-Hello, everyone, and welcome once again
to "Late Night on Lockdown."
My staff and I are still at home social distancing
and doing our part to slow the spread,
which everyone should be doing.
On Monday, we did our "Closer Look" from a hallway.
But I was asked to move because hallways are,
by design, thoroughfares.
So I might be in a different location,
but the story is very much the same --
the rapidly spreading coronavirus outbreak
and the crisis of leadership at the federal level.
And now the president and some of his allies
are saying we should care more about the stock market
than saving lives.
For more on this, it's time for "A Closer Look."
From the very start of this crisis,
Donald Trump has desperately tried
to wish it away with magical thinking,
which makes sense because for most of his life,
magical thinking has worked for him.
I mean, he's failed at virtually everything he's ever done,
but magically he always avoids consequences,
like in the '80s and '90s when he lost over a billion dollars
and he dressed like this.
Takes magical thinking to think that outfit works.
He looks like an out-of-work magician on a job interview.
[ As Donald Trump ] My last gig, let's just say it...disappeared.
[ Normal voice ] Looks like he got banned from performing
at kids' birthday parties for doing cocaine in the bathroom.
[ As Donald Trump ] [ Sniffs ] Hey, Jimmy.
How about we put a little icing on that cake?
[ Normal voice ] Trump is a quintessential con man,
which is bad when you're running a casino into the ground,
but it's especially bad when you're in charge
of responding to a deadly pandemic
ravaging the country's healthcare system
and cratering the economy.
This is a situation everyone was worried about
when we decided to put the most self-centered man on earth
in the most powerful office on earth.
It's like those stories you hear about a small town
that elects a dog as mayor every year.
Sure, you know, it might seem fun at the time, dog mayor,
but what happens when there's a thunderstorm
and you need the mayor to coordinate disaster relief
but he won't come out from underneath the couch?
Trump's fundamentally unequipped
to handle the reality of a situation like this
because he has never dwelled in reality.
His entire life has been built on magical thinking,
and that's what we've seen since the start of this crisis,
like when he literally said the problem
would disappear miraculously.
Even his intelligence reports and public health experts
were warning him that it would be extremely dangerous.
-We're going down, not up.
We're going very substantially down, not up.
You know, in theory, when it gets a little warmer,
it miraculously goes away -- Hope that's true.
-The coronavirus is very much under control in the USA.
-It will go away. Just stay calm.
Be calm. It's really working out.
And a lot of good things are gonna happen.
It's going to disappear one day.
It's like a miracle. It will disappear.
-God, he sounds like he's doing affirmations in a mirror.
It's like an eighth grader
trying to get psyched up for a school dance.
"Yes, you have a huge zit right now,
but one day it will disappear like a miracle!"
Also, the last person any of us should trust on miracles
is Donald Trump.
I doubt he could name one actual miracle from the Bible.
[ As Donald Trump ] Well, let's see.
Everyone knows Jesus cured a leopard,
got rid of its spots so it could leave the leopard colony.
[ Normal voice ] Also, the least effective way to calm someone
is to say, "Be calm."
That's how you talk to a dog in heat.
"Lucy, be calm. Stop humping everyone's leg."
You can't just tell someone to be calm.
You actually have to be calming.
Doctors calm you down by telling you how they're gonna treat you.
They don't walk into your exam room and say,
"Okay, we got your CAT scan.
Be calm."
You see, in his addled childlike mind,
Trump thought that by simply acting
as if the problem wasn't there, it would go away,
which I can tell you from trying...
that doesn't work.
Of course, Trump's happy talk didn't work.
The virus did not miraculously disappear.
There are now more than 50,000 cases in the U.S.
The World Health Organization said on Tuesday
there's been a very large acceleration
of cases in the U.S. and that it has the potential
to become the next epicenter of the outbreak.
And in New York, Governor Andrew Cuomo
said on Tuesday the spread is accelerating
faster than anticipated.
He warned other states that they're gonna experience
what New York is dealing with and put it this way...
-One of the forecasters said to me,
"We were looking at a freight train coming across the country.
We're now looking at a bullet train,"
because the numbers are going up that quickly.
-That's right, a bullet train.
And that's scary because Americans
have never seen public transportation
as fast as a bullet train before.
Our trains are basically just public bathrooms on rails.
True story, in New York, the F train
is just an old-fashioned handcar operated by two rats.
And it's not just Cuomo sounding the alarm.
This week began with the Surgeon General
issuing a dire message to Americans on the "Today" show,
warning them that things are about to get very bad
and pleading with people to stop showing up
to large public sites,
like the cherry blossoms in Washington, D.C.
-I want America to understand, this week, it's gonna get bad.
And we really need to come together as a nation.
I heard the story that you were just playing,
young people out on beaches.
We see here in D.C. that the district set up a cam
for people to watch the cherry blossoms.
You look on the cam, you see more people walking around
than you see cherry blossoms.
And this is how the spread is occurring.
-First of all, no one wants to tune in to a livestream
to see a bunch of people walking around.
That's why zoos have penguin cams,
not "dude on his couch eating Fritos" cams.
"Honey, look.
Oh, look, he's going for a second bag.
Oh, so majestic."
I mean, no one wants to watch some dude
just sit in his house by himself talking to a webcam.
So there you go.
The head of the Surgeon General said it himself --
This week is gonna be bad.
The governor in New York called it a bullet train,
and the WHO said the U.S. could become the next epicenter.
Or, as the president put it on Tuesday...
-Ultimately, the goal is to ease the guidelines
and open things up to very large sections of our country
as we near the end of our historic battle
with the invisible enemy.
There's tremendous hope as we look forward
and we begin to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
-Light at the end of the tunnel?
What are you talking about?
Are you sure you're not just staring into the sun again?
[ As Donald Trump ] We can all see the light
at the end of the tunnel, burning our retinas,
scarring our pupils, leaving us permanently blind.
And thanks to that blindness,
we no longer have to look at boring charts -- so boring --
telling us things are getting worse every day.
Not a flat curve, no.
[ Normal voice ] Think about how deranged this is.
Experts are telling us it could take months.
New York is the first major epicenter.
We're still two or three weeks away from hitting the peak.
Nurses and doctors on the front lines are describing chaos
and comparing ERs to war zones.
And the president is claiming it's almost over.
Finding out what World War II would've been like
if FDR had said, "December 7, 1941,
a date that will live in infamy as the end of World War II!
Smoke 'em if you got 'em, boys.
We've wrapped it up."
Trump has always cared more about the stock market
than the public health crisis.
He cares more about the Dow than saving lives.
It's that simple.
He sees the stock market as key
to his personal political fortune,
so now he's talking about
lifting the public health restrictions
and opening the country back up by Easter --
Easter, which is less than three weeks away.
-I'd love to have it open by Easter, okay?
I would love to have it open by Easter.
I will tell you that right now.
I would love to have that.
It's such an important day for other reasons,
but I'll make it an important day for this, too.
I would love to have the country opened up
and just raring to go by Easter.
-Who suggested that day?
-I just thought it was a beautiful time,
a beautiful time, a beautiful timeline.
It's a great day.
-So you just came up with that yourself?
You're literally onstage with multiple doctors,
and you decided to cede the decision to this guy?
[ As Donald Trump ] He's bringing the eggs whether we like it or not.
I say be ready.
[ Normal voice ] Don't just pull dates out of your ass.
For one thing, that is unsanitary,
and you should wash your hands all the time.
And, two, don't ruin Easter. You're terrible at Easter.
Every year you give a rambling speech to the children
at the White House Easter Egg Roll
with that shocked Easter Bunny standing next to you,
you know, the one that always looks like he just walked in
on his wife having sex with his brother.
"Deborah, what about our 30 children?"
Remember, this is a real thing the president said
at the White House Easter Egg Roll just two years ago.
-Also, I want to thank the White House Historical Association
and all of the people that worked so hard with Melania,
with everybody to keep this incredible house or building
or whatever you want to call it,
because there really is no name for it.
It is special.
And we keep it in tip-top shape.
We call it sometimes tippy-top shape.
-Just a reminder, we have a president
in charge of a pandemic response
who couldn't remember the name White House
and who sometimes calls "tip-top shape" "tippy-top shape."
We're [bleep]
Or as I sometimes call it [bleep] [bleep] [bleep]
Not only did Trump randomly and arbitrarily
concoct a date out of nowhere for reopening the country
against the advice of virtually all public health experts,
he actually suggested he wanted churches
to be filled with worshipers on Easter.
Look, Easter's a very special day for me.
And I see it sort of in that timeline
that I'm thinking about.
And I say, "Wouldn't it be great
to have all of the churches full"?
You know, the churches aren't allowed, essentially,
to have much of a congregation there.
So I think Easter Sunday,
and you'll have packed churches all over our country.
I think it would be a beautiful time.
-Wait. So your plan to deal with a very contagious disease
is to pack as many people as possible into enclosed spaces,
have them touch their faces, and drink out of the same cup?
I mean, let's face it.
That's not even a great idea when there isn't a pandemic.
It's almost like he's trying
to get as many people sick as he possibly can.
I mean, remember when he announced his poorly planned
and confusing travel ban
and throngs of people rushing back into the country
packed into airports and waited online for hours?
What's Trump gonna do next,
hold a giant music festival called "Cough-chella"?
[ As Donald Trump ] Bad news, guys.
It's just the one porta-potty.
Bad planning. That's on me.
[ Normal voice ] Obviously public health experts
are aghast at this idea.
Last week, one of the world's
leading infectious disease experts, Dr. Anthony Fauci,
known for facepalming in the background
as the president speaks,
dismissed it as crazy and heartless
at a White House press briefing.
-You take a look at what's going on in China
and you see what's going on right now -- right now in Italy
and what's happening in New York City.
I don't think with any moral conscience you could say,
"Why don't we just let it rip and happen
and let X percent of the people die?"
-Ah, see, there's your mistake.
You said "with any moral conscience."
You forgot you were standing next to
President Caligula over there.
Trump has no moral conscience.
He's a racist New York City landlord and casino owner.
Having a moral conscience is disqualifying.
I mean, look at him --
dresses like he's heading up a meeting of the Five Families.
All he needs is a baseball bat and a fedora.
In fact, Trump was asked on Monday
if Dr. Fauci agrees with his plan
to reopen the country in less than three weeks,
and Trump's answer was not, um, reassuring.
-Does he agree with you about the need
to reopen the economy soon?
-Well, he doesn't not agree.
-Oh, he doesn't not agree? Thanks for clearing that up.
[ As Donald Trump ] He didn't not tell me
that he doesn't not not agree with not me
about the non-reunopening the non-economy,
AKA the econ-o-non-onomy.
And he didn't not say that I should not not be non-president.
Actually none of that is true.
He said a bunch of medical stuff,
and I tuned him out while I was working on my Easter list.
Fingers crossed I get what's coming to me.
[ Normal voice ] And now Trump is being goaded on
in this sadistic plan to put profits over lives by CEOs,
economic advisers, and fringe characters on the right
who are actually suggesting that it might be worth
letting some people die in order to save the economy.
-The president is right.
The cure can't be worse than the disease.
And we're gonna have to make some difficult trade-offs.
-Within a very few weeks,
let those with a lower risk to the disease return to work.
-My message is that, let's get back to work.
Let's get back to living. Let's be smart about it.
And those of us who are 70-plus, we'll take care of ourselves.
But don't sacrifice the country.
-I'm in the danger zone.
I would rather have my children stay home
and all of us who are over 50 go in
and keep this economy going and working.
Even if we all get sick,
I'd rather die than kill the country.
-Oh, good, Glenn "Death Panels" Beck is back.
You know, divorced Santa Claus over here.
I guess it's easy to take that stance
when you've been socially distancing from people
for five years.
Remember when he pretended to hate Trump for like a second
as a marketing ploy
and a bunch of people helped rehabilitate him
and now he's on TV saying if you're old,
you should be willing to sacrifice yourself
for the sake of Carnival Cruise's stock price?
I'm sorry, but I'm not gonna take public health advice
from a dude who looks like Colonel Sanders
but instead of chicken, it's just buckets of bull[bleep]
Let's not forget, during the Obama administration,
Beck, this same Beck,
famously repeated the "death panels" line,
accused Democrats of wanting to kill people
simply by expanding access to healthcare.
-End-of-life care.
Let me translate "bullcrap" to English.
End-of-life care -- night, night, Grammy.
Pulling the old plug.
-Glenn Beck accused Democrats
of wanting to pull the plug on Grammy, and now 10 years later,
he's saying the stock market's down, Grammy's got to go.
If you're over 60 and you're related to Glenn Beck
and you see him holding a pillow near your face, run.
Seriously, I can't believe these psychos are saying
old people would rather die
than sit inside and watch Netflix for a few weeks.
You're boomers!
You're supposed to love TV, watching TV.
That's what you love.
CBS needs to air an emergency marathon of "Blue Bloods" ASAP
just to keep these people preoccupied.
You know "Blue Bloods."
Stars the reverse mortgage guy.
"Why would I lie to you? Just get a reverse mortgage.
I'm not gonna take your house.
I already have a house.
I'm Tom [bleep] Selleck, man."
Maybe what happened here is a bunch of rich people
realized that in order to both save lives
and protect the economy, they'd have to redistribute some wealth
to working people, and that was intolerable to them,
because there's a third option here.
We can keep people at home to save lives
and give them money to get through the crisis.
Just look at countries dealing with this very same crisis.
The Danish government has promised
to cover 75% to 90% of salaries
if businesses do not lay off their employees.
And the Netherlands will pay up to 90% of wages
for companies hit hard by the pandemic,
with extra provisions being developed for restaurants.
We could have that here.
Instead the president wants you
to go back to work in three weeks,
even if it means wearing a hazmat suit
during your shift at the Olive Garden.
"Would you like unlimited breadsticks?
They're seasoned with garlic and Purell."
The Netherlands is even offering special provisions
to help restaurants.
Meanwhile, our president doesn't even know what takeout is.
-So many of these restaurants, it's incredible.
They're doing service where people come and they pick it up.
Delivery -- I mean, it's been incredible
what they've been doing.
Totally different business than they were in,
other than they cook food.
Other than that, it's like a totally different business.
-Dude, that's takeout.
You just described takeout.
[ As Donald Trump ] It's totally different.
Instead of serving the food in the restaurant,
they put it in a little bag.
It's called a doggy bag.
I guess because -- I don't know --
the dog -- a dog brings it to your house.
And then, uh...
I just want a well-trained dog to not eat the food in the bag.
I guess then they give the money to the dog.
Do you know how this works? Dr. Fauci?
Do you now how this works? Don't touch your face, Fauci.
I got you, Fauci. We're almost through this thing.
Don't blow it with the face touch.
I'm just busting balls, Fauci. You're my best friend.
[ Normal voice ] We're now in an extremely dangerous moment
where a reckless ruling class and a self-absorbed president
are trying to prematurely end the fight
against a dangerous pandemic
because their stock portfolios are taking a hit.
This is sociopathic governance.
If you were evaluating the mental competence
of our president, you definitely wouldn't be able to say
he's in...
-Tippy-top shape.
-This has been "A Closer Look."