Today’s edition of quick hits:
* There’s a lot of work to be done: “Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government’s top infectious disease expert, said Tuesday the U.S. does not yet have the critical testing and tracing procedures needed to begin reopening the nation’s economy, adding a dose of caution to increasingly optimistic projections from the White House. ‘We have to have something in place that is efficient and that we can rely on, and we’re not there yet,’ Fauci said in an interview with The Associated Press.”
* Governors intend to keep governing: “Despite President Donald Trump’s false assertion that he has ‘total’ authority over American states, those with the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths say they don’t intend to wait for his decision on restarting the economy and will instead resolve for themselves what timeline is best to start a measured and calculated re-opening process.”
* That said, some governors aren’t governing well: “As governors across the country fell into line in recent weeks, South Dakota’s top elected leader stood firm: There would be no statewide order to stay home…. But now South Dakota is home to one of the largest single coronavirus clusters anywhere in the United States, with more than 300 workers at a giant pork-processing plant falling ill.”
* On Capitol Hill: “The Senate will not return to Washington for regular legislative action before May 4, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell announced Tuesday. The move follows a Monday announcement that the House will also push back its expected return date until May.”
* Census: “Conceding that its effort to count the nation’s population has been hamstrung by the coronavirus pandemic, the Census Bureau said on Monday it would ask Congress for a four-month delay in delivering the census data used to reapportion the House of Representatives and political districts nationwide.” * Bishop Gerald O. Glenn: “A Virginia pastor who told his congregants, ‘God is larger than this dreaded virus’ died of COVID-19 the day before Easter, his church said. The New Deliverance Evangelistic Church, in North Chesterfield, Virginia, right outside Richmond, announced the death of Bishop Gerald O. Glenn in an Easter Sunday address by Bryan Nevers, a church elder.” * Huckabee loses in court: “A federal judge in Florida on Monday denied an emergency motion that would have allowed former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and other beach-front owners near Pensacola to be exempted from an order that closed all public and private beaches in their county amid the coronavirus outbreak.” See you tomorrow.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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