immune from covid-19. here are the facts as we know them. in georgia, four schools have already had to shut down classrooms after three students tested positive and one kindergarten teacher began showing symptoms. another 1.2 million americans filed for jobless claims last week. that is slightly down from the upward trend over the last two weeks. this as the united states is rapidly approaching 5 million confirmed cases of the virus and 160,000 deaths with more than 60,000 americans testing positive in the last 24 hours. health and human services secretary alex azar now joins me. mr. secretary, thanks for being with us on a very busy day. i wanted to ask you about the president's statements because he again said that children are almost definitely immune from covid-19. and that it doesn't have much of an impact. but the cdc tells us that at least 250,000 children and teens have contracted the virus and some have died. isn't the president sending a

dangerously reassuring message to partners, teachers, and school systems who are now deciding whether to open classrooms? >> well, andrea, i think first and foremost the president, we all want to make sure our kids are safe and our teachers are safe when they go back to school but we do believe that can be done, that if we put our mind to it, if we have a presumption figuring out how to get kids physically back to school in most circumstances, we can make that happen. we just need to make sure that we practice -- use face coverings, that we practice social distancing, we use good personal hygiene, and we design how we have the school interactions in a way that protects everybody. for instance, having the kids stay in the classroom and the teachers move from class to class. bringing the food to the kids rather than having them congregate in cafeteria settings. but it will be customized to the circumstances in each locality. but it's important kids get back, you know, for their physical health, for their mental health, for their

intellectual development, they actually need to be in these environments. we can do it safely, we have to put our mind to it, though. >> absolutely, i agree with absolutely everything you said. certainly there are some areas that are not hotspots where it can be done more easily, no argument about that. my point is the president's comments were so false on the face of it that facebook for the very first time removed a post from the campaign of his remarks and twitter suspended the trump campaign account for violating their policies against spreading misinformation about covid-19. your messaging is absolutely on target. why can't the president say that? >> well, i think, uh, we're still learning about kids. we're learning about the infection rates among kids. of course you don't see as much testing in youth so we're still learning. i think dr. birx has talked about we've got a lot we're still learning about kids, their infection rates. also their ability to transmit disease. one of the things that's pretty clear now is we've learned over the months of this pandemic, is

fortunately, and thank god for this, we see a very, very low severity rate of infection for kids 18 and under. i think it's been slightly -- any death is of course completely tragic, but i think we've seen in the 50s nationwide, even with as many cases as we've had in terms of fatalities of children and often associated with a severe co-morbidity. that's nothing to celebrate, we don't want a single child to die, but in proportion, i think it does help reassure parents a lot about their kids and the severe -- and the likelihood of severe consequences of infection for our children. we don't want them to get infected, of course, but it helps for parents to this about this. >> let me just say, yes, the younger children not only don't get as severely infected, if

they do in some cases, and we don't know enough about the transmission, whether they can transmit it to parents and grandparents. that said, they're not almost immune, correct? that's false. >> we -- we -- we -- we need to keep gathering data about kids and the incidence rate among kids. we put out a -- what we call an mmwr out of the cdc just i think it was last week, uh, that did talk about transmissibility among children at a camp setting. and so we have seen transmission among children. now, in that case, the camp did not do those really important steps that you and i talked about earlier, andrea, people -- the kids weren't wearing face coverings, practicing social distancing, doing good personal hygiene. they were without face coverings, participating in choir and singing activities which we actually know can be quite dangerous in terms of aspirating the virus out of an individual. so, umm, we continue to learn

about this virus. it is apathogen, and, uh, we're 7 1/2 months into this and we're going to keep learning about it. >> those are all very important facts to be shared with parents, especially with summer camp and schools about to reopen in many places or now reopening. the president also said yesterday, mr. secretary, that 50% of the covid tests are rapid tests, producing results in five to 15 minutes. that's not true, according to public health experts who say that those rapid test kits are still not widely available. >> well, what he was referring to is the fact that we basically have a 50/50 divide in terms of how tests are done here in the united states. we're doing about 820,000 a day. half of those tests are either the rapid tests that you mentioned or in-hospital tests that are same shift or same day. that's 50% of the testing that is occurring in the united states. the other half are by these big

commercial laboratories, thinking like labcorp and quest. their performance is improving. we've asked them to prioritize inpatient hospital patients as well as nursing home patients to one-day turnaround. labcorp is moving towards two to three days from the time of order until result. quest has been a longer delay on their testing but now that the fda has authorized pooling of samples, that increases their efficiency substantially and we should get their times much lower also. >> understood. but they're making millions of dollars off of this. we're six months into it. i spoke to a neighbor with three children, she had a test and it took her 14 days to get the results. >> well, andrea, obviously that's not acceptable. umm, and so, again, half of our tests are taking place instant or same day. a large portion of the commercial tests are taking i

think the average right now is 4.27 days for results and that of course depends on which vendor the -- the -- the lab site is using. those results are improving. but no, 14 days is not acceptable. and i know that those commercial lab sites also would recognize it's unaccept sxhbl a seaccepta getting that down. that's not actionable information. >> there's a lot of progress being made on vaccines and the president right now is speaking on the south lawn and is saying that he thinks there might even be, let me get this, a vaccine done before year's end, maybe around november 3. november 3 is of course election day. he also apparently said it wouldn't hurt his election chances but that the real goal is to save lives. i know we're speeding the vaccine, the warp speed project is working very hard, it's unprecedented, and a lot of progress is being made. is this -- is this also politically timed somehow?

>> no. no. umm, every effort that we're making is about saving american lives and improving the health of our people and we need to do it quickly. every day matters with operation warp speed. and that's what president trump has commissioned us, is to get vaccines, get therapeutics as quickly as possible, consistent with fda safety and efficacy standards. and we've had just an incredible last couple of weeks. we now have six vaccines that we have invested in. four of them have positive phase i trials. two are already in the final stages phase iii clinical trials. two more should enter those trials soon. we believe it is very credible that by the end of this year we will have in the high tens of millions of doses of vaccine meeting the fda standards and many hundreds of millions of doses by early next year. and on top of that, thanks to president trump's leadership, we now have therapeutics and we're going to have even more therapeutics. we've got remdesivir, we have

convalescent plasma, we have major investments in monoclonal antibodies, taking the antibodies that come naturally from those of us that recover, the consvalescent plasma and bioengineering it so we have supply. >> large portions of the population say they won't take the virus, which is of course important for eliminating the virus. in 2009, president obama took the h1n1 shot to alleviate fears over the vaccine. do you think president trump would do the same with an approved covid vaccine? >> i don't want to speak for any other individual. i can tell you, for me, i will take a vaccine if the fda authorizes it as safe and effective. and so i certainly will model that behavior. and we will, umm, we will ensure that the vaccine studies and the work of fda is transparent, that it meets fda standards.

the commissioner of food and drug, steve hahn, just yesterday published an op-ed making it clear that he's going to call balls and strikes based on science and evidence in approving any vaccines or therapeutics that come through this process. umm, we're going to run a transparent process. the best thing we can do for vaccine hesitancy is ensure that the data is out there so that doctors and patients can make decisions for themselves about what's right for them, what the safety and efficacy profile of any vaccine or therapeutic is, and does it fit their own personal circumstances. >> last night the white house trade adviser, peter navarro, again touted hydroxychloroquine even though the fda withdrew its emergency approval back on june 15, saying it provided no benefit against covid-19 and in fact could be harmful. can you explain why peter navarro and the president keep promoting it? >> well, what i can tell you is hydroxychloroquine is an approved medicine here in the united states, it's been

approved for decades, umm, we have -- >> but not for covid-19. >> it's not approved for covid-19. but the way things work in the united states is, once a drug is approved for any indication, it's on the market, and doctors can use it for what's called off-label indications. so right now, it's really up to doctors working with their patients to decide if hydroxychloroquine or other approved medicine can be effective in either prophylaxis or treatment for covid. there are ongoing studies still with hydroxychloroquine, i think we've got hundreds of studies ongoing with different therapeutics right now, and those results will come out. but doctors and patients need to be in the driver's seat. >> you're suggesting it's okay for the president to promote something that has been withdrawn for emergency use for covid-19 by the fda? i'm not saying it can't be done, but is that smart for people to

think that they can take it without harmful effects, cardiac effects? >> well, andrea, i think it's, first off, uh, any warning labels, black boxes, other indications are on the product per fda labeling. uh, what i think it's important to clarify about this emergency use authorization issue is, we received a donation from bayer of 3 million tablets that had been manufactured in pakistan when there was a concern of shortage of hydroxychloroquine here in the united states. that product was not made in a fda-approved facility even though fda thought it was an adequate facility. to introduce it into our stockpile, those tablets needed to be put under an emergency use authorization, that's the one you're referring to and that's the one that limited its use to hospitalized in patient settings. the fda revoked emergency use on

that product so it's not being used. but we have product throughout the normal commercial distribution channel. this is fda approved, fda lan licensed product in the united states. again, it's up to doctors and patients to determine whether any product is safe and effective to use under that patient's individual circumstance. >> was it advisable for him to retweet the video of the houston doctor who has had bizarre theories? >> well, i'm not going to get into tweets. what's important is that we're all out there communicating the core public health messaging, andrea, right now. if we want to get these outbreaks under control that we're facing, it's about wearing your face coverings, social distancing, good personal hygiene, and staying away from settings like bars or overcrowded indoor dining establishments where you're not going to be doing those things. that's what we all need to be talking about right now. that's what we saw yesterday. governor ducey went in from arizona and met with president

trump. you know, they had a very dramatic spike in cases as you know in phoenix. but with those simple measures, those simple individual empowerment measures that don't involve shutting our workplaces down, for instance, they have been able to turn that infection outbreak completely around. and i think it's a good lesson for all of us. we can do this but it's up to us as individuals, good, personal, responsible behavior can turn this situation around, as dr. redfield, dr. birx, dr. fauci have reminded all of us on a daily basis. >> you're going to taiwan for the funeral of a former leader. this is not just a courtesy, though, it's a big escalation toward china. you're going to be the highest ranking u.s. official in years to be going to taiwan. what signal are you trying to send and is it wise at this time to escalate the dispute with china? >> this is about taiwan and the united states and the partnership we've had in publish

health. there's a reason i'm going to taiwan as the health secretary. i've had a very deep working relationship with minister chen and taiwan over the last three years. taiwan has been a model of transparency, cooperation, and collaboration in the public health sphere, whether work on ebola in the congo or on covid. i'm going there to reaffirm that partnership and taiwan's important role in the international public health community, a role that over my deep protests over the last three years, the world health organization has denied to the 23 million people of taiwan even observer status. that has been revoked for the last three years. we have fought to get that back because they have an important role to play and they're an important model of how taiwan behaves in a transparent, collaborative, cooperative way. >> mr. secretary, thank you for your time today, we really

appreciate it. and we look like forward to talking to you again as this pandemic continues. >> thank you, andrea. and joining me now, nbc news digital senior white house reporter shannon pettypiece and a senior scholar at the johns hopkins center for health security. the president has been talking on the south lawn, shannon. let's talk about secretary azar's response and whether or not the president is putting the vaccine rollout in the time frame of the election. >> right, this is something new that the president reiterated at his departure from the south lawn moments ago, saying earlier and again that he thinks it's possible there could be a vaccine by november 3. now, none of his public health officials have said that. as we just heard from secretary azar, he is talking about end of the year, early next year, not november 3, which of course is less than three months from now, and we are still in the final stage clinical trials. but tens of thousands of people

need to be enrolled in those clinical trials first. then they need to be followed to see if they have any sort of adverse reactions and what sort of immune response they have. so that seems like a very aggressive timeline and of course november 3 being elections day. when the president was asked about that on the south lawn and specifically if this had anything to do with his election, he said it probably wouldn't hurt to have a vaccine out by election day. so something new we are hearing from the president, but of course, again, like a number of the comments he has made, including children, as you were asking azar about, not in line with what we are hearing from any of his health experts at this point. >> and i know we're waiting to see the actual tape because this is played back, it's not a live feed from the south lawn when he was getting ready to leave on marine one for andrews and then on to ohio, but do we know the context, was he asked or did he raise the issue of november 3? to put it in that time frame? >> earlier today he was asked in

an interview by geraldo rivera how soon a vaccine could be coming. geraldo specifically asked, could it be by november 3, and the president said it was possible. he was asked again by reporters on the south lawn, and he again said he was optimistic that they could potentially have a vaccine by the end of the year including by election day and then asked specifically about that november 3 timeline. and he again reiterated that that appeared to be a possibility, yes. >> thank you, shannon. and stand by while we bring in the doctor, because you as a medical doctor are in a much better position than any of us to go back over what we just heard from the nation's top health official. >> so i do think that the tone that secretary azar took was really good, i think it's an improvement over other people in the administration who have been talking, including the president. one thing that sticks out is when you asked about hydroxychloroquine, again, these

officials are failing to actually see the fact that we have multiple randomized controlled trials that show it does not work. and it's not helpful for the president to continually promote this drug because patients are getting confused between it and remdesivir and asking for one over the other. and it's this sanction that you see from top officials in this administration that gives the president's talk on this legitimacy that it does not deserve. so i do think that still continues to be a major problem. but i would like to see more of secretary azar, more defense of his hhs agencies like the cdc and the nih which are part of hhs. >> and at the same time, doctor, we know from dr. fauci now, he has suggested this before but he was much more specific, that there there have been death threats against him and his family. our colleague kate snow was reporting on "nightly news" last night, health officials, state and county health officials are either quitting or working under fear because of the way this has

been so politicized, there are death threats against them. >> this is actually disgusting. what it reflects is an attack on expertise. it starts from the top. it starts from the white house, they have continually tried to undermine cdc experts, people like nancy mess onier, people like tony fauci. they're not looking for fealty to reality but fealty to the whims of whatever fantasy world or unreality people are living in, stoked by the president's followers who believe he is infallible when it comes to coronavirus. what you're seeing is the opposite way you want to handle an infectious disease emergency. you want to be hearing from the cdc and from the experts all the time, not being clouded with politics, not being told this is something being made up or sinister or a scheme against the president. all of this has made this outbreak so much harder to deal with from the very beginning.

>> we're going to play the president's tape in less than a minute. doctor, finally, the safety of schools. secretary azar laid out all the conditions, as you point out, that are accurate, but in the hotspots, in the last 20 seconds or so, would you send a child into a classroom in one of those hotspots? >> in a hotspot, if you send a child to school, you should expect there's going to be an exposure and that child is going to be put into quarantine for 14 days, and it's going to be very, very disruptive. in the hotspots i think it's going to be very challenging. >> thank you, doctor, thank you, shannon. the president is speaking. >> totally disparaged and insulted the black community, what he said is incredible, and i don't know what's going on with him, but it was a very insulting statement he made, and i guess you'll figure that out, you'll see it in a little while, but it was a great insult to the black community, uh, we're going to ohio, we have great things

happening in ohio, uh, we have a, uh, lot of wonderful things happening for the country. i'll probably be talking to you a little bit later about the coronavirus. we're going to try and keep that at about the same time. we have a lot of good information, some new information. vaccines are doing very, very well. we had some good talks this morning on vaccines and on therapeutics. a lot of good things are happening. >> reporter: you said a vaccine could be ready by november 3. will that give you a boost in the election? >> i'm optimistic it will probably be around that date. i believe we'll have the vaccine before the end of the year, certainly, but around that date, yes, i think so. >> reporter: will it help you in the election? >> it wouldn't hurt. it wouldn't hurt. but i'm doing it not for the election. i want it fast because i want to

save a lot of lives. >> reporter: mr. president, in an interview this week you were talking about people dying of coronavirus, you said that's true and it is what it is. you used the words it is what it is. is that the message -- >> look at the statement i made right after that. >> reporter: but that doesn't mean we aren't doing everything we can. >> yeah, and i said something after that too. >> reporter: what message does that -- >> the message i have is very simple. nobody can do what i've done in terms of all of the things that we're doing to, uh, combat this horrible disease that never should have been sent to us, that was sent, it came from china, should never have been allowed to leave china, they could have easily done something, they stopped it from coming into china, but they didn't stop it from coming into the u.s. and europe and the rest of the world. and china should have done something about it. and frankly, it's a disgrace that they didn't. >> reporter: will you talk with

governor cuomo when you're in new york? >> we'll talk to governor cuomo. they're looking to do a project, the second avenue subway, as you know, we're talking about that, we're also talking about the tram from the airport to a certain location. so we'll be talking to to him, yes. >> reporter: will you meet with him? >> uh, i think they have something scheduled maybe in bedminster. >> reporter: what evidence have you seen about children being immune from this virus? >> all you have to do is read the newspapers or read -- read the medical reports. >> reporter: the cdc, mr. president, says -- [ inaudible question ] >> we're going to see. what china did is a terrible thing. whether it was in confidence or on purpose, it was a terrible thing they did to the world, not only to the united states but the world, a terrible thing. >> reporter: any comment on the attorney general in new york

moving to dissolve the nra? >> i just heard about that, that's a very terrible thing that just happened. i think the nra should move to texas and lead a very good and beautiful life. and i've told them that for a long time. i think they should move to texas. texas would be a great place. or to another state of their choosing. but i would say that texas would be a great place and an appropriate place for the nra. this has been going on for a long time, they've been absolutely decimated by the costs of that lawsuit, and it's very sad, but i would suggest that that's what they should be doing. thank you. >> the president on the south lawn talking about a lawsuit from the new york attorney general against the nra. we'll have more on that later. but first, new york city is cracking down on travelers from 34 states and puerto rico. now setting up quarantine

checkpoints at entry points to the city, including bridges and tunnels, for visitors from areas with high infection rates. nbc news correspondent ron allen joins us from penn station in new york city. ron, how is this going to work, how are they going to enforce it? >> reporter: that's a good question, andrea, it's really unclear. here at penn station, people are meeting a train from florida, a train from washington, d.c., because there are people perhaps from virginia and maryland which are both hot zone states. they give them information, essentially a landing card that you get on international arrival, trying to give them information on where they're going to be and how to reach them. they've made as many as 100,000 phone calls and texts who have filled out these forms that have been out there since late june. it's only now, because new york's numbers are so low and they're trying to keep them low, that they're talking about enforcing this and being much more aggressive about this. so there are representatives from the city's sheriff's department who are making random

stops in tunnels and bridges coming into the city, there's stops here at penn station. what constitutes the $10,000 fine they're talking about is still unclear. the bottom line is new york wants to keep these numbers low and they think people coming in from out of the state are bringing the numbers it and they want to control it. >> thank you so much. joining me, democratic senator kirstin gillibrand from new york. do you think the quarantine checkpoints are a good idea? the enforcement issue raises big questions. >> i do. in fact, the governor and the mayor have done a good job in flattening the curve in new york. one of their recent studies show that one out of every five new cases are from people out of state. so that is a huge infection rate. and so we need to make sure that people who do come in, because they want to see family or they have work or whatever it may be, that they quarantine, that they follow the rules and make sure that they keep our city and our state safe.

>> as you know, 1.2 million workers have filed for unemployment benefits in the last week. it's ticking down but it's still around 30 million people unemployed during this period. is a deal getting closer to extend the supplemental benefits, to do something about mortgage and rent evictions and issues in, state and local? a lot of conal issues. the president apparently just at andrews before getting on board air force one said he thinks they might make a deal with democrats. is this going to happen? >> i certainly hope so. what we've seen out of president trump and mitch mcconnell is a complete lack of empathy and lack of willingness to focus on the real needs of people. people are living in their cars right now. people are becoming homeless. the protections for renters is about to run out in most states. there are several states that have not renewed those protections. we have people who don't have

enough food to put on the table for their children. at food banks, in the bronx, the line goes around the block to get a bag of groceries. in upstate new york, the lines go for miles with cars in line to get food. we need unemployment benefits extended. we need it to include the $600 a week. we need to make sure we have money for food, food stamps, for s.n.a.p. we need to make sure there's rent relief so people don't become homeless. it's pretty absurd not to fund state and local governments. they're going to have to cut more employees, they're going to have to cut first responders like firefighters, they'll have to cut teachers right when we want to reopen. this is not a time to be cutting workers at the front line when we not only have a pandemic and unemployment numbers as high as over 30 million people. >> you are a former presidential

candidate, and you've been through the mill, you know what it's like. at this stage do you think someone who has had elective experience running for office should be the choice? what do you think are the most important qualities, let's say, in joe biden's vice presidential pick? >> i trust joe biden. joe biden is going to pick someone with whom he knows he can work well. the women that are being discussed are qualified, are fantastic. i think any one of them would make an extraordinary vice presidential pick. but i trust joe, he'll pick the right person for the country. i look forward to exchancampaig for both of them, remotely most likely, but i'll go where they need me. >> do you think, given the history, that it should be a black woman this year? >> i think the women of color that joe biden is looking at are

fantastic. i think black women are the heart and soul of the democratic party and their vote has shown to be so powerful in winning electio elections, not only did we flip the house in 2018 but we continued to show great progress in the senate seats around the country. my ambition is for us to flip the u.s. senate so we can govern once again and to make sure president biden will have the support of both the house and senate in his agenda. >> the president has suggested he could even deliver his acceptance speech from the white house which is crossing every line, if not breaking a law, the use of the white house for politics has never been done. what is your reaction to that? >> i think it's an outrage. president trump continues to demean his office. he continues to break norms. and if anyone helps him do his speech, it's in violation of the hatch act. so he may well be exempt, but

again, to misuse federal resources for political gain is something that we do not tolerate and is illegal in many respects. so i hope he does not choose to again cross that line and continue to undermine the office of the presidency by doing things that are inappropriate and unethical. >> finally, a quick question on mail-in balloting, which he has misstated and falsely claimed is often fraudulent, which it's not, but what we're doing to the post office now, the cuts by this political donor who was put in there as postmaster general, do you have any confidence this can be fixed in time for the election? >> i have deep concerns. not only does the postmaster general seem to be a political operative without the relevant experience, but we have challenges. we just saw in new york that it took six weeks for two elections to be decided based on the

mail-in ballots. we saw problems with people's votes not being counted because ballots weren't stamped when they were received. some post offices don't follow the same routine and the same protocols and so they weren't stamped, so a lot of votes weren't counted. so we have a lot of work to do. we hope we can include several billions of dollars in the next covid relief package to help our post offices to make sure that they can open. i also have a big idea called postal banking which does two things. one, it funds the post office to the tune of $9 billion a year. two, it creates banks out of every post office, 30,000 of them, every community in rural america, in inner city america, and turns them into local banks. they used to do this, they helped us recover from the great depression, they helped after world war i and world war ii. if we can use post offices for bank accounts for the 30 million americans who are unbanked or underbanked, it will help us

recover. because to have a savings account, to have a checking county, to ha account, to get help paying bills, this is business that the big banks don't take, they don't provide checking accounts for the lowest income hard working people. two solutions, fund the post office in the covid package, and give states the resources they need for this election. president trump continues to mislead the american people, saying there's fraud related to mail-in ballots. it's not true, our military active duty service members vote by mail every year and we do not have an experience of voting fraud. so what we need now is resources so they can count the ballots. they also should start counting early since there's early voting in a lot of states, they should start counting the ballots two weeks before election day so they're ready for whatever is received on election day and afterwards. >> senator gillibrand, thank you

so much. we have breaking news as well, ohio governor mike dewine was tested because the president is heading to ohio and he tested positive. the republican governor of ohio is now going to quarantine for 14 days. he was only tested because the president apparently of course is now on air force one heading to ohio. the lieutenant governor was tested and he is negative. but ohio republican governor mike dewine has tested positive for covid-19. and meanwhile, nbc news' latest reporting on who joe biden might be picking for a running mate is up next. we have the inside scoop. stay with us. stay with us are you still at risk for a heart attack or stroke?

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as joe biden narrows his choice for running mate and plans one on one interviews with the finalists, he was asked if he has forgiven top contender

kamala harris who tangled with him in the first debate. >> i don't hold grudges. i've made it clear i don't hold grudges. it was a debate, simple as that. she's very much in contention. >> moments ago on capitol hill, senator harris was asked about the vetting process. >> reporter: how is the vetting process going? >> you probably know more than i do. >> what she said was, you know more about that than i do, said senator harris. joining me now for the inside scoop with the man who has it, nbc news correspondent mike memoli in wilmington. senator harris is still a leading contender, mike, but we're also reporting, as we have for the last two days, that michigan governor gretchen whitmer is also in consideration. what do you know about that? she had an announcement yesterday. let's actually play that announcement that she made yesterday declaring racism a

public health issue. >> today i also signed an executive directive declaring racism as a public health crisis in michigan. this pandemic has confirmed and highlighted the deadly nature of these preexisting inequities caused by systemic racism. >> it's hard to read the tea leaves but that could be a strategic announcement. her lieutenant governor would take over, he is african-american, which is significant in michigan, a battleground state. what more do we know? >> reporter: that's right, andrea, we've been cautioning all week that once joe biden himself has fully engaged in this process and the ball is entirely in his court, some of the names we've been talking about as making that final short list could change. and our understanding, the reporting from you, from kristen welker, and myself, is that gretchen whitmer hasn't so much reemerged, she was always in the

top tier. joe biden campaigned for her in 2018, has spoken glowingly of her leadership especially during the coronavirus. she's been facing a lot of criticism especially from republicans in her own state but continued to retain her popularity and is very much in the mix. the million dollar question, andrea, this is the case for everybody we've been talking about as potential finalists, will she get that final interview. all eyes on whether those interviews are beginning and whether she is pafrlrt of that group. >> and kamala harris and susan rice are thought to be two other leading contenders. >> reporter: that's right. but andrea, we need to understand that some of the calls being made now to the finalists are at least telling them to be ready that those interviews will be taking place either in person or virtually, that does not hasn't been made yet, but we'll get a better sense of who is in that group once that happens. >> and he's going to be speaking

to other people besides those two or three, he'll give himself options. thank you so much, mike memoli. despite warnings that the russians and other foreign actors are trying to interfere in the 2020 elections, republican senators ron johnson and chuck grassley are accusing democratic leaders of, quote, knowingly and recklessly promoting false election narratives for political purposes. the top democrat on the senate intelligence committee, mark warners, is one of the leaders who received that complaint in a letter from those two republican chairs and joins me now. what's going on here, senator? >> andrea, i don't know. some of this may just be the back and forth. we just finished our fifth volume, bipartisan, overwhelming vote on our 2016 investigation, the conclusion is that the russians interfered, they did it to help donald trump, to hurt hillary clinton. we hope to have that released to the public shortly.

we're still pressuring the administration. i'm glad to see they took a first step in acknowledging russia, china, and iran. but i think they have an obligation to tell the whole story so that americans don't become manipulated by russian misinformation and disinformation. >> and in fact, the state department put out a $10 million reward on this very subject against russian misinformation, russian propaganda that can be used through social media. it's remarkable that these chairs of these key committees are in fact not only not agreeing with this. you've had briefings. but are pursuing their own issues. in fact in the instance of senator johnson, and collecting false russian/ukrainian information against joe biden. >> again, some of this is in the public domain. some of it is not in the public domain yet. i think it is really incumbent upon the intelligence community

to be really forthcoming. i know they want to protect sources and methods, and we can do that. but if we allow americans and in some cases american elected officials to be manipulated by foreign actors, that doesn't do any of us any good. ing we can take a lesson from sweden and the baltic nations where they educated their population about how russia comes in, plants false stories, and their populations have now grown accustomed to that and they can help spot russian disinformation. we've not done that same education to the american public. we're 88 days away from an election. and frankly, early voting starts in my state september 19. we need to keep the pressure on the ioc to come forward in a more forthcoming way. >> so as far as you're concerned, the intelligence community has not, not been forthcoming enough in alerting the public. >> i think there is an ongoing

debate in the intelligence community. listen, the intelligence community by their just very nature likes to keep things secret. and then you do have to protect sources and methods. but at the end of the day, their customer in this case, as my colleague angus king said, usually the ic's customer is another part of the intelligence community or the president or congress. but their customer in this case is the american public. and i think they owe the american public to err on the side of further disclosure so that people don't get tricked, so we don't say a month from now or two months from now, some story splashes out there, and it would then be traced back to russia. why weren't we warned of that ahead of time? >> let me ask you about mail-in voting, because the president praised florida, again, led by a republican governor, and ally, and where he votes, that the state has worked hard for developing a system for appropriate mail-in balloting.

he's sued nevada against mail-in balloting. are they tried to discredit a process that needs to be widely used to have a safe election during a pandemic? >> i think this is clearly the effort of the president to try to depress mail-in voting which has been used safely, securely, without fraud, in a whole series of western states. many of them republican states like utah, which has got a stellar record. i think people can see through the veneer, when, you know, the absurdity of him being against mail-in voting when he uses that practice himself to vote in florida, and now to no longer focus on florida but to focus on nevada where there happens to be a democratic governor. i think most people see through this. we have to work on educating the american public, that this election will be different. there will be new means and methodologies. a lot of it will be mail-in. we have to be careful that the post office is not being abused. some of the stories coming out of post office these days of changes and delays in mail may

be just a lead-up to efforts by the administration to further gum up the works. >> now, secretary azar just told me today that the beginning of next year, end of this year, as others have said, is the best, most optimistic deadline for a vaccine. but the president talked about november 3. is he trying to have a november surprise, and at worse, rush vaccine production? >> again, i would hope no responsible leader would play politics with this virus. but, you know, we've seen this president be against the u.se o masks until he got shamed into wearing it once, still not having a national testing program. i heard from some of my hospitals and nursing homes last week that they're still buying off the black market in china their equipment. this is the united states of america. why haven't we ramped up our own

production, or if buying from foreign sources, buy in bulk and make sure we have quality control? this failure of leadership, i think historians will look back in the not too distant future and say, on testing, on ppe, this administration was a dramatic failure. and my fear is, if we don't have a plan on vaccinations and get ahead of the game, and not trying to mandate this by some specific date, we're going to be in a real problem. >> thank you very much, senator warner. on vaccines, there is a controversial new approach for actually testing the vaccines. richard engel has that exclusive report, coming up.

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a controversial proposal is being debated to dramatically speed up testing on covid-19 vaccine. the standard procedure is to give the vaccine to volunteers who then live normally which means they may or may not be exposed to the virus. oxford is trying to speed up the virus by giving volunteers the vaccine and then giving them a dose of the coronavirus. nbc's richard engel spoke with an organizers signing up volunteers. >> is there any precedent in history of doing this? i know there have been challenge trials in the past but challenge trials on this scale with really no rescue drug. >> not on this scale. not -- certainly not in this scenario.

we haven't lived through anything like this in my lifetime, nor in yours. and i think one thing to sort of recognize is, yes, this would be a deviation from precedent. that's why it's so important we're having these discussions about ethical considerations, planning and engaging the public and communities because this might happen again. this may not be the only significant pandemic we face. you want to make sure it's a precedent you'd be happy for people in the future to follow. >> joining me is nbc news chief foreign correspondent richard engel. it's fascinating. this is the oxford study, but what about the ethical issues? >> they are very significant, but we are facing an unprecedented challenge right now. many have compared this to a war. and in all wars, in all serious challenges, there are risks that people have to weigh against the benefits. currently, as you laid out, the

way it's working now is large numbers of volunteers are broken up into two groups. one group is listen a placebo or a harmless drug and only half of the volunteers are given the experimental vaccine. and then all those people are let out into the wild and some of them get covid and some of them don't. but based on the reality of where people live, only a very small number of the people who have been given the experimental vaccine actually come into contact with the coronavirus. and those are the most important people. those are the people who can help researchers determine if the vaccine actually works in realtime conditions. in a challenge trial, they would make much smaller numbers of people, dozens, 40, 50 people. they'd have them in a controlled environment, a laboratory-style environment. they'd give them the trial vaccine. and then give them all through inhalati inhalation, a dose of -- a regularulated dose, a

standardized dose of the coronavirus to see if the vaccine actually stops the virus from developing into covid-19. the ethical problems are significant because there is no known, proven cure. there's no proven vaccine as of yet, which is the whole point of all of this. and there are these still not very specific possible long-term consequences of having covid-19. but already more than 30,000 people have signed up and said they would be willing to take part in this challenge trial if it goes forward. and if researchers at oxford believe it will go forward this year. >> it's fascinating. of course, it would eliminate one of the big vulnerable groups, the elderly, that they want to find out. they could not give it to the elderly. it's not a controlled trial meeting those standards. i know we'll see a lot more of your reporting tonight on "nbc nightly news." thanks, richard. that does it for "andrea

mitchell reports." chris jansing picks up our coverage after a short break. businesses are starting to bounce back.

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good afternoon. i'm chris jansing. we're starting with that breaking news this hour. ohio's governor mike dewine has tested positive for covid-19. he was being tested as part of the standard operating procedure to greet president trump who is now heading to cleveland for a fundraiser. dewine has no symptoms, we're told, but he is heading home to