Join us later this morning, warns the citys hospitals are two to three weeks away from running out of essential medical supplies. In pennsylvania, the governor warns the state will be enforcing its new order to close all businesses that are not needed to sustain life. In florida, the states largest county, miamidade, and other towns have issued orders to close beaches. Governor ron desantis wont issue a statewide order, saying that local orders and his ban on large gatherings will suffice. Weve got a lot to get to. Good morning. Welcome to morning joe. It is friday, march 20th. Joe will be back on monday. Along with willie and me, we have White House Reporter for the Associated Press, jonathan lemire. Capitol hill correspondent and host on msnbc, kasie hunt. Associated editor of the Washington Post, msnbc political analyst, eugene robinson. We mentioned mayor bill de blasios warning that new york City Hospitals are two to three weeks away from running out of essential medical supplies. That is the big concern across the country. From big cities to rural locations. As more coronavirus cases overwhelm already dwindling supplies of masks, surgical groanw gowns, and eye gear for workers to do their jobs safely and effecti effectively. Many masks have a shelf life. You cant use them all the time. Were hearing stories of whats happening on the health front lines. One hospital in minnesota is considering shutting its doors over supply concerns. In illinois, an intensive care nurse was told to make a single use mask last for five days. In los angeles, doctors were forced to use expired masks to examine coronavirus patients. The elastic band snapped when they tried to put them on. Others are turning to homemade remedies to ease the burden. Doctors in seattle are using items purchased at home depot and craft stores to create protective face masks. Nurses in boston are gathering racket ball glasses in place of safety goggles. This is where we are, and were at the first phase of this virus. All of this happening as more Health Care Workers catch coronavirus, which could drastically limit the nations ability to combat the spreading disease. At yesterdays white house briefing, Vice President mike pence claimed that supplies are available now. Were working with governors to make sure that the Health Care Providers, the hospitals, and the clinics in their state are placing orders now that this tremendous increase in supply, particularly with industrial masks, is now available. Were going to make sure they understand that the supply has greatly expanded, thanks to Bipartisan Legislation and the accomplishment the president , and the response by the companies is making more masks available. Were going to make sure Health Care Providers are purchasing those and the federal government will also make sure our stockpile is properly reflecting the increases, as well. So mr. When will on the president s question, when will nose mthose masks be . They need them today. Theyre available now. Theyre not. Theyre absolutely not available now. What the Vice President just said, and he is in charge of this Coronavirus Task force that the president has put together, standing next to the president of the United States, the Vice President said something that was not true. Here we go. Bloomberg reports that it could take up to 18 months for hospitals to see supplies from Companies Making masks right now. Heres how the president addressed the federal governments role in the nationwide shortage of medical equipment. You enabled, i guess is probably the best way to put it, the defense production act yesterday, but you didnt pull the trigger. We hope were not going to need it. Youre getting calls on capitol hill from the democratic leadership to do it. What is the rational . Governors are supposed to be doing a lot of this work, and they are doing the work. Federal government isnt supposed to be buying vast amounts of items and shipping. Were not a shipping clerk. The governors are supposed to be, as with testing. The governors are supposed to be doing it. Well help out, and well help out wherever we can. We can buy in volume and, in some cases, great volume. With the masks as an example, which were a problem. Weve helped out. There are millions of masks right now being made. This is really for the local governments, governors, and people within the state, depending on the way they divided it up. Theyll do that, and theyre doing a very good job of it. Where you have a problem with ventilators, were working very hard trying to find nobody in their wildest dreams would have thought we need tens of thousands of ventilators. This is something that is very unique to this. Were headed to a crisis that this country potentially has never seen in anyones lifetime. The president seems to be separating himself from it, saying were not the countrys shipping clerk. He seems detached. He is putting out information thats not true. Well be telling you later about a drug he says is approved and ready to go. His minions on fox were echoing that fact, which is not a fact. It is not true. The Vice President now is getting caught up in the president s branding exercise, willie geist, naming companies that will be making masks. Masks that are not available now. This is a crisis in leadership that is ultimately going to have incredible ramifications for the American People. It is a crisis in leadership and in hospitals right now. If those masks were available, as Vice President pence claimed yesterday, we wouldnt be hearing from hospitals. We wouldnt be hearing from doctors. I wouldnt be getting frantic texts from doctors saying were down to our last mask, or were already out of masks. It is not just for the places taking coronavirus patients. It is for other hospitals who are being asked to give some of their masks to these critical centers, places like cancer hospitals here in new york city that are out of masks or have a week supply left. They have to get out and move quickly. A group of hospitals in indiana is getting ahead of the mask shortage by asking the public to sew masks for the hospital. The Deaconess Health system released this video, showing the public how to sew a face mask, along with a pdf of the pattern to follow. A spokesperson for the Hospital Group says the instructions meet cdc protocols, and that the homemade masks will be sterilized. How long does it take to do one . It takes about 15 to 20 minutes. Obviously, when you first start out, it is probably closer to 20 minutes, minutes. As you make several, itll go faster. Gene robinson, i cant believe what im watching. It is a hospital in evansville, indiana, doing what it has to do to get through this. Pleading with the general public. Please, at home, sew us masks. If you read through the instructions, they say, give us a call. Well meet you in the parking lot of a facility. Deliver the masks, and well sterilize them. In this country, that in 1940 and 1941, turned automobile factories into airplane factories almost overnight, where are the masks . Where are the supplies . Hospitals are dying out here. Its unbelievable. Yesterday, the cdc recommended that doctors, you know, who are working on coronavirus patients, if necessary, use a bandana or a scarf. Which was, i thought, the most amazing thing i had heard, most shocking thing i had heard, until you played that piece about the homemade masks. It is unbelievable. For the president of the United States to stand there and say, we are not a shipping clerk, to absolve himself of responsibility, when the federal government has a unique ability to commandeer, order the production of and commandeer those masks and get them to where they need to go. Its just incredible. You know, i mean, the phrase failure of leadership, i think, is one were weve used the past few days. Were going to use it a lot more. While were describing this situation, it has realworld effect on patients, on medical care providers. It is shocking. Jonathan lemire, im hearing from doctors who i know and doctors i built relationships with more recently as weve gone through this crisis to be strong, calm people. Im sensing panic in their voice, fear in their voice as they plea, we need this equipment, or else all the doctors and nurses are going to get sick. Then they wont be able to provide care for the people flooding the hospitals. Heres another eyeopening number. Hhs official at a Senate Hearing earlier this month said in the middle of a pandemic, this country would need 3. 5 billion masks. Billion with a b. We cant even get masks on shelves of these hospitals right now. Right. The wave of these cases is like just starting to break. Yeah. It is going to get so much wosh worse, according to all health experts. Hospitals are on the verge of being overwhelmed. Mayor de blasio said were two, three weeks from pure crisis. There will be a domino effect if the First Responders, the Health Care Workers get sick themselves, then theyre taken out of service. The care for the patients just gets that much slower and potentially ineffective. From the white house, were still seeing so much was made, too much was made, about President Trumps shift in tone tat beginning of the week. That has faded as the week has gone on. Thats evaporated here, and there hasnt been a lot of strong leadership, to the frustration of some of his aides and republicans on capitol hill who want him to do more. Were getting overpromising. The website has just come to life, and it only serves california. It is not something that is a national approach. I know were going to get into the drugs later, but the fda has to put out a statement, saying, first of all, the medicines, we dont know if theyll work, and if they do, they wont work for months. The head of the fda was standing behind President Trump when he made the claim, this was false. In the moment, he tap danced around it. They put out a strong statement later. This white house is still trying to win the pr battle rather than deliver the ventilators, masks, and services to the sick people in the country who need it. That is exactly the case. Thats what im seeing completely. That shift in tone, by the way, jonathan lemire, i have to say, we all recognized it. We talked about it. Some of us louded it. I think that was hopeful. At this point, every american, whether youre a journalist, a health care worker, american citizen, is hoping for leadership at this point. Look at the white house. You have a live look at the white house. Usually the lights are on, 6 00 in the morning. Theres hans. Behind him, the white house. Ill get to hans nichols. This could be symbolic. Youve got american citizens doing social distancing. Youve got Health Care Workers doing what they can to condition front this crisis would be the supplies. You have scientists desperately saying, desperately saying that we are directly on track with italy. Yet the lights seem to be out completely in this white house. The president seems to be unmatched. He is putting out false information by the day. The president also claimed yesterday, hans, an antimalaria drug would be available almost immediately to help treat coronavirus. That is not true. Factcheck that. Reporter theres clearly some steps that need to take place with chloroquine to have it ready for anyone who needs it, as well as the ebola drug, which there are promising results on. Pull up the shot of the white house, and you see the upstairs light on. You look up to see which lights are on, to see whether or not the president is up. It could be an indication well get some tweets. Normally, the lights that shine on the white house come from these reporters here, the correspondents row, where we throw lights at them. They asked us to turn some of those down. I cant say definitively whether or not the lights of the white house are less on from the white house perspective. From our perspective, we were asked to turn some lights off early this morning. Overall, the president really is facing three difficult decisions this morning. How to deal with this on an international front, how to deal with this internally. Internally, we may get an update at 11 45. Crucially, and this is more kasies territory, what to do on the hill with the size of stimulus. Internationally, he is paring pack. We had reporting late last night, you dont want to antagonize in this moment. You want to hunker down. We should get an update at 11 11 45. There are inconsistencies rhetorically as well as whats happening on the ground that the white house hasnt clarified. Then we get to the idea of the spending package and how much stimulus there is going to be. Again, this is more kasie, but this doesnt feel like a split the difference moment. This is a double the difference moment. I dont know if americans can have sticker shock anymore, but this number is trending towards the 2 trillion number, not the other way around. That is remarkable to listen to Senate Republicans talk about that. Guys . Yeah. Weve got kasie hunt standing by. Well get to her in a minute on that, on whats happening on capitol hill, where some of the action is. I got a question for you. It is a serious one. It may sound sarcastic, but im dead serious. President trump trots out mike pence, who is now beginning to lie to the American Public along with him. Then the scientists who are doing their best. Dr. Fauci, dr. Birx, and the others all standing too close on the podium every day. So my question to you is, during times of crisis, a president has an inner circle. An inner circle beyond the czars and the teams hes set up to respond to a crisis. Who is the president s inner circle . Please name the people. Who are the people who are around him all day, every day, helping him figure out how to make decisions . Reporter well, there are two, right . There are multiple inner circles. Two people . Jared kushner is playing a key role on this. We saw it with the wednesday night speech, the address to the nation on wednesday night. The kushner faction. We dont quite know how the mark meadows and Mick Mulvaney chief of staff role is playing into this. Meadows is the new chief of staff. You have mulvaney, who is leaving. He was out for large parts of the week because he had been exposed. He wasnt part of this. Then theres the president s outside advisers. Thats always the problem when you have a chief of staff that isnt particularly strong or, in this case, isnt particularly stood up, is so many people can get information into the president. As we see with this president , he is liable and likely to say whatever the last person told him. That may account for some of theothe responses from the president. Kushner is playing a key role, as well as the new chief of staff. I think people are still feeling their way around this new environment. Remember, it was just the end of the month or beginning of last month that, in the middle of all of this, the president decided to change his chief of staff. Okay. Hans, thanks very much. Kasie hunt, lets talk about whats happening on capitol hill. Trying to get aid to the American People. Mika, were waiting kind of minute by minute as these negotiations unfold. I think the pig question for the day today is are the houses of congress, are house representatives and the senate going to be able to rise to this occasion and do business differently than theyve done . Weve gotten strong signals they may be willing to. If you listen to a lot of the republicans in the senate, youll be stunned. You may not recognize them based on what their advising, how much money we spend, how many of them are angry that the current draft of the bill doesnt give more money to the neediest among us. It is linked to how much income you may have had in a previous year. As hans pointed out, this is creeping towards the 2 trillion mark. At the same time, there havent been the kind of levels of conversations between republicans and democrats that this situation seems to demand. Thats what im looking for today. Can they actually get together in a room and rise to what this occasion is demanding of them . You know, the only thing i can hope at this point, mika, is that they actually are capable of demonstrating they can work. How many times have we talked about on this show the function or lack thereof of the u. S. Congress . I think a lot of americans really didnt have much faith in Congress Going into this. Now, they have so much riding on whether or not they can actually work together. I think they still are a ways to go to prove theyre ready to take on this unbelievable task. Additionally, heres hoping that it is enough to make a difference. Because this crisis is spreading and metastasizing so quickly, i dont think any of us really have our heads around that. You know, i just hope if they can get this bill together, it actually is something that can make a difference. I think that spiral is expanding quickly, and theres real questions about that. There are scientists who say in the coming days things are going to be really, really different. Willie, Claire Mccaskill tweeted she has a daughterinlaw who is a nurse, and the hospital is setting up sewing stations throughout the building. I saw that. To make masks and gowns. Isnt that i maamazing . Nurses themselves becoming seamstresses before they can put on masks and treat patients. To the larger question, john meacham joins us now. Ill appeal to the historian in you, which is all of you, so this will work well. The arsenal of democracy, which i mentioned before, 1940, fdr makes that speech. The automobile factories flip, gm and ford, very quickly, from making automobiles to making b14 liberators, one an hour at one point in the ford factory. What kind of moment do we need here, and what kind of a president do we need here to inspire that, to get this country making masks . We dont have to make a bomber, just make a bunch of masks, gloves, gowns, and get them into these hospitals. Yeah. I would say, my instinct is to say this is not a time for polit politics, bu