contact information for members of congress, governors, and federal agencies. order your copy online today at c-spanstore.org. ♪ >> washington journal primetime. for the next hour, a special evening edition. your questions and comments about the coronavirus epidemic start now. ♪ host: with the u.s. coronavirus dr.h toll past 82,000, fauci telling a senate committee earlier today that the official number is much higher. on this tuesday, may 12, we welcome you to the washington journal. house speaker pelosi outlining a new stimulus plan. the price tag, $3 trillion. votes this friday. live on c-span.

we will get the details later this hour with a wall street journal congressional reporter. a leading public health expert on what is next as some areas of the country begin to slowly reopen. the impact this virus is having on native american communities with representative deb haaland of new mexico. our phone lines are open. we want to hear from you. for those of you out west -- if you are a medical professional, please dial in. we would love to hear from you. good tuesday evening. we begin with the official numbers courtesy of john hopkins university. worldwide the number of cases, 4.25 million. the death toll in excess of 291,000. joining us from baltimore is dr. leana wen. she is the visiting professor at george washington university. today it was announced the washington post new opinion

contributor and baltimore city health commissioner from 2014 to 2015. dr. wen: happy to be with you. host: i want to begin with new projections-- new 4, the withy august death toll could exceed 147,000. when you see that number and projection, what is your reaction? dr. wen: my reaction is that it is an underestimate. i hate to say this because that is so many people, it is unimaginable. but it is also unimaginable for where we are right now. two months ago we had more than 80,000 americans who had died from covid-19. i am not sure how many people would have believed it. anare already on an incline, increase in the number of deaths in the u.s.

the only thing keeping the virus in check is social distancing in the absence of a cure and vaccine. what was keeping the virus in check was the ability of people to stay apart as much as possible. now that states are loosening restrictions against social distancing without the proper capabilities in place to constrain the virus, we are going to see an exponential spread. i fear that the explosive spread we will see is not even reflected in the new numbers by the university of washington. i fear the new numbers will be much higher, and this time it will be entirely preventable. we will have known the consequences but let it happen anyway. host: earlier there was a feeling among young people that they were immune to this virus. ece write about it in your pi in the washington post. you write "1 in 5 patients

requiring hospitalization in the u.s. are between the ages of 20 44 according to the ddc -- 20 to 44 according to the cdc." people are dying from strokes, even if they are not likely to become severely ill, they could become asymptomatic carriers. growing evidence is suggesting children with mild or no symptoms could be highly contagious carriers. there is new reporting about the side effects that younger children, including infants are facing as a result of covid-19. can you explain? dr. wen: this underscores that there is a lot about covid-19 we just don't know. anyone saying there is a particular group that is immune or will not experience the effects of covid-19 is simply not true, because we simply don't know. virus,9 is a respiratory

but it does not just affect the respiratory system. it is also causing kidney failure, strokes in young people, and now we are finding in young children it is causing inflammation of blood vessels and even toxic shock syndrome, with at least five children in the u.s. who died from this so far and hundreds infected and hospitalized. we are just now beginning to find out about this. these are the new effects that we didn't even see in large numbers in other countries, but are being reported in the u.s. we cannot think any group is invincible. we cannot think that any group is immune without further information. and even if there is a group that experiences mild symptoms or no symptoms, they can still be carriers and transmit the virus to others. we believe even up to have of all those transmitting -- to half of all those transmitting the virus are a symptom attic.

it means -- are asymptomatic. it means it is our responsibility to protect ourselves and those around us. host: what do you tell parents? be wen: i tell parents to vigilant and not let their guard down, which is the same advice i give to people of all ages across the country. there is confusing messaging around reopening. the term reopening is confusing in and of itself because it implies there is an on and off which, -- off switch, that it is back to the way things were. a dial is more appropriate. we are dialing up and opening somewhat, but there should also be a dial down when we find there are new cases and we have

to bring back restrictions. i would say to everyone, do not let your guard down. just because your state is reopening does not mean the virus has gone away. do everything you can to practice social distancing. if you now have to go to work, there are things you can do to reduce your risk. risk is kamala to. even if you have to go to work, that does not mean you can now plan dinner parties. do not plan play dates. do not get your kids together. this is not a snow day. i know kids are bored, but it is not safe to gather in groups. this virus is highly transmissible, highly infectious, the effects of which we don't yet fully understand that could have permanent consequences on a person, a child even. recognize that social distancing is a privilege. for those that can still

practice social distancing, continue to do so. host: you monitored the testimony of dr. anthony fauci today, the health education labor and pensions committee, which is available on our website and will air later tonight on c-span. dr. anthony fauci told lawmakers about the future outbreaks. dr. fauci: i have been consistent that i get concerned if you have a situation with an outbreak in an area as such where you are not seeing that gradual 14 day decrease that would allow you to go to phase one and if you go to phase two and sees three -- and phase th ree. citiesy concern that as jump over those checkpoints and prematurely open up without

having the capability to respond effectively and efficiently -- my concern is we will start to see little spikes that might turn into outbreaks. i have been very clear in my the besto try to extent possible to go by the guidelines, which have been very well thought out. host: you seem to be echoing what dr. fauci told the senate committee today. dr. wen: that is right. the reason why we imposed these shelter-in-place stay-at-home guidelines in the first place was to buy us time to get our hospitals ready so that we don't overwhelm all of them at the same time to flatten the curve. the other reason was to buy us time to get our public health capacity up to par so that we have enough testing, enough contact tracing that ideally by the time the orders are lifted we would have suppressed the

cases to a low enough level that we can identify each case through testing, we can identify all the contacts this person might have been in contact with when they were infectious, and isolate those contacts and those who tested positive. the problem is we did not use that time wisely. we have not gotten far with contact tracing at all and done almost nothing with quarantining and isolation capacity. and the number of cases continues to go up. this is a recipe for failure. if we open up now, we don't have the capacity to trace most of these new cases. and while these cases continue to increase, there will be exponential spread soon. ist dr. fauci articulated what we saw in new york, new york becoming this huge epicenter overnight, could occur all across the country.

there could be communities that we don't even know are the next experiencebut could that type of explosive spread. we could see many outbreaks across the country. i fear that so many of these outbreaks will be occurring in places with limited health care , health caree workers leaving the area, that faced hospitals being shut down. that will happen across the south, in the midwest, and other parts of the country. we will have seen it coming. we will know what the consequences are. it is a tragedy we have not been preventing. host: our guest is a former public health commissioner in the city of baltimore and contributing writer to the washington post. you write about one other component of the story, that covid-19 disproportionately affected people of color who are likely to be essential workers and have chronic health

conditions. minorities and working-class americans of all ethnicities unable to shelter at home will continue to bear the brunt of infections, illness, and death. keith joins us from indiana. welcome to the program. caller: thanks. this is the first time i have ever done this. i have a simple question. if someone has the virus is walking without a mask, then i walk up five minutes later after they are gone, does the virus stay in the air or fall to the ground because of gravity or wh at? host: thank you. dr. wen? dr. wen: great question. the main issue people want to know is could you still be infected with the virus if somebody walks by with the virus and you walk by five minutes

later? the chances are basically zero. that is because the virus will be dispersed in the air. there needs to be a certain concentration of that virus for it to infect you. does bring up a good point that we know with this virus and others that the concentration of the virus matters. that is why when you are in an enclosed space with that person for a period of time, the risk of contracting the virus is much higher than if you happen to pass someone on the street and you have a couple seconds encounter. that is important as we move forward in discussions about reopening. if we are reopening, as we are in 43 states across the country, we have to think about the individual risks for each encounter. not all encounters are the same.

will are the situations we be thinking through. which encounters are safer than others? what are the ones we can avoid while keeping others in our lives? host: our next caller is from michigan. you are on the air with dr. leana wen. caller: i have contracted the covid. i was in the hospital for six days. now that i am at home, it has been at least six weeks. hotticed that now if i get or overly heated, my body feels me andicks are sticking i get overheated. i have to turn on the fan, but it still hurts for a while. it never happened before until this disease. host: tell us a little bit about

yourself. how old are you? did you have any previous conditions? any idea how you contracted it? caller: i am a health care worker. i am a phlebotomist. that is probably how i contracted it. i work in nursing homes. i am 53. the only thing i have is high blood pressure. host: thinking. -- thank you. dr. wen: first of all, i'm glad you left the hospital and are at least on your way back to recovery. thank you for being one of our frontline essential workers. so often we refer to doctors and nurses, but we don't open the -- don't openly acknowledge all the health care workers, so thank you for your important work. we are just beginning to understand covid-19. we keep talking about recovery

as a binary state, either you recover or you don't. we are learning there are so many patients that contracted covid-19 and are living with the effects for quite some time. patients who are intubated have a prolonged recovery because they were on a ventilator and now have to recover their lung function. it is not only them. it is patients who may have milder forms that seem to have long-lasting symptoms of some kind, including the type you are describing. i have heard a number of lasting symptoms. we don't fully understand exactly why that is the case. we need to keep that level of recovery in mind. we will have a generation of people who will have lived with covid and are recovering from it, but we don't know what type of long-term consequences this will cause in someone's life.

i wish you well. host: why is that? we heard reports that children have side effects not anticipated by this virus. is that unusual? dr. wen: we simply don't know at this point. we only know what we have seen thus far. we have only known about this virus for less than half a year. we have really no information of the long-term consequent as of this virus. with regard to children, we are still learning why children have that type of response. why is it young adults are getting strokes? is it the body's immune system is attacking itself? is there some type of dysfunction or some type of effect caused on blood vessels, clotting factors? we really don't know. justis why we should not

say this disease is like the flu. it is really not like the flu in so many ways, including these long-term consequences that we are just now beginning to even understand, much less fully investigate. host: the death toll could potentially be much higher. that was one of the issues that came up today in an exchange with senator bernie sanders and dr. fauci. sen. sanders: the official statistics is 80,000 americans have died from the pandemic. some epidemiologists suggest the number may be 50% higher than that. what do you think? dr. fauci: i am not sure if it will be 50% higher, but most of us feel that the number of deaths are likely higher than that number. given the situation, particularly in new york city,

when they were strapped with a serious challenge to their health care system, that they may have been -- there may have been people who died at home who had covid who are not counted as covid because they never got to the hospital. i think you are correct that the number is likely higher. i don't know exactly, but it is almost certainly higher. virtual hearing was dr. anthony fauci in his home in d.c. and senator bernie sanders in vermont. jim is next from california. good evening. caller: good evening to you and thank you, dr. wen. two questions. i have a six-year-old grandson and my daughter is extremely concerned about sending him back to school in september. they had some kind of day camp program. they were going to keep him separated. she decided not to send him.

i think that was probably a good idea. what about school in september? it seems when i look at western european statistics that the number of cases per million, all across the board in other countries, in germany it is less than 100 per million. any thoughts on why the death rate and the morbidity rate in countries, which all seem to have fine health care systems, should be so different? host: jim, thank you for the question. dr. wen: both of these are excellent questions. the first question about schooling, you will not like my answer because i will sound not certain, but i just don't know. i can't predict until september.

it depends where this is in the country and what happened to that region in the interim. there are possibly parts of the country where covid-19 is well controlled and there could be a public health capacity with testing and tracing that maybe it will be ok to go back to school in september. i imagine things like staggered shifts, no assemblies, desks put six feet apart, having many classes held outdoors. you can imagine scenarios that would make school safe in september. germany is trying an experiment now where some students are tested every four days and teachers are tested every four days. so much good happen between may and september. something like that could be implement it in the u.s. -- implemented in the u.s.

right now it is not safe, but september i am not sure yet. with regard to death rates in other countries, this goes to the undercounting happening in the u.s. different countries have different demographics in terms of the type of people who live there, comorbidities, but also countries have different ways of counting deaths. in the u.s., we have an undercount in the number of deaths, including flu season. it may well be people we think who died of the flu could have died from covid-19. this probably was the case in other countries. that might also account for the death rate. host: we are talking with dr. leana wen, a visiting professor at george washington university. you were quoted in a recent baltimore son piece -- sun piece

regarding pregnant women. a growing number want to have their baby at home, not in a hospital, because of covid-19. what is your recommendation? dr. wen: my recommendation is don't change your birth plan. if you were going to give birth in a hospital anyway, don't change to a homebirth because you think it will be safer. first of all, you don't know it will be safer from a covid standpoint. the person coming to your house to deliver the baby may may well be an a symptomatically carrier, because that person is exposed to so many people as well. hospitals are taking steps to stay as safe as possible. that, changingof your birth plan in general is not great. you may have a high risk pregnancy,a --pregnancy, as i did. don't change your plan thinking

it is better. at the same time, understand there are a lot of uncertainties. you may not have the number of visitors in the labor and delivery ward you might have expected. to any have to go appointment without your partner or someone else with the. bring a list of your medical conditions, the name of your physician, your allergies, and bring an electronic device with you in case you are separated from your loved one or your doctor or midwife is unable to be at the hospital at that time. have a list of your medications and conditions with the so you can be your best advocate during these uncertain times. caller: our -- host: our next caller is from california. good evening. caller: hi, how are you doing? i am a pool man.

i take care of about 50 pools. i am heavily chlorinated by sticking my hands in there all day long. i have a few customers who are andering is it safe to bring bunch of the neighbor kids over and have them splash around? i think it is ok, but i was wondering about your professional opinion. host: thank you. dr. wen: i appreciate the question. i can understand many people would have this question as the weather gets nicer and our kids become more stir crazy. it is not safe. here is why. the pool itself is not the problem. you will not get covid-19 by swimming. covid-19 is not transmitted through water.

if it is your own pool and you are using it yourself, there is no risk of covid-19 that way. if you are the person who repairs the pool, there will be limited risk for you too, in part because the chlorine will certainly kill covid as well. the problem though is if you have a number of kids coming over. i worry about them transmitting the virus to each other. this is a respiratory virus that transmits from person to person. if kids are splashing on each other, i don't know i would trust the same kids to be social distancing when they are coughing and talking, that they are not infecting each other and potentially their own families when they go back home. there are other services one might be touching as well -- surfaces one might be touching as well.

they might go to the restroom and touch the doorknob. they might be sharing utensils or a jug of water. all of those variables are potential for infection. find to swim with their own family. -- fine to swim with your own family, but i would certainly not have a gathering now. host: you are in baltimore. would you and your family be comfortable going to camden yards this summer or september? dr. wen: not at all. we love the orioles. they would be a sad day for -- it would be a sad day for us not to do this, but that kind of mass gathering is exactly the hotbed for infection. mass gatherings will be happening that soon, but i ask anyone contemplating having

such a gathering, how would you feel if dozens or hundreds become second by going to your -- sickened by going to your event? host: 5.5-week-old isabella, very much a newborn. kevin is joining us from raleigh, north carolina. caller: good evening. good evening, doctor. willu think the cases spike due to these three openings? -- these reopenings? thanks. dr. wen: i do think there will be a spike in infections. when is that going to occur? it will not happen immediately. i don't want for the wrong lesson to be drawn. there is a lack in time between when exposure happens and when

someone becomes infected. it could be up to 14 days. when someone becomes ill enough to be diagnosed with covid, that could be another week. for someone to become hospitalized and ill enough that they succumb to the illness, that could be another couple weeks. if we were to look at the numbers a week or two down the line in the states reopening, we might not see any difference at all. i don't want individuals to think oh, what was the big deal? nothing bad happened. i don't want other states to look at these initial states and copy them. i don't want the advocates for reopening to be emboldened. we cannot let our guard down. what is going to happen is so predictable at this point. we have already seen it happen. we didary and february,

not know the trajectory of this virus. we now know all too well what will happen. the numbers will spike. we will have an increase in hospitalizations and deaths. it will take time for that to happen, but it is basically like watching a train wreck happen in front of us, except we have the ability to stop the train from crashing, but we are just not doing it. we have not met the white house's own criteria for reopening. the number of cases are not consistently declining. we don't have the capabilities in place to safely reopen. that is in our control, and we are not doing it. host: from the president yesterday saying we are leading the world in testing, an estimated 10 million per day. the question is did we test early enough? dr. wen: we clearly did not test early enough. that was probably the single

biggest mistake that the u.s.-made. had we tested early, we could have had a chance of containing the virus. we could have had low enough numbers to trace and isolate our ways out of this without resorting to societal level lockdowns. the shelter-in-place is a blunt instrument. we shouldn't have had to resort to it if we could have used toolsg as fine precision rather than this blunt instrument. but i want to look forward. toheard in the testimony day that the best case scenario is 30 million tests per week by the full. public health experts estimate we need on the order of 5 to 20 million tests a test, not one million tests a day, but up to

20 million tests a day. we have to ramp up to that capacity now. the white house is people to issue tests every day to their staff and quickly quarantine. that is what we need for everyone, not just for people who work in the white house. that is what it will take for employees in other industries, for students to go back to work in a school. we are not even close to being there. we need a national plan to reach that level of capacity, not this piecemeal approach. host: let's go to lewisville, texas. you are next. good evening. caller: i wanted to ask a question of dr. wen. i have two questions. the first one is, how do we know when the covid-19 is completely gone?

my second question is, if one can be a carrier with no symptoms, how does that one know they are carrying it? dr. wen: these are both great questions. the first question about when do we know it is gone -- i am afraid covid-19 will not be gone. the best prediction for wha this illness will be like -- it will not be like sars and mers that could be contained -- it will be more like the common cold or influenza, something we live with season after season, but we get vaccinated. that is what will happen. it will just be around us for the rest of our lives and for generations to come. health why the world

organization tried to stam -- to stamp down on this early. it is something we could live with if we had a vaccine. transmission,ic that is why testing is so important. if everyone who had covid had symptoms, that would make it much easier to contain, because you could identify all who showed symptoms. the problem is how do you know the students sitting next to you and shares your desk utensils isn't also carrying covid-19? who nottesting people only have symptoms, but those w ho don't. that is why testing is key. host: we have gone from seven

cases in february to more than 1.3 million cases today. is tampa, florida. good evening. caller: i am a grocery worker long,wear a mask all day but we have people who come in chewing gum. blow out of they their mouth, i smell the spearmint. i smell that through the mask. host: thank you. a good: you bring up point about the importance of masks. the guidance has changed in part because of asymptotic transmission. at the beginning of the outbreak, we did not know so many would transmit covid-19 who did not have symptoms. masks protect other people from you.

if you are wearing a mask and you may be an asymptotic carrier, you are not spewing these drops onto other people. that is why the cdc guidelines in many states have mandated that in closed spaces where you could be within six feet of someone that you should be wearing a mask to protect other people from yourself. everyone listening and watching to follow that guidance. we are in this together. this is something we can do to show courtesy for each other. host: is this going to be the new norm based on what you everyone listening and watching to follow that guidance. experienced going to the grocery store in your community? dr. wen: yes. i believe it will be the new normal for the foreseeable future, especially as we look at other countries. wearing a mask reduces the level of transmission of covid-19.

that is all the evidence we need to make it the new normal. we should be doing everything we can. host: from hawaii, good evening. welcome to the program. hello? you are on the air. caller: hello, dr. wen. dr. wen: aloha. whenr: i want to know why, you go through the drive-through to be tested with the swab, the technicians don't change gloves. i am curious of that. if you're going to swab one car, i am watching as you get a new swab -- i had a problem with that and i pulled out. is there a way you can do it with a home kit and submit it? host: we will get a response.

dr. wen: this is why having home testing is so important. at the beginning of the outbreak, we ran out of a lot of reagents and swabs necessary to do covid-19 testing. one of those limiting supplies was personal protective equipment, because health-care workers had to keep changing equipment to protect themselves and others. i don't know the circumstances of your drive-through, but the answer at the end of the day will be home testing so you don't have to spend so much personal protective equipment and you can avoid the staff time of having a nurse or doctor swab you. imagine there is a home test, something point of care where you get the result back immediately. think a pregnancy test, you get the result immediately.

that would be a game changer. that allows a person to administer their own test without using other's time and equipment. that could determine whether you are safe to go to work or school or so forth. host: thank you for joining us washington,ale, which is where covid-19 first developed in january. caller: hi, thank you for taking my call. i work at a kennel. in october i did get the flu i gotbut come february 3, the worst case of the flu in my life. i couldn't go back to work for five days. everyone had it. after that, our dogs started getting sick. our vets couldn't figure out what was wrong with them. we got the place sanitized. come the 16th of march, we were

furloughed and out. are there any dogs or cats still getting infected? dr. wen: not knowing the specific circumstances, i will speculate a bit. it is possible you can still get influenza if you get the flu shot. would still recommend everyone get the flu shot. it does not protective against covid-19, but protect you against the flu. even if it is not 100% effective, you want to get that as well. i am sorry you and your colleagues went through this. there are some symptoms in animals. they could also get respiratory viruses. with covid-19, there are some cases, it seems, of animals that have symptoms due to covid-19. there has not been any

documentation of that pet, that animal transmitting the virus to the human. i'm not quite sure if that was the question being asked, but you should not fear that your pet is going to give you covid-19 or the flu. host: we talked to in emergency room physician last week. he indicated people are reluctant to go to the er because of covid-19. for those who need to go to the er, what do you tell them? dr. wen: if you need to go to the er, you should go. you could have a life-threatening condition. if you have crushing chest pain, if you can't move a part of your body, if you have sudden extreme headache and dizziness, if you cannot move a side of your body -- all of these are concerning symptoms for heart attacks and strokes. i am an emergency physician.

we treat people for acute conditions all the time. that is what the er is for. we figure out the best protocols to protect the while you're in youhospital -- protect while you are in the hospital. if you have a life-threatening condition, i understand it is frightening to be potentially exposed to covid, but you still need to go to the hospital to treat the life-threatening condition because you need to survive. that is what the er is for. please seek medical care if you need it. host: northern california. you are on the air. good evening. caller: hello. my girlfriend and i got real sick in february. we live in a mountain community in california. cases ofad two to four coronavirus here and people are treating it like it is nothing.

today i went to the store and no one had masks or gloves. if i had the coronavirus, is there any way this late in the game to check if i had it in february? dr. wen: very good question. this is one of the most common questions i get asked. i had some sort of symptoms in february or march, or i couldn't get tested at the time, should i get tested? the answer is it depends why you test.o get that if you want to get the test because you are curious, that might be a reason. there are antibody tests you can get. antibody tests are not the other tests i have been referring to this segment, pcr tests, which look for if you have an infection. the other test looks for if you have antibodies to the virus.

you can see if you had the virus before, but there are a couple problems. one is there are so many of these tests on the market , and many of them frankly are junk. they have such a low positive rate that you might as well be shaking a magic eight ball. if you do get the test, how do you interpret the result? let's say it is positive and you have the anti-body, which means you did have covid-19 in february instead of the flu, the problem is we don't know if that means you are immune to covid-19. we don't know yet if having exposure before and having the antibody means you are protected against covid-19. i would not want you or anyone else to get the impression you are safe to interact with people because you already had this. if you want to take the test

because you are curious and trying to find out if you had exposure before, take it if it i s the right kind of test, but don't use it to plan your everyday activities because that could be false hope and be dangerous. host: you are a physician. you are also an instructor. how is this changing the medical profession? dr. wen: i think it dramatically altered the medical profession, including in ways we don't fully understand yet. -- i are obvious things think people are now understanding what it is we in the emergency department and public health really do. we are switching to telemedicine. it works really well for a lot of people. i think there are also changes to the doctor-patient-provider relationship. like myself when i was giving birth, i never thought i would

be in a situation with my five week old where i worried so much about my providers and for my providers. i worried they could be exposed and be exposing me. that is a different type of concern we have had in our profession. i think there are many downstream effects we are not fully recognizing it. there are primary care offices going out of business as. community health centers may not be functioning anymore after this pandemic. i think this pandemic is unmasking many of the underlying health disparities and inequities of our health system. it will take us time to get over the acute crisis, but we have to think about what kind of reforms are necessary to make our health care system into one that is accessible and equitable for all. host: dr. leana wen is a

visiting professor at george washington university school of public health. she is also named a contribute in opinion writer for the washington post, and most devotedly a new m -- most importantly a new mom. we thank you for being with us. speaker nancy pelosi today outlining a $3 trillion stimulus plan. the debate and vote set for friday. live coverage on c-span. joining us is a congressional reporter for the wall street journal. i have to begin with that price tag. what kind of reaction is that getting, especially among house republicans? >> house republicans are talking nonstop about the price tag, saying it is too much. $3 trillion would be almost doubling what congress put toward the crisis already in fo ur bills.

it would double that in one bill . house and senate republicans immediately launched onto the price tag, especially because they are saying they want to tap the brakes and see the money they already approved dispersed before they see another bill. host: there are parts to the bill where you would imagine there are revolution support, -- is republican support, including aid to cities. dr. wen: there is one large bill. nancy pelosi called it the heroes act in honor of first responders and those working the front lines of the crisis. there are several proposals in this bill that do have bipartisan support, things such as the state and local government. among governors in hard-hit areas. some of the tax proposals build

off of the proposals that republicans supported in the previous legislation. speaker pelosi not include legislation pushed by progressives to make stimulus payments monthly or some sort of paycheck guarantee program. she stuck with the current proposal passed before. there is some bipartisan support, but the price tag -- i was talking to house republicans today who said they don't think they can support it at all. host: is it dead on arrival in the u.s. senate? >> yes. this is nancy pelosi's anchor point. she is laying down what she would want and challenging senate republicans to come up with their own plan. she wants to put down as what she sees as a big proposal. she said she wanted to think big. she expects some negotiation to

happen, but she wants to get that started. this is her bill that she wants to see start that conversation. host: let me ask you about the deficit. we will see a record debt. i realize we are in an emergency, but at some point, when will congress say we have to bring this down, to raise taxes, cut spending, or a combination of the two? >> it seems these things catch up to lawmakers when they can't do what they are pushing to do. should there be a change in the presidential election year, you might hear more talk. when lawmakers feel like they can push their policy proposals, they don't think so much about the deficit. we saw that with the republican-controlled government, this hardline talk about the deficit went down.

the volume has turned up. we are spending trillions of dollars. republicans are worried about adding to the debt and we will hear it ramp up more. host: the senate in session this week. the house will be back on friday. what can we expect? dr. wen: >> house will come back on friday. there are at least two voted to delayo the vote. the house is going to change its rules when they vote on this package. that is a key reason to come back. the house leadership wants to change the rules to allow the house to operate remotely. they may not be back in washington on monday night because they will change the rules to allow committees to operate remotely, to allow votes

to happen by proxy. -- untilate side, memorial day. host: her work is available online. we will have live coverage of the florida debate on friday. -- floor debate on friday. joining us live from skype is representative debra haaland. she represent's new mexico -- represents new mexico's first congressional district. congresswoman, thank you for being with us. first of all, where are you? looks great. rep. haaland: i am in albuquerque, new mexico on my back porch and we are having a spell of beautiful weather. i sit outside every chance i get. host: how has this virus impacted the native american

population, not only in your district but across the country out west? rep. haaland: let me start with new mexico, where 11% of the population is native american positiver 54% of the cases. indian country is behind. they start way behind. a lot of native communities don't have running cases. water, no electricity, and broadband is absolutely nonexistent in so many places. that goes for every tribe across the country. so many tribes can't connect. when it comes to dealing with life on its own on to but add a pandemic that, and it exacerbated the

situation in indian country, which is why we have been fighting to make sure tribes get the funding they need to fight the virus. host: we know now some of the new mexico state parks have begun to reopen as of may 1. non-essential businesses are beginning to now reopen. we are seeing travelers in new mexico have to self-quarantine for 14 days. how is this being enforced? rep. haaland: the self-quarantine order a new -- i am sorry. governor lujan grisham, she has been a tremendous leader during this time. she was our former secretary of health and human services in new mexico, so she has a background. down, used to shut

the riot act on the books a new mexico to shut down cities to make sure people are traveling. -- aren't traveling. there are curfews. people are getting cited. we have a part to play in this pandemic. we owe it to our community members to keep safe and ways we what -- the need to make sure we are not spreading this virus. the only way we can reopen anything is if we stop spreading the virus. i came back from washington the last time i voted. there was a big sign at the airport when you move into the terminal. it says if you are coming in from another state, you have to stay home for 14 days. i followed directions.

i have been here at my house. i got off self-isolation this past saturday. there is no reason for me to be out there doing anything that would exacerbate the spread of this virus, so i stay home as often as possible. i am working 12 or 13 hours a zoom,rough skype, through through teleconferencing. we are finding ways to make sure we are moving our country forward. we can do it at a distance. host: it has become the new norm during this pandemic. will you be back in washington friday for the debate over the $3 trillion stimulus plan the speaker outlined today? rep. haaland: let me put it this texting, have been emailing, talking. the speaker had a number of calls with members of congress,

so i feel like we absolutely have a say in this bill. . gratefulfor -- very for that. i will be part of this legislation regardless of how we move iti forward. f that is the day we go back, i will be there. host: what about the house rules committee taking up proxy voting during a time of emergency? do you think it will change? changethink it will the institution? rep. haaland: the institution is changed. this pandemic is affecting every sector of our country. is a change. we have been on a couple zoom calls, me and my colleagues, talking about our is experiences

and how it has been working from home. when you are in d.c. in your office and go from point a to point b, you always see people in the elevator, in the halls, you have a moment to chat about the bill you just filed. that is not going on right now because we are not there. things have already been changing. gathering on the floor of the house is another place where you can walk across the aisle, talk to your members of congress on the others of the aisle, asking them to sign on to a bill. it has been difficult. we are taking things in stride. we are doing what we have to do to move our country forward for working families, for frontline workers, for essential workers.

the american people deserve every ounce of effort we can put into that. however we meet and move our country forward, i am going to be part of that. i will do whatever i have to do to make sure we put our working families first. and: as a native american someone who represents a large native american population, we have heard from democratic leaders who say this pandemic made us realize there are cracks in america's social infrastructure. how big is that among native americans? rep. haaland: what this pandemic as done is it has shined bright light on the disparities in our country. not just native americans, so many communities of color. we see that in our urban centers

that african-americans have the highest rate of coronavirus. , the federalntry government has interested responsibility -- entrusted responsibility to tribes. when the u.s. government has not lived up to its was possibility, that -- its response ability, that is when you have folks with no broadband service. no health care. some people have to drive 80 some people have to drive 80 miles to a hospital to get seen by a doctor. these are disparities we cannot ignore any longer. so as i said, it shined a tremendous light on indian country. it is our opportunity to make sure that tribes no longer get we push the that

united states government to live up to its trust responsibility to indian tribes because they deserve to get past this terrible crisis as well as every other community. host: joining us from her porch in albuquerque, representative debra haaland. thank you very much for being with us. rep. haaland:: thank you. host: we will give you a sense with covid-19. the new worldwide infections in the last 60 minutes, 1797. the majority are here in the u.s., just over 1300. the worldwide death toll increased by 121, the vast majority in the u.s. at 94. we are back tomorrow at 8:00 p.m. eastern with another journal." "washington and infectious disease expert

will join us. as we celebrate nurses, kendra mcmillan from the nursing association will join us and representative gerry connolly from virginia, which includes a large percentage of federal workers. all of our coverage including today's hearing with the senate and the testimony of leading experts is available online any time at c-span.org/coronavirus. don't forget tomorrow morning, the washington journal at 7:00 a.m. eastern time from my home to your home. stay safe, keep healthy. thanks for joining us. ♪ [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2020]

[captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] c-span's washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. wednesday morning, the washington times reporter talks about foreign intelligence surveillance and the broader debate over government surveillance. of the select committee on the coronavirus crisis join us. they discussed the federal response. dr. joshua gordon, director of the national institute of mental health, will talk about the impact of the pandemic on mental health and the nation's mental health care system. live atshington journal 7:00 eastern wednesday morning. join the discussion. altered --as unfiltered coverage to of the federal response to the

coronavirus, which features our daily call-in program washington journal, hearing your thoughts about the crisis. if you missed any of our live coverage, watch anytime on demand at c-span.org/coronavirus. >> coming up tonight on c-span, dr. anthony fauci and members of the white house coronavirus task force testify on guidelines to reopen the u.s. economy amid the pandemic. >> next, members of the white house coronavirus task force testify on the federal response .o the pandemic national institute of allergy and infectious diseases director dr. anthony fauci testified about guidelines in place to safely reopen the economy but warned the country can expect little spikes that might turn into outbreaks. other witnesses included cdc director robertfi