Them. Despite the reality on the ground. This virus, to our dismay is spectacularly efficient in transmitting from person to person. Plus back to school. The administration pushing for schools to reopen quickly. We are very much going to put pressure on governors and everybody else to open the schools. We dont want the guidance from cdc to be the reason why schools dont open. As educators say safety, not speed, is what matters. Teachers get sick, whats the policy . If someone in the family gets sick, whats the policy . Brett gerard and miamidade school superintendent. Trump versus mueller. Roger stone was treated horribly. A rare, public rebuke. Robert mueller denounces President Trumps roger stones sentence. Ill talk to larry hogan of maryland who is considering a 2024 president ial run. Joining me for insight and analysis are nbc News White House correspondent Kristen Welker, syndicated columnist george will and anna palmer, correspondent for politico. Welcome to sunday. Its meet the press. From nbc news in washington, the longestrunning show in television history, this is meet the press with chuck todd. Good sunday morning. For a country that celebrates american exceptionalism the United States finds itself in an exceptionally bad place today. The calendar says july 12th, but it feels more like april 12th when it comes to battling this virus, even if President Trump did finally wear a mask in public late yesterday. Once again, cases are surging, the ten worst days for cases nationwide have occurred over the past 11 days. We are facing shortages of protective tests and icu beds for covid19 patients and once again, we are left to wonder how did we get here again . Is it because of a president who remains in denial about the sdafrter unfolding on his watch . Is it because states chose not to listen to Health Experts and reopened too soon or is it because of scenes like this, too Many Americans being foolish deciding they were immune or the experts were wrong or that they had a right not to wear a mask or is it all of the above . Now President Trump is urging schools to reopen with weakened safety protocols and pointing to germany, denmark, norway and sweden as examples of countries that reopened schools safely. He did it on a day when those countries had a thousand new cases combined. On that same day the United States had roughly 60,000 new cases. President trump nning a war we clearly losing and his risking his own katrina moment when voters lose faith in a president s ability to lead. Ive never been against mask, but i do believe they have a time and a place. The president wearing a mask in public for the first time at walter reed on saturday faces a leadership crisis of his own making with new u. S. Cases spiking to more than 71,000 and daily death tolls in north carolina, arizona and tech tex up in the past month. The worst is yet to come as we work our way through the massive increase in people testing positive. Mr. Trump is at odds with his top infeshgz disease expert. On the trajectory of the virus. The current state is really not good. We are still kneedeep in the first wave of this. Dr. Fauci is a nice man, but hes made a lot of mistakes. On the federal response, as a country, reywhen you compare us other countries i cant say were doing great. Is the United States losing the war against cove snid. No, we have areas that flamed and over a period of time. The mortal iterate is a level that people dont talk about, but its down tenfold. Tenfold. President trump is threat toeng make the already difficult debate over cool reopenings his latest front in the culture wars after the cdc had new guidelines mr. Trump called them tough and expensive. The president said we dont want the guidance to be too tough and thats the reason why next week the cdc will be issuing a new set of tools. The president warned may cut off funding if not open. Pointing to democratic governors. They dont want to open because they think it will help them on november 3rd. I think its going to hurt them on november 3rd. Open your schools. I dont see anything, but remote education if the federal government doesnt step in. With less than four months until the president ial election, mr. Trump finds himself under siege. The two conservative justices he appointed joined the Supreme Court majority to dismiss his claim from investigators seeking his tax returns. This is a political witch hunt, the likes of which nobody has ever seen before. A tellall book by his niece hits stores this week. Any reaction to your nieces book . And it will hurt the ballot in november. Perhaps looking to his postpresidency, mr. Trump commuted the sentence of roger stone who was convicted of lying to congress, witness tampering and obstruction all to protect the president. The president has saved my life, and hes given me the opportunity to fight for vindication. With me now is the assistant secretary of health and a member of the president s Coronavirus Task force. Admiral brett girois. The president says were winning, but honestly, admiral it does look like were right back to where we were in april which to a lot of lay people it looks like we are losing this battle with the virus. What do you say . So, thank you for having me on. We are definitely not losing the battle, but we are in the midst of it, the numbers of cases have gone up recently, particularly over the last month. The Positivity Rate is leveling off. We have about 63,000 people in the hospital and thats a lot more than 40,000, a lot less than 85,000 and we do have a lot more tools in our tool box right now to combat this, but i dont want to underestimate the seriousness of this right now. Its all hands on deck and we have people in the field assisting essentially every county, every hot spot so we are in the midst of this and were taking it very seriously. Heres what i dont understand. In march and april it was understandable we didnt have ppe and we didnt ramp up testing. In march and april it was understandable that it might take days to get results. The whole point of the april shutdown was to get ppe and in inventory so that we wouldnt run out, have testing so that it was reliable and fast. We are running into the same problems that we were talking about in april now in arizona, in texas and florida. Why . Well, thats really not true. If you look at the data, and we follow the data every single day. Over 75 of the hospitals have at least 15 days of ppe and supply and less than 2 have under three days in supply. The ppe situation is in a much, much, much better place and, in fact, we are really ready to attack this. Im not saying there is not a shortage at one hospital, but overall we have lots of ppe. In terms of testing we did over 800,000 tests on friday. We tripled, quadrupled the number of tests we have and we have 12,000 retail sites that they are in and we are surging testing in basically every specific county thats having a problem. So it is not true that were the same where we are in march and april. We are much better prepared and we are attacking it aggressively. Admiral, the testing situation, yes, were getting more test, but were not getting the results fast enough. It takes five, six, seven days in the hot spots so you cant do Contact Tracing under that circumstance. Again, youve really got to look at the data, okay . Youre looking at the data on half the testing which is a large commercial labs and the other is point of care testing or within hospital systems. Point of care system will get you a result in 15 minutes and the hospitals are usually providing it in 24 to 36 hours. On the big commercial labs if youre hospitalized you get it in 24 to 36 hour, but you are right. We need to decrease the time to turn around those results and we have a number of efforts, number one, were starting to work with them on pooling. We expect to see that very soon and number two, the big surge is because were testing everyone in Nursing Homes. Thats a really, really good thing, but thats millions of tests per month to protect our elderly and were going to fix that problem and youll hear more this week about point of care testing in Nursing Homes so we are aggressively testing this every night. I get a report by state, what is the turnaround time and what is the delay . In arizona, florida and texas, the turnaround time has improved over the last 30 days and we follow this data and i look at that first thing i do and last thing when i go to bed. I want to tell you something Michael Osterholm said to me on friday. Take a listen, sir. The way were going to end up, i think, maximizing on our overall safety, our health and our economy is getting it shut down once and for all, coming back slowly and gradually, much like new york is doing and the rest of the world and then living with it until we get a vaccine. Is there any hes basically advocating in order to get control of this we have to shut down right. We didnt shut down correctly the first time. Do you concur with that that we didnt get this right the first time . I think mikes a really smart guy, and i listen to a lot of things he says and i read his newsletter and well have him very involved. At least in most places around the country. Our models really show that if you close down bars, where theres a lot of transmission, if you decrease restaurant capacity to about 50 , that you really, strictly physically distance and really, everybody, if youre out in public, we have to have 95 mask wearing or face coverings. If we do just those simple things we can bring that r value, the transmissibility value down to below one which means it goes away. So i think we need to be very selective. Sure, if we shut down once again, but we dont need to. There is a tremendous cost, mental, emotional, substance use, no cancer screenings, and no vaccines. Lets do what we know really works. Like i said, avoid bars because they really do spread. Restaurant capacity down 50 , hand hygiene and please wear at important. Weve got to have 90 or 95 adherence to that, and we can achieve the same results. You know, i want to follow up on the mask thing. A mask ordinance was not something that anybody the in federal level was talking about in march and april and the president himself has been has been at times acting like almost an opponent to mask wearing. How much did that set us back on this political debate about mask wearing over that threemonth period . , n well, i think the Public Health people have been very, very clear that mask wearing is essential. Its very important that we can really decrease the transmission. You may not protect yourself, but you protect everyone else and the Surgeon General says it well. Covid stops with me. If you want it to stop with you, wear a mask and you want to emphasize that and particularly with new data that there might be a small amount of aerosol transmission particularly in closed spaces with poor ventilation and wooe been very, very clear about that. Combined with the testing that we have right now, to tell us where a hot spot is starting and the commercial labs have done a great job, doing that and doing half our testing and combined with that we have a good signal radar to know where to surge in. Combined with the techniques that we have and again, were sending out Covid Response assistance teams and were sending it out to ten different locations and well do another nine and thats 19 major metroplexes. We know what to do with this, but weve got to have people onboard doing it, and the good news is we know how to treat you better and we have the remdesivir. Im not trying to paint a rosy picture, but we are in a better spot than we were in march and april, but we have to take this incredibly seriously and i think everyone in the country is doing that. Admiral, i am sure with logistics that we are in a better place that weve streamlined this process, but results sir, look at europe and look at us. Why do we have such a different and poor outcome than europe . Well, first of all, if you look at much of europe right now youre seeing some resurgence in cases. So i think the book is still out on that. This virus is not done with humanity yet. Probably 10 at most with people who have had it so there are a lot of susceptible people and we have to be disciplined about that and we have to do the kinds of mitigation techniques that weve been talking about. On the testing side, we have good, early signals now and we know that an increase in positivity heralds the rest down the line and an increase in positivity will mean an increase in infections and emergency room and hospitalizations and unfortunately deaths. When we see that, you have to be absolutely rigorous and disciplined about those measures and if we do that we can do that around and early every county right now, weve had an up surge in cases and early signs are that thats starting to level off and we have to keep the foot on the gas because we have a long way to go before this is over. And the final question i have for you is whether on this task force, whether Public Health guidance is being sort of massaged a little bit. This was from the Washington Post about anthony fauci. Dr. Fauci has argued that parts of the country experiencing surges should shouut down, but theres no buyin on act said someone who spoke on condition of anonymity. Are there some ideas that you cant propose because the president will never accept them . I want to just put this to rest. There is complete, open, honest discussion within the task force. The task force meets three or four times a week. The Vice President calls me regularly. Dr. Birx is not one to hold her tongue. Believe me, if there is a Public Health opinion that needs to be said that needs to be it and i respect dr. Fauci a lot, but dr. Fauci is not 100 right and he also doesnt necessarily and he admits that, have the whole National Interest inind. He looks at it from a very publ view, but let me just say there is absolutely open discourse and i feel absolutely saying anything to the Vice President and the Vice President briefs the president on a daily basis. So nobody feels like anything held back. We take this as a serious crisis and its got to be science driving the policy and thats the way it is. Admiral giroir, i have to leave it there. I appreciate you coming on and sharing the administrations perspective, sir. Thank you. Thank you. There are few issues amid this pandemic that are of greater concern to parents than getting their children back to school and also doing it safely. President trump is threatening to cut off federal funding for states that dont move as fast as hed like. Many worry the administration is putting speed ahead of safety. Joining me is the superintendent of the Public Schools district in florida and its the Largest School system in the country. Mr. Carvallo. Welcome to meet the press. Let me ask a straightforward question the president implied. Do you find the cdc gid linuide for opening schools too expensive . Number one, thank you for the invitation. Weve gone through the cdc guidelines and they have informed the opening from the local and state Health Departments. There a in the recommendations from the cdc obviously, we take them very seriously. The issue of social distancing in any one school in miami date or broward or palm beach districts may be difficult to achieve, but there are mitigation strategies that you can take in lieu of the six feet of distancing like the wearing of masks which will be a mandatory element when we do reopen like the use of nontraditional spaces like cafeterias or Media Centers or gymnasiums. So we are looking carefully at the cdc guidelines. We are consulting from the Health Department and i think we come up with a reopening plan that quite frankly, lifts the best possible practices with implementation with aggressive limitation strategies when those are impossible to implement in miamidade. Im curious, where are you getting the money for this . Well, the federal government during its first stimulus package in the cares act has appropriated 900 million for the state of florida. The governor controls about 137 million and the rest of the allocation comes from School Districts and we received not g sufficient. Obviously, it is clear on the s of Economic Conditions they think will trail the Current Health crisis that much more will need to be earmarked just as a measure of comparison. During the last Great Recession of 20089 in excess of 13 billion had already been, in excess of 113 billion had been invested to protect k12 institutions. At this point only 16 billion. I think for the purchase of ppes and additional disinfectionic soels and the disinfection of schools and we may need mdistan. More than likely we will need additional sources earmarked specifically for local governments and systems. You have a hybrid approach. You want to give parents a choice, quite a few School Districts are offering this. You can go full online or a partial inperson until youre able to get to miami and is able to get to phase 3 in the reopening process. Im curious, have you thought about bringing Elementary Students back five days a week, but middle school and high school holding off . Some of the Scientific Data are your Health Advisers saying that that might be a compromise in order to get younger kids who dont appear to spread the virus as much in their every day, but older kids, maybe not. Number one, our reopening plan has been from the very beginning informed by Health Experts and individuals who have distinguished themselves in the area of medicine and Public Health and our plan, as we modify well continue to be informed by those same individuals. This tuesday were bringing them back to reexamine our plan in collaboration with the county mayor to make sure that we not only have a unified voice and unified set of data and dating criteria that we shall monitor for the appropriate evolution in terms of reopening our school system, but what you just said is absolutely right. Our plan relies on a five day a week schooling experience across all miamidade in addition based on parents option a my School Online which is a synchronous, remote teaching and learning opportunity for parents and then the possibility of hybrid models that rely on the alternate cohort of students spending part of the time in school and part of the time at home on the basis of utilization or capacity limitations in schools. One of the things that i keep looking at this is exactly that. Younger children and perhaps students with disabilities to a certain extent and english language learners. You know, some of those that by virtue of age, but also by virtue of the greatest possibility for learning to reengage quickly for the best possible way of taste coming is face to face with a teacher. Very quickly, mr. Superintendent. Extracurricular activities, im thinking football, marching band and things like that. Is that likely out for the early part of the fall, for sure. We are now in conversations with the states Athletic Commission to make decisions about everyones sport. Certainly, its easier to envision tennis being practiced in a safe way than it is wrestling or football, but we are probably progressively be opening some time in later july. Some Training Camps with extreme social distance and an opportunity for kids to reengage. Look, the last thing id like to say is this. We will obviously considering where the health data currently is. A Positivity Rate of 29. 1 . A month ago it was at 6 . Our start of the school year is six weeks from now. It is quite possible if the social behavior and the restrictions in place if people wear masks, if people exercise social distancing that conditions may of teaching and learning which is in person, but we need the communitys collaboration. We need the science to drive the practice rather than politics influencing what is legitimately a community concern. Alberto carvallo, thanks for coming on and sharing your perspective about my old haunts, as well. And still the best. When we come back. One of the few republicans who has been willing to criticize President Trumps come on in, were open. All we do is hand you the bag. Simple. Done. This smells so good. Big thanks to you guys at home. Were here right now. We adapt and we change. I mean you just figure it out and well do like we do as safely as we can. I got a new job. Weve just been finding a way to keep on pushing. Were lookin for a day at a time baby. Theyre going to be paying for this for a long time. They will, but with accident forgiveness allstate wont raise your rates just because of an accident, even if its your fault. Cut sonny. Was that good . Line the desert never lies. Isnt that what i said . No you were talking about allstate and insurance. I just. When i. Lets try again. Everybody back to one. Accident forgiveness from allstate. Click or call for a quote today. Right now, there are over a million Walmart Associates doing their best to keep our nation going. Because despite everything thats changed, one thing hasnt and thats our devotion to you and our communities. Our priority will always be to keep you and our associates safe, while making sure you can still get the essentials you need. Welcome back. Its always risky to predict november elections in july, but right now President Trump is in trouble and were he to lose hed likely take the Republican Senate down with him giving democrats full control of washington. Lawmakers who have kept some distance from mr. Trump are starting to look ahead to a posttrump gop if one exists and among them is marylands governor larry hogan who has been sharply critical of the president s handling of the kro coronavirus and thinking of running in 2024 and written a book still standing, surviving riots, a global pandemic. Governor hogan, its a reminder, youve had a very, very busy tenure as governor of maryland. Let me start with the and that virus, but specifically, lets talk about schools. You have a lot more say than most governors do over schools. Where are we headed . Could you open schools up five days a week in person if you wanted to . Well, we could if we wanted to, but look, i think everybody would like to get our kids back to school as quickly as we can, but we alwaso want to do it and make sure our kids are safe as possible and we dont want to be rushed into this. From the beginning weve been working with our doctors, our scientists and epidemiologists to make sure were doing the things that make the most sense and our state superintendent of schools will be sitting down to get a report from her and shes been meeting with the local jurisdictions and with the top Health Professionals and getting the stakeholders in and well come up with a plan that will probably be a hybrid that talks about how well provide the best education we can for our kids and do it in a safe way. Lets talk about the Bigger Picture here at 30,000 feet. Youre on these weekly phone calls with the task force because they supposedly have these open lines with the governors. We hear from from the Vice President a lot, but results are just that. Why are we in a worse position than europe from your perspective . Well, its a great question. First of all, yes, we are now doing weekly calls and it started out doing a couple of times a week, and ill give the Administration Credit for this and theyve done an excellent job of communicating from the beginning of the crisis and almost all of the nations governors are on these videoconference calls with what sometimes the president and typically the Vice President runs these calls with the Coronavirus Task force and many of the cabinet members and they try to keep us uptodate. I think theyve made progress in a number of areas with respect to now getting ppe out to thereo question that mistakes were made, that we should have had a National Testing strategy and we should have been on top of this and we should have had a much more clear, National Strategy and been communicating much earlier on in the process and i think the governor his to step up and be on the front lines, but we had 50 different states with 50 different strategies and some did better than others. Is this ultimately, youre talking about the lines of communication. Does this come from the president . Is it the president s leadership that has led us down this path . I dont want to spent a lot of time just criticizing in the middle of the crisis because i dont like to monday morning quarterback, but i havent been afraid to speak up when i thought something was wrong or when i thought they were off in the wrong direction and ill continue to do so. I lead the nations governors on every single weeks call i usually raise issues of concern on behalf of my colleagues and on behalf of my state and on behalf of my colleagues across the country on both sides of the aisle. Theres no question that things could have been done better from the beginning of the crisis and right now it doesnt do any good and we have to deal with the situation at hant and we have to do the best job we can because this thing is out of control. Its by no means behind us and were all in it together and weve got to Work Together at the federal, state and local level. I want to talk politics with you. What do you make of the future of the Republican Party after this election if the president wins a second term . Is there room for the Republican Party if the president wins a second term . Well, look, i think regardless of what happens in completely frustrated with divisiveness and dysfunction in washington and i think the Republican Party, and quite frankly, both parties will be reexamining what the future looks like. Im a lifelong republican who has not been afraid up to disagree with the president on any number of issues. I dont know what the future holds in november, but i know that the Republican Party is going to be looking at what happens after President Trump and whether thats in four months or in four years, and i think theyll be looking to how do we go about becoming a bigger tent party . In maryland, im in the bluest state in america. I was just reelected overwhelminging overwhelmingly by reaching out and trying to find the middle ground where people can Stay Together and avoiding divisive rhetoric, and winning over women and independents and winning with minority votes and thats something the Republican Party will have to look to. Well have to find a way to arc peel to more people and have a bigger tent. Do you think this roger stone commutation is one of those things that just sets the party back a little bit on things like believing in the rule of law and sort having some sort of where it looks like there is a double standard. If youre close to the president , you get a break. If youre not, you go to jail. No question thats the appearance and its a problem and, look, roger stone is convicted of seven felonies and look, the president does have the right by law to take the action he took. That doesnt mean he should have, and weve got a guy who is convicted of serve felonies a couple of months before the election. For the president to take this action it will certainly hurt politically. You said you wrote in your father for president. You didnt vote for President Trump, and you didnt vote for Hillary Clinton either. Can you imagine pulling the lever for joe biden . You know, i feel like im in the same kind of position i was four years ago. Right now, luckily as chairman of the organization i get to avoid it it, because i represent democratic and republican governors together and i dont get too actively involved in the political games, but ill make that decision between now and november. Im in the same position, and a lot of people in america are, i think, and frustrated that this is the best we can come up with on both sides of the aisle. Its a difficult choice. I think most people would like to see Something Different and maybe well figure that out in 2024. Larry hogan, the republican governor of maryland and your new book is out. I appreciate you coming on and sharing your views this morning. Stay safe. Tha chuck. When we come back. Robert mueller stock slices. For as little as 5, now anyone can own companies in the s p 500, even if their shares cost more. At 5 a slice, you could own Ten Companies for 50 instead of paying thousands. All Commission Free online. Schwab stock slices an easy way to start investing or to give the gift of stock ownership. Schwab. Own your tomorrow. Welcome back. The panel joins us from their remote locations, syndicated columnist george will. Nbc News White House correspondent Kristen Welker and anna palmer senior washington correspondent for politico. A great trio this morning. Welcome to all. Kristen welker, i want to start with Robert Muellers op ed pushing back on the president s decision to commute roger stones sentence under the headline, roger stone remains a convicted felon, heintermeadiar. He denied about meeting with the Trump Campaign about the timing of wikileaks diseases and he tampered with the witness imploring him to Stonewall Congress in your report, Kristen Welker, the president is basically alone apparently in that west wing in being in favor of this decision. Did he really push back on every single adviser on this . It seems that he pushed back on post advisers, chuck, according to conversations with multiple officials. He was counselled against this move by some of his top aides including by the attorney general and yet, President Trump moved forward with this decision and, look, his aides, chuck, were saying to them this could be politically risky. This could ultimately cost you. Your base supports you because they wanted you to build the wall and drain the swamp and this winds up looking liketrail biden and a lot of aides are concerned that hes not going to be able to afford these types of missteps, chuck. Anna palmer, your ear to the ground on capitol hill is second to none. Mitt romney speaking out, not a surprise. Pat toomey, while im not surprised, hes somebody that is very careful when he comes out and criticizes this president , but he also seems to speak for that inbetween, the nevertrumper world and the devotees. He seems it speak for them on this one. How big is that caucus in the senate of pat toomey and mitt romney . I think its a pretty lonely circle in terms of the number of republican senators who are willing to actually step forward and spe the scenes with Senate Republicans. What they wont say publicly, but they do say privately is this is not helpful for november. They are gravely eaconcerned wi what the president is doing on this and several other issues and they dont seem to have the ability or the wherewithal to publicly condemn this president. You saw lindsay graham, one of his big boosters come out and defend the president here. I dont expect you will see a number of other republicans want to take questions about this when they come back in a week or so or be willing to publicly state that they feel that thede. George will, there is a lot of even Richard Nixon didnt do this writing this morning. Well, nixon didnt because in this case mr. Trump is pardoning someone who is involved in an episode involving thee presiden speculation because mr. Stone bragged that i will not listen to the language, i will not roll over on the president. Thats mob talk. There comes a point in the downward spiral of the company at this point where worse is better, that is if you have a gangster regime, that ought to be made really clear, and i think does make that really clear with the kind of language theyre using. Mr. Trump will not be hurt by this among those who are the only people he cares about which are his base. Mr. Trump ran for president promising to overturn and smash and pulvarize the norms of american politics. So chock up the stone commutation to keeping another promise. Kristen welker, to me whats even more stunning and tone deaf about this decision was the timing of it. Doing it on friday, never mind the president s entire day on friday seemed tone deaf. He goes to the hottest spots of hot spots of the virus, Miamidade County and then he has a fundraiser in tampa and then he commutes roger stone and we have a virus. That to me is what makes this potentially so lethal with the president and a year ago he might have gotten away with this more. What are you focused on here . And remember, chuck, when you think about the timing, it also came in the wake of the Supreme Court decision on his financial forms which was broadly seen as a defeat. So you have a number of his close allies saying it looks like he was trying to turn the page on that Supreme Court decision by putting the focus on this decision to commute the sentence of roger stone, and youre right, chuck, it did come on friday when the president was in florida, one of the hot spots not talking virus. Instead, focusing on a key voting group, and it underscores what a lot of his officials are concerned is his inability to focus on what so Many Americans are focused on right now which is the virus and deep concerns that it could ultimately wind up costing him not with his base necessarily, chuck, but with moderate republicans and with independents and undecided voters. Anna palmer, do Senate Republicans on capitol hill understand what the president is doing politically right now . No. I really think that there is frustrat you know, if you look back at the past four years Senate Republicans have largely been in lockstep, this is the party of trump, but they are more and more worried as november gets closer and their own elections and you started to see senator roy blunt and what the president is doing is want helpful when it comes to their reelection which is what theyre always most concerned about. George, i want to close with this because heres what max boot wrote and i would love for you to respond. Max boot, no one would mistake for a liberal. Hes someone like yourself a conservative who cant stomach President Trump. Three months ago i proclaimed donald trump the worst president ever. Oh, how innocent i was. Back then i thought he was edging james and now with roger disgraced that no occupant has come close to doing. Is he was only inept and not inept and corrupt . I think buchanon is clear on the list of worst president s and above him is the fierce competition between donald trump and andrew johnson. Andrew johnson who became president when lincoln was shot and tried to reverse or minimize the consequences of the civil war. He was a klansupporting man who supported only preserving the union and not getting rid of what made the south distinctive at this time which is slavery. Mr. Trump is aesthetic. Its to the tone of the country and its to what is considered acceptable and its to whether we have norms anymore and that comes in because it looks like a redundant demonstration on the part of the president that he simply doesnt care, and there is crockery rid now. I know if we saw an erdogan do this a putin or bolsonaro, thats for sure. President trumps style of its easy to get lost in the economic uncertainty. The volatility. The ambiguity. This moment calls for more. And Northern Trust delivers more. With specialized expertise. 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From june to january in 2018 the figure grew to 243 times a month. And ready for this . From january to june of this year a whopping 986 tweets and retweets a month. That is a 500 increase in average minuteonthly tweets in first part of each year. There is a down side and the president knows it. The most recent poll on President Trumps use of twitter found 63 of those surveyed believe he tweets too frequently and only 20 believe the president tweeted the right amount and that is the core social media base. President trump is using it to keep his base energized and its what they dont like about hey, can i. Hold on one second. Sure. Okay. Okay safe drivers save 40 guys guys check it out. Safe drivers save 40 safe drivers save 40 safe drivers save 40 thats safe drivers save 40 . It is, thats safe drivers save 40 . Hes right there. Its him hes here. Hes right here. Hi hi. Hey thats totally him. Its him thats totally the guy. Safe drivers do save 40 . Click or call for a quote today. Safe drivers do save 40 . Come on in, were open. All we do is hand you the bag. Simple. Done. This smells so good. Big thanks to you guys at home. Were here right now. We adapt and we change. I mean you just figure it out and well do like we do as safely as we can. I got a new job. Weve just been finding a way to keep on pushing. Were lookin for a day at a time baby. A lot goes through your mind. With fidelity wealth management, your dedicated adviser can give you straightforward advice and tailored recommendations. Thats the clarity you get with fidelity wealth management. Grab a box of 15 or try them loaded. Get em now with no contact delivery. Welcome back. The other thing we have been watching is an amazing amount of polling coming out showing President Trump in a rough place, and in a place that seems as if he cant climb out of and george will, in 1980 the iran hostage crisis, i feel like were watching a similar thing with the virus. At first there was a rally around carter and then obviously, the failed attempt at rescue and just over time hed lose faith and the public sort of lost faith in his ability to lead. Im wondering, is this are we going to look back in december and say yeah, thats the moment we hit that and we hit that in july with this virus . This is like katrina only worse and in the katrina moment people looked at mr. Bushs response and said the Bush Administration isnt behaving as well as we think it could. The katrina moment, it was national. This is international. The pandemic has struck the entire planet and so we have International Metrics of how other nations are doing with this and it doesnt look that good. The man who came in and said im going to make America Great again is presiding an america that is largely around the world pitting today. In april 1970 Richard Nixon went on National Television and said we must invade cambodia to clean up the sanctuaries of the north vietnamese otherwise we will look like a pitiful, helpless giant and im afraid that the United States floundering in its attempt to deal with this virus looks like a pitiful, helpless giant. Anna palmer, were seeing senate polls that are just, you know, were seeing democrats competitive in places that they didnt think theyd be competitive at this point in time. Im thinking kansas and maybe even South Carolina and maybe even kentucky although that may be a money play than an electoral play. How dire do Senate Republicans see at holding the senate right now . I think they still think there is a chance. Theyll fight tooth and nail to keep it strong in a lot of those areas in states that six months ago we would never be talking about kansas, for example, i dont think in a real way. I think the real way is can democrats capitalize on this . There is a lot of fear to count their chickens before theyre hatched and trump is this unicorn that won last time four years ago when no one thought he was going to and to me the big thing for Senate Republicans is tackling and youll see more distance by some of these more traditional republicans trying to say im the leader, whether or not the president is leading in the pandemic and well see this in the coronavirus package at the end of the month for sure. Kristen welker, the president , we cant tell, does he believe hes as behind as the public polls show or are people feeding him a false notion of security here . Oh, i think that a number of his Campaign Aides for sure are trying to bolster his confidence in this moment, but when you talk to those who are close to him they will say, look, its still way too early to tell whats going to happen. Think back to 2016 when he weathered a number of storms between now and election day. At the same time there is broad concern that the president is failing when it comes to his messaging and strategy, that hes failing to land a punch on joe biden and hes calling him sleepy joe. Hes trying to cast him as a criminal when he just commuted a real criminal and the publics just not buying it at this point. They want the president to make this more of a contrast between his record and joe bidens record, and listen, chuck, democrats say joe biden seems to be hitting his stride. He just gave that speech on the economy and talked about how hell bring back manufacturing jobs and steve bannon said it seems like hes taking a page out of our playbook fr change his messaging and to try to put the focus on biden and his record, chuck. Think the remarkable thing just now then Kristen Welker is you made the reference to joe biden. Were four month away and it just shows you thats the biggest problem the president has is it looks likae a referendum on his leadership unless he can figure out Something Else and the virus may be figuring it out for him. Thank you. What a terrific panel. Thats all we have for today. Thank you for watching and tuning in and trusting us. Well be back next week because if its sunday, its meet the press. vo since our beginning, our business has been people. And their financial wellbeing. Its evident in good times, with decisions focused on the longterm. And crucial when circumstances become difficult. That continued emphasis on people our advisors, associates, clients and communities gives us purpose, strength and a way forward. Today. And always. Thistheres this gametime gig spinternetting room. Xfinity. So fun. And then theres this workfromhome internetting room. Finally, the openconcept internetting r now thats simple, easy, awesome. 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