Largely be behind us by memorial day while some state and local leaders are not as optimistic, Coronavirus Task force response coordinator dr. Deborah birx seems to agree. We believe that both the hospitalizations, the icu needs and frankly the number of people who have succumbed to this disease will be dramatically decreased by the end of may. Eric and this weekend kentucky is joining 30 other states in developing plans to reopen its economy and try to get people back to work. Georgia, tennessee, florida, california, already putting their plans into action but a few of the beaches now open and attracting crowds if california amid cautions from governor gavin ne newsom to observe socil distancing and pleading with people to stay at home. Newport beach reports 40,000 visitor were there amid the record high temperatures in the state. We have live team fox coverage right now, Mark Meredith is standing by at the white house. First lets go to Steve Harrigan at the centers for Disease Control headquarters in atlanta. Hi, steve. Reporter there is not a lot of visible cosh distancing going on on some of those california beaches with temperatures in the mid70s and people cooped up in their houses or apartments for several weeks. As far as the states go, weve seen four now really begin to reopen their businesses in a larger way, thats georgia, south carolina, alaska and oklahoma. Theyve reopened some Small Businesses with a lot of restrictions and as many as 31 other states in the coming week will begin to loosen some of those restrictions. Hawaii, however, is a state thats going the other direction. They have extended their stay at home order through may 31st, also a twoweek quarantine in hawaii for any visitors. Officials say theyre afraid of undoing all the progress they have made already by beginning to reopen their economy. As far as testing goes in the u. S. , they are currently testing at a level of 1. 5 to 2 Million People each week. Dr. Fauci of the White House Task force said that number really needs to double before the economy can gradually and safely reopen. Abbott labs says it has shipped more than 1 million test kits to all 50 states, most of those tests going to hot spots. Its really a rapid test that can give you a positive result in just five minutes and they say they will be producing 2 Million Units of those testing kits per month by june. Eric, back to you. Eric well, thats really, really needed. Steve, thank you. Arthel. Arthel all right, eric. Well, the u. S. Is now seeing the highest levels of unemployment following the 2008 financial crisis but the Trump Administration is expressing some optimism. Let gs to Mark Meredith, lets go to Mark Meredith, live at the white house. Reporter the white house is bracing for the Unemployment Rate to skyrocket when the next jobs report comes out in early may. We are getting a prediction of what those numbers may look like. The cbo projecting the Unemployment Rate for the Second Quarter could hover right there about a 14 and at the gdp could decline by some 12 for the same quarter, the federal budget deficit projected to jump up quite a bit to 3. 7 trillion. The treasury secretary told foxs Chris Wallace today he believes things will improve by summer. I think as we begin to reopen the economy in may and june, youre going to see the economy really bounce back in july, august, september. And we are putting an unprecedented amount of Fiscal Relief into the economy. Youre seeing trillions of dollars thats making its way into the economy and i think this is going to have a significant impact. Reporter congress refunded the Paycheck Protection Program last week, the president signed it on friday and the loans are expected to begin getting processed tomorrow. Theres talk about what the next stimulus bill should and should not include. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi addressed some of the complaints even from some democratic governors that said congress should have made sure that money was going to state and local governments to make sure they can make up for the revenue shortfall, she pushed back against the complaints earlier today as well. Just calm down, we will have state and local and we will have it in a very significant way. Its no use going into what might have been. Reporter meanwhile, a senior white house official tells fox news that the rumors that health and Human Services secretarial y alex azar will be pushed out are false. A senior official told me rumors are false and no imminent changes are planned. The president has nothing on the public schedule today. We cannot have a white house we did not have a White House Briefing yesterday. The president tweeted out he feels right now theyre not worth the time and effort because he feels hes not getting fair coverage in the press. Well let you know if that changes throughout the afternoon. Arthel. Arthel Mark Meredith, thank you. Well, the president is not briefing. However, new York Governor Andrew Cuomo is as he does daily, so lets listen in. Which is horrific and there is no relative context to death death is death, 367 people passed, 367 families. What ive been working from day one is to make sure that people understand the facts of what were dealing with because this is a unique situation. Government really cant act unless the people fully support the action. What we have done here, government couldnt do. It was a pure function of what people did. So my plan all along has been give people the facts and if they have the facts, they will act responsibly. But they have to have the facts. They have to buy into the plan. And it really is an individual decision, right. Who is taking care of your health . You are. Were mutually dependent in what i do can affect your health but it really comes down to giving everybody the information so people can make their own decision and the great achievement in this period has been that when people get the facts, and they trust the facts and they understand the facts, they do the right thing. And that is a lesson that i hope people remember after this is all over. But we still have to remember the facts. And we talk about reopening, we talk about reimagining. Lets start to put some meat on the bones of what were talking about so people understand. The federal guidance from the cdc is that before you start reopening the state and the regional hospitalization rate must be in decline for 14 days. Okay. Thats the cdcs guidance. The federal government leaves it up to the states, up to the governors, but they also give guidance. And in this case, i think the cdc guidance is right. So were monitoring the hospitalization rate. Were monitoring the regional hospitalization rates. We said in this state its a very diverse state, upstate regions are like states in the midwest, even out west and we have very different hospitalization rates so we look at the rates all across the state as well as across the regions. Were going to reopen in phases, regional analysis on what we call our economic regions that weve been working with the state on and those regions have been working together on economic policy, et cetera. So to analyze the regions, which are existing coalitions, actually works. But look at the regional analysis, make a determination and then monitor whatever you do. Phase one of reopening will involve construction and Manufacturing Activities and within construction and manufacturing, those businesses that have a low risk, right. There is a range of construction activities, theres a range of Manufacturing Activities. But those businesses that pose a low risk within them. Phase two would then be more a business by business an analysis, using the ma matrix tt weve discussed, how essential a service does that business provide and how risky is that business. If you reopen that business, how much risk are you possibly incurring and how important is it that that business reopen. And that matrix will be guiding us through phase two. In phase two, when we get there, we need businesses to do that analysis. They have to think about how theyre going to reopen with this quote, unquote, new normal. Arthel okay, so thats new York Governor Andrew Cuomo basically talking about the rollout of reopening happening in phases, hes saying phase one, phase two. Want to start out by Governor Cuomo started out by applauding the power of the people acting responsibly as long as theyre given the facts and trust the source. So the governor will continue. We will monitor it. If he makes news, well bring it to you. Meanwhile,ism going to toss it over to you, eric. Eric thanks so much. As the governor noted, new york state will be opening in phase as you pointed out. Certainly that is one of the major issues that our Public Officials have to deal with in terms of exactly when to open or not to open all the businesses in their local area. And there are warnings and cautions from local officials and others about the guidance that they need in dealing with that. One of the officials who has to Balance Public Health and the economy is joining us now, he is the mayor of san antonio texas, mayor ron nuremberg. Mr. Mayor, you are being cautious. You have to protect the citizens of your state but youre starting some steps. What exactly are you cooing dogd who are you balance what exactly are you doing and how are you balancing this. Here in san antonio, we have like the other areas of texas taking a very prudent approach, and so we have been very aggressive with preventative measures. Governor cuomos comments about giving the public the facts is right on the money. You know, we have seen that when the public has the information, transparently about whats happening with the infection, they act accordingly. So weve been blessed in that way that weve had a Community Come together. We have put together a Public HealthTransition Team to give us a sense of what are the conditions and circumstances and system thats need to be in place in our community for to us be able to safely open and in addition to that were working with an economic Transition Team to interpret those conditions and come up with some real Risk Mitigation strategies, sector by sector. Once we ensure the public that those Public Health conditions have been met, we can begin opening up in stages. We take a prudent approach because we know that a healthy economy starts with healthy people. Eric mayor, you mentioned the steps that youre taking, for example youre going to start retail to go, that is shops put something on the curbside and you can buy that. Dont use cash, use a credit card. Everyone has to wear masks above 10 years old. Talk about the retail to go and the concerns you have, are people going to go into stores and youre saying basically all citizens should wear masks . We put in mask orders under the guidance of the cdc and we believe that thats one of the social distancing measures that we need to make sure that people who perhaps are asymptomatic and carrying the disease make it less likely theyre going to pass it onto someone else. The retail to go that youre talking about started friday. That was part of a state order, governor abbotts order. He is also looking at releasing more statements about and orders about how were going to begin to open up texas. Now, if i listen to the governors words about how this will go, hes also talking about phasing, making sure that theres medical guidance, Public Health guidance underpinning every decision so thats a good approach. I will tell you that we have to make sure that we dont do this carelessly. We saw a lot more movement around over the last two weekends and weve got to ensure that folks know that according to the Public Health guidance and in order to ensure that we dont find ourselves battling another wave that could be even worse for the frontline workers and for the public in general, weve got to open up carefully and doing so a week early, two weeks early or days early matters and it will matter in lives, it will ultimately determine how healthy and how quickly our economy will bounce back. Eric mayor, do you think people enough people take it seriously . You saw those protests, for example. Weve seen out in other areas people just arent taking in some cases social distancing seriously or seriously enough. Do you fear that once the doors open, man, its going to be like back to normal right away and officials wont be able to do anything about it. You know, theres always outliers. I will tell you that the vast majority of san antonio residents and texans that i can tell are taking this very seriously. Unfortunately, too many of them have a loved one or close relative who has already perished from the disease or is very ill. They know we have to stand behind the great work of our first responders, paramedics and fire personnel, our healthcare workers, and we save their lives by doing our part to social distance and stay home when its not necessary to go out. Eric that is such an important point that we are saving lives by not going out. In your county, youve had 1,195 cases, 43 deaths so far. Thankfully, 383 people have recovered and you mentioned the governor here he is talking about what you just said, doing this in phases. Lets listen. I have a team of fours fros who are looking at all different types of businesses and strategies that they can open safely without stoking a spread of the coronavirus. People in san antonio and across texas have done a fabulous job of slowing the spread of the coronavirus. We must continue to slow that spread as we begin to open up businesses. Eric so mayor, finally, what do you expect tomorrow morning, 9 00 a. M. , opening of business . Im not really sure. San antonio is a military city, usa, we had a heightened awareness of this because were a site of evacuation mission, bringing americans home from china and the bruce ships cruise ships. We were prepared and took preventative measures. The cooperation we had from the Governors Office leads me to believe he will take a cautious medical approach first. Again, we are playing a long game. Texas is one of the strongest economies in the world. We didnt happen to become that way overnight. We take a datadriven, evidencebased approach and if we do that it means that were going to put Public Health officials out fronting make sure were cautious and careful as we open and make sure were open for the long run in a healthful, economically way. Eric that is words to the wise. Mayor ron nuremberg of san antonio, texas. Thank you for joining us, i guess from your kitchen this morning. It will certainly all be back to normal at some point, thank you, mayor. Have a great week. Eric you too. Arthel eric, thank you. Thank you, guys. Listen, the department of Veterans Affairs coming under fire for not doing enough to protect patients and Healthcare Providers amid this pandemic. This after the executive in charge admitted in an interview that the system is facing shortages in masks and protective gear. Bringing in Jacqui Heinrich live in new york city. Jacqui, im not sure if youve had a chance to read this report or vet it but let me say that i read a report this morning that according to this report that fema redirected millions of masks that were ordered by the va to use in their system, that fema redirected those masks to use in the federal governments stockpile. Reporter well, arthel, we did get a response from fema this morning addressing that. The back story is va officials reportedly denied any ppe shortages for weeks until things got so dire they reached out to fema for help. Now, this was when they found out that masks and other supplies they had ordered had been diverted to the national stockpile. Richard stone, who is a former combat surgeon and Deputy Surgeon general told the washington post, hi 5 Million Masks incoming that disappeared and the supply system was responding to fema. I couldnt tell you i when my nt delivery was coming in. Vas secretary asked fema for help after the four week supply was nearly depleted. They were using nearly 200,000 masks per day. Fema handed over half a Million Masks. This morning fema would not go on the record with us about claims, about the va supplies being diverted but they told fox news that fema and va staff have been closely coordinateing in the covid19 response, telling us to date fema has cured late inned ship coordinated shipments of 4. 3 million of various types of respirator masks, 1 million facial surgical masks and 14,000 face shields to va facilities across the country. Healthcare workers throughout the va system tell a different story. Some were protesting in florida and georgia. Unions says nurses are also given surgical masks and face shields instead of n95 press f respirators. Theyve been told to use, disinfect and repair masks. They are investigating a complaint at one va hospital alleging that employees sick with covid19 were ordered to keep working. To date, the va has more than 6800 positive cases and more than 400 deaths and more than 2,000 employees have fallen ill with 20 deaths. On thursday, Senate Democrats appealed to Vice President mike pence over the