Governor Cuomo: "The big issue was testing. As everyone knows, that's going to be the next step as we go forward and how do we separate the responsibilities and the tasks on testing vis-a-vis the state and the federal government and the acknowledgment that we all need to work together on this. It has to be a real partnership and I think we had a very good conversation."
Cuomo: "A state has laboratories in the state. The state regulates the labs. The state should determine where tests are taken and how they're allocated. The tracing is a state function. But we need help from the federal government to make the supply chain work ... and we said that we would like to work together in New York State to take our current rate of testing - we do about 20,000 tests a day on average - and double that, to go to 40,000. It's a very aggressive goal and we said that we would work together to meet that goal so it was a very good conversation."
Cuomo: "I also spoke to the President about the need for the states to get funding. That's not in the current bill that the Congress is considering but the states are in desperate shape and everything's being left to the states to do the reopening, reopening, reopening, and then they don't provide any funding to the state government. The President seemed very open and understanding of that and said the next piece of legislation that passes, he's going to be open to that."
Earlier today, Governor Cuomo was a guest on MSNBC's Deadline: White House with Nicole Wallace following his meeting at the White House.
AUDIO is available here.
A rush transcript of the Governor's interview is available below:
Nicole Wallace: Governor, how did your meeting go and what did you say to the President?
Governor Cuomo: The meeting went well and I think it was productive. The big issue was testing. As everyone knows, that's going to be the next step as we go forward and how do we separate the responsibilities and the tasks on testing vis-a-vis the state and the federal government and the acknowledgment that we all need to work together on this. It has to be a real partnership and I think we had a very good conversation. A state has laboratories in the state. The state regulates the labs. The state should determine where tests are taken and how they're allocated. The tracing is a state function. But we need help from the federal government to make the supply chain work for the manufacturers, on these reagents, on the test kits, et cetera, and we said that we would like to work together in New York State to take our current rate of testing - we do about 20,000 tests a day on average - and double that, to go to 40,000. It's a very aggressive goal and we said that we would work together to meet that goal so it was a very good conversation.
I also spoke to the President about the need for the states to get funding. That's not in the current bill that the Congress is considering but the states are in desperate shape and everything's being left to the states to do the reopening, reopening, reopening, and then they don't provide any funding to the state government. The President seemed very open and understanding of that and said the next piece of legislation that passes, he's going to be open to that.
Nicole Wallace: What was your approach with him? I mean, you obviously know that Nancy Pelosi has walked into that building and spoken truth to him and been attacked and ridiculed. Donald Trump has alternated between praising you, highlighting your come accomplishments, and attacking you. How did you attack the meeting with the President?
Governor Cuomo: You know, the same way I approach most of these situations. It's just honest, Nicole. It was just honest and open and the President is communicative about his feelings and I'm communicative about what I think. But, look, for the President and for myself, this is not about anyone's emotions about anyone else. Who cares what I feel, what he feels. We have a tremendous job that we have to get done and put everything else aside and do the job and that was the tone of the conversation - very functional and effective.
Nicole Wallace: Did the President say anything about his press coverage?
Governor Cuomo: No. We talked about the issues, we had a broader conversation about the coronavirus, et cetera. He wanted to know what was working in New York, what was not working in New York, what are our challenges ahead were, what we needed from the federal government, how we could see the state and federal government working together. We talked about what the federal government did do during phase one when we were ramping up to develop hospital capacity. We took the Javits Center and the Army Corps of Engineers did a fantastic job putting in 2,500 beds. The President sent up a navy ship, the Comfort, a hospital ship which was very good to have in case we had overflow but I said we don't really need the Comfort anymore. It did give us comfort but we don't need it anymore so if they need to deploy it somewhere else they should take it.
Nicole Wallace: What was your goal, I mean, were you invited to the White House or did you ask to come down and talk to the President face to face?
Governor Cuomo: I wanted to have a face to face conversation. This issue of testing and who does what on testing, we had to get this ironed out, so to speak. This is a very big issue. It's important for states that have a more difficult time reopening, like New York. It is how you educate yourself as you're making reopening decisions and it's a frontier that we have never done before. This is all basically private sector labs and private sector manufactures, and how do you get them to increase their volume tenfold, when it's not really a government function at all. And how can the federal government help and how can the states help? That is the issue for the country right now, I think.
Nicole Wallace: What's your - how do you see testing as a piece of bringing our state back? Do you see one test once a week, do you see daily testing? Do you see a test to establish a baseline before you contemplate reopening any sector of life in New York State? Can you talk about how you see testing, why you think testing is this threshold issue for opening your state?
Governor Cuomo: Initially it's a benchmark, right, where are we? Are we on the increase, are we on the plateau, are we on the descent? The only way we track that now is really by the number of hospitalizations, that's the only hard data you have. We can extrapolate that.
Nicole Wallace: And that's after people are already sick.
Governor Cuomo: That's right.
Nicole Wallace: Do you want how many asymptomatic people are many your state too?
Governor Cuomo: Ideally, you would. But the first piece of information as a benchmark, is the infection rate going up, is it going down or is it stable? You don't find that out without testing.
Nicole Wallace: Does the president share that, does he seem to understand that, because the way he talks about these briefings, it's, "Everyone that wants a test can have a test"? He said this wearing a MAGA hat the CDC a month ago, and then the latest take on testing from the president was if they want to test the governors have to test -- does the president see testing the same way you do?
Governor Cuomo: Well, you know, I'm in New York that has one of the most intense situations in the country if not the most intense situation. The sense I got from the President he was deferential to the needs of that state and the full spectrum of states, because some states are in different situations. Look, some regions in my state are in a very different position. Even in New York, we have some counties where we have more cows than people, right? So, density is not an issue. So, he was more understanding of different states having different problems and testing is a vehicle for those states that have the bigger issues.
Nicole Wallace: Did you feel any sense that he wanted you to open faster than you think you're going to be able to?
Governor Cuomo: No, not that he communicated. He was inquisitive about what we were doing and what we thought and what we needed, but he never editorialized on what he thought was an appropriate timeline.
Nicole Wallace: What do you think in terms of just managing expectations about kids going back to school, about any the sort of soft openings that less densely populated regions have considered? What is your thinking right now on the timeline for any of those steps?
Governor Cuomo: I said to New Yorkers yesterday, "Don't get arrogant and don't get cocky just because we have shown we can control the beast," which we have, the infection rate has reduced. We have a long way to go. To make those decisions you have to know that your stabilizing the rate of infection and that's where testing comes in, or you're reducing it. You have to fully accept the new protocols, masks, social distancing, et cetera, and we need to rely on the data to make these decisions. And again that's why you go back to testing. Everything is closed, schools are closed. Frankly to reopen a school would be a major undertaking at this point. We are regionally coordinated in that we're acting in concert with other states so we don't have people going back and forth between or among states because different states have different rules. But status quo, let's plan reopening, plan a reimagined reopening where we learn the lessons of what we just went through. Unless we get data that says we're proceeding cautiously and safely, I think it has to be data-driven.
Nicole Wallace: Governor, I'm curious. New York is my adopted state. As you're talking we're showing pictures of empty Times Square, empty financial district of our city shut down to protect our neighbors and our loved ones. Donald Trump lived in New York a lot longer than I did. Did he have any emotions that he expressed to you about seeing his hometown like this?
Governor Cuomo: Oh yes, he made exactly that point, Nicole. He spoke about how he's never seen the city this way. And I agreed with him, I'm a born and bred New Yorker, more years than I care to remember, and I have never seen this under any circumstance. I mean, you can be in the middle of a tremendous snowstorm, you get more New Yorkers out than you get out now. And that's I think a fact that people forget, it's one thing for government to say, okay, it's safe to go out. If people don't believe it's safe they're not going to go. So, the data and the testing works both ways. It can give people a sense of security. When they open some of these other places people didn't come out even though the government said you could come out. So, it informs everyone.
Nicole Wallace: I'm sure you read the front-page piece in today's New York Times, with some questions about whether some of the things that make New York City, New York City - Broadway, the density, the subway, the restaurants - that some of those things may be threatened for a longer period of time. What's your take on when some of those things come back, theaters, public transportation, restaurants, bars?
Governor Cuomo: Well, look, it's anyone's guess. But if you don't have a therapeutic or a vaccine, I think you'll see a significant lag in those areas, right? Because density is what created this issue. New York City is one of the most dense places on the globe, That's why you can't compare any other place to it. And density is a problem in this situation and whatever we do or whatever government says, I just think people are going to be very weary before they walk into a Broadway theater or they get in a crowded subway car. They're going to want to know that there's a therapeutic, a vaccine, but some real safety measure before they subject themselves to a situation like that.
Nicole Wallace: So, my last question, Governor, I watch your briefings every day. We obviously cover you as a national figure. I think most New Yorkers would argue that our state is a national story even when there's not a pandemic. But how are you - What's guiding you? I mean, are you looking to your team, are you out talking to people? Are you surrounded by scientists? Do you have an open line to Dr. Fauci? I mean what does your kitchen cabinet look like right now?
Governor Cuomo: The kitchen cabinet is very broad right now because no one knows. There's no expert. There's no one person who's been through this. So, I think the best advice is to talk to a number of people and then adapt it to your particular circumstance in New York. But my health commissioner, the health team, the statisticians, the data people who look at this, because a lot of this is trying to determine where we are and where it's going. Dr. Fauci certainly has tremendous experience and he's been very generous with his time. So for me it's been following the data and the science and trying to get ahead of this virus for the first time with the help of health officials, and then we have had an operational nightmare that we had to make sure the hospitals weren't overwhelmed and we had to organize and manage the hospital system in the State like never before. And what people forget it's not a government system. These are private hospitals that have never been managed by government. And now we're trying to get to them to all coordinate. Go ahead -
Nicole Wallace: No, go ahead. Sorry.
Governor Cuomo: No, so there was both sides. There was an operational challenge and then this unknown with the virus and the spread and the numbers.
Nicole Wallace: You know, I wonder if you defended the hospital workers from the unfounded allegations that Donald Trump made a couple of weeks back they were doing something akin to hoarding, or something worse, with medical supplies. Has he backed off his suspicion of New York-area hospital workers? Did that come up at all today?
Governor Cuomo: That did not come up, that was a passing issue, where the President made a comment that they were going out the back door. I don't know if it's a common saying beyond the Northeast. I don't know how widespread that expression is. It suggests that they maybe - somebody maybe be taking them wrongfully, going out the back door, but it was a passing comment and, you know, you can't - you can't rebut everything, so sometimes you let it go in life.
Nicole Wallace: Did you use the meeting to rebut anything that he's still saying? Did you express any concern about his support for protesters over the weekend? I know there aren't any in our state yet, but did you raise any of that or did you stay focused on other topics?.
Governor Cuomo: Yeah, I stayed focused on what we were there to talk about and for me the substantive agenda was testing, who does what, how do we get it up to scale and somebody has to stand up for funding for the state. The president's relying on governors, working with governors, which he is and the Vice President has been working with governors and now we've determined that it's up to governors to reopen. They have a tremendous financial problem and you can talk about small businesses, and airlines, how about police, how about fire, how about teachers, how about funding the reopening?
Nicole Wallace: Someone said it's like funding post-9/11 New York, over and over and over again. Governor, thank you so much for getting on the phone and sharing what sounds like a very productive conversation on the subject of testing and funding for New York and I hope we can keep a direct line to you to understand what's happening in the state of New York. Thank you, sir.
Governor Cuomo: My pleasure, Nicole. Thank you.
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