majority of women, who have at some point in their lives experienced exactly that interaction where they have been called a name for no other reason that just being who they are. or walking down the street in some cases. >> and you know, katy, there hasn't historically been a lot of women around this place. it changed a lot in 2018, but even then, women still represent a significant minority of members of congress who are up here in this hall ways, and for many decades, and nancy pelosi experienced this, typically, the

advice that many women who were here would get from their mostly male colleagues is to basically just put your head down, do your work, and ignore all of that kind of stuff. and alexandria ocasio-cortez has really taken kind of a new way and a new approach dealing with stuff like this. and some of that is a cultural change that we have all experienced as a society. i mean, nancy pelosi came into a much different congress, and the way she talks about being a woman in this kind of a situation is a little different, but aoc, as she's come to be called around here, took it head on in a new way. i'm not sure those words have ever been said on the house floor before. that alone is pretty significant, katy. >> there's a younger generation of women out there that are just refusing to keep their head down and ignore that sort of behavior but are instead confronting it head on. whether it is on the house floor, as alexandria ocasio-cortez did, or on the street, as somebody might be yelling at them for not smiling at them. kasie hunt, thanks so much for

joining us today and bringing us this story. we appreciate it. >> thanks, katy. and there is still so much we do not know about how the coronavirus impacts children. now, doctors in the uk say they have noticed a disturbing trend, lingering neurological issues. and also an expanding list of hand sanitizers are being recalled. some you might have seen on the shelves, might have even bought yourself. the fda warns they could be toxic. we're going to bring you more details about this in just a moment. stay with us. with us

we're following the latest developments in the coronavirus pandemic. and here are the facts as we know them this hour. hospitals nationwide are nearing the peak number of covid-19 patients that we saw on april 15th. more than 59,000 coronavirus patients were hospitalized wednesday, according to the covid tracking project. that's just 300 fewer than april's peak. california surpassed new york in total number of coronavirus cases after the state saw a record-breaking day with nearly 13,000 new cases. the surge in new cases was closely followed by a warning from the california hospital association that more beds must be secured by the state as soon as possible. more than half of states in the united states have a mask mandate in place now. republican governors in ohio and

indiana issued state-wide mandates this week. bringing the total number of states with a mandate to 30. the fda is recalling a long list of hand sanitizers that may contain a toxic ingredient. methanol, sometimes listed in the ingredients as wood alcohol, can be dangerous when absorbed through the skin or ingested. check the ingredients of any hand sanitizers in your house currently, and visit the fda's website for the full recall list. and as millions of families are faced with a decision about whether to send students back to the classrooms this fall, we continue to learn more about the potential impact this virus is having on children. pediatric neurologists in the uk have started to see something new in just the past few weeks. issues with brain function in some children, including several who have also suffered from the covid-related multisystem inflammatory system. joining me from london is nbc

news global correspondent willem marks. you have been following this inflammatory syndrome we saw popping up around this disease. what are you learning now about what's happening with brain function? >> reporter: well, katy, there's been a pretty strong body of evidence about the impact on adults' brains once they have been infected with coronavirus. just in the last couple weeks, the hospital behind me, which is a focused hospital for children here in central london had a study out looking at 27 kids infected with that multisystem inflammatory syndrome. four of which went on to develop new neurological symptoms. talking about this in terms of the context of this pandemic is very important. this is a very, very small number of individuals affected. and i talked to dr. jennifer mcguire, a pediatric neurologist at the children's hospital philadelphia, about the frequency of the cases. >> it appears that the incidence of these complications is relatively low, however, if

we're going to have such a high volume of total cases across the country, even a low percentage that has a neurologic complication could turn into a lie absolute number. so i think that the better that we aggressively first try to just understand what this is -- >> and katy, doctors looking at this say it's not yet clear what the cause or mechanism is by which the virus impacts the brain. there's a number of potential reasons it could be happening but what they say really important, is for parents, family members who express these symptoms, hallucinations, fatigue, loss of memory. even slurred speech, to contact a doctor immediately. >> it might not be happening frequently, but it is something certainly to watch out for just in case. willem marx, thank you very much. >> the $600 weekly enhanced unemployment assistance for out of work americans expires in a week. and we continue to see signs of

this benefit still needed by so many. just today, the labor department said another 1.4 million people filed for unemployment benefits. and in some states like oklahoma, overwhelmed and outdated systems have created a huge backlog, leaving many unemployed americans with no benefits at all. with me now from tulsa, oklahoma, is msnbc correspondent david gura. so david, you join some people waiting in line for those benefits. what did you learn? >> reporter: this is a fascinating experiment that takes place in the building that's next to me. we think of applying for unemployment benefits at this kind of solitary thing. you do it by phone, perhaps you fill out a form online. what we have discovered in oklahoma is how difficult it's been for so many people in the state. there's an estimated 30,000 oklahomans who have not received their benefits because their applications are held up. they have started this program at least sites across the state. you can show up, get a ticket,

come back later and meet with somebody face-to-face. they're pitching this as you have somebody there who can answer your questions and help you fill out the forms and get the benefits. truth be told, these have been difficult weeks for folks here in oklahoma. new numbers out from the labor department today. we have seen more than a million jobs lost across this country for 18 weeks now. have been struck talking to people here by how many haven't gotten the benefits over the duration of this economic crisis. one is glenn patin, i caught up with him after he met with someone today. take a listen to what he had to say. >> well, last few month have been terrible. you know, i'm about three months behind on rent. a couple months on my car. food has been hard to get. trying to apply for s.n.a.p., but you know how that goes. it's been pretty bad. i have never needed benefits before. i have never seen anything like this before. america is a great country. we shouldn't be struggling like this. even with a pandemic.

you know? our government should be able to take care of us. >> katy, a lot of people here talking about that federal benefit, that $600 per week benefit part of the initial c.a.r.e.s. act as being so crucially important. this facility serves 2,000 people a week. you can kind of distill the problems they have been having and the stories, and one is they want to work. they really want to get back to the workforce, but the jobs aren't here yet, and a number of them, most of the people with whom i spoke, talked about the $600 benefit and the need to fortify the social safety net longer as they wait for the opportunity to be able to get to work and the opportunity to be able to get back to work safely. a number of people talked to me just about the dilemma they face. do they rush to get back to the work force as they're worried about getting sick themselves. they're looking at the epidemiological figures as well. >> as the virus spreads, you're going to see more shutdowns, more businesses not able to operate. david, really quickly, that extra $600, it wasn't just

benefitting individuals. there are economists out there that said that extra $600 benefitted the entire economy as well, allowed it not to sink even further. >> yeah, we're at a real precipice here. there's also been this moratorium on evictions, and glen, with whom i spoke, we heard a clip. he hasn't been able to pay rent for three months. there are a lot of people in the city who are worried about what's going to happen when that moratorium is lifted this week. people have just been getting by. nonprofits have been helping them out, but you're right. that $600 has bought food, paid for rent, made it possible for people to get on their lives as they look for work and try to get through this, katy. >> david gura, in tulsa, oklahoma, thank you so much. and first it was portland. and now president trump says he will send a surge of federal officers to other cities. albuquerque, new mexico, is on the president's list. the state's secretary of state is my next guest.

i called reputation defender. vo: take control of your online reputation. get your free reputation report card at reputationdefender.com. find out your online reputation today and let the experts help you repair it. woman: they were able to restore my good name. vo: visit reputationdefender.com or call 1-877-866-8555. $$9.95? no way.? $9.95? that's impossible. hi, i'm jonathan, a manager here at colonial penn life insurance company, to tell you it is possible. if you're age 50 to 85, you can get life insurance with options starting at just $9.95 a month. okay, jonathan, i'm listening. tell me more. just $9.95 a month for colonial penn's number one most popular whole life insurance plan.

there are no health questions to answer and there are no medical exams to take. your acceptance is guaranteed. guaranteed acceptance? i like guarantees. keep going. and with this plan, your rate is locked in for your lifetime, so it will never go up. sounds good to me, but at my age, i need the security of knowing it won't get cancelled as i get older. this is lifetime coverage as long as you pay your premiums. it can never be cancelled, call now for free information. you'll also get this free beneficiary planner. use this valuable guide to record your important information and give helpful direction about your final wishes to your loved ones. and it's yours free. it's our way of saying thank you just for calling. so call now.

bracing for another round of clashes between protesters and federal forces this evening. portland mayor ted wheeler was hit with tear gas as he joined demonstrators overnight out front of the city's courthouse. portland has seen 55 straight days of demonstrations and the involvement of those federal forces, according to local officials and people on the ground there, has only escalated tensions in that city. despite that escalation, though, the white house plans to send federal forces into more cities. the trump administration announced it would be expanding operation legend, the expansion includes plans to deploy 200 agents to chicago, and another 35 to albuquerque, new mexico. more cities could potentially follow. the white house contends the agents will help crack down on violent crime and are gnaw tasked with cracking down on

protests. let us bring in new mexico's secretary of state, maggie toulouse oliver. thank you for being here. the white house and the justice department are contending that your city, albuquerque, in your state, needs these federal forces because of rising crime. what do you say to that? >> well, i think it's deeply concerning for a number of reasons. first and foremost, this action is completely unprecedented. sending federal forces into a locally governed city when you do not have the cooperation of local election officials is deeply concerning. and secondly, this is a potential threat to our democracy. not only for the ability of citizens to be able to get out and peacefully protest and raise their voices regarding whatever issue is concerning them, but the entrance of these forces into albuquerque, which is my hometown, so that's fine, we can

say that, is also probably going to actually create the kind of or re-create the kind of civil unrest that we did see earlier this year. so it's actually going to have what i believe is probably an intended effect, to really re-create that level of civil unrest. it's very deeply concerning for a number of reasons. >> so do you think this is politically motivated? we had a number of guests on in oregon, there's also tom ridge who was on earlier this morning with my colleague, stephanie ruhle, saying this is politically motivated. and it has to do with the president's re-election. >> well, unfortunately, that wouldn't surprise me, and let me tell you why. albuquerque has been dealing with a crime problem. for a number of years. and in fact, the ostensible reason for sending in the troops now pertains to an agreement reached with the federal government well over a year ago. and of course, now we're about five days above the 100th day before election day, when the campaign really kicks in.

so as secretary of state and the chief election official for the state, i have to be really tuned in to and concerned about what the potential impacts are on our election of this activity. and my concern is not only that this is potentially politically motivated and for the purposes of a political campaign, but that these federal agents without accountability, without a timeline for understanding how long they will be here, could potentially be here in a way that could intimidate or otherwise outside affect our election here in new mexico. that is what is most deeply concerning to me right now. >> well, explain to me why you think it's going to affect the elections, though. expand on that. >> sure. so the reality is, right now, it's completely untransparent and unaccountable process that's going on. we have been given three reasons all within the last week about why these federal agents are being deployed to these cities that are largely urban and largely made up of people of

color. and so we have heard first that it was to quell the unrest. we heard second that it was to protect federal buildings, and now we had a third reason which has to do with crime more generally. but the problem is, we don't know when these troops are going to leave. there is no timeline. there is no clear communication from the federal government about exactly what they are here to do, whether or not their mission could change, and whether or not they will be here very short term or for the long term. and as we approach the election again in just about 105 days from today, if they are still here, who is to say whether or not these agents could potentially be used to intimidate or otherwise disturb the election process while they're here. and those are the kinds of concerns that i as a state election official have to have, have to be thinking about. we cannot have that kind of activity that would disrupt or otherwise derail our democratic processes here in the state. >> interesting.

new mexico secretary of state maggie toulouse oliver, thank you very much for joining us. >> there's a little bit of breaking news we want to update you on. the department of justice office of the inspector general has now opened an investigation into allegations of inappropriate force used in portland. so the doj's office of the inspector general is now going to be examining whether or not law enforcement personnel acted inappropriately in portland. important to note that this is the inspector general of the department of justice. and america's favorite pastime returns tonight. and this year's baseball season will be like -- unlike anything we have seen before. we're going to get into what it's going to look like and all the rules that will be in place. stay with us. j.d. power has named the most awarded for network quality 25 times in a row. this network is one less thing i have to worry about. (vo) then give people more plans to mix and match, so you only pay for what you need. that is so cool! (vo) include the best in entertainment

and offer it all starting at $35. with the most advanced iphone yet-- iphone 11 pro on us when you buy one. because everyone deserves the best. this is unlimited built right. only on verizon.

with the long awaited return to baseball today comes a whole new set of rules and regulations designed to keep everyone safe during the shortened season. face masks for some, social distancing in locker rooms and dugouts, games played in empty stadiums will give this 2020 baseball season a very different feel than years past. joining me, espn correspondent and mlb reporter pedro gomez. he is a voting member for baseball hall of fame. good to see you. thanks so much for being here. i was going through the list of rules, it is 100 plus pages. governs everything from what a

player does when they leave their house in the morning to where they stand in the dugout, how they interact with people in the locker room, how close they can get to an umpire. how is the game going to look and feel with all these rules? >> it's going to be unlike anything we've ever seen before in the 150 year history of baseball. you mention some of the things, you're showing some things right there. no spitting. a pitcher is going to have a wet rag in his back pocket, so instead of licking his fingers to get moisture on his fingers, he will go to wipe it down to get moisture. no arguing with umpires, that will be fascinating. we know players and managers absolutely love to argue. you're going to see arguments from six feet away instead of face to face. it is going to be interesting and different. masks, anybody that's not a player must wear a mask, meaning all managers, coaches, anybody

else on the field, in the dugout. players, it is optional. we know that some players are going to wear them 100% of the time. mike trout told me he plans to wear it. his wife is due with their first child the first week of august. >> yeah. >> which is not far away. he does not want to take any chances. >> you know, i was going to ask about what the pitcher would do with the no spitting rule. you answered that. what about when a player tries to steal second or try to get across home plate, beat out a throw from somewhere on the field. there's a lot of close interaction in those two instances. how are those going to work? >> there's close interaction there, close interaction when a runner reaches first base and the first base man is holding the runner on. umpires nearby. i know you come from a baseball family because of your husband. you're aware of these things. you're right. a player sliding into second base, there's contact with the

second baseman and shortstop. same at the plate. these are instances that everybody is going to be watching and making sure that there's nothing untoward happening, but there's no way to 100% guarantee that there won't be some exchange of something in the air in those instances. they're going to have to be as careful as possible. already we saw today the great left fielder juan soto, he tested positive, he will not play tonight. >> so what happens when somebody tests positive in the middle of the shortened season? >> well, the rules that baseball set up is that that player has to be taken out of the mix and he has to have two negative tests before he can rejoin his team, but that can't be -- soto can't take a test tomorrow and tomorrow afternoon, say i have two negatives. he will be apart from the team several days now until the tests come back double negative.

and then he can rejoin his team. but it is a new frontier, and i think i have a feeling we're going to be learning as we go as well. >> i'm happy baseball is coming back. i'm a little tired of my husband reliving glory days from college, telling you every play, every time he hit a homer, he hit a homer in orioles stadium. i heard that story 3,000 times in the past three months. so i appreciate that they're coming back. it will give us something else to talk about. thanks so much for joining us. we appreciate it. >> absolutely. you'll be hearing that story for 40 years, by the way. >> that's true. that's true. that will do it for me this hour. i will see you back at 5:00 p.m. eastern. i'm taking a brief interlude to hear my husband's baseball stories, but i will be back at 5:00 for "mtp daily." brian williams and nicolle wallace pick up coverage after a

quick break. after a quick break. it's about the humans. these humans, those humans. groovin, and golden. it's about getting more than health insurance and a partner who listens and acts. humana calls it human care. it's talking to a doctor from your couch, or helping you find a cheaper prescription before you ask. it's helping you fix the rugs so you don't fall, and keeping you social, online or off. it's getting to know you, so you can be your healthiest. that's our superpower. that's human care. from humana. that's human care. i have the power to lower my blood sugar and a1c. because i can still make my own insulin. and trulicity activates my body to release it like it's supposed to. once-weekly trulicity is for type 2 diabetes. it's not insulin. it starts acting from the first dose. and it lowers risk of heart attack, stroke, or death in people with known heart disease

or multiple risk factors. trulicity isn't for people with type 1 diabetes or diabetic ketoacidosis. don't take trulicity if you're allergic to it, you or your family have medullary thyroid cancer, or have multiple endocrine neoplasia syndrome type 2. stop trulicity and call your doctor right away if you have an allergic reaction, a lump or swelling in your neck, severe stomach pain, changes in vision, or diabetic retinopathy. serious side effects may include pancreatitis. taking trulicity with sulfonylurea or insulin raises low blood sugar risk. side effects include nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, belly pain, and decreased appetite, which lead to dehydration and may worsen kidney problems. we're committed to helping ensure trulicity is available and affordable. learn more at trulicity.com.

simon pagenaud takes the lead at the indy 500! coming to the green flag, racing at daytona. they're off... in the kentucky derby. rory mcllroy is a two time champion at east lake. touchdown! only mahomes. the big events are back and xfinity is your home for the return of live sports.

good day on this thursday. brian williams with you at 3:00 p.m. in the east, 12 noon out west. nicolle wallace will be along momentarily. we want to begin with headlines and facts as we know them at this hour. the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the u.s. has now passed the rubicon of 4 million. 16 days after reaching 3 million. over 144,000 have died, another 1100 souls lost