President Donald Trump speaks during a coronavirus task force briefing at the White House, Friday, April 10, 2020, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
By Jill Colvin and Darline Superville
At the end of a week officials had warned would be this generation's Pearl Harbor, White House officials pointed to hopeful signs Friday that the spread of the coronavirus could be slowing, even as President Donald Trump insisted he would not move to reopen the country until it is safe.
At the same time, Trump said he would be announcing the launch of what he dubbed the "Opening Our Country" task force next Tuesday to work toward that goal.
"I want to get it open as soon as possible," he said at a Good Friday briefing while adding: "The facts are going to determine what I do."
With the economy reeling and job losses soaring, Trump has been itching to reopen the country, drawing alarm from health experts who warn that doing so too quickly could spark a deadly resurgence that could undermine current distancing efforts.
But Trump, who had once set Easter Sunday as the date he hoped people in certain parts of the country might begin to return to work and pack church pews, said he would continue to listen to health experts like Drs. Anthony Fauci and Deborah Birx as he considers what he described as the "biggest decision I've ever had to make."
"I listen to them about everything," he claimed, adding: "We're not doing anything until we know that this country is going be healthy. We don't want to go back and start doing it over again."
Trump's comments came at the end of a week that officials had warned would be a devastating one for the country. Hours earlier, Johns Hopkins University announced that the worldwide death toll from the coronavirus had hit a bleak milestone: 100,000 people. That includes about 18,000 in the U.S., where about half-million people have been confirmed infected.
More than 40 percent of the deaths in the U.S so far have happened in New York state, which reported 777 new deaths on Friday.
But there were also signs of hope, with state officials reporting that the number of people in intensive care dropped for the first time there since mid-March. Hospitalizations are also slowing, with 290 new patients admitted in a single day versus daily increases of more than 1,000 last week.
While bemoaning the death numbers as "so horrible," Trump also said, "Tremendous progress is being made."
"In the midst of grief and pain, we're seeing clear signs that our aggressive strategy is saving countless lives," he said, pointing to models that are now forecasting far fewer U.S. deaths than had originally been predicted.
Health experts have warned, however, that if the country rolls back restrictions too quickly, case levels could once again begin to soar, especially without widespread testing to determine who might be a carrier of the virus. While the new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people, for some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or death. And research has shown that people can be highly infectious even if they are not displaying symptoms.
"When we decide, at a proper time, when we're going to be relaxing some of the restrictions, there's no doubt you're going to see cases," he said. "The question is how you respond to them."
The Cowboy State has become one of the world's top tax havens, according to the Pandora Papers, a trove of more than 11.9 million documents obtained by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and The Washington Post. The papers reveal, among other things, how ultra-wealthy people from around the world move money into the U.S., invest, and spend it under a shroud of secrecy. Allison Tait, University of Richmond law professor, joined Cheddar to talk about Wyoming's laidback tax laws, their impact on the nation's economy, and provided some details on the financial arrangement known as the "cowboy cocktail."
Carlo and Baker preview President Biden's address to the nation as Omicron becomes the new dominant Covid strain. Plus, Trump gets booed for getting his booster and the White House gets a new puppy.
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Carlo and Baker wrap up another week discussing the latest explosion in new Covid cases in the Northeast, President Biden's stalled agenda and more. Plus, Love, Hate, Ate featuring the question: why did movie dialogue get so hard to understand?
Since July 2021, families with children have received monthly payments from the federal government as part of the expanded child tax credit, a policy that may be expiring this month. Megan Curran, policy director at the Center on Poverty and Social Policy at Columbia University, joined Cheddar News to discuss.
During the pandemic, student loan debt repayment was put on pause amid an unprecedented crisis. However, on February 1, 2022, the schedule is set to resume, and currently it looks as though the Biden administration has no plans to extend it. Cody Hounanian, the executive director of the Student Debt Crisis Center, spoke to Cheddar about why he believes the loan collection pause needs to at least be extended as borrowers are still struggling with the resurgent pandemic and inflation. "There's really no good economic or policy or political reason as far as why they're focused on getting payments started now," Hounanian said. "We surveyed 33,000 people with student loans last month. Nine out of 10 told us that they are not ready to resume payments."
As the 2022 midterm elections fast approach, here are some politicians Americans should be on the lookout for. Democratic Massachusetts state senator Sonia Chang-Diaz, who was the first Latina and Asian American woman to be elected to the state's senate, now has her eye on the governorship with Republican Charlie Baker leaving. New Jersey GOP candidate for Congress, Billy Prempeh also bears watching, and while Boston's newest mayor, Democrat Michelle Wu, was already sworn in last month, all eyes will be on Beantown as the first woman and first person of color to hold the office tries to usher in a new era for the city.
