This article is from the source 'guardian' and was first published or seen
on .
It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.
Coronavirus US live: Trump uses Defense Production Act to make ventilators
Coronavirus US live: Trump uses Defense Production Act to make ventilators
(31 minutes later)
President says order will help manufacturers including General Motors secure supplies
President says order will help manufacturers including General Motors secure supplies
The president was tested this morning, according to the White House physician.
Fact Check: Testing
Hi, there - it’s Maanvi Singh, blogging from the West Coast.
Trump claimed the United States is testing more people than any country in the world, including on a per capita basis.
Soon, we’ll hear from Donald Trump and his coronavirus task force. The federal government is close to finalizing new guidance reccomending that many or most Americans wear face masks while they’re outside, in order to slow the spread of Covid-19.
While the US has overtaken South Korea in total numbers of coronavirus tests administered, it has conducted far fewer tests per capita given the US population is over six times larger than South Korea’s.
The AP reports:
As of Thursday afternoon, the United States, with a population of 329 million, had administered at least 1,267,658 according to the Covid Tracking Project, a group led by Alexis Madrigal, a staff writer for The Atlantic magazine, with more than 100 volunteers that compiles coronavirus testing data from states.
The Guardian’s Susie Cagle reports on the latest from California:
This equates to 385 tests per 100,000 people in the US (with huge variations depending on the county, city and state) compared to 709 per 100,000 in South Korea and 600 per 100,000 in Italy.
In his daily coronavirus press conference, California governor Gavin Newsom announced that he signed an executive order today that would protect residents and small businesses from having their water shut off if they are unable to pay their bill.
Trump complained about being subjected to “witch hunt after witch hunt, after witch hunt.” He blasted Congress’ efforts to maintain oversight of the administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, calling their efforts “ridiculous”.
The order comes weeks after other states and municipalities across the US had already moved to protect water access for their most vulnerable residents. And the announcement came as something of a surprise -- buried at the end of his comments, only revealed in response to a question from a reporter.
“This is not the time for politics. Endless partisan investigations - here we go again,” he said.
Newsom was apparently acting in response to California’s fierce contingent of water advocates. On Monday, a broad coalition of environmental and environmental justice organizations demanded that the state take immediate action to protect California’s most vulnerable from losing their water.
He then added that the Democrats were helping out his poll numbers.
“How can we stop the spread of Covid-19 and protect our communities if people don’t have access to clean water?” said Susana De Anda, executive director of the nonprofit advocacy organization Community Water Center.
The president said he has agreed to turn the Javits Center temporary hospital into a treatment center for COVID-19 patients. Previously, the center was designed to take on overflow patients
Newsom has worked with and supported many of these same advocates on other water legislation in the past. “We appreciate their leadership, their advocacy,” he said. “And those same advocates have made it crystal clear not just to you but to me that they want to protect not just residents from having their water shut off but also small businesses. I signed an executive order today to do just that.”
Fact Check: Obama Stimulus checks took months
That’s it from me today. My west coast colleague Maanvi Singh will take over the blog for the next few hours.
Mnuchin said it took the Obama administration “months and months” to send out checks to Americans during the Great Recession.
Here’s where the day stands so far:
It took the Obama administration six months to give out checks to social security beneficiaries, retired railroad workers, veterans and the disabled. It also gave out money by expanding tax credits. However, there were in fact two stimulus packages in during the Great Recession. The Bush administration also gave out the money in a stimulus package, and it took the Bush administration eight months – two months longer – to get the money out, according to The Balance personal finance website.
The number of coronavirus cases worldwide has surpassed 1 million, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins. The global death toll of the pandemic passed 50,000 earlier today.
For those Americans who don’t have the ability to get direct deposits because they don’t have a bank account, the Treasury is exploring other ways to get them money quickly, including prepaid debit cards.
New York is expected to run out of ventilators in six days, governor Andrew Cuomo said. The state has 2,200 ventilators in its stockpile, and officials are trying to expand their capacity by splitting ventilator tubes and converting BIPAP machines.
The IRS is expected to make about 60m payments during the week of 13 April, for taxpayers who provided their direct deposit information while filing 2018 or 2019 taxes. But up to 80 million Americans, who haven’t provided direct deposit information, may have to wait months for paper checks unless the Treasury finds a workaround.
Trump issued an order to use the Defense Production Act to make ventilators. The president has resisted a broad implementation of the law for weeks, even as Democrats have called on him to press companies to speed up the production of medical equipment.
The Guardian’s Vivian Ho reports:
The Democratic convention has been postponed until August because of the pandemic. The Democratic National Committee announced the nominating convention would take place the week of August 17, instead of July 13, in Milwaukee.
A nursing home in Washington state that was briefly the center of the country’s coronavirus outbreak was fined more than $611,000 and could lose Medicare and Medicaid funding for its response in mitigating the spread, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid said Wednesday.
House speaker Nancy Pelosi announced the formation of a select committee on coronavirus. Pelosi said the bipartisan panel would ensure the $2 trillion allocated in the stimulus bill will be “spent wisely.”
The Life Care Center of Kirkland, where at least 37 people died because of coronavirus, failed to identify and report a respiratory infection and pneumonia outbreak in a timely manner, federal inspectors wrote in a report provided to the Guardian. The nursing home failed “to ensure multiple residents did not experience inadequate provision of care and services”, as well as failed “to ensure multiple residents did not experience acute changes in condition such as respiratory distress, changes in vital signs, hospital transfers and in some cases, death during this outbreak”.
Maanvi will have more coming up, so stay tuned.
The nursing home has until 16 September to “correct all deficiencies and return to full compliance”, federal inspectors wrote in a letter to the home.
Joe Biden said he would take senior White House adviser Kellyanne Conway “at her word” that Trump is open to talking to him about how to respond to the pandemic.
As of Wednesday, there were 5,984 confirmed cases in Washington, and 247 deaths.
“I understand if he doesn’t want to take my advice, but it won’t be, ‘I told you so,’” Biden said of how he would approach the conversation.
The treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, says within two weeks, Americans will see direct deposit relief payments from the government. He said he doesn’t want to send paper checks, which could take longer to reach some Americans.
The former vice president said his previous conversations with Trump have been “respectful” and “straightfoward.”
“This money does people no good if it takes four months to show up,” Mnuchin said.
“I’m not doing this to criticize,” Biden said during his virtual press briefing. “I’m doing to say this is what I think you should do.”
The New York mayor, Bill DeBlasio, is the latest official to ask people to cover their mouth and nose in public with a face covering. “Use a scarf, bandana or piece of clothing,” he said. Medical-grade masks should be reserved for health workers.
Joe Biden criticized Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell for pushing back against demands for a fourth coronavirus package.
Fact Check: social security
“The majority leader of the Senate was wrong and slow the first time around, and he’s wrong and slow this time around.” Biden said.
“I will always protect your Social Security, your Medicare and your Medicaid,” said Trump.
Asked about McConnell’s comments that another relief package is not necessary, Biden expressed skepticism about the majority leader sticking to that stance.
In fact, in 2017 Republicans including Trump supported an $834bn cut to the Medicaid program, a public health insurance program for the poor and disabled. The proposal was to replace Obamacare, and ultimately failed. In January, Trump also said potential changes or cuts to Medicare and Social Security were something Republicans were “going to look at,” by “the end of the year”.
“The idea that this will be the end of it -- I will be dumbfounded if that occurs, and disappointed,” Biden said.
The president was tested this morning, according to the White House physician. This is the second time that Trump has reported results from a coronavirus test.
Joe Biden called on Trump to expand his use of the Defense Production Act to speed up the production of medical equipment.
Trump issued a statement this afternoon saying he would use the DPA to “help domestic manufacturers ... secure the supplies they need to build ventilators needed to defeat the virus.”
During his virtual press briefing, Biden said the statement was an encouraging sign, but he called on Trump to expand the DPA to cover the production of other medical equipment, such as masks and gloves.
“He should deploy that Defense Production Act for all the things needed,” Biden said. “That should be done yesterday, last week, a month ago. Get it done now.”
The Guardian’s Vivian Ho reports on the latest from California:
In an effort to assist small businesses suffering from the economic blowback of the coronavirus crisis, Gavin Newsom, California’s governor, announced Thursday that the state was offering a 12-month reprieve on sales tax receipts for up to $50,000.
Essentially, consumers will continue to pay sales tax on items and services purchased at small businesses, but instead of turning over those payments to the state, those businesses can use up to $50,000 of those funds “as a bridge loan,” Newsom said.
Newsom encouraged small business owners to see this initiative as a bridge loan so that they would also apply for the federal loans like the economic disaster injury loan assistance and the paycheck protection program. “We need to be able to get federal dollars into the state of California,” Newsom said.
The sales and use tax makes up a significant portion of California’s annual budget, with the receipts comprising 18.8% of the 2019-20 general fund. California ranks in the top 10 in the country for highest sales tax.
The exact impact of this initiative remains unclear, as so much else is in flux, but when asked about the budget he proposed in January, Newsom said, “The world has radically changed since the budget was proposed.”
“The magnitude and impact of all of this is just coming into full light of day and we should be prepared for substantial adjustments in our budget,” he said.
In California, 1.9 million have filed for unemployment insurance since 12 March, Newsom said, with the state averages 111,000 claims a day over the past week.
Nearly half of all private sector employees in California were employed by small businesses, Newsom said.
Joe Biden said he was working to set up a call with Trump about the US response to coronavirus.
Biden’s comments come a day after senior White House adviser Kellyanne Conway suggested the Democratic frontrunner should be offering his help amid the pandemic.
“Why doesn’t Vice President Biden call the White House today and offer some support?” Conway said. “He’s in his bunker in Wilmington.”
During a virtual press briefing, Biden said, “I’m happy to hear he’ll take my call. My team’s working with him to set such a call up.”
The Navy is expected to relieve the commander of an aircraft carrier who raised concerns about coronavirus spreading on the ship, according to Reuters.
Officials said yesterday that most crew members aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt would be allowed to disembark and quarantine in Guam after a scathing letter from the ship’s commander was made public.
“We are not at war. Sailors do not need to die,” Captain Brett Crozier wrote to Navy officials. “If we do not act now, we are failing to properly take care of our most trusted asset—our sailors.”
Crozier demanded that most of the crew members be allowed to quarantine to control the outbreak. At least 93 sailors aboard the ship have now tested positive for coronavirus.
