If anyone has a bullet-point list or any summary of the plan, please post - whether a link or your own summary. I'm completely pooped out of watching videos, tbh.
jmo
New Jersey and five other states along the I-95 corridor will form an advisory council to begin planning when and how to reopen a vast region that includes the hardest-hit areas by the coronavirus as they face pressure by President Donald Trump to ease restrictions and return the country to some sense of normalcy.
Each of the states will name to the council an economic official and a health official who will work with each governor's chief of staff to research and design a "reopening plan," New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said on a conference call Monday.
The governors did not set a time frame, but a regional reopening still seems a distant prospect. While Cuomo said his state, which has the most deaths in the country, seemed to be at a "plateau" with infections, New Jersey is "a couple of beats behind," Gov. Phil Murphy said. On Monday,
the state reported 2,443 related deaths and 64,584 positive cases, according to the Department of Health.
An economic recovery only occurs on the back of a complete health care recovery. And that order is essential," Murphy said.
The states in the compact, all led by Democrats, are Connecticut, Delaware, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island.
The governors have been facing pressure in recent days from Trump, who is eager to reopen an economy that had been humming before the pandemic brought it to a halt,
wiped out the gains of his presidency and sent
unemployment claims to a record high.
Trump said to much dispute Monday that the decision to reopen states was up to him, not governors. He
made a similar claim Friday that he had "absolute authority."
"For the purpose of creating conflict and confusion, some in the Fake News Media are saying that it is the Governors decision to open up the states, not that of the President of the United States & the Federal Government. Let it be fully understood that this is incorrect...." Trump
tweeted Monday.
He followed up with another tweet: "....It is the decision of the President, and for many good reasons. With that being said, the Administration and I are working closely with the Governors, and this will continue. A decision by me, in conjunction with the Governors and input from others, will be made shortly!"
Trump's authority to take such sweeping action is in dispute.
Elie Honig, a
CNN legal analyst and former state and federal prosecutor in New Jersey and New York, said that while the president has broad powers during an emergency such as this one, they do not extend into state's schools and businesses. A president may order a national quarantine and lift it as he sees fit, but states can keep their orders in place, Honig said.
"There's nothing that gives the president that power to reverse that, to reach into a state or a locality and say I’m undoing what you’re governor or your mayor ordered," Honig said. "Federalism does not mean the federal government gets to do whatever it wants."
Trump's focus on governors in recent days comes amid plans to form a council to reopen the country. He
said Friday he would consider adding governors to the council for their input, even a "very liberal guy" like Murphy, with whom he has developed a "great relationship" in their frequent communications about the virus and its deadly disease, COVID-19.
The governors have been much more cautious in their handling of how to revive economies they have largely forced into dormancy to try containing the spread of the virus and protecting fragile hospital systems from becoming overloaded. It must be done carefully, intelligently and with the input of experts, not politicians, Cuomo said Monday.
"Open the valve slowly, advised by experts, keep your eye on the meter — the meter is the infection rate and watch that infection rate. And if you see that infection rate start ticking up," he said, "then you know you’ve opened the valve too fast."
An economic restart cannot happen without widespread testing so states have enough data to drive their decisions, Cuomo said. And in his weekly phone call with the White House, Murphy
said on Twitter Monday that he stressed a similar point with Vice President Mike Pence and other governors, that "the need for rapid, reliable, and large-scale testing to ensure our economic recovery is informed by our health care recovery."
Trump, whose administration was slow to test at the beginning of the outbreak, seemed to understand the link in an
edict delivered Sunday to governors via Twitter.
"Get your states testing programs & apparatus perfected. Be ready, big things are happening. No excuses! The Federal Government is there to help. We are testing more than any country in the World. Also, gear up with Face Masks!" Trump said.
Testing and protective equipment such as face masks have been in short supply in states including New Jersey.
Cuomo
recently said he has been in discussions with other governors, including Murphy, to increase testing.
But there are many other factors to consider, such as how to restart transportation networks and lift restrictions on businesses. In an earlier briefing Monday, Cuomo said easing the economy back open would mean a "recalibration" of what is considered essential work.
"There is going to be no epiphany. There is going to be no morning where the headline says 'Hallelujah, it’s over,'" Cuomo said. "It will be incremental."
Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo said she was considering how her state could adapt to a new way of life caused by the virus, such as increasing touchless technologies and screening people entering businesses.
NJ joins northeast states in regional commission on economy's reopening
