California Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom praised President Donald Trump during a CNN interview on Friday night, saying that Trump has met every request that California has made that Trump was capable of fulfilling.
“Tonight, you know, obviously, you’ve had differences with the President in the past, tough words on both sides,” CNN’s Anderson Cooper said. “You’ve been able to work together, it seems, in this for the needs of your state.”
“Yeah, look, I mean … we’re involved in 68 lawsuits with the Trump administration. I’ve been on your show, I haven’t been timid. He certainly hasn’t been timid,” Newsom responded. “But I got to say this, it’s just the fact. I’d be lying to you. I’d be lying to the American people. Every single direct request that he was capable of meeting he has met. We have the U.S.N.S Mercy in California because of his direct intervention and support; 2,000 of these federal medical stations because of his direct support.”
“And so I can only speak for myself, but I have to be complimentary, otherwise I would be simply lying to you, misleading you,” Newsom continued. “And that is a wonderful thing to be able to say, and I hope that continues. But this has been a remarkable moment, or at least we’ve been able to rise above that partisanship.”
WATCH:
California Governor Gavin Newsom offers strong praise for Pres. Trump’s handling of the coronavirus in relation to his state saying, “every single direct request that he was capable of meeting, he has met… I have to be complimentary, otherwise I would be simply lying to you.” pic.twitter.com/4vn6iIAPBL
— Anderson Cooper 360° (@AC360) April 11, 2020
TRANSCRIPT:
CNN HOST ANDERSON COOPER: Governor Newsome the fact that California with 40 million people in the state hasn’t had a surge the way that New York has, what do you attribute to them and you did get a head start on a lot of the other states.
GOV. GAVIN NEWSOM (D-CA): I think it’s 40 million people practicing physical distancing 40 million people by and large staying at home that have really stepped up to meet this moment. And I think there’s no greater non pharmaceutical impact to bend a curve then people doing just that and I couldn’t be more proud of the state.
COOPER: And Dr. Fauci today said that despite progress, this is certainly not the time to be pulling back at all. Obviously, there’s other considerations that the President and others on Wall Street and elsewhere have. In terms of what the virus is doing in California in the coming weeks. Do you have a broad sense based on what you know right now? How long your timeframe is to keep the stay at home orders in place? NEWSOM: What appears that we’ve not only bent the curve, but we have stretched it. And we’ve stretched it out a little bit. And we still seen a modest growth rate on a daily basis today, a 2.5% increase in total number of hospitalizations. That’s the number Anderson, I look at every morning, number of people in ICU and the number of people that are hospitalized.
So those numbers are modest, which is bought us time allowed us to procure more assets, not only physical alternative care sites, but the human resources and appropriate protective gear. But it’s still too early to say and the worst thing we can do is run the 90 yard dash on this virus.
COOPER: So right now, what are you telling people? It just for the foreseeable future? Have you said we’re going to reassess at the end of April or have you not specified?
NEWSOM: We haven’t specified because it’s really on the basis of the virus and the determination of individuals to bend the curve, to mitigate the spread of the virus. It’s literally that question is best answered by asking 40 million Californians what they will do to meet the moment every hour of every day, over the course of the next few weeks.
And over the course of the next few weeks, if we see this modest growth begin to bend in a different direction, then I will be in a position based upon the expertise of our health professionals and based upon where this virus is, based on more and expansive and comprehensive community surveillance, meaning testing, make that determination.
COOPER: If the President decides in coming weeks to make an announcement to reopen the country, I mean, the White House has been talking about May as — somewhere in May, ultimately governors like yourself will be the ones determining when stay at home orders will be lifted or to what degree. The President said today that he can override state stay at home orders if he wants. I mean, is this a mixed message? What — how do you interpret this?
NEWSOM: Yes, I don’t anticipate that will happen. I mean, at the end of the day, I think the government will be led broadly and the President will ultimately be led by the facts on the ground, and that’s federalism, 50 parts one body and I get the incredible power and potency of his voice. But at the end of the day, the practical application of that reality is at the state level, and I have all the confidence in the world that if we made a determination what’s best interest for the state of California to keep people healthy, keep people safe, which will buy us the opportunity to get this economy back on track in a much more sustainable way, then short, fusing this process. I have a confidence to President, will support those efforts.
COOPER: Yes, “The New York Times” is reporting today that the new federal projections show a spike in infections, if stay at home orders are lifted at 30 days at the end of the month, that certainly is in line with all the scientific advice that’s out there. NEWSOM: Look, the worst thing we can do again is, you know, as we’re getting so close to turning the page, turning the corner on this, is to get ahead of ourselves to trip over ourselves. And to see the kind of spike that we’re seeing around the rest of the world. What more evidence do we need than to see what happened in Singapore? And let’s see what’s happened in Hong Kong and Wuhan province and elsewhere, where we’re seeing people that were starting to come back out now are being pulled back in.
So we’re the beneficiaries of some of those facts in some of those examples. Let us not be ideological about this. And let’s deal in real time on the basis of real data, real scientific evidence and on the basis of the spread of the virus, but again, there’s no substitute for making a determination of when that date occurs, where we give new guidance than the determination of millions of individuals practicing safe physical distancing.
COOPER: Have you given much thought? Or do you have people sort of just thinking that far ahead whenever the date may be about what coming back online looks like? I mean, the President’s talked about a big, big bang. You know, Dr. Fauci has said, this is not going to be turnkey and suddenly everything, you know, starts going full bore, it’s obviously some sort of a gradual thing. But testing is obviously and you’ve already said, this is critical in all of this contact tracing. Is the state right now set up to do the kind of testing the kind of public health contact tracing that would be needed?
NEWSOM: Every day we’re making real progress in that space, or continue to be limited on the progress we otherwise could make if we had more supplies. Particularly swabs I can impress upon you more in particular, it’s now collecting the samples and the media related to the samples more than the RNA extraction and the reagents. That is a limiting factor as relates to expanding testing. But testing is improving not only testing, but the diagnostic side in terms of the time to get the results of the test. So we’re going to start to see that scale.
But the answer to your question is yes, we have a team of people focusing exclusively full time on what the parameters look like, what the expectations are. And if we meet those thresholds, how we can architect a strategy to very thoughtfully and strategically get back to some sense of normalcy with heightened sense of vigilance, so that we can make sure we don’t have a second wave.
COOPER: How would that mean — I mean in a company, how might that work? Would it — I mean would people’s temperatures be taken when they came in to a, you know, an office building if it was a large company would there be quick testing available if an employee had a cough, I mean, I, I’m just trying to get a sense of what that might actually look like sort of company a company.
NEWSOM: No, and the answer is yes. And yes, all of the above. Again, the beneficiaries all of us are beneficiaries of best practices, and bad practices from around the rest of the world. You’ll see more face coverings, face masks, more PPE is procured, you’ll see more points of temperatures being checked, you’ll see much more aggressive efforts to socially isolate individuals and quarantine individuals in real time based upon new technologies on tracking and tracing.
Today, just as an example, to California based companies made an announcement we’ve been working with them, Google and Apple in terms of helping with the tracing, all of that will be deployed all of that’s part of the architecture of which we’re considering, and we’ll be making public very, very shortly.
The California I know loan 500 ventilators I think it was to a number of states in including New York, New Jersey, you said the California hospital systems only about using about 31% of the state’s ventilators. If the peak is still coming in California, you’re confident obviously you’re prepared for that. If you’ve been loaning out ventilator.
NEWSOM: Yes, we have over in fact, as I speak, at this moment, I just cut the new numbers 8,700 ventilators that are not in use, that exists within our hospital system and exist with our cash in the state. I would love to deploy all of them to the hotspots to Illinois, New Jersey, and to New York and elsewhere. We were proud we were able to provide a few hundred. And we of course are prepared to do more if we feel we can.
But to your question, we’re cautious, none of us are spiking the ball. None of us are suggesting first, second, that we have turned the corner here. Again, modest growth, but not the kind of acuity of growth, not the slope that was originally anticipated. And again, that’s because of millions of people practicing physical distancing.
COOPER: And finally, tonight, you know, obviously, you’ve had differences with the President in the past tough words on both sides. You’ve been able to work together, it seems in this for the needs of your state.
NEWSOM: Yes, look, I mean, Anderson, we’re involved in 68 lawsuits with the Trump administration. I’ve been on your show, I haven’t been timid. He certainly hasn’t been timid. But I got to say this, it’s just the fact I’d be lying to you. I’d be lying to the American people. Every single direct request that he was capable of meeting he has met. We have the U.S.N.S Mercy in California because of his direct intervention and support; 2,000 of these federal medical stations because of his direct support.
And so I can only speak for myself, but I have to be complimentary, otherwise, I would be simply lying to you, misleading you. And that is a wonderful thing to be able to say, and I hope that continues. But this has been a remarkable moment, or at least we’ve been able to rise above that partisanship.
COOPER: And just finally your message to Californians tonight and not just California, but really all Americans about where we are where we went lies ahead. NEWSOM: Stay the course, stay the course. I mean, the fact is, let us, let us not run as I said, the 90 yard dash. If we stay the course we’ll get this economy back sooner, we’ll save lives. We’ll avoid a second wave, will buy ourselves time for more and better treatment. And of course, a vaccine and the kind of humor that kind of immunity herd immunity that ultimately will get this economy back on its feet and get Americans back at work and back spending more time with their family and less time at home.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
COOPER: California Governor Gavin Newsom. We appreciate his time.