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4/13/20: Members of the Coronavirus Task Force Hold a Press Briefing

May 31, 2021
The President: Thank you all very much. My administration will do everything we can to help those communities recover. We are talking to the governors and representatives. FEMA is already on the way and they got there. As soon as we heard the word, I said, "Come out." So FEMA is there and you know the great work that FEMA does. It is, really, something very special. So we just want to say: our deepest condolences and we will be with you at all times. It's a tough deal. That was a bad level five bed. That was a bad group.
4 13 20 members of the coronavirus task force hold a press briefing
That's as high as possible. It was a bad cluster of tornadoes. Something that is incredible, the power... the horrible and destructive power. The United States continues to make critical progress in our war against the virus. Over the weekend, the number of new daily infections remained stable across the country. Department. Hospitalizations are slowing in hot spots like New York, New Jersey, Michigan and Louisiana. This is clear evidence that our aggressive strategy to combat the virus is working and that Americans are following the guidelines. What they have done has been incredible. You looked at the graphs, and the graphs, and the models from the beginning, they were predictions of 100 and 120,000 people.
4 13 20 members of the coronavirus task force hold a press briefing

More Interesting Facts About,

4 13 20 members of the coronavirus task force hold a press briefing...

If they did it right, unfortunately they were going to perish. And hopefully we'll be way, way below that number. That will be a sign that people are doing things right, but it is still a horrible thing around the world. One hundred and eighty-four countries. This is all a tribute to our wonderful advisors and healthcare experts who have been with us from the beginning. We appreciate them very much. In fact, Dr. Fauci is here. He maybe he could ask Tony to say a few words before continuing. Thank you so much. Tony, please. Dr. Fauci: Thank you, Mr.
4 13 20 members of the coronavirus task force hold a press briefing
President. Just one... a couple of things, and then I just want to make a comment about something that happened yesterday. You'll soon hear from Dr. Birx about the numbers we've been talking about and how things are starting to balance out. And I think as we go forward each day, I think we're going to see... and again, I never like to get ahead of myself or Dr. Birx, but it seems like even though we've had this past week it was really bad. Remember, when I spoke to you before, I told you that this was a really bad week.
4 13 20 members of the coronavirus task force hold a press briefing
There will still be many deaths, but we are starting to see them in some areas now. that kind of flattening, particularly in a place that was a hotspot like New York. That is first. The second thing is that I had a really, really productive conversation with the Congressional Black Caucus this morning, for about an hour, and they really wanted to know exactly what we're going to do in the immediate, as well as the long term. range, about health disparities and discrepancies in both infection and poor outcomes in minorities generally, but specifically African Americans. And I mean, I made it very clear to them that what we need to do is focus on getting the resources to where the vulnerable are, to be able to do testing, to be able to get the proper identification, where appropriate and where appropriate, to isolate and trace contacts. if we can, but also to help mitigate in a community that is hurting and suffering much more disproportionately.
So I just wanted to get that out of the way. The other point I wanted to make is that I had an interview yesterday where I was asked a hypothetical question. And hypothetical questions can sometimes give you a hard time because they are about what "would have" or "could have." The nature of the hypothetical question was: if, in fact, we had mitigated sooner, could lives have been saved? And the answer to my question was, as I always do, and am doing right now, to honestly say "yes." I mean, obviously. If so, mitigation helps. I've been here many times telling you that mitigation works.
So if mitigation works and you instigated and started earlier, you will probably have saved more lives. If you started it later, you would probably have lost more lives, if you started it at a certain time. That was taken as a way that maybe, somehow, something was going wrong here. So let me tell you from my experience - and I can only speak from my own experience - that we had been talking, before any meeting we had, about the pros and cons, the effectiveness or not, of strong mitigations. . So the discussions were mainly among the medical staff about what that would mean.
The first and only time that Dr. Birx and I went in and formally made a recommendation to the President to actually have a, quote, "shutdown" in the sense of... not really "shutdown," but to actually have a strong mitigation, we discussed it. Obviously, some would be concerned that that could actually have some negative consequences. However, the President listened to the recommendation and moved on to mitigation. The second time I went to Dr. Birx to the President and said, "Fifteen days is not enough. We need to go thirty days," obviously there were people who had a problem with that because of the possible side effects.
However, at that time the President followed health recommendations and we extended it another 30 days. So I can only tell you what I know and what my recommendations were. But clearly, as happens all the time, there were interpretations of that answer to a hypothetical question that I just thought would be really nice for me to clarify because I didn't have a chance to clarify. Thank you. La Prensa: The date of that? Dr. Fauci: Excuse me? La Prensa: The date. Dr. Fauci: You know, to be honest with you, I don't even remember what the date was. But I can tell you that the first and only time I came in and said we should do aggressive mitigation, the response was, "Yes, we will." Press: And what did he do?
Were those the travel restrictions? Dr. Fauci: No. The travel restriction is independent. That was whether or not we wanted to enter a mitigation stage of 15 days of mitigation. The trip was another recommendation, when we went in and said, "We should probably do that." And the answer was "yes." And another time it was, "We should do it with Europe," and the answer was "yes." And the next time, "We should do it with the UK," and the answer was "yes." Press: In this interview, you said that there was rejection. Dr. Fauci: Yes. La Prensa: Where did that rejection come from?
Dr. Fauci: No, it wasn't; that was the wrong choice of words. Do you know what it was? When people argue, not necessarily in front of the President, when people argue, they say, "Well, you know, this will maybe have a detrimental effect on this or that." So it was a bad choice of words. There was no one who said, "No, you shouldn't do that." Press: Are you doing this voluntarily? Or did the President... Dr. Fauci: No, I'm doing it... La Prensa: --or did the Vice President ask you to do this? Dr. Fauci: Everything I do is voluntary.
Please. Don't even hint at that. The Press: So, Mr. President, the question is... The President: And, by the way, the travel ban, that was before. The travel ban was done before. Press: He couldn't give us a date when he spoke to you. The President: And if we look at the statistics, it occurred to me to write a couple of them. If you look at the statistics, on January 6th, long before the dates you're talking about, there was... the CDC issued a travel advisory for Wuhan, China, an advisory, even before there was a confirmed case. . of the virus in the United States.
That's January 6th. All this is documented. Since we have so much fake news, I like to document things. On January 6, long before the dates we're talking about, the CDC issued a travel advisory for Wuhan... for Wuhan. As of January 11, we have no cases in the United States. Zero. We don't have any cases. So there are no reported cases that we know of. This is January 11th. The CDC issued a level one health travel advisory when there were still no confirmed cases. So we had zero cases. People want me to act. I'm supposed to shut down the economy, the largest economy in the history of the world, and we don't have a single confirmed case in the United States.
That's January 11th. On January 17, the CDC began implementing public health entry controls at three major US airports that received the highest volume of passengers from Wuhan, following my guidance. There was not a single case of

coronavirus

in the United States. So on January 17 there was no case and the fake news says, "Oh, you didn't act fast enough." Well, you remember what happened. Because when I acted, I was criticized by Nancy Pelosi, by Sleepy Joe Biden. Everyone criticized me. In fact, they called me a xenophobe. I was asking Biden to please define that for me. The Democrats and some others called me other things; actually, not many more.
So that... by the media, definitely. Now, January 21st, this is long before the time we're talking about, because when Tony talks, I think he's talking about the end of February. On January 21, well, still early, there was a case of the virus. At that time we called it the "Wuhan virus", right? Wuhan. There was a case throughout the United States. We have a case. All this is documented. Everything comes from you. A lot comes from you. On January 21, the CDC activated an emergency operations center. There was only one case, one person. That's why that ad was so false.
There was a person in the United States. You know they used the ad: "There's only one person..." That statement was made at that time. A case. In the entire United States, a case. Am I supposed to shut down the government? The largest economy in the history of the world. "Turn it off. We have a case." Seven cases were on January 31. Now, on January 21, there was a case. No person had died. You heard that, Steve, right? Not a single person. So we have this huge country, the United States of America. We have the largest economy in the world, much bigger than China, right? -- for what we've done over the last three and a half years, before the virus, but including the virus.
So we have the biggest economy, the biggest economy we've ever had; the highest employment figures; the best employment figures; The best unemployment figures too. The best of all. So on January 31st, think about it, not a single person died. Not one. No one died. None, Jon. I don't think you'll find any. This is reported by the CDC and confirmed by the news, which means nothing to me because they are not telling the truth. But the CDC reported: As of January 31, not a single person had died. And I issued a travel restriction from China. Think about it.
So no one died and I broadcast. You can't get there before that. So no one died and I said, "China, you can't come in. I'm sorry." Because I saw what was happening. It wasn't so much what they told me; It was that I saw what was happening and I didn't like it. But I didn't talk to Tony about it. I didn't talk to many people about this. I did not like. So what did I do? Ready? January 31: In the United States, not a single person had died from the... again, the Wuhan virus. So I imposed travel restrictions on that date, even though no one died, and the

press

brutalized me for it because I arrived too early;
I shouldn't have done it. Brutalized by the

press

. But, you know, more or less... I've been brutalized for the last four years. I was doing well before I decided to run for politics. But I guess it's going well for me because, as far as I know, I am the president of the United States, despite the things that are said. So, we did the first mandatory quarantine in more than 50 years. First mandatory in 50 years. The same restrictions that Democrats and the media called "xenophobic." Now, Joe Biden said: "He is a racist." He called me racist because I said, "We're closing the entry from China.
We're closing it." He called me a xenophobe, he called me a racist and other things. Since then, on a Friday night two weeks ago, Joe Biden issued a statement... it wasn't him; he didn't write it. I'm sure he doesn't even know it was broadcast. But his campaign people...they're smart. The people who write those little PR releases are pretty smart and reasonably good. They're not the best, but they're not bad. But they issued a statement, saying that Joe Biden agrees that President Trump was right to shut it down to China. Now, he did that. He now he aired it on Friday night.
We've all heard about it, Jon: Friday nights, right? In fact, yours was later on Friday night than I posted mine on Friday night. Well? Press: (Inaudible) It seems pretty late. The President: He did it like that... he did it quite late. I mean, you know, like 11 at night or something. You know, that's pretty late. Anyway. Then Joe Biden issued... and it's one of those things. But in February, Nancy Pelosi said we should come to Chinatown. We are at the end of February. "Come to Chinatown. We think it's very safe. Come here. Let's all do the big parade: the Chinatown parade." Probably referring to San Francisco.
And that is. But I took this step early. And that's why the New York Times story was totally false. It's a fake newspaper and they write fake stories. And someday, hopefully in five years, when I'm not here, all those newspapers will close because no one will want to read them. But now they like them becauseThey write about me. Now with that, I have a couple of interesting things: We have some clips that we're just going to post. We could turn the lights a little lower. I think you will find them interesting. And then we'll answer some questions.
I will ask you some questions because you are very guilty, but forget it. But the most important thing is that we will return to the reason we are here, which is the success we are having. Well? Please could you put it on. Thank you. (Video plays.) Speaker: People should be more concerned about the flu in this country right now. Male Speaker: People are worried about the

coronavirus

because they are hearing a lot of news about it right now. But the reality is that, comparing it to the flu, for example, it is not even close to being at that stage.
Male Speaker: What if it's worse? Is this a time when maybe countries put aside politics, a little pride, and we have American officials? Should we involve American professionals, like you? Speaker: How worried should Americans be about the coronavirus? Male Speaker: The coronavirus is not going to cause a major problem in the United States. ♪ (spicy music plays) ♪ The President: Well, we have asked them to accelerate what they are doing in terms of a vaccine. We are suspending all travel from Europe to the United States for the next 30 days. To unleash the full power of the federal government in this effort today, I am officially declaring a national emergency.
Medicare patients can now visit any doctor by phone or video conference at no additional cost. Secretary Esper: The first million masks will be available immediately. "As there were more cases, and it was clear that it was spreading outside of China, where it originated, the president took this action for which he was widely criticized by Democrats and even some Republicans at the time, which was to tear down a series of flights from China to the US. The idea was to stop the spread of the disease, keep transmissions to a minimum. He was accused of zenophobia, he was accused of making a racist move.
At the end of the day, it was probably effective, because in reality took a pretty aggressive step against the spread of the virus. Governor Cuomo: Your team is on it. They've responded late at night and early in the morning. And so far they've been doing everything they can do. And I want to give you thank you. And I want to say I appreciate it. Governor Newsom: Return the calls. He's reaching out. He's been proactive. We have that Mercy ship here in Los Angeles. That was here Directly because he sent it here. Two thousand medical units came to the state of California, these FMS, these Field Medical Stations.
And that has been very, very useful. Governor DeSantis: The president has been outstanding in all of this. The vice president has been outstanding. Members of the Coronavirus Task Force, very receptive. Male Speaker: We had asked if we could have... if New Jersey could have access to a portion of the beds that are on the USNS Comfort. And the President came back, he called me a few minutes before I came in here to tell me that they would indeed grant that to New Jersey. So that's a big step for us, in addition to all the other capabilities.
That news is literally just published in the press. And I thank the president and the vice president who were on the call together. Male Speaker: President Trump approved Arizona's request for a Presidential Major Disaster Declaration. I want to thank the President for a quick turnaround. We applied for this on a Wednesday and got approval on Saturday morning. And we thank the administration for its continued support and responsiveness. Male Speaker: Well, first of all, I want to congratulate the president and the vice president for doing a very good job communicating with all the governors. So we could give you hundreds of clips like that of governors, including Democratic governors or "Democrats," as I call them, which is actually the correct term.
We could give you hundreds of clips like that. We've got them. We didn't want this to go on too long, but I just want to say that... you know, it's very sad when people write false stories like, in that case, I guess they were mainly obtained from the New York Times, which is very... .I mean, if there were libel laws, they would have closed before they even ended up closing. So it's a shame. But we could have given them... you saw the statements. We have hundreds of statements. Hundreds of statements, including from Democrats and Democratic governors.
And if you look, everyone was saying, "We need fans. We need..." You don't hear "fans" anymore. They have all the ventilators they need, which we were right about. We said, "You're asking for too many. You don't need them." And to be fair, these two people here, Dr. Birx and Dr. Fauci, said, "I don't think they need that many ventilators." And I said, "I agree." At one point, and I'm not criticizing New York for this, but they were asking, remember? -- 40,000 fans. And that's more than they have in the entire country. And we got them a lot of fans and no one has complained.
As you know, we get them beautiful - we build hospital rooms all over the country. Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards was very kind. He said, "You know what? There's no need to build a second hospital." Because good news is happening. They can't fill the beds. They needed two hospitals. We built one; it was perfect. We're getting... we're just starting the other one. I called it. I said, "Do you think we should build the second one? I don't think you need it." He said, "Let me go back." The return. We didn't need it. With Governor Cuomo, in all good spirit and faith, he wanted the Jacob Javits Center built.
And we built 2,900 incredible beds. Incredible. Then we did... we did COVID... and... or, to be exact, COVID-19, and... which was a lot of work. We had to change the ducts. We had to seal off certain areas. We had to put stuff areas on the roof above the beds. We work a lot. And we had it, but they never really got much use out of it. And they also called... Mayor de Blasio, rightly so, called. He said: "Would it be possible to get more medical help?" So now, not only are we building facilities, but they are asking us for help because they can't handle them.
And we got him help. We received a lot of help from Mayor de Blasio. Then when the Javits Center wasn't used much, and then, as you know, the Mercy, we took the Mercy and we took the Comfort, and we made them both, Los Angeles and New York, made them COVID-friendly, which was not easy to do. And we hardly get any people sent there. At first they didn't need them because they didn't need them for anything other than this because there were fewer accidents, fewer motorcycles, less of everything. And what we did was an incredible job, but they didn't need them.
It turned out that they were there. We were ready. Do you know the expression? They have an expression: "Ready, willing and able." We were ready, willing and able. What the Army Corps of Engineers did was a miracle. What...what FEMA did was a miracle. What the doctors did. Two days ago I received a call from the mayor of New York. He said, "Could you help us even more with the medical staff?" And we sent... I think it was 448 doctors, nurses and respiratory experts. True experts. And I got a call from the mayor and he said, "I want to tell you: Incredible, these people are incredible." He said, "They lifted the spirits of New York City hospital workers like he had never seen before." He...it was amazing what he said.
He was really appreciated. And I let you know. I let the military... said, "They came in there so bravely, so incredibly. They lifted everyone's spirits." We did all this work, but when you read the fake stories, you, no one, no one recognizes it. And it is not necessary to recognize it, from my point of view, but it is necessary to recognize it for the great work that these doctors, nurses, the Army Corps of Engineers, FEMA, all these people, have done this incredible job. And they shouldn't be abused because... look what happened. Nobody asks for ventilators, except outside our country.
They call me outside our country, in all countries. They are calling me. So many countries. And I'm going to try to help them because we are building thousands of ventilators. But no one asks for ventilators. Nobody asks for beds because we build hospitals. I think we built 20,000 beds in a period of a couple of weeks. The work they have done is incredible. Having said all that, I get along very well with the governors. And if he didn't, Mike Pence had a call today with the governors and it was like a 10. I said, "How was he?" He said, "He's a 10." He was one of my expressions, in fact.
But he said he was like a 10. And I'm sure you guys were probably on the call even though you weren't supposed to be. But you were sitting in someone's office listening to it, because every time we have these... and, you know, you would know for weeks those calls have been very good. But he didn't raise his voice. There wasn't even a statement like, "We think you should do this or that." I heard it was like a perfect phone call. It may not be reported that way. They'll say, "I thought someone maybe raised a little..." he didn't even raise his voice.
All I want to say is I want to get back to the reason we're here: the press hasn't treated these incredible people who have done great work, it hasn't treated them fairly. They are so far. We were way ahead of schedule. And remember this, because the Times story was false, but everything, remember this: Everything we did, I got criticized for coming in too early. If I had waited longer, I would have been... you would have been critical... if I had gone too early, if I had gone three months early, I would have been criticized... you know, criticized for coming too early.
So, with all that said, we get it. I think I've educated a lot of people about the press. And I would love to be able to say that we have a very honest press. Honestly, Jon, there would be nothing I would be prouder of if the press worked... and I don't mind being criticized, but not when they're wrong. Not when people have done a great job. Yes. Press: Can I ask you about the video? Because I've never seen a video like that played in this room. It looks a bit like a campaign ad. Who... who produced that video for you?
The President: That was done by a group in the office, and they just... we just put together some clips. I could give you... I bet you I have over 100 more clips, even better than them. They were rebuilt over the last two hours. That was... oh, we have much better than that. That's nothing compared to some of them. The Press: But this was produced here in the White House by... The President: Yes, this was done by Dan and a group of people, and they put it together in a period of probably less than two hours. Press: Why did you feel the need to do that?
The President: Because we receive false news and I like to see it corrected. They're saying we're doing a great job, and the media - these are the governors of California, the governor of New Jersey, the governor of New York. Look, in New York we work very closely with Andrew. In New York, we didn't have fans (we probably will), they didn't have any problems. We got them a huge amount of...thousands, but we got them a huge amount of ventilators. The fans are not heard to be a problem. The beds were going to be a problem. I mean, I'm happy about that.
The Javits Center, which is amazing, is almost empty because they don't need them. That's good news, not bad news. I... you know, I'm not saying, "Wow, I wish there were more people there." I don't want any more people there. We brought the boat. We brought the Comfort. And this is not what the Comfort was originally supposed to be for: the coronavirus. It wasn't supposed to be for that at all. They called and said, "Could we have it?" That was several weeks ago. We said, "We don't think you need it, but if you need it, we'll do it." Then they said, "Could you get the medical staff to take care of the Javits Center?
Could you get the medical staff to take care of the ship?" We said, "If we have to, we will do it." And we did it. There were military personnel. Those are the ones that Mayor de Blasio was so good about, in terms of his statements. I mean, I really appreciated his statement. He was very impressed with them and so was I. The level of genius and bravery. They are great people, the military. And we rebuilt it; I would say it took less than two hours. It was made at home. Steve? Press: But to be clear, this was produced by government employees, by people here in the White House.
This campaign style video here? The President: I would not use the word "produced." All they did was take some clips and just played them. And the reason they did it is to keep you honest. Now, I don't think that's going to work. It's not going to have any impact. But think about it: you heard the clips, you heard what I said. They said I acted late in shutting down the country. Some people wish we would never close it. Now, if we didn't, we would have lost hundreds of thousands of people. You know, interestingly, I'm against that.
We did the right thing. Everything we did was good. If we had closed... Press: Don't you thinkhelp other countries. We will help the states if they need it. We can help build reserves in some states. You know, they're supposed to buy their own reserves. They have state reserves. They're supposed to be using that. And unfortunately, most states weren't there. And a lot of people didn't want to talk about it, but they weren't there. We will talk about it at the appropriate time, if you wish. I... at this point, I'm more focused on getting through this nightmare of an epidemic or a pandemic, whatever you want to call it.
We have to get over it. No one who has needed a ventilator has not gotten one. Think about it. You know, you've heard all about ventilators, ventilators. "We need ventilators." Because they didn't have them. Because the states should have had them. No one who has needed a ventilator has not gotten one. No one who has needed a hospital bed has been denied a hospital bed. That's not even really our responsibility. Now, if we can help, we will. But that's where the Army Corps of Engineers did a great job. We built more than 20,000 beds. In fact, we built thousands more than we really needed to be safe.
We wanted to be sure and they truly rose to this incredible occasion. I mean, we built more beds than we thought. We thought that in Louisiana we were very heavy. And again, when I called the governor, I said, "Maybe we shouldn't build that second hospital, because we don't want to build it if you don't need it." He called back and said, "I don't think we need it." They had 1,000 rooms, 1,000 beds, and they used many of them, but they didn't need the other one, so we left it because we don't want to waste. But we are prepared to build thousands more if we need it.
I don't think we're going to need it because it seems like we're plateauing and maybe even, in many cases, going down. In addition, we have ordered a total of 60 mobile decontamination and decontamination systems. So the Battelle decontamination system in Ohio is kind of incredible because it takes the masks and you can decontaminate a mask up to 20 times. And I've been asking all along, "Why can't we sterilize and sanitize these masks?" And it turned out that we can. And there was a great company in Ohio, they sent us great equipment and they're doing it now. And now we're going to be cleaning and decontaminating over 33 million N95 masks a week, and it's going to be fantastic.
It's something that, frankly, I think people should have thought about a long time ago. Five more flights landed today as part of Project Airlift – our massive airlift operation to bring personal protective equipment to the United States, which has already delivered nearly half a million N95 masks, 370 million gloves, 25 million surgical masks and 4.9 million dresses. So, we have millions of gowns, gloves, masks and all the surgical equipment available in case the states need it. Now, states...states are supposed to buy their own stuff. But if they need it, we are willing to give it to them, because we are building up our reserves again like crazy.
Remember, I... and you saw the stories. I inherited - this management - Mike, I, the entire management, inherited a warehouse where the cupboards were bare. There was nothing. And I say it and I'll say it again: just as we didn't have ammunition, we didn't have medical supplies, we didn't have ventilators, we didn't have a lot of things that they should have had. . And you can read your own stories about that because you know what happened: They didn't want to spend the money. But we did it. To date, we have facilitated the supply of more than 38 million N95 masks nationwide.
This week we will ship 2 million N95 masks to the State of Pennsylvania. The vice president will go into more details. He goes into great detail about that and I think it's a pretty amazing story. We already have many masks in stock and have more on the way. We are further expanding hospital surge capacity in key areas of opening, and have a portion of certain VA hospitals and non-veteran coronavirus patients, including in East Orange, New Jersey Medical Center, as well as facilities in Manhattan and Brooklyn . . They are ready. They are capable. They are beautiful. Hopefully we won't need many because, frankly, we built everything the governors wanted.
And in many cases, it is too much. We told them it was too much, but we wanted to err on the side of caution. The United States has so far conducted nearly 3 million tests for the virus. Three million: the most for any nation. We perform approximately 150,000 tests every day and our testing rate is especially high in the areas hardest hit by the virus, if you look. And that's really, and it has hit some areas, the virus, very, very hard. For example, testing per capita in New York is higher than the rest of the world. The NIH, CDC, and FDA are also currently validating several antibody tests that will allow us to determine if someone has already had the virus and potentially become immune to the infection.
We are seeing that. Antibody tests are going to be very interesting in the coming times. There is a lot developing as we speak. In the race to develop effective treatments, pharmaceutical company Gilead announced that its drug, remdesivir, has shown promising results, very promising, in compassionate use settings. Additionally, the FDA just granted emergency use authorization for a device that removes certain proteins from the bloodstream, possibly preventing the patient's immune system from overreacting to the virus and damaging vital organs, which is a big deal. Additionally, over the past seven days, my administration has deployed approximately 28 million doses of hydroxychloroquine from our National Stockpile.
We have millions of doses that we purchased and many people are using them across the country. And recently, a friend of mine told me that he got better thanks to the use of that... that drug. Then, who knows? And he combines it with Z-Pak, he combines it with zinc, as recommended by his doctor. And it's having very good results, I'll tell you. I think if anyone other than me recommended it, it would be used everywhere, to be honest with you. I think the fact that I recommended it probably set him back a lot. But there are a lot of good things happening with him.
Lots of good tests. Scientists are also investigating a blood therapy known as convalescent plasma. Convalescent plasma. This therapy uses antibodies from the blood of recovered patients to treat the sick. And this is something that is actually a very old procedure, but it is done in a very modern way. During this difficult time, we are also working to ensure that the 2020 Census is completed safely and accurately. We may be asking for an extension because obviously they can't be doing much right now. They wouldn't even be allowed to do it. So on the Census, we're going to ask for a delay... a significant delay, I think.
How can you be knocking on doors for so long? The Census Bureau recently made the decision to temporarily suspend its field operations data collection activities to help stop the spread. Also, as millions of Americans continue to fill out their questionnaire online, the Census Bureau has asked Congress for an extension of 120. I don't know if you have to ask them. This is called "an act of God." This is called... a situation that has to be... they have to give way. I think 120 days is not enough. My administration is also taking bold steps to help American workers. On Friday, Americans began receiving cash payments authorized by a historic $2 trillion relief bill.
By the end of the week, nearly 80 million Americans will receive a total of $147 billion. And from what the Secretary of the Treasury tells me, that is very punctual and going very well. He'll be speaking in a moment. And the payments...these payments go directly to the banks and into these people's bank accounts. Millions of additional payments will follow. The typical family of four will receive $3,400. That's for a family of four. That's something. Also, through our Paycheck Protection Program, which is a tremendous success and they should expand and increase it. This has been a tremendous success. So successful that the banks are taking a little longer to distribute the money, but it is going quickly.
We have already processed more than $200 billion in loans to help small businesses retain their workers. Now we urgently need lawmakers to put aside partisan agendas and replenish this program with new funding because it truly is something that has been an incredible success. And they need more money to maintain these businesses and keep them open. I want to thank the many governors, health professionals, scientists and business leaders for their incredible hard work and contributions over the last month, and even well beyond a month, Mike, I would say. You know, we've been working together with many for, it seems, forever.
I have had many conversations with my team and top experts, and we are very close to completing a plan to open our country, hopefully even sooner than planned. And that is very important. We will soon finalize new and very important guidelines to give governors the information they need to begin safely opening their states. My administration's plan and accompanying guidance will give the American people the confidence they need to begin returning to normal life. That's what we want. We want to have our country open. We want to return to normal life. Our country is going to be open and it will be a successful opening.
And in a very few days we will explain exactly what will happen. Also, as you have probably heard, we have developed a committee. In fact, we call it a series of committees with the most prominent people in the country, the most successful people in different fields. And we will be announcing them tomorrow. This weekend, the United States also helped facilitate an unprecedented agreement between the 23 OPEC Plus nations (that is, OPEC plus additional energy-producing nations) representing many of the world's largest oil-producing countries. to stabilize oil markets. And, in fact, we have, and I think we've seen a lot of stabilization in recent days.
Together, countries around the world will reduce oil production by approximately 20 million barrels. People say 10 million, but we think the number they will actually reach will be closer to 20 million barrels per day. And that will go a long way to saving jobs across Texas, Oklahoma, North Dakota and many others, other of our great energy states. This historic action will help nearly 11 million American workers supported by the U.S. oil and gas industry. It is a very monumental agreement. I want to thank Saudi Arabia and the King of Saudi Arabia, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, both of them.
I want to thank President Putin of Russia. And I want to thank a very good friend of mine, a man who has become a friend of mine: the President of Mexico showed great flexibility. President López Obrador. He showed great flexibility and tremendous intelligence in doing what he did. It wasn't so easy for him. And I want to thank Mexico and the president. This is a very historic agreement. Very historical. So we'll see how everything goes. In this moment and challenge, and we are certainly in a moment like we probably have not been in many, many decades, we are strengthened and sustained by the ties of love and loyalty that unite all Americans.
I am very proud of the American people. Everywhere you look, you see the patriotism of our people shining, and the courage of our doctors and nurses on the front lines, and the dedication of our food supply workers, and the commitment of every citizen to achieve victory over the virus. That's what's going to happen. It will happen sooner than people think. And we're going to be smart about it. Very, very smart about it. We will be sure about it. We will also hear from great doctors and medical professionals. Together, we are defeating the invisible enemy and paving the way for a great resurgence.
Truly a great resurgence of American prosperity. Our country wants to return. They want to go back to work. They will return safely and that is what we want. Now I would like to ask Vice President Pence to say a few words, followed by Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx. I think before we do this because I know there's an emergency they want Steve to come to. So what I'll do is ask Steve to come, the Secretary of the Treasury. You can talk a little and then maybe answer a couple of questions about what's happening. Tell them the success we are having.
Thank you so much. Secretary Mnuchin: Thank you, Mr. President and Mr. Vice President. As you announced, we are very pleased to be ahead of schedule in delivering the economic impact payments. These are what are known as checks by mail that we want to deliver in direct deposit. This is ahead of schedule. We started processing them last Friday. We hope that more than 80 millionHardworking Americans receive direct deposit this Wednesday. And we know how important that is to all those hard-working Americans, many of whom are home and not working right now. If you don't receive them by Wednesday, we will release them on IRS.gov on Wednesday.
Click on IRS.gov, go to "Get your payment." If you filed a tax return in 2018 and 2019, or 2019, have that information available. You'll be able to identify yourself, enter your direct deposit information, and within several days we'll automatically deposit the money into your account. We want to do all of this electronically as we can. It is very important nowadays. It's safer and you don't have to go to the bank. If you are a Social Security beneficiary, you don't need to do anything. You will receive a direct deposit. If you haven't filed or needed to file a 2018 and 2019 return, you can go to IRS.gov now and enter your information and authenticate.
Again, we are very pleased that this came ahead of schedule. I would also like to announce the progress we are making in the SBA's new program, the PPP. Let me remind everyone: this is a brand new program that is already a week old. We have distributed and confirmed $230 billion in loans to more than 4,600 participating lenders. That's multiples and multiples of anything the SBA has done in a year before. And I want to especially thank the broad-based community banks that participate. Again, more than 4,600 banks. If your loan has not been processed, it will be processed this week.
As the President said, we went back to Congress and asked them for more money to make sure all businesses have access to this. Let me also comment for the states. This week we will distribute half of the money to the states. That's a week ahead of schedule. And we will deliver the other half of the money to the states next week. And finally let me comment that we have been working very closely with the Federal Reserve. Last week, we announced expanded and new facilities totaling $2.3 trillion in liquidity. And in particular, I would like to highlight a Main Street lending service that will be for businesses between one worker and 10,000 people (i.e. mid-sized businesses) and also a municipal service so that state and local governments can access funds given the scarcity they have.
That being said, I'd be happy to answer any questions. The President: Do you have any questions for Steve, please? Press: Secretary Mnuchin, thank you, sir. Both Speaker Pelosi and Minority Leader Schumer have said that they are negotiating with you right now about additional funding for these small business loans, for that package. However, Leader McConnell has said nothing should be added to the package. They should be specific to small business loans. What is the administration's opinion of him? Should there be some kind of haggling or should it just be small business loans? Secretary Mnuchin: Well, the president's opinion, the vice president's opinion, and my opinion is that this was a bipartisan program.
This SBA program was not a Republican program, it was not a Democratic program; It was a bipartisan program. We are committed to small businesses. We should complete that program now. I know Democrats want to talk about more money for hospitals and states. Right now, we're just sending the money to the hospitals and the states. They haven't come close to using that money. And I know the president and vice presidents have said that once we're done with the SBA, we can pass another funding bill. The President has talked about the possibility of adding infrastructure and other things.
We think there's a chance we need more money, and we will... we'll sit down and try to get a bipartisan bill. But it is important that we deliver for small businesses. Fifty percent of people work for small businesses. Press: Thank you, sir. Press: What is the emergency that the President said he had to respond to? The President said that he had an emergency meeting. The President: Negotiation. La Prensa: For this bill? Secretary Mnuchin: Yes, well, or because we don't want to run out of money. We have used about $220 billion of the $350 billion. We don't want to run out of that money.
We don't want to create panic that people won't understand it. So we want to... we want to complement that and we've asked for another $250 billion for that program. And again, let me remind you that every dollar we spend on this program, we save a dollar of unemployment insurance. So even though we're asking for $250 billion, it actually won't cost that much. Press: Can I follow up? Press: What are your concerns? Are you worried about lifting the guidelines too soon? And what is the economic impact? Obviously, I understand the economic argument for getting people back to work. But what is the economic risk of removing them too early and then seeing a rise in cases again?
Secretary Mnuchin: Well, of course there are economic risks in both directions. Today we reviewed with the President a very extensive list of more than 100 business owners who will help advise the President on what needs to be done to reopen the economy. We want to make sure, and again, the combination of economic impact payments, small business payments, enhanced unemployment insurance, which the President made very clear, we want to make sure that hard-working Americans have liquidity as we look forward to reopening the government. . Press: So do you think the government should reopen... or that the country, excuse me, should reopen on May 1?
Secretary Mnuchin: I have had conversations with the president. I know he's considering it and I think he'll make a decision later this week. The President: We have to do it... everything has to be safe. We want security. Press: What is your advice to the president? Secretary Mnuchin: My advice is: As soon as you're ready to open and based on the medical professionals, and again, we're working very closely with the president and outside business leaders to develop a plan. Press: I wonder... I wanted to ask you, Mr. President, what do you think... what... if you could outline for us what the reopening of the economy would look like.
Do you think everything will be open? Or do you believe? The President: Well, I will in the next few days because we will probably make a statement on that and exactly what it looks like. I know what that looks like, but I also want advice, in a sense. We have some of the largest companies on this council. In fact, we are creating several different councils or committees, I guess you could call them. And we have a lot of smart people. I think they will also give us good advice. But no, we want to be very, very sure.
At the same time, we must open our country. Press: Yes, I understand, Mr. President. Do you think there is then a possibility that what you do is open it incrementally? Do you think people will return to restaurants, to concerts, to the movies? The President: I think so. In the end they will. Yes. La Prensa: And let me ask one last question. The President: I think they eventually will. And I think we're going to... boom... I think we're going to... I think it's going to be quick. Our people want to get back to work and I think there is pent-up demand like there hasn't been in a long time.
And that's why, and that's why we see the stock market, I mean, to think that the stock market is at the level it is now, with everything that this world and this country has lost. And look at the European Union, how decimated it has become. Look at other countries. Look at China, by the way. I have seen the numbers. Look at China. Look how these countries have been decimated by this. And to think that the stock market is at this tremendously high number. Not so much, you know, it seemed a little bleak for a while, but it got to a certain point and then it started going up.
I think it's a great tribute to the fact that there is a demand. Yes. Press: Mr. President, thank you, sir. Regarding some of your tweets today, and I think it was Steve's question, my question to you is: What provision of the Constitution gives the president the power to open or close state economies? And then... The President: Numerous provisions. We will give you a legal report if you wish. Press: And then... we will be looking forward to it, sir. But next: what if he says, for example, "We want states to reopen but California or New York won't open"?
What are you going to do? The President: Well, I think everyone wants to open. I mean, I guess that could happen, but I don't think it will. Come in please. The press: It has been the states that closed, ordered the closure of schools. It has been the states that have ordered the closure of businesses such as restaurants and bars. The President: That's because I let that happen because I would have preferred it. I let that happen. But if I wanted to, I could have closed it. But I let that happen and I like the way they've done it.
And the seven that really stayed in kind of a semi-lockdown... if you look at those states, they've actually done a very good job. They are very different from New York or other places where they have been hit very hard. The Press: So are you prepared to go to the Bigfoot states and say, "I order you to open your schools, I order you to

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children to be able to go"? The President: Go ahead, please. Yes. Press: Yes, Mr. President. As a result of this, today there are two consortia of states: California, Oregon and Washington on the west coast;
Northeastern states, representing a total of about 100 million people, that have said they will cooperate and decide when to reopen those states. The President: Well, they can decide, but... La Prensa: Does that undermine what you're trying to do? The President: No, not at all. Let me tell you... very simple. I'm going to put it very simply: the President of the United States has the authority to do what the President has the authority to do, which is very powerful. The president of the United States makes the decisions. If we weren't here in the states, I would have had a problem in this country like I've never seen before.
We were here to support them. And we back them, and we have backed them in spades. We did work that no one thought was possible. It is a decision of the president of the United States. Now, with that said, we are going to work with the states because it is very important. You have local governments, they are designated. It's really... what you're talking about... it's like a microchip. They are marked. We have a local government that will hopefully do a good job. And if they don't do a good job, I would intervene very quickly. But no, they can't do anything without the approval of the President of the United States.
La Prensa: But, Mr. President. The President: Go ahead, please. La Prensa: So if some states refuse to reopen and you order them to do so, the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution says that all powers that do not reside in the President or Congress reside in the states. How do you overcome that? The President: Well, if some states refuse to open, I would like to see that person run for election. They are going to open. They're all going to open. La Prensa: So that's valid (inaudible). The President: I think that is something that is not going to happen.
They want to open. They have to open. They have to open up. In each of those states, people want to go and they want to... now, some will... they're in a different situation. You have... I won't name states now, but I will in the next two or three days. I'm going to be very specific. But there are some states where this is not the kind of problem that it is in New York, Louisiana, Michigan or other places that were hit hard. Illinois was hit hard. But all states want to open and they want to do it as soon as possible.
But they want to open safely and so do I. Yes please. Press: Thank you, Mr. President. Today, French President Emmanuel Macron said he will maintain the lockdown in France until mid-May. Does that mean that the United States will maintain the flight ban from... The President: No, France was very affected. France suffered a severe blow. And again, you have to do what you have to do. He is a friend of mine. But France and Spain have just been decimated. If you look at what happened in Italy, it is a very well-known fact what happened in Italy. No, they were hit very hard.
Press: Question for Secretary Mnuchin: Has everyone you would like to have, the 100 businessmen on the Economic Council, already been invited? Have you all agreed to be... Secretary Mnnuchin: Have you... not been invited yet? We just reviewed the names with the President. The President: It is a group. Secretary Mnuchin: - today, for approval. Press: And are they from all sectors? Energy. Secretary Mnuchin: Yes, there are basically verticals. That's why we wanted each and every area of ​​the economy to be represented. The Press: Great. Another thing. Is there anything more that needs to be done to work in the industry (oil industry jobs) to save oil industry jobs after last weekend's deal?
Secretary Mnuchin: Well, I think there are always things. That's why we're working with Larry Kudlow. I mean, we have... Press: Is there anything specific that needs to be done? Secretary Mnuchin: We have... we have economic plans for everypart of the economy. Obviously, in the case of the oil industry, they have been especially affected because it has had both the problem of supply and demand. Press: Have you calculated the bailout money for the airlines, with the allocations for the airlines? Secretary Mnuchin: I'm pleased to say we've worked very hard. I think, as you've probably seen, we put out a press release where we've already talked to almost all the airlines.
I have personally had conversations with all the CEOs of the major airlines. We specifically created an exception for small airlines that we were able to process very quickly. And I think you will see, very quickly, that decisions will be made. I am very satisfied with the discussions we have had. The President: We have had very good discussions...really good discussions. La Prensa: Mr. Secretary? Secretary Mnuchin: Yes. Press: Do you still see the need for a phase four stimulus? Or is this push to reopen... The President: Steve, I just want to say that we've had... La Prensa: --the economy instead?
The President: - debates - wait, excuse me. A second, please. We have had very good conversations with the airlines. Very good discussions. Press: And is it possible to reopen the economy on May 1? The President: I don't want to say that. You will hear it in the coming days. The Press: Mr. President. La Prensa: Will phase four be later, Mr. President? Secretary Mnuchin: Let me... let me comment... I'm going to answer your question. Press: Mr. Secretary, do you see the need for phase four? Or is it an impulse rather than another stimulus? Secretary Mnuchin: Okay. Again, let me comment: I mean, Congress, on a bipartisan basis, approved an unprecedented amount of money to help American workers and businesses because it was not their fault that businesses were shut down.
We had been working very diligently on that. You know, everyone said it was going to take months to get money to people. We are executing very quickly. We created a completely new SBA program in one week. Our job right now is to execute the $2.3 billion, to which we can add several trillion dollars with the Federal Reserve. The area of ​​particular concern to us is the small business program. Frankly, it's even more popular and successful than we expected. That's why the president wants to be very clear: we have money for that. And once we're done with that, we'll review it with the President.
If more money is needed to support this economy, to support hard-working Americans, we will work with Congress to get it in time. The President: And Steve, do you want to talk about phase four? Secretary Mnuchin: In the fourth phase, the president has talked about infrastructure for a long period of time. We've talked about... to the extent that hospitals need more money because of medical issues, we'll monitor that. We want to make sure there are incentives for restaurants, entertainment and people to get back to those types of things. So we will look, very specifically, at provisions to stimulate parts of the economy.
Some of them may be money problems. Some of them may be regulatory issues. La Prensa: Mr. President, just to clarify your understanding of your authority vis-à-vis governors... to be very specific: for example, if a governor issued a stay-at-home order... The President: When you say "my authority": the authority of the President. Not mine, because it's not me. Press: If I could ask the question... The President: This is... when someone is the President of the United States, the authority is total, and that's how it should be. La Prensa: Is it total? Is your authority total? The President: It's total.
It's total. Press: Is your authority total? The President: And the governors know it. La Prensa: So, if a governor... The President: The governors know it. No, you have... Press: If a governor issues a stay-at-home order, you... The President: --a couple of bands of... excuse me. Excuse me. You have a couple... La Prensa: Could you rescind that? Could you rescind that order? The President: You have a couple of groups of Democratic governors, but they will agree. They will agree to it. Press: What if he were a Republican governor? The President: But the authority of the President of the United States, with respect to the subject we are talking about, is total.
Yes, please, go ahead. The Press: Mr. President, one of the things that you... The President: Go ahead, please. Press: One of the things that you, one of the things that you talked about, we saw in your video was the travel ban from Europe. As part of the reopening of the United States, do you want to reopen the borders so that people in Europe, in the United Kingdom... The President: At the right time. La Prensa: How soon do you think we will get out of... The President: And, actually, it is a very good question. Well, I'll have to take a look at it.
I wouldn't say Italy is doing very well right now, and I wouldn't say Spain is doing very well right now. And we just learned that France is extending its stay-at-home order, right? Her stay, they've extended it, I just see it, and I think for a short period of time. But not when they return. We want to do it very quickly, but we want to make sure everything is okay. No, right now we have very... La Prensa: Weeks, months? The President: At this moment we have a very strong prohibition. Let's keep it like this until they heal.
La Prensa: Weeks, months? What would you do? The President: Well, I can't tell you that. I can't tell you that. I have to see: How are they doing? I mean, France was only there for another two days, for another two weeks. We have to see. Jon. Press: So Dr. Fauci said that you followed his advice on the issue of mitigation. He made the recommendation. You accepted it. You put it in its place. In making this next decision, which, as you said... The President: Well, I'm not sure who... Jon, I'm not sure who actually gave me advice on the ban.
I think I agreed... Press: No, not about the ban. I'm talking about mitigation. The President: I think I followed my own advice on the ban. I don't know. The press: - the social - social distancing, I mean. The closure. The President: Okay. Press: Not about travel, but about activity. So my question is: As you make this next decision, which you have said may be the most difficult or important of your presidency, will you assure the American people that you will again follow the advice of the doctors, of Dr. Fauci? , from Dr. Birx? Will you follow the advice of health experts before doing that?
The President: Me and many other people too. But I will absolutely follow your advice. The press: But would you go against them? The President: Please go ahead. La Prensa: Yes, sir... La Prensa: Would you go against his recommendation? If they say you need another 15 or 30 days, could you? The President: I don't think it's likely because I think we're not far from being on the same page. Please. The Press: Yes, Mr. President, one thing Governor Cuomo said today is that states do not have the capacity to do mass testing for COVID-19 before reopening, because... The President: Well, they have to do it. .
Look, they're supposed to. La Prensa: You say you cannot buy the diagnostic tests or the equipment. The President: Yes, I know. I know. The press: -- and needs federal help. So will the states understand it? The President: Well, they... may need help, but... La Prensa: Will they get it? The President: But they are there. They are on the ground. They have local mayors, local representatives. They have people who do it. Press: But you need the supplies. The President: And what we did last time is unprecedented. We literally reconstructed the evidence. We rebuilt an entire industry because we did not inherit anything.
What we inherited from the previous administration was totally broken, something someone should eventually say. Not only were the cupboards empty, as I say, but we inherited broken evidence. Now we have excellent evidence. I just left Abbott's top executives. Who would have thought this would happen, where they have a big test like that? And, in fact, what I'll do... I think, unless you have more questions for the Secretary of the Treasury, do you have anyone for Steve? Any? The Press: Mr. Secretary Mnuchin. The President: Is that for the Secretary of the Treasury or for me? The press: For Secretary Mnuchin, yes.
Yes sir. The President: Because if it's for me, we can wait. Press: It's for Secretary Mnuchin. The President: We have to get him back to work, okay? Press: Yes, sir. For Secretary Mnuchin, a question. Secretary Mnuchin: Yes. Press: -- from one of my colleagues who cannot be in the room. They are curious about the SBA rule that prevents small casinos from getting some of this relief. Is that something you're looking at? Is there going to be a change in... Secretary Mnuchin: So, no, not small casinos, but things like small taverns and restaurants that literally have small games.
And we're going to offer additional guidance on that. But I want to be clear: these are not small casinos. Press: Thank you, sir. La Prensa: Secretary Mnuchin? La Prensa: Secretary? Secretary Mnuchin: Yes. The Press: There was a letter that some House Republicans sent out this weekend about the liquidity of mortgage servicers. Secretary Mnuchin: Yes. Press: Can you explain what you're seeing on that front? Secretary Mnuchin: Sure. I think I commented on this about a week ago. We had a subcommittee working group at FSOC that specifically studied this issue. We have all the right people on it.
Ginnie Mae has automatically taken some action. We have had conversations with the FHFA about what they are going to do for Fannie and Freddie. And we have said that to the extent that certain Treasury authorities need it, we will accommodate that. So we are very aware of the problem. Frankly, we have been studying this issue long before COVID and were concerned that some of these non-bank managers were not well capitalized. But we are going to make sure that the market works correctly. Press: Thank you, sir. We've seen, in several of these relief bills, that Democrats and Republicans have been able to push different non-coronavirus-specific funding priorities.
Are you trying to maintain coronavirus-specific funding? And then if there are going to be other additions, for example, a change in labor rules is something that many on the left wanted. Some on the right wonder if they, too, should... if they should also push for their preferred supplements. Secretary Mnuchin: Well, I think our expectation has always been that this is related to COVID. Some people have a pretty broad view of what is "COVID-related," because it has affected almost every business. I mean, I think the President has talked about the Kennedy Center, which is a good institution.
Obviously, that wasn't the top priority of the bill, but they were affected by COVID-related issues. So... but no, the President has given instructions that we want to be very specific in the next bill. They are COVID-related articles. La Prensa: It has been reported. The President: Well, we didn't want to build the Kennedy Center, so you understand. And that was done: the Democrats wanted it. We didn't want that, but they did. And we had to agree to be able to do something for the workers. But we want this to be for the workers and for the companies that employ them.
That's what we're looking for. We are not looking for superfluous nonsense. Press: It has been reported that you argued, at the time the China ban was being discussed, that it was too damaging to the global economy. Is that accurate? Secretary Mnuchin: Let me be clear: I had nothing to do with the China ban. I was not in the working group at that time. I'm not even sure I did; I think I was traveling at the time. But I never had any, I wasn't part of it, I did become very active, and after the China ban, that New York Times report wasn't accurate.
Press: Didn't you intervene beforehand? Secretary Mnuchin: I was not part of the

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at the time and I was not... I was not involved. In fact, I think I may have been traveling. Press: Secretary Mnuchin, there is a proposal made by Senator Hawley to get direct payments to employers to pay people who have been laid off and keep people on the payroll. Does the administration support that proposal? Secretary Mnuchin: Well, again, that's the PPP. Basically, the PPP is sending money to small businesses (50 percent of American workers) to keep those people paid. And it is the most efficient way.
Every dollar we earn, as I said, is one dollar less unemployment. And most importantly, we want those people to be associated with the business. So as soon as the president is ready to open the economy, those companies will be together. We don't want those businesses to fall apart. That's why it's such a successful program and we want Congress to invest more money. The President: But are you talking about unemployment? Are you talking about unemployment? Press: (Inaudible) Senator Hawley. The President: Send itindirectly to the states? We would have preferred it to be sent directly to people. Democrats wanted it sent through the unemployment system.
And you know, I've told you about it: we have 40-year-old equipment in many of those systems. They are run by the state. But I heard they'll take the money out anyway. Secretary Mnuchin: So some... some of them are, and some states are not, and we encourage... you know, we're working with the states to try to upgrade their computers, but it's... a long haul. The President: Are you okay? Thanks Steve. Secretary Mnuchin: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. President. The President: Phase four, Steve. Phase four. Come on, Steve. Press: A quick question about something you just said. You said, "When someone is president of the United States, his authority is total." That is not true.
Who... who told you that? The President: Okay. So you know what we're going to do? We are going to write articles about this. It will not be necessary, because the governors need us in one way or another, because in the end it comes with the federal government.government. That said, we get along very well with the governors and I am very confident that there will be no problems. Yes please. Forward. Press: Has any governor accepted that you have the authority to decide when your state reopens? The President: I haven't asked anyone why... do you know why?
Press: Because no one has said it. Nobody has said that. The President: Because it is not necessary. Come in please. Press: But who told you that the President has total authority? The President: Enough. Please. Press: You mentioned the vice president's call with the governors today. Governor Hogan of Maryland has urged his administration to ask Congress for $500 billion to help stabilize budget deficits created by the coronavirus. The President: That is very kind of Governor Hogan. We appreciate Governor Hogan's statement. Press: Governor Cuomo said the CARES Act ignored state government deficits. The president: Cuomo. Press: Do you support that request?
The President: Which one? What did he say? Press: He said the CARES Act ignored budget shortfalls. The President: Well, they are analyzing things in phase four, where they have... you know, where they talk about states and also hospitals. They are talking about states that have been hit and also about hospitals. And we're certainly willing to look at that. Press: Will you urge Congress to defend them? The President: You know, we'll see what we all come back with. But they are talking about states and hospitals. OAN. Press: Thank you, Mr. President. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed an executive order Thursday banning the sale of non-essential goods.
If other states follow... The President: The sale of what? La Prensa: Non-essential goods. It has banned the sale of non-essential goods. Many describe this measure as draconian and unconstitutional. As president, do you think that if other states followed suit in the coming weeks, the federal government should intervene? The President: Well, I don't think that's going to happen. I think it's very extreme. But it is, and I think it will be a long time before we have to start thinking about it too much. Is strong. It is a very strong position to take. But they're making a lot of progress in Michigan, so let's see how it all works out.
Press: What is the status of funding for the World Health Organization? The President: We will talk about that very soon. I'm getting a full report. I am not happy with the World Health Organization. I'm also not happy with the World Trade Organization. They have all scammed us. And we have done it: this country, for so many years, has been scammed by everyone, whether it is World Health or World Trade. And they say... I call them the "Bobbsey Twins." They looked at our country; For years and years, we had people who did nothing about it. We are doing a lot about it.
Then we will have a report. And also... we're also talking about the World Trade Organization. But we've made a lot of progress there. Now we are winning cases for the first time, because they know I will leave if they don't treat us fairly. This country, our country, was at a point where we rarely, if ever, won lawsuits within the World Trade Organization. But now we are beating many of them, because they know that I am not playing. We will withdraw if necessary. We just won a lawsuit for 7 billion dollars, which was very good. Press: Do you expect a decision to be made this week on cutting funding for the WHO?
The President: Oh, yes. I would say that towards the end of the week I will make a decision on that. Yes. There is a lot going on right now. The Press: On China: why are there no consequences for China for the misinformation they shared? The President: How do you know there are no consequences? Press: Because you said so. Well, they have asked you and it seems that there were no... The President: How do you know there are no consequences? Press: What are the consequences, Mr. President, of misinformation? The President: I wouldn't tell you. China will find out.
Why would I tell you? The press: But people are worried that they have obstructed, that they have given wrong information. The President: No, you started by saying: "Why are there no consequences?" Press: Because you have been asked this several times, I am looking forward to your response. Why are there no consequences for China? The President: How do you know there are no consequences? La Prensa: Because we asked you. The President: You are going to find out. La Prensa: - and you said - you said that you did not want to have consequences because you suggested an exchange.
The President: I wouldn't tell you. You'd probably be the last person on Earth I'd say it to. Press: So you're saying there will be consequences? The President: Go ahead. Oh yes, please. Press: Mr. President. Actually, this is a question for Mr. Vice President. Do you agree with the President's statement and his understanding of federalism, that his power is total, as he described it? Is there anything you'd like to add or any context you'd like to add to the way he was discussing that? The Vice President: I support the President's leadership under the national emergency declaration that he signed.
And we are before you today, for the first time in American history, when all 50 states and territories have issued emergency declarations. This is an unprecedented moment in the life of the nation. And fortunately, as the President has reflected and our health experts will continue to reflect, because the American people have heeded the President's Coronavirus Guidelines for America; because state governors took them and implemented them, even in states where there was no significant outbreak; and we implement additional measures as we provide them with case data and best practices – we are making real progress as a country. Press: But it seems that you think your power is more limited than totally.
The President: Well, make no mistake: in the long history of this country, the authority of the President of the United States during national emergencies is unquestionably plenary. And you can look back to times of war and other national emergencies. And as the President said, we will be happy to report it. But in the coming days, what the President has

task

ed us with is to work with our health experts. We're bringing together an extraordinary group of American business leaders to advise the president. And then, working with the CDC, we're going to produce new guidelines, based on the data, for every state and territory in this nation.
Let's give them guidance. And, as the President has indicated, we will continue to respect the leadership and partnership we forged with every governor in the United States. But this is an unprecedented time. But I have to tell you: When we look at the fact - despite the heartbreaking loss of more than 22,000 Americans - when we look at the fact of what health experts told us this could be, I think I can only feel a sense of gratitude toward the American people, gratitude to the extraordinary team that has advised this president, the actions that President Trump has taken, the policies that governors have implemented throughout the United States.
I mean, today we were discussing, in the working group, that when you look at the European Union as a whole, they have a mortality rate almost three times higher than what the United States of America has today. And that is a tribute to our extraordinary healthcare workers, their dedication, their tireless work. But it is also a tribute to the fact that the American people implemented the mitigation efforts that the President advised the nation to do on the advice of our best scientists, now more than a month ago, and our hospitals were not overwhelmed. nor are they overwhelmed at this hour.
And I have to tell you, standing here today, I couldn't be more proud to stand alongside this President and be part of this team that has served the American people during this difficult time. And I'm just saying, to all the Americans watching, as we see the numbers leveling off and maybe even starting to go down, I encourage you to keep doing what you're doing. Thanks to the sacrifices that Americans and American families have made through these mitigation efforts, they are saving lives and helping our nation get through this moment. The President: Go ahead. The press: Sir, did the states tell you?
You've been talking to the governors quite a bit...those coalitions of states on the West Coast and in the Northeast, have they told you what they're going to announce? before they announce it? The Vice President: Governor Phil Murphy and the Governor of Connecticut expressed today that they would speak and discuss at the regional level what their recommendations would be. And today we assure you... The Press: Did you notify the White House about that, sir? The Vice President: I assured you today in our conference call with, I think, 48 governors who were with us today for almost an hour and a half: we told them that what the President would be producing... he has ordered that additional guidelines will be produced for the states, certified by the CDC, which would inform those governors, local communities and mayors on the best path forward, based on the unique circumstances facing those states and those communities.
I think what's clear is that the American people have seen the experience in Washington state, where all of this really began for us; and in California; and now, the extraordinary challenges in the New York City metropolitan area, including New Jersey and Connecticut; the challenges in New Orleans and Louisiana and Detroit, still Chicago, parts of Houston. But they're also seeing that, in each of those cases, the mitigation efforts are actually working. And so we will work with those, we will work with those states. And in some cases, it will make a lot of sense for them to work together at a regional level.
Press: Any idea why they didn't tell you in advance what they were planning? The President: Well, you don't know. You do not know. The Vice President: But... but the President... the President will be... The Press: (Inaudible.) The President: You don't know. I'm sorry. The Vice President: I'm sorry, I didn't hear your question. Press: Mr. President, can you tell us? Did they let you know? The President: You don't know. No, you made a statement. You do not know. The Vice President: I didn't hear your... I didn't hear your statement. I'm sorry. The President: And we would like... and we would like to have your cooperation.
And we will count on your cooperation. They will cooperate perfectly. Look. The Vice President: I... and let me affirm what the President said. We heard it again today on what I believe was our ninth conference call with governors: I think all Americans would be proud to see the partnership that this president has forged with governors across the country. I mean, it's an extraordinary statement. And you'll see some data when Admiral Polowczyk rises in a moment, but the flow of resources from around the world that we've moved into areas that have faced challenges... I mean, this President has directed us to ensure that every state has what it wants. you need it, when you need it.
And the spirit I heard again today from Republican and Democratic governors reflected that partnership. And as we move toward the President's goal of reopening America, we look forward to the same type of partnership in the nation's interest. The President: Very good, go ahead, with the mask. Forward. La Prensa: Sir, if you can hear me through the mask. The President: Barely. The Press: Can... can you? The President: In fact, I hear you well. La Prensa: -- the -- the District of Columbia argues that they were shortchanged in the most recent funding bill because they were treated as a territory rather than a state.
Will that be resolved in phase four? The President: Well, we are certainly looking at that. I heard that complaint, but the mayor seems to be very happy with everything we've done. The vice president: She was there today. The President: I mean, she actually... and she was saying very good things today. She's fine, yes. Forward from behind. Press: Mr. President, you said that this is the most difficult decision thatwill have to take on reopening the economy. I wonder how much the idea weighs on your mind that if there is a second wave, you will have reopened the economy and may have to shut things down again.
The President: That's right. And I hope that doesn't happen. I certainly hope that doesn't happen, but it weighs on my mind. Okay, back, forward. You had one. Forward. La Prensa: Mr. President? The President: Go ahead, please. Press: Thank you. OK thanks. A question for one of my colleagues who couldn't be here. China deployed an aircraft carrier to the South China Sea this weekend, amid claims by Chinese state media that COVID has reduced US military preparedness in the region. What kind of answers are you thinking of? Will you have a response to this action? The President: China has its own difficulties.
We have a relationship with China in which we are not happy with certain things that have happened in the last period, as you know, and I have been very explicit about that. But we know everything about that. And no, China is... we have seen what they did. We have seen many other things they have done, both pros and cons. And we will be fine. The Press: About Abbott, you said something earlier where he said that he was forming the economic task force and that he thought the recommendations were being implemented sooner than expected. Did you mean to suggest that it could be before May 1 when you start recommending that states open?
The President: I don't want to say that, but we are going to publish guidelines and recommendations quite quickly. In a few days. Press: Don't you rule out it being before? The President: I'm not going to say it. But look, certain states are doing very well. Certain large areas of the country are doing very well. They are doing really very well. Therefore, we will publish recommendations and guidelines very soon. Steve? Press: And would these new guidelines be tailored to each area or would they be a uniform set of guidelines? The President: Well, you'll see. I don't want to tell you now, but right now we have a very strong indication that we know, more or less, that we have some good ideas.
I also want to have... I want to have... we will have a video conference or at least a phone conference with a lot of very good people, having to do with certain fields, whether it's energy or entertainment and restaurants. , etcetera etcetera. We have to get people back into restaurants. We have to do what we have to do. We'll see if it's deductible or not, but it should be deductible. You will recover them very quickly. I mean, they used to have deductibility. The restaurant business was one of the most popular businesses. And then they ended it a long time ago, many years ago.
But we may need that to get people back into restaurants. Please. The press: Yes. Michelle Obama, today, supported voting by mail throughout the country as a possible solution for the states. She said it shouldn't be a partisan issue. Have her advisors told you that this could save lives? And (inaudible)? The President: Absentee vote, does she mean? Absentee voting? Press: Yes, and on a large scale due to the coronavirus. The President: Well, I don't know what she did. I mean, I didn't see that. When I pass that? Today? The Press: Yes, she's part of... that's a non-partisan group.
The President: Well, I wish you luck. I wish you good luck. Please go ahead. The Press: Regarding Abbott Labs, you said you had a lot of time... The Press: Yes, Mr. President. There is a bit of confusion about his phone calls yesterday with President Putin. The Kremlin says that you discussed current issues related to strategic security. That was not mentioned in the White House reading. Can you enlighten us? The President: We discussed many things. We talk about China. We discussed a lot of different things, but... it was mainly a call for oil, as you can imagine.
And they were of great help in achieving a stabilization price, a stabilization of the number of barrels. I think the number will be closer to 20, maybe 15, but closer to 20 than 10. And I think that was a very important call. I also spoke with the King of Saudi Arabia and that was a very important call. And the last nine positions are OPEC Plus. It is called OPEC Plus because there are also other states, other nations. We reached a very good agreement. Please. The Press: You have... The President: Go ahead. Press: What was the part about strategic security? Was that...
The President: I would say we were talking mainly about China. We were talking about its borders. And we are talking a little about our borders: our borders with Mexico. Because, as you know, Mexico is a big part of the deal. And Mexico really... was very complex from Mexico's point of view. It was not an easy deal for Mexico. And, Mr. President, we appreciate some flexibility. But we talk about borders, we talk about China, we talk about Mexico. Press: But "strategic security" sounds more like arms treaties. The President: Well, I mean, I... we talked about guns. Yes we did it.
In fact, that was a very important part of the call. Yes, good point. Please. The Press: So at Abbott Labs, you said testing is going very well. We know so. These machines have been sent to some of the governors, but some of them say they do not have the materials to conduct the tests. The President: Well, they have to get the material. You know, governors have to get the material. The Press: The cartridges. The President: Now, if they can't get it, they're going to see us. Press: The government... the federal government is distributing those cartridges. The President: I am referring to local governments.
I'm talking about the governors having to get the material. Now they have machines. In fact, let's go inside. I would ask Mike to do it as soon as I leave. They have very powerful machines that they don't even know they have. I'm not talking about Abbott; I am referring to the governors. They have machines that are used for this -- Press: The hospital laboratories. The President: Do you know what I'm talking about? Do you know what I mean? La Prensa: Yes, they have two different machines. The President: Very large and very powerful machines that, in the case of a certain state, only use 10 percent of their capacity and they did not know it.
Turns out that's Illinois. Jon, please. La Prensa: Okay, well, very quickly. Very fast. These 15-minute tests that they sent out, these new ones that they had at the Rose Garden, they say, including Governor Sununu in New Hampshire, that they don't have the cartridges to do the test. So when will you get those cartridges? The President: What do you think is the answer? The Vice President: We are rapidly increasing the numbers, Mr. President. The President: The numbers are increasing rapidly. The Vice President: And Deb will speak to (inaudible). Press: Can we know when? The President: It is increasing rapidly.
Well, pretty fast. Press: They can... they can make 50,000 a day, right? The President: Well, there are other machines that can really work. Press: Can you go beyond that? The President: And many states have big machines that can do a lot. They didn't even know they had them. They didn't even know they had them. And Mike is going to be talking about that. Press: And do you remember he mentioned, several weeks ago, that Google was creating this website where they would do drive-thru testing? The President: Yes. Google and Apple. The press: Have you given up? The President: He refers to the combination of Google and Apple.
The press: Has he overcome that because he said so? The President: No. Many people do not like it from the point of view of constitutional rights. I mean, a lot of people don't like it and some people think it's cool. No, they are working on it, as I understand it. Press: How about the testing website? Remember you said a website for Google and... The President: Yeah, no, I know. I know that. I know. The Press: And I think right now it's only operating in five counties in California. Is that? The President: That's right. No, Google is studying it, but Google is also working with Apple or studying something.
We have the largest companies in the world analyzing things that, within a year, everything we are seeing now will be obsolete. That's how good it is. Things are happening that are incredible. I saw a presentation today that I can't talk about yet, but it's amazing. Also, I think they're doing, Tony, I think they're doing very well with the vaccines. They are working hard on the vaccines and I believe they will have an answer for the vaccines. I think there are great things emerging regarding that. Now you need a trial period, but you are going to have great things.
Please. La Prensa: Sir, about the contact tracing that Google and Apple are doing... then, a different topic, about contact... The President: No, no. These are... these are Google and Apple. I don't know if it's a partnership or what, but they're working on something... Press: Right. Then there was the following... The President: They are working on more than one element. They're working on a couple of different things, Google and Apple. Google is also working on something that, as you know, has to do with testing. I think they are doing it in a unique way. The Press: So my question is not about the drive-thru testing website.
Not that. The President: Okay. The Press: About Google and Apple contact tracing that they want... The President: Yes. Yes. The Press: Now they have this process where they can put, you know, contact tracing on your phone. The President: I know. La Prensa: If you choose to subscribe, you may receive an alert if you have already done so. The President: That's right. La Prensa: -- in contact with someone with the coronavirus. How do you feel about that? The President: Well, it's kind of surprising, but a lot of people have big constitutional problems with it. You know it.
It's kind of surprising and it would be... in fact, as you know, other countries are thinking about using something similar but not as good. Press: What other countries are thinking about something similar? The President: I have heard that Singapore is. Singapore is. No, Singapore had a little setback because it had a... it had a break. You know that, and... but they'll take care of it. I know... I know Singapore people. They are doing a great job and they will pay it forward very quickly. But Singapore and other countries are looking at other things, and some countries are doing other things.
Press: Would you prefer Americans to use some other system? The President: Well, I don't want to go into that because we have a whole constitutional issue. We have more of a constitutional problem than a mechanical one, but we will make a decision on it. That's something we're going to discuss with a lot of people over the next four weeks. That would be a very accurate way to do it, but a lot of people have problems with it. Yes please. Forward. Press: A testing question, perhaps for Dr. Fauci as well. Can you talk about where the antibody test is and how fast it will be (inaudible)?
The President: Well, everything is moving forward. I think I can talk because I have to go. Moving fast, moving well. It's a test that's been going on for many, many years, except now we have very modern, awesome versions of it. But that moves on. Antibody testing has progressed very well. Well, more COVID-19? COVID-19? Yes, Steve. Press: A Theodore Roosevelt soldier has died. Have you determined the status of Captain Crozier, the former commander? The President: Well, that goes through the Navy, as I understand it. The Navy will make decisions on all that. And they had a break: to be honest, I don't think the ship should have stopped in Vietnam when there is a pandemic.
You know, I don't think the captain should have been writing letters. He is not Ernest Hemingway, as I said before, and he should not have been writing letters. And I don't think... I don't know who gave the order to stop in Vietnam. But they stopped in Vietnam and suddenly they went up, and now there are over 500 sailors and people on the ship who are affected. I don't know whose idea it was, but it wasn't such a good idea in the middle of a pandemic. Yes please. Jon. Go ahead, Jon. Press: Just one last... on this question of constitutionality, I wonder what changed your opinion because...
The President: Nothing changed it. No, no, I know exactly what you're going to say. Nothing changed it. The fact that he wants to depend on the states or maybe he does or maybe he has, and the fact that we have gotten along, is one thing. The fact that he doesn't want to use the power is another thing. Look... La Prensa: But you said from the point of view of the Constitution. The President: Yes, the Constitution. The press: -- you thought it should be the responsibility of the governors. The President: Constitutionally. You can look constitutionally. You can look at federalism.
You can see it another way. Jon, the fact that I don't want to exercise my power is very different. We have the power. You asked, "Does the federal government have the power?" The federal government has absolute power. He has the power. As for whether or not I'll use that power, we'll see. I would prefer... La Prensa: So if New York wants to stay closed, you can... The President: Jon, I would prefer to work with the states, because I like to use a local government. That's why, I guess it's now seven states, not eight, that, like South Carolina did, moved away from what we discussed last time.
That's why I looked at the individual states; They are doing a very good job. They are really doing a very good job. I prefer that they make the decision. Now the fact thatI'd rather have it... okay. But I have the absolute right to do it if I want. I may not want to do it. We have a very good relationship. Now we'll see what happens. If you look, the few states you're talking about have Democratic governors. But the governors are doing a good job and controlling it better, because there's no one in Washington saying, "Set up a testing site in the parking lot of a Walmart." And we're in Washington and they're in a state that's very far away.
That's really... that's how it should be and always should have been. And I've always said it was. But the relationship we have now with the states and the governors is very good. And we will be announcing, over the next very short period of time, exactly what we are going to do. Okay, a couple more. Forward. The press: about the coronavirus and Joe Biden: he is the presumptive Democratic candidate. Does he have any plans yet about when he will start sharing or when the White House will start sharing some of that information about the coronavirus? His daily presidential

briefing

on him?
The President: Well, no one has called about the coronavirus, from his point of view. Look, they had H1N1, which is swine flu, and that was a big failure. That was a tremendous failure. They had many failures. And you take a look at what... you take a look at the history. And you know, 17,000 people died. And are you talking about afternoon? They were so late... they were late as if they never existed. That was a big problem. It also caused a lot of trouble for many other people. So if Joe Biden wanted a

briefing

, he would certainly give it to him.
I don't know what I would do with it. Yes please. La Prensa: So Jared and Ivanka are serving on the new task force? And how are they going to balance? The President: No. The Press: What? The President: No, they are not. No. The Press: Okay. The President: Yes. Yes, go ahead, please. Press: I just want to clarify. So in a previous conversation, there was a description of multiple different councils or tasks - task forces. Can you explain exactly what the structure is and who will be in it? The President: Well, we have Mike's task force, which is the White House task force, that really got us to this point brilliantly, I must say.
I dealt with the governors and I dealt with the governors until the end. And I was on a lot of those calls. And each call got better and better. At first it was hostile. When we finished, I mean, today's call was a very good call, a very friendly call. I think everyone is online. And again, there's no one driving you crazy, saying they're not getting ventilators, they're not getting all the different things, they need more beds. They have plenty of beds right now. The Press: (Inaudible) hospitals that...doctors who say they don't have the supplies they need.
The President: And we always make mistakes, and I think it is important that you know, we always make mistakes in order to "give them more." Even when we didn't think... we didn't think that New York needed the beds they asked for. We didn't think they needed the ventilators they ordered. And we were right. Now, with ventilators, we are ready to go. I told them this: we are ready to go. We have 10,000 fans. We are ready to move them anywhere in the country when we need them, if we need them. We are also building a lot of ventilators and I think they will be used at some point.
You know that we are going to have reservations, including state reservations if they want to reach some type of agreement with us. But we are also going to help other countries, whether it is Italy, Spain or others: France is having a big problem. They all desperately need artificial respirators (Germany too). So we're going to have a lot of fans. We have a lot, you heard the numbers, we have a lot for next week. Next week, we have a huge amount coming. Okay, last question. Steve. The press: And regarding the working group, I asked about the task, how the working group will be structured.
It is one? The President: No. Then we have... in addition to that, we have various committees. We will have a transportation committee. We are going to have a manufacturing committee. You'll see it tomorrow. We are also going to have a committee of religious leaders. We have a great group of religious leaders. We are having committees with religious leaders. They've been seeing what's happening with the churches and all that. And we are going to have a committee of religious leaders. And so we have... we're going to have some committees. I will call them "committees" and we will ultimately make decisions.
So we're going to make decisions pretty quickly and I think they'll be the right decision. I hope so. Steve. Press: So tomorrow you will form the economic working group. When do you want recommendations? The President: Soon. Soon. And you know what I want. La Prensa: Next week or... The President: And then, when we form... when you say "form", I don't have to give you instructions. They are very sophisticated people. These are the best people in their fields. So I don't have to say, "Wow, we just met and we're meeting in two weeks and this is where we are..." I said, "This is what I want." We have already told you.
And they are... La Prensa: What did you tell them you wanted? The President: -- the best names in the different businesses, professions and religions. I mean, they're... these are the biggest names. The people who, I think, probably know the most. So we have called them and we will speak to them very soon. And we want them to have... if it's questions or statements, we want them to have them for us. And we will have an answer, or maybe... I mean, ideally we will learn from them. And we'll be able to do that and put everything we learned from those calls into our new guidelines.
So we will have new guidelines soon. I think it's going to be very good. I think it's going to be very smooth. And I hope it's very safe. Thank you very much to all. Thank you. Thank you. Press: Any thoughts on Stanley Chera, sir? Any thoughts on Stanley Chera? The President: Stanley Chera has been a friend of mine for a long time. He is a great real estate person; he passed away. He was a great real estate person. Excellent. Excellent. Kind of a legend in New York real estate. He called me a couple of weeks ago and said he tested positive.
I'm guessing Stanley is in his 80s. And Stanley went to the hospital and never came out. He went into a coma. He was unconscious for a long period of time and never made it out. A great man. He left...very charitable, really a great philanthropist. A very, very successful person in Manhattan, in the real estate business. So I got to know him a lot. He was very excited when his friend from New York became president of the United States. He was like... like a child. And he was not a child, but he was like a child.
He was very excited. He thought we would do a good job and he was very happy. And he... he was very proud of what we've done in this administration. But he tested positive and unfortunately he didn't make it. It's very... for me, it's very sad. Thank you very much to all. Thank you. Press: Thank you. The Vice President: Thank you, Mr. President. As the President mentioned, the working group spoke today with 48 of the country's governors. On that call, we reflected on the fact that all 50 states had emergency declarations in place, which was a first in American history; $5.2 billion had been distributed to states under the Stafford Act.
And it was a productive call and a reflection of President Trump's current direction for us to work closely with states to make sure that states in the areas hardest hit by the coronavirus have what they need, when they need it. We talked about the topic of testing and supplies. And I'm going to ask Dr. Deborah Birx to come forward, as well as Admiral Polowczyk, to reflect on both of those issues. Dr. Birx has led a task force effort from the beginning to rapidly scale up testing. From the beginning, the president formed this public-private partnership with commercial laboratories.
And as we stand here today, more than 2.5 million tests have been performed. And when we add up the lab estimates we have to take on, with reasonable safeguards (the projections have not yet been reported to the CDC), we think that number could be closer to the 3 million tests that have been performed. As mentioned, the new 15-minute test, we are working closely with Abbott Laboratories, who the President and our team met with here at the White House today, to rapidly increase availability of cartridges. Abbott produces approximately 50,000 cartridges a day. FEMA purchased an initial supply of that and distributed it to the states, but we are working with the states to not only distribute what is being manufactured, but also to work with other suppliers to create additional cartridges.
One point I'll ask Dr. Birx to expand on in a moment is the fact that beyond the new 15-minute test made by Abbott Laboratories; beyond what we hope will be a new antibody test, which could well be approved by the FDA within days; and an antibody test that would be produced at a rate of 20 million tests per month; The reality is that those commercial laboratories that the President brought here almost two months ago and initiated that public-private partnership have been producing hundreds of thousands of tests every week. But as Dr. Birx and our team have understood, we believe, right now, that the Roche team that is out there doing the high-speed testing, and we reported this to the governors today, we believe that around 20 percent of that capacity is not being used.
And with respect to the Abbott m2000 systems, we told governors today that we believe that 75 percent of the laboratory capacity that exists in the United States today is not being used by our governors. So today we send a very clear message to the governors to go to their hospitals and laboratories to identify the presence of the Roche Amplicor 500 and the Abbott m2000 to activate them. We literally estimate that even though we're doing over 110,000 tests a day in the United States, if our... if our governors and state labs would just turn on the machines that are already there, we could double the amount of testing in the United States.
America literally overnight. So I know that the governors' teams watch these briefings and we will respectfully remind them again to identify those laboratories. And we have a team that is now deploying and reaching out to labs to see if we can activate all of those labs. Secondly, on the issue of supplies, I've said it a couple of times from this podium today, but let me say it again: the direction that President Trump gave us, in dealing with states on personal protective equipment and ventilators, has been to ensure that states have what they need, when they need it.
And we recognize that while we all look at the overall coronavirus curve in the United States (understandably, the national numbers), the reality is that this outbreak has taken place on its own individual curves: first, on the West Coast; then the New York City area; then Louisiana, Michigan; and now we continue to fight it in Chicago, Houston and other metropolitan areas. It has given us the opportunity to ensure that personal protective equipment and ventilators are critically available. And I have to tell you: We are incredibly proud of the effort and the partnership with the states that has us here today to say that no one who has ever needed a ventilator has been denied one in the United States of America.
Right now, we have just under 7,000 ventilators in the Strategic National Stockpile. But as Admiral Polowczyk will detail, we are already beginning to receive newly manufactured ventilators. We will receive another thousand this week. By mid-May, we will literally have another 8,000 ventilators available to deploy across the country. I'll let me describe the specific details of those resources. But, but I want to, I want to share these numbers, especially with our healthcare workers across the country in the areas hardest hit by the coronavirus, so they know that resources are getting to hospital systems at the time of need, and We will continue to do just that.
Let me thank Dr. Birx for reflecting on the data and also, perhaps, for some comments on the evidence. And then, Admiral Polowczyk, if he can step forward and then he will describe the supplies. We'll hear back from Dr. Fauci and then answer some questions. Dr. Birx: Great. Thank you, Mr. Vice President. I don't know if we'll be able to get the first slide on cumulative cases. Yes, thank you very much. I wanted to show you a different way of looking at it today. Obviously, we looked at the case count per 100,000 Americans in each of our states and metropolitan areas, but I wanted you to see, in absolute numbers, how much the New York and New Jersey metropolitan area dwarfs all other metropolitan areas.
And that's why you can't even see Chicago, Detroit or Boston. All of those metropolitan areas have fewer than 25,000 cases. It can be seen that the New York, New Jersey metropolitan area has about 250,000 whenThey put those cases together, almost one more record. And that's why you hear us talk a lot about the New York and New Jersey metropolitan area; and Rockland and Westchester and Suffolk and Nassau and Bergen counties, New Jersey; and why we are so focused on bringing resources to that metropolitan area. If you could see the next slide, then. So if I exclude the New York and New Jersey metropolitan area, these are the other metropolitan areas that we have been following very closely.
I wanted to show you this so you could see how those curves are already starting to stabilize. So if you look at Detroit, if you look at Philadelphia, if you look at Louisiana, Louisiana is green. Detroit is in grey. You can see that generally in these metropolitan areas, in all metropolitan areas, there is a greater concentration of people, this is what the American people have done in these large cities, where it is often more difficult to socially distance. And we're really impressed by the work of the mayors and governors to make this happen. I also wanted you to see this because you can clearly see Chicago and Boston.
And so, Chicago is in orange and Boston is in yellow. They're crossing Detroit. And that's why we've focused a lot on the needs of those areas. And there is one, and Providence is in that category too. It's hard for them... for you to see them because they're so much further down the slide. But the highest, if you look at the axis of this slide, is 25,000. The axis of the last slide was 300,000. And that's why I really want people to understand each of these smaller epidemics, these small epidemics in each of the metropolitan areas, that we are tracking independently, as well as any epidemics and outbreaks that are happening in some of our other areas. state.
I just wanted to give you that perspective of how important the New York and New Jersey issue is and why we've been following it so closely. But I also wanted to assure all the other states that we're watching them very closely and really working with governors and mayors and everywhere, and that's why I wanted them to see that not only are the curves flattening in some of those big metropolitan areas, but they are beginning to decline. And this is what we are very excited about. These are cases. We also know that mortality will be delayed. That's why we're also tracking the number of people who have succumbed to COVID-19.
I also wanted to point out here that, yes, our mortality is lower when you combine European countries the same size as the United States. And I think it's really about two things: One, it's the incredible work of the American people, which is also the incredible work of our healthcare providers and the system of each of these hospitals that have the resources and the ability to respond to the needs of COVID-19 patients. And I think you can really see the excellent healthcare delivery that's being achieved because of the low mortality. Just to mention very quickly about testing, because you've heard me talk about it before, and then it was a little misquoted and misaligned, but there are several Abbott machines, so I'll be very clear, having spent years in the lab.
The high-throughput machines, which are the Roche 6800 and 88 (I think it's the Roche 8800) and the Abbott M2000, are machines that run between 500 and 1,000 assays at a time. The Abbott company worked very hard, three weeks ago, to get one million tests used. And they can do a million tests a week for all our laboratories that have these platforms. And so far, to date, around 250,000 tests have been used in three weeks of work. And that's why we've been appealing to lab directors to actually get all those machines up and running. Last week, Dr. Fauci and his incredible team of researchers agreed to actually look for more high-performance machines from Roche and Abbott that are at research institutions and doing critical research work, to bring them online to complement those from other labs. . work, to create a mosaic and a complete strategy that brings together high-performance platforms, with medium-performance platforms, with those that are low-performance but fast platforms, which is this ID NOW.
ID NOW will not be the answer to the amount of testing we will need over the next few weeks. They perform a test every 15 minutes and we can obtain around 55,000 cartridges per day. But I just said that these other machines, of which we have hundreds, can run 500 to 1000 in a single period of time. That's why we need to bring all these essays together. And a team has been created to call every laboratory and every research institution in the United States to define full capacity in each state. Because we shouldn't expect every governor to understand exactly everything in his state, but we have to understand everything in every state so we can meet the needs of the American people as we increase testing.
Now, I know you all know that in three weeks, we went from 300,000 total tests to 3 million total tests, in three weeks. We know we have to increase that even more. That's actually been done by HHS, Admiral Giroir and the team there. And we're going to supplement that team to really bring in all the additional resources and platforms that we have in the United States of America, just like we did with the ventilators to provide all the capacity necessary so that we can continue as well. to increase testing. Additionally, of course, as these epidemics subside, more and more tests can also be used for surveillance.
But I do want to mention the 19 states that are generally never represented on these charts. States have continued to conduct containment and outbreak investigations. And I've been able to talk to many of those states. And I just remind everyone, when I talked to each of these state health officials, where they are finding outbreaks in nursing homes. And so we really knew that we needed to continue to protect and we continued to test in nursing homes, because we know that that is a particularly vulnerable group and it is a group that we are often in, now that we are starting to understand the asymptomatic. transmission.
No one intends to transmit the virus to others, but we know that among essential workers in the United States, people unknowingly become infected and then spread the virus. And those are the ones they were very interested in finding. And you might say, "Well, how do you find them if they don't have symptoms?" And this is where we really have to increase vigilance in a very deliberative and comprehensive way. And so we're really looking at what the sentinel surveillance sites are. I think we can see where there are outbreaks, because once people have symptoms, you can see them.
But where is sentinel surveillance done to find them before they show symptoms? This is what we have done for decades with HIV, and it is what allows us right now to really control the HIV/AIDS epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa, because we find asymptomatic people and treat them when they are asymptomatic. asymptomatic. So this is something that we know how to do and it's something that we're working very closely on with the CDC and others to make sure that we can provide all of that capability to the American people. These are just some ideas and what we are working on.
Obviously, we continue to track each county and community. And then finally, I'm going to convene an additional group. There is a group of HIV/AIDS activists and community workers who understand these tests that I've been talking about, these DNA tests, these RNA-based tests. Because they often acquire viral loads in HIV. But they will know how to explain this to the community, about sampling and what it means to conduct those trials. They are essentially virologists. They understand all these essays. They also understand antibody testing, because it is antibody testing that they recommend and use in HIV testing throughout the United States.
And maybe he will be our translator for the American public and their local mayors. They understand these tests. They basically understand all the virology and all the immunology. And I really ask everyone to help us communicate what these tests are so that the community is prepared for them. Because antibody tests measure something very different than the viral load in the front of the nose that we use for diagnosis. So, really being able to understand all of those tests, when to use them and how to use them is going to be really critical. But the good thing is that in the United States of America we have these community groups that understand these tests very well and we will be able to discuss them at all levels with their community.
The Vice President: I'm going to call Admiral Polowczyk in a minute, but I have to call Dr. Tony Fauci. Let me... let me... let me say something really straight from my heart, if I can. 32 years ago today I lost my dad. April 13 is always a difficult day for our family. And this morning, as my brothers and sisters sent pictures of Dad, as we always do, I thought about the families of the more than 22,000 Americans we have lost. And I just want to tell you that he is in our hearts and in the prayers of millions of Americans as you, as you face this heartbreaking loss, as well as the families who have family

members

who are battling serious illness.
But let me encourage everyone that in the midst of that loss, because the American people have been putting these mitigation measures in place, there are families that are still together today. And I just want to encourage you here, about halfway through "30 days to slow the spread," to take it seriously. In no way do I minimize the losses that we have experienced as a nation and as families, but... but we should be encouraged to know, when we see those numbers in the vast majority of states, that because of what the American people are doing, it is working. .
And Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx, and the entire team, continually asked us to remind the American people, and we do it again today: Keep doing what you're doing with the "30 days to slow the spread," and we It will hasten the day when we heal our land. Dr. Fauci? Dr. Fauci: I just want to make a comment related to a question that was asked, and then we'll have questions. I don't want to take too much time. The idea of ​​how we would evaluate, from a purely public health standpoint, what I call re-entry to some kind of normality.
As health people, I know nothing and do not pretend to know anything about economics. There will be people who will know much more than me, who will give advice on all the committees the President was talking about. But the one thing we do know as health professionals, as doctors and scientists and public health professionals, as I mentioned, I think over the weekend, on one of the shows, is that some people may think it's going to be like a light. turn on, turn off and turn on. You know, either we go out or we go in. It simply won't be that way because we have a very large country and there are different impacts.
You see, New York is very different from other parts of the country, from the Midwest, from the mountain region, from California and from Washington, different from New Orleans. So as we discuss and consider the public health aspects, it's probably something I refer to as sort of a continuous re-entry. It won't be one size fits all. So I don't know what it will be yet because we still have time to see it. Dr. Birx, who does an incredible job of showing you the data and graphs, will probably influence some of the recommendations we will make. But I can assure you that there will be recommendations that will be based solely on public health.
And the President will get a lot of other input from others, but we will give honest public health recommendations. The Vice President: Thank you, Tony. Admiral? Admiral Polowczyk will give an update on supplies and then we will answer some questions. Rear Admiral Polowczyk: Thank you, Mr. Vice President. Can I make the fan slide up again? I'll start from there. Alright. Thank you. So start with what's in reserve this morning. And then, here are the contracts that we will be delivering over the next few weeks. And we added 8,600 fans to the pool we already had. That's the math you get there.
That's... that includes the DPA action with GM. And we will say that we have also issued what would be called "classified orders" with all of these suppliers to allow them front-line privileges, so to speak, within their supply chain. So these, there it is, you know, we've written the contract. We're talking about over 100,000 ventilators, and then we will continue to work with them to ensure that the ventilators actually appear. So we have to continue working there. And while we were doing it, we realized that downstream supply chains also needed some additional work under the Defense Production Act.
If you go out to the airlift, there are 80 flights scheduled, 37 complete, 43 on the horizon. And you can see the amount of material that has been brought in to supplement the volume that is needed. Now, first I'm going tosee a series of slides from New York. So Dr. Birx gives me what I'll call a geographic reference to align the supply chain. So in all of those cities, you'll see a little theme here. I will talk about many cities and geographic areas. I aligned the supply chain with those geographic areas to try to get as much as possible there, while realizing that the rest of the country also needs supplies.
And then we align with the supply chain to the point of care: public hospitals, VA, private hospitals, nursing homes, first responders, critical care and more. So last work week, Monday of last week to Friday, Saturday of last week, these are the massive materials that came into the New York, New Jersey metropolitan area, and you can see the volumes there. So if you go to Detroit, we talked about their hotspot. Here are the volumes of deliveries made to Detroit during that same period. If you can, go to Chicago. And I'm going to go over this quickly, but you can see that the geographic alignment, the places that Dr.
Birx talked about is where we are concentrating supplies. You can go to New Orleans to understand yourself. Washington DC, right? So now I can talk about it. Today was, you know, kind of an early entry into Washington, D.C., Baltimore, right? - position supplies before needs, we hope, in Washington. Go to Baltimore and you can see the volumes there, trying to get ahead of that. And then comes Philadelphia. And now the next slide is a summary of nine cities. And to save a little time, I didn't include Boston and Houston in there. So you can see the volume of material flowing through an airlift of the commercial network, its supplies, into geographic regions and then, and then further prioritize the site of care.
Now, last topic: N95 masks. That's why the Department of Defense announced DPA action this weekend. That came from the Department of Defense on Friday to the White House and was approved on Saturday. And the contract awarded today for 131 million dollars to five companies: 3M, Honeywell, Owens & Minor, Moldex and Draeger. You know, the CARES Act was signed before the end of March, towards the end. Basically, two weeks since that money was deposited into Title III authority for the Department of Defense. This action takes us from a baseline of what was being produced in the country, around 30 million masks, to, as we move from fall to the end of winter, 120 million masks in the country.
Currently, we are meeting some of that demand from foreign sources. Good? And so the additive masks here, through this, will increase, reduce dependence on foreign sources and that will essentially secure a large part of the supply chain. Five companies, six... six cities: Smithfield, Rhode Island; Phoenix, Arizona; Del Rio, Texas; Lexington, North Carolina; Sheboygan Falls, Wisconsin; and Aberdeen, North Dakota, all producing more fabrics or increasing production facilities to accelerate that progress. The Vice President: Great. Great job. Thank you, admiral. And can we put up that slide? I guess it's still open. This is only for the week ending April 11.
We have distributed or directed the distribution of 5.3 million N95 masks, 5.5 million surgical masks and 110 million gloves. We share that primarily to make sure our health care workers know that resources are flowing, we're going to continue to do that, but these are just this week's numbers and don't include, for example, what the president announced. . Today I was able to tell Governor Tom Wolf of Pennsylvania that next week they will be receiving 2 million N95 masks to support some of the health care challenges they face in the broader Philadelphia area. That being said, we'd be happy to answer a couple of questions.
Forward. Press: Thank you very much. One for the admiral and then one for Dr. Fauci, if you don't mind. The vice president: Yes. Please. La Prensa: Admiral, wouldn't that have been helpful, since you're reviewing all those supplies that are now entering the system? You talked about having to buy foreign products, you know, As we catch up and manufacture it, wouldn't it have been helpful if it hadn't taken until mid-March for the government to start placing wholesale orders for this type of supplies? Rear Admiral Polowczyk: Well, I came from the Pentagon on March 20, so I'll speak starting March 20.
We are using the Defense Production Act. I think you'll see a lot more use of that as we move forward. You know, we do... La Prensa: Sir, but my question is about the moment here and the lost time that the President denied today. Rear Admiral Polowczyk: I know. And I'm not... I'm not prepared to talk about it... except from March 20 onwards. I just... I wasn't... I was on the Joint Chiefs of Staff. I wasn't involved. The Vice President: Okay. The Press: And I wanted to ask Dr. Fauci. The vice president: Dr. Fauci. The Press: - You know, you said you would give your recommendations to the president, you and Dr.
Birx, you would come up with a plan that you guys are comfortable with. Are you willing, once the President has made his decision, to come here and tell us, tell the American public, what he actually recommended to you and whether he followed through on what you recommended? Dr. Fauci: I'm actually not...what do you mean? Like... La Prensa: So, when the President stands here, whether, you know, on May 1, whatever day it is, and describes his plan, are you willing to stand here behind him? and tell us all, tell us? To the American public, what do you recommend they do if it makes a difference?
Dr. Fauci: You know, I have to think about that because, you know, when you have conversations with the president, sometimes they really should be confidential in what you give him because he's going to have to make his own decision. I'd have to think about that. Press: That way we would know if he was really listening to the health advice he was being given. Dr. Fauci: Correct. Yes he is. I mean, he... I can tell you one thing: he will listen. But I think what's going to happen, you know, I don't know for sure, is that he will receive input from various individuals who represent various aspects of society; one of them will be health.
All I can tell you is that I will give you advice based on evidence, on my observation of what the best public health approach would be. The Press: Dr. Fauci? Dr. Fauci: Yes. Press: Just to get back to where we started today, which was with the President's apparent frustrations with some of the reporting on his initial decision-making process in January and February. As I'm sure you know, the reason we in the press do that kind of reporting is so that the next president who comes along and has to deal with a pandemic can learn some of these lessons.
After watching closely how this unfolded, what do you think were the mistakes that were made early on that a future president could learn from? In retrospect, of course. Dr. Fauci: You know, I... The Press: Because no president does everything right, obviously. Dr. Fauci: I understand. I don't want to use the word "mistakes," because when you're in the fog of war, when you're doing something, you have to make decisions. You get input from various people. It's always a moving target. And I just don't want anything taken out of context because I already had one of those in the last few days (laughs), so I don't want to go through that again.
I wouldn't say "error." Could things have been done better? Of course. I mean, nothing is perfect. And you can always do better. But, I mean, I hesitate to say something is a "mistake." Press: But in retrospect, with that caveat, what could have been done better? Dr. Fauci: Well, I mean, I can't... I can't comment on anything outside of my own field. But what, when I think back, was evolving, in my mind, was something that was a much worse virus than I had thought it was going to be, based on what we had learned from the beginning, when at first it felt like something who just jumped from an animal to a human, and didn't really have much ability to jump from one human to another.
And then suddenly you find out that not only was it not just animals to humans, but there were many... that's how it probably started. But then when you step back and realize that there were probably a lot of infections, maybe if we had dealt with that a little bit more, we might have learned that not only does it affect person to person, but it transmits very efficiently. . When I question myself, I am not perfect; Maybe I... I wouldn't say I made "mistakes", but maybe I should have tried to dig a little deeper into what was going on, but the information wasn't communicated as much as I would have liked.
And then all of a sudden when you find out that you're dealing with something that's not just your worst nightmare, because people ask me, "What's your worst nightmare?" -- a new virus that is transmitted by the respiratory route, that has a high degree of transmissibility, that has a high degree of morbidity and mortality. You know, is that a mistake? Maybe I should have realized that sooner. I'm not sure it was a mistake; It was just an evolving thing that we finally realized and said, "Wow, this is really worse than we could have imagined." Assistant: Okay. The last one, guys.
Press: When you met with Abbott Laboratories today, what did you ask them to do? What did they say they could do? The Vice President: Well, today we spoke with Abbott Laboratories about how we can significantly increase production of cartridges for the 15-minute test. Because, remember, today we are, we are, we are not just scaling to rapidly expand testing across the country. And it's one of the reasons you heard me and Dr. Birx say that we have a whole team that will now be working with governors and working with labs across the country to identify the machines that already exist today that could be activated when performing tests.
But we also want to work with Abbott Laboratories for the long term. Because if current trends continue (and I literally hope and pray that we soon find ourselves on the downward slope of the coronavirus in this country), this epidemic, in its current form, will come to an end. But as we make decisions in the coming days to reopen America, what President Trump also wants to do is have a policy to remain open. And have the kind of surveillance testing available across the country so that the CDC can do immediate contact tracing, when you have a positive test, so that we can deploy resources like the new 15-minute Abbott test specifically in nursing homes.
Today we spoke with Governor Baker in Massachusetts and Governor Hogan in Maryland, who have been very innovative in implementing federal guidelines to prevent the spread of infectious diseases in nursing homes, and we commend them for that. But being able to ramp up manufacturing of those devices so they can be deployed in the coming months is also a focus of our efforts. Therefore, today we continue to rapidly expand testing. And the governor of Louisiana told me today that they had the highest per capita testing, by his numbers, of any state in the union. And we congratulate him for it.
But making sure that, going forward, we have the testing infrastructure across the United States to deal with the coronavirus should it come back in the future. With that said, let me... let me wish you all a good night. And tomorrow we will be back. And... The Press: Mr. Vice President... The Vice President: Okay. Forward. Press: I just have one question about these cartridges and this schedule because the governor of New Hampshire says the federal government is in charge of distributing them, and FEMA is. So what's the timeline for when they'll have enough? Because they say they don't have enough.
Illinois said they didn't have enough. So what's the timeline you're working with? The Vice President: Yes, let me...let me have Dr. Birx address that. But there is an initial tranche that we bought. There are about 18,000 Abbott Laboratory machines throughout the country and FEMA purchased a certain number that were immediately distributed to all states. But now Abbott Laboratories is literally producing about 50,000 a day, and those are available on the open market. And we will also work with Abbott and with the states to deploy those resources. And we are also working with other manufacturers to increase cartridge production.
But if there's more you want to add, Deb, we'll do it last. Dr. Birx: No, that was perfectly said. I just want to... sometimes you ask those questions and I always want to make sure people understand. So a third of them went specifically to the Indian Health Service and these states that have smaller epidemics. Two-thirds of it went to the public market, mainly destined for places where there is a high incidence of disease. But only two-thirds went that way so people could buy them directly, and one-third went to the Indian Health Service and the smaller states that actually bought them.they need.
So I think what we're trying to do now is balance the entire testing framework of medium, low and high performance machines to give everyone maximum flexibility, state by state, depending on the needs at the time. . If there is an outbreak and you have to do 5,000 tests, you will not do them on an ID NOW machine that takes 15 minutes for each negative result, but you will do them on your high-throughput machine. So making sure everyone knows where everything is and what's running is going to be really critical going forward, because we can't leave anything unactivated; everything has to be on the table so we can dramatically increase testing once again. -- we uploaded a log in three weeks.
So if we are going to increase again, we will have to include all teams. The Vice President: Let me say again, thank you all for your time and attention. And thank you to all the Americans who joined us tonight. I just want to encourage you that we will continue to support each other in this effort, to expand testing across the country and distribute supplies to our incredible healthcare workers who have done incredible work in the midst of the coronavirus epidemic. But my last word, on behalf of the President, on behalf of our entire task force, is: It's "30 days to stop the spread." And I know we're almost halfway there, and I know it's been a month of these mitigation strategies, but I hope that as you look, as you see the progress that's been made on the West Coast, the beginnings of real progress in the New York City metropolitan area, Louisiana, Detroit and elsewhere.
I hope this only serves to strengthen your resolve to continue doing your part to slow the spread, because we will get through this, but it will take all of us to continue doing it. So thank you to the American people for all your efforts and we'll see you tomorrow.

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