A startling claim about how he would handle the coronavirus. Some people would like to see new york quarantined because it is a hot spot, new york, new jersey, some other places, im thinking about that right now. We might not have to do it, but there is a possibility that sometime today well do a quarantine, shortterm, two weeks. That came as a surprise to everyone, including cuomo, who had some strong words in response. It would be exactly opposite everything he has said and everything he has done to date. I dont even believe it is legal. It would be chaos, and mayhem. Now, in this show yesterday, Laurence Tribe of Harvard University confirmed what we suspected all along, that cuomo was right and trump had no Constitutional Authority to claim he could quarantine whole states. Right on cue, trump almost immediately backed down. Tweeting that he has advised the cdc to issue a travel warning, but that he determined a quarantine will, quote, not be necessary. Not necessary . Man, try not legally possible. But go on apprentice guy, go off. Of course, it is hardly news that trump has always had designs on reigning as a monarch with Unlimited Power rather than serving as a mere president in a democracy. With the country facing an unprecedented Public Health crisis, what lengths might he, backed by an attorney general whose write aenings and actionst to a power, what lengths might he go to . Another case in point, the special Inspector General that the democrats fought tooth and nail for in the gargantuan 2. 2 trillion Economic Relief bill was supposed to be an objective third party, overseeing which megacorporations get bailouts and how they spend the money. But, again, right on cue, when trump signed the bill, he issued a signing statement, undermining the Inspector General provision and it reads, quote, i do not understand and my administration will not treat this provision as permitting the special Inspector General for Pandemic Recovery to issue reports to the Congress Without the president ial supervision required. Joining me, a man who helped craft that bill. Congressman Hakeem Jeffries of new york, chairman of the House Democratic caucus. And chairman jeffries, thank you for being here. Good morning. I want to lets go in reverse order. Because i do want to ask you about the special the person who is supposed to be overseeing that bailout. Im going to go back, you are in new york, what do you make of the fact that the president of the United States issued a casual, almost casual kind of blanket threat to quarantine the new york tristate area, new york, new jersey, connecticut, something he had no Constitutional Authority to do, freaked out a lot of people, who thought this was possible, and then immediately takes it back and the cdc, you know, he says, im going to have the cdc do a no travel order. What do you make of the fact he did that at all . Well, the big problem at this moment is that in times of crisis, leadership really matters. Governor cuomo is providing it for instance and donald trump is not. What we see from donald trump is that instead of operating in an evidencebased fashion, being guided by his Public Health professionals, hes freelancing in terms of whatever comes into his mind at any given moment, often what comes into his mind is wrong in this case, it is unconstitutional, and as Governor Cuomo pointed out would be counterproductive of the Public Health and safety of new yorkers and people throughout the country. Were seeing donald trump has a tremendous influence over his followers. His followers in some cases include elected officials. Lets take florida. You tweeted out last night, calling out the Florida Governor ron desantis who has been slow on the uptake of dealing with the coronavirus outbreak in his state, despite all the Senior Citizens and tourists there. You called him out for trying to scapegoat new yorkers. Said Florida Governor set up checkpoints on i95 to stop drivers from the new york city area. Instead of trying to scapegoat new yorkers, look in the mirror, this is the same guy who allowed thousands of spring breakers to wildly party on florida beaches for days, shameless. I will point out, you know, as a former florida resident, i can tell you broward county, we called it the sixth borough because so many new yorkers live there, live in the state, including donald trump, a palm beach resident. Your thoughts. Think about this. Governor desantis for weeks was in denial. So much so that effectively he kept the beaches open, thousands of young people were partying in close proximity, the very opposite of social distancing, it great harm and detriment of the people of florida and throughout the United States because many of these young people, of course, came from all over the country and some cases different parts of the world. And so instead of trying to scapegoat new yorkers, he should be trying to implement social distancing measures that make sense to protect the wellbeing of the people he serves in florida. But to your point, joy, i think what we have seen is that the right wing has taken on this mantra of trying to blame blue states whether thats california, new york, washington, and some cases, or engage in xenophobia and blame china and other instances, this is a very dead ly disease that knows no boundaries, thats why we should all be coming together to try to conquer covid19. Let me ask you one question as a member of democratic leadership, how will congress constrain donald trump who now put it in writing he plans to undermine the Inspector General, part of whose job is to make sure that companies dont misuse the bailout money to buy back their own stock or pay their executives, and to ensure that donald trump and his family and their company dont try to benefit from that bailout funds themselves. It is a very important point and very important issue, joy. This really Speaker Pelosi laid out, signifies the difference between what democrats are all about and what republicans are all about. We fought for a bill to protect displaced workers, Everyday Americans and Small Businesses and we made substantial progress in that direction. And more needs to be done. They fought for a bill, so essentially tried to create a corporate slush fund that donald trump could potentially abuse for his friends and his family. And we put in several Different Things to try to push back against that were successful. One, we prohibited any company that receives assistance from the federal government from using that money to pay bonuses, dividends, or engage in reckless stock buybacks. That was successful. We also put into law a five Member Committee that will be appointed by members of the house and the senate, poeth tbo minority and majority to provide oversight of this payer assistance. And the third piece was the designation of an Inspector General. Now, thats in law. Donald trumps signing statements are merely words. This may lead to another constitutional class that winds up in the courts, and well have to explore that remedy, but we do think that they are also other strong protections that have been built into the law to guard against the type of cronyism we have seen repeatedly from the Trump Administration. Do you foresee democrats having to take this administration to court because we know that the history of Steve Mnuchin is that Congress Says they want to see Donald Trumps taxes, he refuses. Congress puts out subpoenas during is this going to wind up being just another case of the Trump Administration in court with members of congress or with congress tryinging to prevent this Inspector General from making reports to the legislative branch . Well, well have to cross that bridge when we get to it. What i do think is important is that the president under the c. A. R. E. S. Act has been given the authority to nominate an Inspector General, but the senate has to confirm that Inspector General and i would expect there will be robust hearings, in terms of the confirmation, and robust consideration of who is actually qualified to engage in this endeavor, given the reckless nature of the Trump Administration and hopefully the senate will do its constitutional duty and ensure that whoever is confirmed has the integrity and the intelligence and the independence to safeguard american taxpayer money. That term qualifies doing a lot of work there. We have seen a lot of people put up for judges and jobs, a tough one. Up to the senate. Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, thank you very much, stay safe. Stay safe, thank you. Now we want to turn to congressman joe naguze. Ill jump right into it, you tweeted out imploring mike pompeo for help bringing americans home. This is your tweet. My staff is working around the clock to help get constituents home from peru. Over 60 of my colleagues joined me yesterday in imploring the secretary of state to help but he cant be bothered. Pick up the phone and help us get our fellow americans home. There are cruise passengers still stuck in limbo on ships in which some have been taken off who are ill and others cannot make land because they are not being permitted. Tell us the status of trying to get americans who are essentially stranded due to this outbreak back into the United States, into their homes. Well, thank you, great to be with you. The good news is since that tweet, there has been substantial progress made by folks in the state department in terms of repatriating people back home. As you know, there are thousands of americans including many coloradans who are essentially stranded in a variety of Different Countries across the globe and certainly at the beginning of this crisis the state department was slow to respond. And we were very frustrated by the inability of the state department and the secretary of state to show bold leadership as has been the case in other countries where they have taken every step that they can to repatriate their respective citizens back to those countries. So the good news is i said thanks to the work of so many in congress, the various individuals in the state department, i believe are now taking this very seriously, we had a number of constituents arrive back home in the last few days, for example, from peru. We anticipate we can get each and every american back home safely. Well continue to fight for that as are my colleagues. Lets talk about other issues regarding the way this outbreak is impacting people. We just had on representative Hakeem Jeffries, he and cory booker, senators cory booker and Kamala Harris have introduced legislation that would immediately free inmates who are pregnant, have Underlying Health issues, are over 50, into community supervision, outside of prison, unless they pose a violent threat to the community. Thats a response they would like to see in terms of the way that people are being treated. I want to play vince warren, who is the executive director of the centers for Constitutional Rights on this show last night. Take a listen. Or yesterday. The same amount of energy that it takes to get the state and the city to get all of us to shelter in place, to socially distance, to turn off businesses, thats the type of energy that we need with respect to our prisons. We have to stop thinking about people as criminal elements and start thinking about them as equal. We stop schools. We close colleges. We have done all of these Amazing Things and yet we expect to have these four men and women to sit there while this virus spreads. Can you tell us what congress can do to try to move that forward . We know in some states there are moves to try to release prisoners and to space people out so people arent they arent turning into petri dishes. What can the federal government do in. There is a lot we can do. Im optimistic that we can get something done, we can make some progress on this particular issue. Our caucus chairman introduced a bill that has bicameral support in the senate that would direct the department of justice and the bureau of prisons to consider very carefully the potential humanitarian release of certain individuals under certain conditions. Individuals who dont pose a threat to public safety, individuals already slated to be released in the course of the next six, eight, 12 months and who are in vulnerable populations. At the end of the day, as chairman jeffries said, this virus does not discriminate. It does not matter what state you live in, what you look like, or what Political Party you affiliate with for that matter. At the end of the day, were all in this together as americans. I would think the dop and the other statebased corrections agencies ought to be taking present steps to make sure that their populations as well, you know, are in the potentially creating an epicenter of sorts for this virus to metastasize and spread further. Congressman joe neguse, thank you very much, stay safe. Im thinking about all of you in colorado this morning. Thank you. Joining me now is congressman ray luhan. Of new mexico who serves as the assistant house speaker. Thank you for being here, congressman. I want to talk about another issue that a lot of people are bringing up as were looking at trying to help people who are now struggling economically because of this outbreak. Donald trump is pushing to knock hundreds of thousands of people off of food stamps. Here is a quote from a piece in rolling stone, a rule change that the usda is looking to put in place would halt states ability to waive certain work and time limit requirements for snap recipients. The change would remove approximately 700,000 people from snap roles starting on april 1st. The federal snap requirements mandate ablebodied adults without dependents must show they have worked at least 80 hours per month for more than three months in a 36month period to stay on a snap program. You cant do when people are being laid off. Here is what bishop barber had to say about the way the poor are treated, even in the bill that congress passed. This stimulus actually leaves out millions. We dont have a prohibition against water shutoff. We dont have a prohibition against evictions. Millions of people, part time workers, that means they get nothing. They dont have paid sick leave. It didnt provide the 50 billion we need for child care. It didnt do anything about Health Insurance for the uninsured. Congressman, what can be done regarding the food stamp provisions, as well as will there be a consecutive bill that will just specifically with people who didnt make it into this bill, people who are quite poor and were already struggling before this began . Well, joy, look, this is another example of heartless policy coming from this administration. I cant understand why President Trump and those around him cant understand that people are suffering. They lost jobs through no fault of their own. People are staying home, people need to eat. And this is something that has to be held accountable, the congress will continue to take action. One of the provisions in the bill that we passed was to increase supplemental nutrition assistance programs so that the most vulnerable amongst us are able to get access to food. We need to do everything we can to push against this policy and many others that President Trump is putting forward that just hurts people across america. Let me play for you the speaker of the house this morning, on cnn and talked about an issue we talked about a lot on this show that seems to be a gnawing problem, testing and the lack of it. Take a listen. The president , his denial at the beginning was deadly. His delaying of getting equipment to where it continues is delaying getting equipment to where it is needed is deadly. And now i think the best thing would be to do is to prevent more loss of life rather than open things up so that because we just dont know. We had to have testing, testing, testing. It is pretty stark to hear the speaker of the house call the president of the United States actions deadly. But, you know, some states have done better than others in terms of trying to get testing rolled out. What can congress do to get more tests available into more states so that we can start to get a handle on how many people have been exposed to coronavirus . Look, our governor in new mexico is doing a great job in making more testing available. But she has expressed to us as we heard from other governors that theyre having problems with this. President trumps comments initially when it came out, he ignored it. He said this is going to pass, dont worry about it. He refused to invoke the defense production act in order to push everyone to be making all of the protective equipment that people need and the tests and congress will continue to push each and every one of the pieces of legislation we put forward was with an emphasis to test, to test more, to continue to make sure that everyone across the country can get access to a test, and that theyre