Audio & Rush Transcript: Governor Cuomo Is a Guest on MSNBC's Morning Joe

Earlier today, Governor Andrew M. Cuomo was a guest on MSNBC's Morning Joe to discuss New York's plan to combat the novel coronavirus crisis.

AUDIO is available here.

A rush transcript of the Governor's interview is available below:

Joe Scarborough: Let's bring in Governor Cuomo. Thank you for being with us. You certainly have been on the forefront of governors across America responsible, pushing for, asking for help from the federal government, but also understanding you're going to have to take matters into your own hands because it's sort of like Katrina. I was on the ground in Katrina for the first two weeks before the federal government did anything. Anybody waiting for the government to respond to Katrina kept waiting. It seems like we're at the same place, here, 15 years later, but this time it's not a hurricane. it's a pandemic.

Governor Cuomo: You're 100 percent right, Joe. I said that this is the Hurricane Katrina version of a public health situation and we are taking matters into our own hands, frankly. We are doing drive-throughs. We didn't wait for the federal government and we're doing everything we can do. But you and I were both in the federal government. We understand the capacity. There has been no country that has handled this, Joe, without a national response and we have been behind on it from day one. I'm not giving up. There are things we need the federal government to do. You look at today, the news, all these patchwork acts by these different states. It makes no sense for me to take an action. I close bars and then people drive to New Jersey or Connecticut, my neighboring states. You need a federalized response, especially on the looming crisis, and the looming crisis is that curve that everybody talks about - is not a curve. It is a wave and the wave is going to break on the hospital system. There is no projection that says our hospital system can handle this. We need the Army Corps of Engineers in here now retrofitting old buildings, dormitories, etcetera, for more hospital capacity. That's what China did, that's what South Korea did, that's what Italy didn't do, and I have one of the largest state governments in the nation but I can't build hospital beds in three weeks. I need the Army Corps of Engineers.

Mika Brzezinski: Also, governor, don't you need these people separated from the rest of the hospital population? You have an op-ed out this morning which is a call to President Trump to mobilize the military to help fight coronavirus. I mean, military hospitals being set up around the country would do a lot to stop the clusters inside the medical community and among the people who are on the front lines of helping the sick.

Governor Cuomo: That is exactly right and look, they say life has options. We don't have any options. We know the health care system will become overwhelmed. That's how people die. I only have 3,000 intensive care unit beds in the State of New York. About 80 percent are already occupied so I only have about 600 beds available. I already have 60 people in those beds. This is a disaster waiting to happen. We know it. The only alternative is to build, develop more beds, retrofit. You're not going to build anything new. Get some of the people out of the hospitals into those new medical facilities and do the best we can. It's still not going to be good, but just to be wasting day after day after day - this is nonsensical and it cannot happen without federal resources, period.

Joe Scarborough: Now, you talked about how we were both in the federal government before. A guy who was Speaker of the House, I think it's safe to say, had an up and down relationship with, was Newt Gingrich. Of course I haven't agreed with much of what he said over the past three years since Donald Trump has been elected President of the United States, but it's interesting that finding Newt Gingrich is writing an op-ed saying I'm in Italy, the coronavirus is deadly serious and America better wake up. I'm finding more and more Republicans who have blindly defended the President over the past three years are waking up to the reality that we can't bluff, we can't BS our way out of this pandemic. Are you finding that as well in New York? Are you finding that Republicans are more willing to work with you despite the fact that the President is still sending reckless mixed signals?

Governor Cuomo: Yeah, I think what's happening, Joe, is first of all, people are frightened. They're truly frightened. They're frightened for themselves, frightened for their families, and that overrides partisan loyalty, right. It's about them now. It's not about loyalty to their political party. Secondly, it's unavoidable on the facts. People know what's coming. You look at that projection, Dr. Fauci puts up that curve every day. You know that curve is going to crash, and we can't handle it. And also, I think people, the President is trying to show leadership, and he's trying to show leadership by calming people and that is a responsibility of leadership. But, you don't calm people unless you tell them the truth. You're not going to deceive people. You're not going to say it's all going to be fine, take two aspirin and call me in the morning. So they know it's not working and it's actually making things worse. And when the federal government then is not doing its role and you have these broadcasts of every city, every state doing all these different things, people see pandemonium and it is frightening. You put pandemonium on top of a pandemic, it is a bad situation.

Joe Scarborough: Yeah. Katty Kay is with us in Washington. She has a question for you. Katty?

Katty Kay: Governor, you have seen the pictures from Europe of countries like Italy and Spain on near total lockdown. Do you think we're going to get to that stage here in the United States? Do you think you're going to get to that stage in New York City? In Rome at the moment, you cannot go out in the streets unless you have a special pass that lets you go out in the streets. Police will stop you and check your paperwork. Is that where a state like New York is heading?

Governor Cuomo: I hope not, and I don't believe so, and I don't even believe you could do that in this society. But I'm going to be announcing more actions today. I closed the schools yesterday, making sure there's child care for health care workers because, again, this all comes back to hospital capacity. Some of these states have closed schools that made no capacity for child care and now you see health care workers and nurses not showing up. So closing the schools, closing bars, closing restaurants, closing mass gatherings. We'll be doing more of that because right now, the numbers are continuing to spike. So you have to ratchet down on the density control if you're going to get those numbers anywhere near where you can manage them in the hospital system. But for me, my priority is turning to the hospital system because that's where we're going to have a major crisis, and it's weeks away.

Mika Brzezinski: Governor Andrew Cuomo, thank you very much. We appreciate it. Appreciate your leadership.