irwin redlene rerk redlener. and david shulkin.revious veterans affairs secretary under president trump. the author of the book "it shouldn't be this hard to serve your country." good morning. dr. redlener, president trump is consistent in saying regular folks who don't know these things don't understand modelling. he says it is obvious to say if we started a week earlier, we would have had fewer deaths. the distinction here is a week earlier, public health officials, including you, because you and i talked about this months ago were actually saying we needed to do this. it is not that if we started a week earlier that we didn't know about it, we could have saved lives. we did know about it. >> yes, ali. you know, the interesting thing here among other things is that it was obvious, i think, that we should have started this particular procedure of staying at home earlier. the problems is a lot of dithering among the states because we didn't have much in the way of a good central guidance from the federal government. they were all o

redlener, i want to play for you something. this is the president today on testing. >> do you have any concerns about the abbott test given some of the new numbers that have come out? >> no. abbott is a great test. it's a very quick test. and it can always be very rapidly double-checked. if you're testing positive or negative, it can be double-checked, but it's a very good test, very portable, very quick. okay? >> doctor, the president has been actively promoting the abbott test. he's had the product out there displayed next to him on a small table with the presidential seal. the abbott test happens to be the subject of a cdc advisory warning of upwards of a 50% false positive/false negative rate. what do you make of that? >> well, i mean, it's preposterous to be pushing this test. it has not been fully tested before it was released, and a 50/50 chance, you might as well just flip a coin. it is a ridiculous situation that we've been put in here now, and actually there's almost 400 tests that have been given this emergency use a

irwin redlener, pediatrics physician. he also happens to be the director of columbia's national center for disaster preparedness with an expertise in pandemic influenza. shannon, what was that event about today, the medical easy that thift arthur kaplan watching live coverage guessed right afterwards that it was about re-election. that's what the end of the year buzz phrase is all about. >> well, it's really the way we started the week. so on monday the president was in the rose garden, held a big event about testing. that was around messaging to governors, to the public, that we have the testing capability in place to reopen and to get back to normal and business as usual. now, a lot of people have said, we don't get back to normal until we have a vaccine. we don't have a stadium full of people until we have a vaccine. so we end the week talking about vaccines and this, you know, very -- as you detailed -- lofty goal by the president to have a vaccine by the end of the year. so giving the public this -- this assurance th

irwin redlener, thank you, as always, for agreeing to come on and spend some time with us. >> thanks,rian. >> coming up as we've been saying the streets of an american city on edge tonight. is it going to get even worse? >>> and what trump said that caused some members of his own party to say enough. those stories when we come back. when we started our business we were paying an arm and a leg for postage. i remember setting up shipstation. one or two clicks and everything was up and running. i was printing out labels and saving money. shipstation saves us so much time. it makes it really easy and seamless. pick an order, print everything you need, slap the label onto the box, and it's ready to go. our costs for shipping were cut in half. just like that. shipstation. the #1 choice of online sellers. go to shipstation.com/tv and get 2 months free. >>> as we mentioned, we are keeping a close eye on the protests tonight in minneapolis following the death of george floyd, the unarmed black man who died after a white officer detained him and pinned him down by kneeling on floyd's neck. four

redlener, you mentioned dr. fauci, and i want to go a little bit deeper.e talked about it being conceivable that we'll have a vaccine by the end of this year or just slightly into 2021. this has not been your position in past interviews. knowing that the answer could be a lot, what does he know that the rest of us don't? >> you know, i don't know, brian. and i will tell you that dr. fauci is one of the most respected public health experts in the world. and so people pay attention to him. but i have no idea how somebody is proposing a shortening of the length of time it's going to take to test this -- whatever new vaccine there is out there for both effectiveness and safety. you know, in 1976, president gerald ford was the first to get his, you know, injection of swine flu vaccine for, you know, to prevent and control the swine flu at that time. but it turned out that that vaccine a couple years later was shown to have very serious neurological complications. this is just a process we cannot rush and still feel like we're being safe. we already have a big a

irwin redlener, thank you, as always, for agreeing to come on and spend some time with us. >> thanks,rian. >> coming up as we've been saying the streets of an american city on edge tonight. is it going to get even worse? >>> and what trump said that caused some members of his own party to say enough. those stories when we come back. >>> as we mentioned, we are keeping a close eye on the protests tonight in minneapolis following the death of george floyd, the unarmed black man who died after a white officer detained him and pinned him down by kneeling on floyd's neck. four officers have been fired from the force. but today the city's mayor called for criminal charges against the officer involved. protests have also broken out in los angeles late today over floyd's death. demonstrators could be seen damaging a california highway patrol cruiser on the freeway after one demonstrator had climbed onto a chp cruiser, had fallen off, and was subsequently knocked unconscious. now, back to the situation in minneapolis. george floyd's sister spoke with lawrence o'donnell earlier tonight. >> i do

irwin redlener, pediatrics physician by training, a clinical professor with the skoofl public healthp at columbia university in new york where, importantly, he is director of columbia's national center for disaster prepar preparedness. and irwin, you must get a lot of jokes about being fun at a party given your job description, but this could not be more serious business. >> au contraire, as we say. >> yeah. and knowing i was going to talk to you tonight, think about it, we've had an outbreak of tornadoes during this pandemic period in the south and southeast. we've had 1,0$1,000 michigande michig michiganders on the run from flooding. this didn't hit the ritzy areas by and large. some of these folks were out of work already. so what you're calling for i'm guessing is a specialization in natural disaster preparedness during a pandemic. >> yeah, brian, that's really what we need. and right now even, even as we're in the middle of the pandemic and we're just days away from the official beginning of hurricane season, every single governor as well as the federal government, ought to be a

irwin redlener, thank you so much as always for your time. thanks for coming on. >>> and coming up for us, the justice department asks to drop the case against michael flynn despite two guilty pleas. we'll ask two former high-ranking doj officials how this is going over in the actual justice community. >>> a crime cannot be established here. they did not have a basis for a counterintelligence investigation against flynn at that stage. >> does the fact remain that he lied? >> well, you know, people sometimes plead to things that turn out not to be crimes. >> more from attorney general bill barr today on this doj seeking to drop its criminal case against michael flynn. flynn, again, pleaded guilty to lying to the fbi about his conversations with the former russian ambassador. the president had plenty to say when the news came out at the white house. >> he was an innocent man. he is a great gentleman. he was targeted by the obama administration, and he was targeted in order to try and take down a president. and what they've done is a disgrace, a

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erwin redlener, an nbc health analyst.on the move today, out and about, talking about his use of a drug that the fda warned was lethal when taken outside of a hospital. when president trump said, take it, what do you have to lose, the american medical association answered him directly by saying, your life. is the president trying to convince anyone else to take it or simply defending himself from criticism that he takes it. >> i think most likely the latter, nicole. it's hard to know given this transparency and the lack of transparency we've seen from him over the years related to health questions, not to mention other topics. it's hard to know or at least not be a little skeptical of his claim that he is taking, and certainly the vice president today said that he is not taking it and obviously, we have to take him at his word for that. so you can look at this two different ways. you can look at this as a president who may be feeling especially vulnerable. the statement from the white house basically attributed or linked h

erwin redlener. both, lucky for us, msnbc contributors.er, how is all of that truth telling from dr. fauci and the other scientists as well as the tough questioning as we just played from mitt romney landing at the white house today? >> not that well, nicole. we saw a press briefing in the last hour by kayleigh mcenany, the white house press secretary, who tried to reiterate the message that the president sought to deliver yesterday and in the rose garden, which is that the administration, the country has prevailed, has met these testing challenges and is ready for the economy to reopen, and yet there was such a jarring disconnect watching that hearing today. and it started actually at the very beginning from the senate chairman lamar alexander, a republican from tennessee, who said in very direct and plain language that this country needs more wraed testing aidespread ty millions more tests will be needed for people to be able to safely return to work. that is completely different from what president trump said yesterday in the rose garde

irwin redlener and dr. bhadliah. >>> now to the breaking news overnight. president trump has fired the state department inspector general steve linick. he played a role in the impeach. proceedings by providing co documents that rudy giuliani gave to the committee. quote, i have learned the office of the inspector general opened an investigation into mike pompeo. the firing strongly suggests this is an unlawful act of retaliation. in the notice of intent to fire linick, trump no longer had c confidence in linick. harry, like this and most of the things happened late on a friday night during the pandemic crisis which is the way this president does things. the alarming thing for most people, because most of the viewers are not familiar with or name any of the inspectors general. their job is to oversee the department to see if procedures are followed or the law is being followed. the president seems to have remarkable disdain for anybody who is going to oversee his appointed secretaries. >> first, as you say, friday night, the classic time for polite hit job.

redlener is talking about, testing supplies and protective gear. >> our story, nicolle, focused on a find a new source of ppe in march and early april at the time when the country was basically out of ppe and fema was almost out. they were looking for these masks and gowns and gloves and other materials that would help front line workers with the emergency response. what they did was, they took 20-something people from wall street, the trump task force and place them at the front lines of the search inside fema in the hopes their experience and private equity deal sourcing would be a good match for running through hundreds and hundreds of leads. instead they were overwhelmed, they hadn't had the training or expertise in procuring procedures or supplies. we talked to a volunteer who said after the experiment was over, not a single lead that they had processed had turned into a firm contract for ppe for fema. >> there's also an echo of the whistle-blower complaint yesterday from dr. bright of crony i cronyism and real, real political orientation toward directing the kinds of things the

redlener, are we confident these senior facilities can be kept safe from this pandemic?> no, and i totally agree with governor cuomo. i also would not put any relative or friend if anybody asked me into a congregate facility right now. it's easy to sort of say that, chuck, the problem is whether should people be? if you don't have a huge home and you can separate grandma from other people because she's at risk, that's fine. but a lot of americans, a lot of people in new york and all other major cities, have very small housing, very tiny apartments. and the separation would be to have, and testing we need to get done, is just not there yet. it's like with the rushing to reopen businesses, there's a lot of problems yet but i think governor cuomo is exactly right and what i think all of us should take heed about because those facilities are not yet safe enough to put an older person at risk in there at this point unfortunately, chuck. >> doctor, i have to leave it there. we had some tech issues and things got piled up at the top 6789 i appreciate you making it and glad we g

redlene rechlt, alwaare, you.onsin just had the first weekend without a statewide stay at home order. the state also hit its highest single day of new coronavirus cases. and cases are on the rise in illinois as well. it doubles the testing capacity from just a few weeks ago. we'll go to a new testing center on chicago's south side. >>> first though, the uncertain future for our restaurants. we teased this a moment ago. some owners fear they will never reopen. and andrew zimmer is back us with in just a moment. >>> president trump is sitting down with restaurant executives and owners today to discuss what the future holds for the hospitality industry. restaurants already operate on thin margins. closures due to coronavirus threaten to close many places permanently. as we've explored on this show, that do cause rape wia ripple e across the entire economy as millions of americans lotise thr jobs. let's bring in the creator and host of what's eating america, andrew zimern. we talked about this a lochlt now the preside

irwin redlener, very thoughtful and provocative op-ed, i hope people take a look at it themselves and thank you for your expertise. katie, over to you. >>> you're going to make me cry. let's move on. coming up, the president blames china again for the pandemic. and his trade advisers accuse the government of trying to steal u.s. research on a vaccine. rnment of trying to steal u.s. research on a vaccine. just because someone grows older does that mean they have to grow apart from their friends, or from the things they love to do? with right at home, it doesn't. right at home's professional team thoughtfully selects caregivers to help with personal care, housekeeping, meals - and most of all, staying engaged - in life. oh, thank you, thank you. you're welcome. are you ready to go? oh, i sure am. we can provide the right care, right at home. i do motivational speakingld. in addition to the substitute teaching. i honestly feel that that's my calling-- to give back to younger people. i think most adults will start realizing that they don't recall things as quickly as they used to or they

irwin redlener co-authored the report. >> we cannot undermine the necessary things that need to be in in order to go back to work safely. >> also gaining new skills, there are online educating resources like skill share. they're offering free mini courses teaching from you software development to product and marketing. this is really a time to invest in yourself. one more thing, katy, for folks working from home enincurring additional costs, don't hesitate to ask your employer if they'll reimburse you for head phones and printer. you don't know unless you ask. >> it's a business expense. vicki, thank you very much. chuck, over to you. >>> well for more on what to expect when americans start get back to work, we now want to join gene sperlg, former economic adviser to presidents clinton and obama. "economic dignity" is out this week and considering what we have now in our society deemed as essential workers and not, the idea of economic dignity perhaps takes on a different meaning for some folks. but gene, let's start with you've been involved with rescue operations before. big governm

redlener, how do we live with this virus? >> first of all, i totally agree.been a voice of wisdom since this began, and we live with this virus by doing what people have done during world wars, during the pandemic of 1918, during all the other conflicts and stressful situations and disruptors we've had, we have to adapt to reality, and the reality, katy, is we don't yet have effective medications. we certainly don't have a vaccine that will get here anytime before a year to a year and a half from now. so living with covid-19 means getting used to sheltering in place, figuring out ways to re-establish our economy and basically standard of living for our many american families dependent on their annual paycheck. we have to figure that out. we can't do this in the absence of having the right tools. so learning to live with this is complicated, difficult and stressful. every family, including my own, has to deal with it. we have to expect there will be changes that will be around for a very long time. >> and not to bury the lead here but he's saying 60% to 70% of