President to take timely action despite several early warnings. Officials are now debating how to carry out the new goal of rolling back social sdandistanc guidelines. Despite Health Concerns that such a move without widespread testing would step back any progress made from social distancing. The president was warned about the potential for a pandemic, but internal divisions, lack of planning and his faith in his own instincts led to a halting response. In short, trump was warned, by, quote, the very people in his government whose expertise and long experience might have guided him more quickly toward steps that would slow the virus and likely save lives. For instance, the times reporting by the third week in february, the administrations Top Health Experts concluded that should recommend mr. Trump a new approach that would include warning the American People of the risks and urging steps like social distancing and staying home from work. But the white house focused instead on messaging and crucial additional weeks went by before their views were reluctantly accepted by the president , time when the virus spread largely unimpeded. The subsequent economic disruptions were so severe that the president repeatedly suggested that he wanted to lift even those temporary restrictions. He frequently asked aides why his administration was still being blamed for the widespread failures novembering testing, insisting the responsibility had shifted to the states. Also, dr. Anthony fauci appeared to confirm part of that New York Times report that claims he and other Health Experts had pushed for social distancing measures as early as february. Dr. Fauci discussed how earlier restrictions could have saved more lives. The New York Times reported yesterday that you and other top officials wanted to recommend social and physical distancing guidelines as far back as the third week of february, but the administration didnt announce such guidelines nebraska almost a month later. Why . You know, as i said many times, we look at it from a pure health standpoint. We make a recommendation. Often the recommendation is taken. Sometimes its not. Do you think lives could have been saved if social distancing, physical distancing, stay at home measures had started third week of february instead of mid march . You know, jake, again, its the what would have, what could have. Its difficult to go back and say that. Obviously, you could logically say that if you had a process that was ongoing and you started mid investigation earlier, you could have saved lives. Obviously, no one is going to deny that. But what goes into those decision sess complicated. But youre right. Obviously, if we had right from the very beginning shut everything down, it may have been a little different. But there was a lot of pushback about shutting things down back then. So then on twitter this happened. The president appearing to signal frustration with those comments from dr. Fauci. The president retweeted a post from a former republican congressional candidate what used the firefauci. As the New York Times notes, the president has been irritated at times with dr. Fauci. But the twitter post was the most explicit he has been in letting that show publicly. Joining me now, managing editor of the Washington Examiner magazine, jay curser. Dr. Fauci, dr. Birx, they the utmost of expertise on the Coronavirus Task force. Who, in fact, then, if youre looking at that retweet that the president did last night with the firefauci, who, in fact, is the president listening to . Well, that is part of the problem with President Trump is that he listens more often at times to the cranks on the internet and social media than he does his own experience. Look, sometimes doctors are going to give you advice that you dont like. And that is just what happens. If i decided i wanted to jump off my roof to see if i could fly, the doctor would say, we dont recommend that. This move behind trying to fire dr. Fauci is something that is building up steam among and particularly within social media and the trump right. And its ridiculous. The guy has been in Public Service for years now. Look, i understand, this is difficult, especially with the economy. Its not easy. But at the same time, if we were looking at the total numbers, if we had just kind of done nothing, nobody even knows, nobody can imagine how bad it would be at this point. There are two people listened to the most during those coronavirus briefings. Dr. Birx and dr. Fauci. Lets talk about some of this New York Times reporting. Criticism of the president for not rolling out measures sooner to stop the spread. As you heard dr. Fauci saying, it could have saved lives. Now theres plans to reopen possibly the economy by may 1st. Looking at those plans, of course, the trump administration, thats just under three weeks away. Do you think thats a realistic date to shoot for at this point . Well, its really tough. I look at the Johns Hopkins website in terms of how many cases of coronavirus have been logged and how many deaths there were. Yesterday morning, when i looked at it at the end of the day, there were 1800 more deaths and people are saying, this is just for like the flu and we need to get things going again. I understand it and i sympathize with people who have lost their jobs. My daughter is out of work right now as a result. She worked in the service industry. So shes not working. My son is concerned about losing his job. He works in the auto industry. So there is it is difficult, its tough, but at the same time, i dont want to get to a point where were in a situation where we say, okay, were going to do this now because we just have to and by the end of may, were back into a full blown pandemic where the infection rates are even higher than there were before. And i think dr. Fauci and others have said there needs to be more aggressive testing so we can find out whether anybody has built up antibodies to do tracking and tracing, something of that nature. I think its unrealistic at this point to say here is a hard date when were going to reopen the economy. Such a good point, as long as we dont have widespread testing, its hard to imagine how were going to roll back those guidelines. Jay, thank you, as always. Stay close. Were going to talk to you again in just a bit. British Prime MinisterBoris Johnson was released from the hospital yesterday, ten days after testing positive for covid19. Johnson said, quote, it could have gone either way as he thanked the front line workers for saving his life. The 55yearold spent three nights in the icu. He witnessed the personal courage of the hospital staff and thanked the nhs workers for risking their lives to save his life. Joining me from london, cal perry. Great to see you today. Some good news over the weekend, to say the least. Boris johnson being taken out of the icu. Talk to us about what youre hearing with regard to his current status. Very good news. I think the country was, for obvious reasons, very worried. When you look at the statistics, half the people that go to the icu have died and half recover. Hes out at checkers. That is the Prime Ministers residence in the country. Its about 40 miles outside of london. He has been joined by his fianc fiancee who is pregnant and who she believes is recovering from covid. The this maPrime Minister thank doctors and nurses and in particular two people who were by his bedside. It is reinvigorating a debate in this country about the National Health service and the funding for National Health service and immigration. Those two nurses who the Prime Minister says saved his life were from outside the united kingdom, one from portugal. The Prime Minister will not be returning to his duties right away. We will continue to see dominic raab in his role. Cal, quickly here, the uk death toll surpassing 10,000 yesterday. Making it the fifth nation in the world to surpass these numbers. How is the government handling these numbers . 737 passed yesterday in a 24hour period. And i have to tell you, we suspect those numbers are probably low because it only accounts for people who have died in hospital, it doesnt account for people dying in rest homes or dying at home. So we suspect that number is going to be higher. The new of new cases seems to be decreasing, but the number of deaths is increasing. The key here will be testing, testing, testing. The key everywhere, testing, testing, testing. Thank you, as always. Still ahead, the legal battle over abortion rights in the era of the coronavirus. Were going to have the new developments on the fight unfolding in texas. Plus, Severe Weather now takes aim at the northeast. Bill karins has more on that, just ahead. Who has time for wrinkles . Neutrogena® rapid wrinkle repair®. Weve got the retinol that gives you results in one week. Not just any retinol. Accelerated retinol sa. For not only smoother skin in one day, but youngerlooking skin in just one week. And thats clinically proven. Results that fast or your money back. Unless youre attached to your wrinkles. One week is all it takes. Neutrogena®. One week is all it takes. New crest pro active defense. Youre doing more to keep your body healthy for the future. Shouldnt your toothpaste do the same for your mouth . Now with crest pro active defense, future proof your whole mouth. Its active Defense Technology neutralizes bacteria to shield against potential issues. Crest. There are times when our need to connect really matters. To keep customers and employees in the know. To keep business moving. Comcast business is prepared for times like these. Powered by the nations largest gigspeed network. To help give you the speed, reliability, and security you need. Tools to manage your business from any device, anywhere. And a team of experts here for you 24 7. Weve always believed in the power of working together. Thats why, when every connection counts. You can count on us. Welcome back. Texas abortion providers have petitioned the texas supreme court. The New York Times reporting they have asked the course to reshort medication abortions. They filed this on saturday after a federal Appeals Court upsell governor abbotts executive order prohibiting all nonessential medical procedures out of the need to preserve personal protective equipment and focus the attention of medical personnel on combatting the coronavirus. At issue are medication abortions. T according to the ft. Worth star telegram, the clinics argue these types of abortions do not require personal protective equipment like masks, gloves and gowns that might be needed for coronavirus patients. The debate is raging around the state with abortion opponents saying the procedure is not essential during a life tlitenning pandemic. But advocates are saying more medical resources are needed for an unwanted pregnancy than for a doctor providing a bill. The state, they argue, is taking advantage of the outbreak to limit abortions. Danny, good morning to you. Great to see you today. I believe that more than one District Court has overturned the executive order and the Appeals Court then reinstated it. So now its going to the supreme court. Do you think the court is going to take this case . Likely. It goes directly to Justice Samuel alito who has, you would say, jurisdiction from this part of the country. Hes likely to bring it to the whole court and decide this important issue because it does represent some important decisions of constitutional law and some splits between an Appeals Court and the lower court. So can we get into a little bit of the constitutional law part of this whole thing. From that basis, what personal rights versus state interests are at odds here . At this points, it gets complicated properly. On april 7, the Appeals Court prevented the lower court from preventing the governor from preventing abortions. Then on april 10th, it kind of did the same thing again, but the only thing it really prevented on april 10 is these oral abortions by pill or medication abortions, as they are called. Constitutionally, this comes down to the governments power to legislate and prevent citizens from doing things in the interest of Public Health versus an individuals now fundamental right to have an abortion. The right to abortion is based on a constitutional right to privacy. And even that case holds that it cannot transform on individual rights, even in a time of crisis. Danny, thank you. As always, great to see you this morning. Still ahead, President Trump has been pushing an antimalaysia drug to treat coronavirus despite little evidence of the drugs effectiveness. But now a new study about hydroxy color quinn is raising alarm bells. That store and much more, coming up. Sher doesnt get everything clean. I tell them, it may be your detergent. More, coming up. That store and coming up. Recommend cascade platinum. With the soaking, scrubbing and rinsing built right in. For sparklingclean dishes, the first time. Cascade platinum. Whats up . Eard . For the First Time Ever you can watch the brand new Trolls World Tour movie. Wait for it. At home. What, what, what . Oh what a troll. The World Premiere is now in your home. Welcome back. As scientists around the world are working tirelessly to find a cure for covid19, theres a new report raising the alarm over chloroquine. According to the New York Times, doctors are Halting Research trials with the drug after discovering patients taking a higher dose of chloroquine developed irregular heart rates. The brazilian study involved 81 hospitalized patients. And the report says this. Roughly half the study participants were given a dose of 450 milligrams of chloroquine twice daily for five days while the rest were prescribed a higher dose of 600 milligrams for ten days. Within three days, researchers started noticing heart arrhythmias in patients taking higher dose. By the sixth day of treatment, 11 patients had died lead to go an immediate end of the high dose segment of the trial. Theres also some warnings about that from doctors here in the United States, as well, for heart failure. Were tracking some Severe Weather here. I want to bring in nbc meteorologist bill karins, as well, to talk about that. You and i were talking about the numbers throughout the country with regard to covid19. Not necessarily concentrating on the weather, but weve had some Severe Weather overnight. As i was waking up, i was getting alerts of tornados throughout the country coming in overnight. Talk to us about the damage we have been seeing, what people are facing right now. Yeah. A high impact day. Yesterday, we had 38 tornados, we know there were at least six fatalities. Hundreds of homes had been destroyed and those numbers will grow once the sun comes out and we see what actually happened. This is monroe, louisiana, one of the first areas hit by the tornados yesterday. You see the airport got hit. Numerous homes were destroyed. There were numerous injuries, but no fatalities. In mississippi, we had two monster tornados during the afternoon that went through. These may have been ef4, maybe even possibly ef5. We have indications that this tornado was throwing debris up into the sky as high at 28,000 feet. That is an indication of extremely strong tornado. Well see just how deadly and hoe destructive that was. So let me show you where we are right now. Areas of South Carolina, weve had some tornado warnings. This is a map that shows you where the tornados were yesterday. This is where we are right now. We have this line of storms through certain georgia, central South Carolina. Right now, we have tornado warnings in north carolina, virginia, georgia, South Carolina and numerous locations in southern georgia. So for today, 40 Million People at risk. Anywhere there in the yellow, slight risk. The orange and in the enhanced Severe Weather. And then later, as we go throughout the afternoon, these winds are going to be a huge issue. 164 Million People. Thats half the people in this country are under either wind advisories or high wind warnings. Later on this afternoon, when these winds go through d. C. , philadelphia, new york, we could see wind gusts as high as 60 to 70 Miles Per Hour. We will have thousands if not millions of people losing power because of these winds later on this afternoon. So here we are in the middle of this pandemic. We have First Responders trying to go and help people that got caught in tornados or flash flooding. And then we have the risk of a lot of us losing power later on today. People working from home, home schooling, just a nightmare. Not a good time for Severe Weather or loss of power, that is for sure. Bill karins, great to see you this morning. Im going to see you again in just a little bit. Still ahead, President Trump says hes torn over the issue of when to reopen the u. S. Economy. He has signaled that he wants to resume business by may 1st, but experts are saying that may not be such a good idea. Plus