These days, anyone can be a publisher through social media, but the professional press, shows like this one, websites and magazines still set the national and global conversation. So in my humble view, we should be advocating, not for a particular politician or party, but advocating for a safe, healthy, wellinformed public. We can do that by centering coverage of this pandemic not around politicians. But around their voters. We can focus on the bottomup. Cover this story from the bottom up. We have to push elected officials to see what lockdown life is really like. Look at todays front page of the santa fe new mexican. It profiles the owner of joes diner. The profile says barely hanging on. In lancaster, pennsylvania, don mur phy saying will restaurants recover . These are all examples of elevating the storie of real people, businessmen, entrepreneurs, workers, nurses and doctors, uber drivers and engineers, elevating their voices. Thats the power of the press. We help facilitate a conversation with each other. Helping folks be heard. Like in chicago. Look at this headheadline. It quotes hospital workers saying theyre outgunned, outmanned and underfunded. Their voices are so important. Lets exemplify them over the politicians. Theyre why we need some of this, the Los Angeles Times front page. The crisis turns critical. A second story also documenting the trump administrations failures to meet this moment early on. Then the third story about schools becoming pantries for hungry families. All these stories are related. I know the White House Briefings seem disconnected from reality. The president doesnt seem to acknowledge the rising death toll. He doesnt seem to understand the problems of the voters i was just talking about. When that happen, the press has to point it out, fact check it and advocate for the needs of the public. I dont know about you, but im starting to get frustrated, angry, and its a time for that passion. Its a time for journalists to channel the publics anger, frustration and fear and show some of that outrage on the publics behalf. In fact, sometimes those are the best moments for journalism. Piers morgan knows a thing or two about that. Let me bring him in. You know him from his days anchoring here on cnn. Hes currently the cohost of Good Morning Britain and the editor at large of daily mail. Com. I know this is one of your first times being back on cnn since your Program Ended back in 2014. Welcome. Thank you for joining me today. Thank you very much, brian. Good to be here. You have been doing something remarkable, interviewing british politicians and leaders and lawmakers and Health Officials and holding their feet to the fire. And in some cases showing how many failures are happening not just in the United States but in the united kingdom. What are the parallels now between the u. S. And uk responses to the pandemic . I think theyre very similar, brian, in the since that you have two populous leaders in Boris Johnson and donald trump. All the tricks that they used to become popular and to win elections, to lead their countries are now being tested in a very different way. Its not about partisan politics anymore, its about plain war crisis leadership. Its a very different thing. What ive noticed with Boris Johnson and with donald trump is an apparent inability to segue into being war leaders. Theyre still playing the old games of party politics. Donald trump in particular, ive known him a long time. I consider him to be a friend, but ive been watching these daily briefings with mounting horror, frankly, because this is not what the president should be doing. You wont like me saying this, but the president of the United States is an incredibly important person in the world. Not least to americans who are dying in the tens of thousands from a disease that we dont know much about yet. And all that is required from the president in those moments and any world leader, frankly, they have to be calm, show authority, they have to be honest, they have to be accurate, entirely factual with what theyre telling the people and they have to have an ability to show empathy. On almost every level of that donald trump at the moment is failing the American People. Hes turning these briefings into a selfaggrandizing, self justifying, overly defensive politically partisan almost like a rally to him. Almost like whats more important is winning the election in november. No, its not, donald trump. Whats important now is saving american lives. I believe that the complacency that the american and british administrations have shown in the first few weeks of this crisis has been extremely damaging to both countries ability to deal with coronavirus, but its not too late for them to get a grip and actually make the attack on the virus their number one priority. Not pumping themselves up. Not telling us all day what a great job theyre doing. But actually focusing on what matters. And that is human life. But, you know, you mentioned your relationship with President Trump. You were on the Celebrity Apprentice you won one of the seasons, you interviewed the president repeatedly. Pretty much whenever he visits great britain, youre sitting down with him there. Given your relationship with him, what do you think has caused this reaction from the president or these failures from the president . I think he thinks its just another thing to deal with, rather than the most unprecedented crisis of our lifetime, most unprecedented since world war ii. It requires a different skillset. If you look around the world, other World Leaders who got on top of this, also won populous support, its people like new zealand, chancellor merkel in germany, even Emmanuel Macron last week was very candid with the french people. He was very honest. He said, look, we dont really know when this will end. It will be tough. He implemented tough lockdowns but he also conceded they were too slow on personal protective equipment for Health Workers, they were too slow in other areas, on ventilators and so on. It says something from a candidate and a leader in a war that goes down with the public. Macron has never been more popular, nor has chancellor merkel. Donald trumps ratings are fallen and the reason for that is he needs to understand this theyre falling because people dont trust him. Hes turning these briefings into selfserving rallies, i dont understand why he cant do the basics of crisis leadership, which is to make the public come with you, lead you, and show them the empathy that they need when so many people are dying. Do you think you say its not too late. It feels pretty late to me. You think the president can turn it around . Trump it current it around . I guess ill stop pretending he has total authority. It was a staggering moment when your Kaitlan Collins last week had to remind the president of the United States he doesnt have total authority. He doesnt have ultimate power over all these state governors. I think what needs to happen what should have happened from the start is a global effort in america from all the states, all the governors and the federal government to come together and work as one and show a unified front, stop this ridiculous nonsense right now with trump singling out various democratrun states for political reasons connected to the election. The it doesnt matter. I dont care about the election. Nobody should care about the election. Donald trump, if hes listening to this or watching, you will win the election in november if you get this right. If you stop making it about yourself and make it about the American People and show that you care about them over yourself, you will win. Conversely, you will lose the election in november if you continue to make it about yourself, you continue playing politics, continue targeting democrat governors because that suits you for your electoral purposes. None of that matters. Until donald Trump Realizes that again, he doesnt want to hear it, but he may as well hear it from me until you realize that, mr. President , you will not get this right. If you dont get it right, more americans will die. Are you risking your friendship with the president by calling him out . I saw your recent clunl folumn e daily mail which said america doesnt want a king trump. He does still follow you. Youre one of the few people that the president of the United States follows on twitter. How do you view this relati relationship now . Is this still a friendship with him. Ive always tried to be candid with him. Ive written about 100 columns on President Trump. I would say its about 50 50. 50 positive, 50 critical. I try to be fair about him. Hes not my president. Hes a president i look at from afar here in the uk. But i try to be balanced and fair, notwithstanding the fact we have a friendship. Right now i dont really care about the niceties of whether donald trump is going to be offended by what im saying. He has to put the country before himself. He has to put americans before electioneering. He has to remind himself every day what can i do today to prevent more lives being killed . Not how can i score more petty points and try to stand here for two hours with people like dr. Fauci waiting to do their work, which will actually save lives, and try to have arguments with the media who are actually trying to do their job, which is holding the government to account. Exactly as they should be doing. Donald trump should not take that personally, he should use the criticism from the media to ask himself every day am i doing the right thing . Am i doing enough . Thats his job. Its time to really hold these Public Officials accountable in interviews, press conferences, however we can given how many failures have happened not just on the federal level but on the state and local level as well. Tell me about how you have been trying to do that on your program on itv. Well, we have had a lot of cabinet ministers coming on. Theres been an extraordinary situation, of course, in the uk because the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, got coronavirus, he got it three weeks after boasting that he had been to a hospital where he had shaken as many hands as possible, and the hospital had people with coronavirus. Surprisesurprise, the Prime Minister who took this so casually then got the virus himself and became critically ill and nearly died. He was saved by the power of the Health Workers. The very same Health Workers that weve now seen lose their lives in this country and, indeed, in america for lack of personal protective equipment. I hope that focuses Boris Johnsons mind on what is required here. But on a wider point, because hes not been there to lead the country, weve had to interview people like the health secretary, matt hancock, and other ministers and hold their feet to the fire about so many things that the British Government have been doing, which are quite, actually, reminiscent of whats happening in america, but which have been failing on almost every level. A file youre to really take this seriously soon enough from the end of january they should have been all over this, they werent. Boris johnson only chaired the cobra committee, the most Important Committee in British Government at the start of march on this. Weve been behind on ppe, behind woefully on testing. Its frankly scandalous, brian. Never mind anything else, but the fact that the uk and the u. S. Are two of the worst performing countries in the world on tests per million of population is a disgrace. And it shames america, it shames britain, it shames every one involved in this. But like i said at the start, its not too late. You have to ramp up the testing. The only way that donald trump can actually reopen america for business in the same way that Boris Johnson wants to do in the uk, you have to test enough of the population with an Accurate Enough test that you can then have confidence of putting them back into the populous. And that is why the testing is so crucial. And that is why its been such a damming indictment of both governments that theyve been so slow to ramp up the testing to the levels that we saw were happening in countries like china and in south korea that didnt happen in italy. So the italian doctors were screaming at america and britain, for goodness sake, ramp up the testing. If you dont do that, if you dont lock down your cities, then youll have the same problem were having. Well, america and britain looked at what was happening in italy and they basically put their fingers in their ears and their hands over their eyes and thought to themselves it cant be that bad here. It is that bad. In fact, its worse now in america and britain than it was in italy. Thats because the governments did not get their act together. My message to both of them, to Boris Johnson, to donald trump, is get your act together now. Put all the normal stuff that got you elected, all the jokey stuff, the wise cracking, the punching of opponents, all that stuff is irrelevant. It doesnt matter. Bring your countries together, bring the best medical, scientific minds, the best political minds, the best military minds, bring them together, unite the country and fight the war. Remember this, for once, were all on the same side. This is a war between human beings and the virus of covid19. Were in this together. So lets act like it. Appreciate your flashes of anger about this. It reminds me postkatrina in the United States. The Great Recession in 2000. These failures of government demand journalistic accountability and frankly sometimes anger to channel the publics frustration and anger. What is your advice for journalists navigating this . Do your jobs. Never has there been a more important time to be a journalist. Hold your governments to account. Nothing that has come before this matters. This is the big one. This will be the biggest story of every journalists life. We thought 9 11, we would never see that again or the final crash. But this is much bigger than all of that. In terms of the Global Impact on every single country in the world, this is it. This is what journalists are supposed to be about, about getting to a truth, Holding Governments to account and making sure they make right decisions. If we do our jobs properly, if we challenge every single thing that these governments do in britain, in america, in france, in germany, all around the world, if germans do their job, they will hope those governments make better decisions. This is like i said before, were all in this together. Were all on the same side. Its not about whether youre republican or democrat or conservative or labour or whatever Political Party youre affiliated to, creed or anything. None of that matters. Its all about unity and the way germans can do their job is to stand tall, work together, dig, dig, dig and get to the truth and then compel governments to be accountable. The decision is their taking, and to make sure they make the right ones. If the end, if journalists do that job properly government and World Leaders will thank the media. They will thank them for helping to save lives. Piers morgan, great to see you. Thank you for being here. Good to see you, brian. We have a lot more coming up including a conversation about the coronavirus culture war, why we are seeing on fox news promotion of protests plus this remarkable interview with dr. Anthony fauci and laura ingram, a full analysis with philip bump and Juliette Kayyem in just a moment. More than ever, your home is your sanctuary. Thats why lincoln offers you the ability to purchase a new vehicle remotely with participating dealers. An effortless transaction all without leaving the comfort and safety of your home. Thats the power of sanctuary. And for a little extra help, receive 0 apr financing and defer your first payment up to 120 days on the purchase of a new lincoln. When you think of a bank, you think of people in a place. But when you have the chase mobile app, your bank can be virtually any place. So, when you get a check. You can deposit it from here. And you can see your transactions and check your balance from here. You can save for an emergency from here. 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Some hosts there are leading the charge to prematurely reopen the country, so to speak, and promoting these protests that have been popping up at state capitals. Some seem like grassrootsests, some seem more artificial or corporate supported, but these protests are getting a lot of attention. Theyre getting a lot of attention in part b