E3: US coronavirus: Democrats block bill over lack of worker aid as Trump briefs nation – as it happened

That’s us done for the day, thank you for reading. Here’s a summary of events:

Trump signs off by saying he will be back for another briefing tomorrow. He also says his initial instinct is to cut foreign aid during the coronavirus outbreak but he may reconsider. “By the time they walk those list into my office, I say, we have to keep doing that. That’s humanity,” he says.

Trump is asked if he sold stock in the run up to the outbreak. He describes it as a “nasty” question. He goes into a rambling answer even by his own standards. “It cost me billions of dollars to be president,” he says before praising Melania as a great first lady and a then segues into a riff about the fact that George Washington had two desks, presumably a reference to the fact that he was the president and a businessman. Trump then adds he is now a “wartime” president. “I’m glad that this team and me are here for this horrible thing,” he says.

Trump is upbeat about medicine’s fight against Covid-19, despite the fact that a vaccine is in all likelihood at least a year away.

“I don’t want to get anybody overly excited, but I’m very excited by the prospect of it,” says the president. “Then in addition to that, NIH is working on vaccines and they’re making great progress. But the vaccine does have to be tested for a long period of time because you can’t give thousands and millions a vaccine and it turns out to be dangerous, so that does have to be tested. But this one’s been taken for a long time, so we know pretty much one result.”

Trump is asked if undocumented people are welcome to be tested without fear of being reported to authorities. He defers to the surgeon general, Jerome Adams, who says that undocumented workers should be allowed to be tested. Mike Pence adds that border protection are not targeting emergency rooms to look for undocumented people.

Trump says that undocumented immigrants shouldn't fear deportation at ERs or testing sites. "If that's not the policy," he adds, "I'm making it the policy."

More from the Associated Press on the delay in the $1tn economic stimulus package today:

Democrats in the U.S. Senate on Sunday blocked legislation that would pump well over $1 trillion into the American economy on programs to help companies losing business during the coronavirus outbreak and unemployed workers.

The measure faltered after it failed to get the necessary 60 votes in the 100-member chamber to clear a procedural hurdle after days of negotiations.

Trump says no one said “thank you” after he gave away his salary as the US president. “I get excoriated all the time,” he says. What this has to do with a global pandemic is unclear.

Trump is asked about help for New York City, with the mayor, Bill de Blasio, saying the city needs urgent help and supplies. Trump says de Blasio is “trying very hard” because no one has “ever seen this scale” of a disaster. Trump then talks about sterilizing facemasks so they don’t need to be thrown away and how alcohol companies are manufacturing hand sanitizer.

As news breaks that the Senate has failed to advance the coronavirus bill, Trump says the economic stimulus package is important so US companies – large and small – can be helped. He is then asked if he will reach out to former presidents for advice. He says he has an “incredible” team already and he “doesn’t see” a situation where he would reach out to George W Bush or Barack Obama.

Trump resumes his criticism of China. He says he wished China “had told us three months sooner” about coronavirus. He adds that “we could have saved a lot of lives.”

Trump is asked if he will free elderly, non-violent criminals from federal prisons to alleviate the outbreak in the penal system: “We are actually looking at it, yes” he says.

The president is asked when the last time he had contact with Rand Paul, who has tested positive for Covid-19, was. Trump says it was not recently. He is told four senators are now in isolation after coming into contact with Paul. When he finds out that one is Mitt Romney he says, with a hint of a smile: “Gee that’s too bad.” He is asked if he is being sarcastic. “No,” he replies.

The President reacts to Mitt Romney self-isolating with “gee that’s too bad”
When asked if that’s sarcasm, the President says it’s not pic.twitter.com/7mXAxBnF4Z

Donald Trump is back at the podium to take questions from the press. He repeats Mike Pence’s hopes that a new test will soon be available that will give patients their results much more quickly than under the present system. He repeats accusations that he has made in the past that any problems are not down to him but rather than the “broken” system he inherited.

Pence says America is in a better state than many countries in Europe and Asia because Donald Trump banned travel from China and Europe early on. While countries like Italy are experiencing huge death tolls, many countries in Europe and Asia have - at this stage - much lower deathrates than America and appear to be better prepared.

The vice-president, Mike Pence, is speaking now. He says there is a “bipartisan” spirit to the fight against Covid-19 and it is a great credit to America. He says testing is becoming more widely available every day.

Peter Gaynor, the Fema administrator, speaks and emphasizes that the deployment of the National Guard does not mean martial law has been imposed in the three states where they will serve.

Trump ends by addressing Americans about the fight against what he says is an “invisible enemy”: “It is a challenging time, a great national trial. We will prove that we meet the moment, we are at war in a real sense.”

To those who may feel isolated he says: “We are all joined together as one people ... no American is alone as long as we are united. We are very united. You will have a leader who will always fight for you, this is going to be a great victory.”

Trump has moved away from figures to tell the country that he has very high poll ratings among military veterans.

The President appears to be less freewheeling than usual, and is unrolling a long list of figures of the relief effort. He goes on to add that he wants to make sure that military veterans are protected during the coronavirus outbreak.

Trump is spelling out specific numbers at the press briefing. Says New York has received:
186,416 N95 masks
444,078 surgical masks
84,560 face-shields
68,944 surgical gowns
245,486 gloves
from federal stockpile to help with coronavirus outbreak.

Donald Trump says the US economy will “skyrocket” once the “war” against Covid-19 is won. He says the national guard has been ordered to help with the fight against the virus in New York, California and Washington, where the outbreak has hit hard. He says he spoke to the governors of all three states and they will have control of the national guard in their respective states. He says additional supplies will go the three states, including extra beds and facemasks. He says the supplies will be delivered in the next 48 hours. He also says Major Disaster Declarations have been approved for New York and Washington with approval for California to come.

Trump announces he has approved major disaster declarations for New York and Washington. A declaration for California, he adds, will be approved "very quickly."

The Coronavirus Task Force’s press briefing at the White House is about to start, nearly 90 minutes late but better late than never. Donald Trump starts the conference by saying the country is trying to repatriate two groups of young Americans in Peru and Honduras. Trump once again pretty much goes against the language of everyone else in the country by calling Covid-19 “the China virus”. The president reminds Anericans to wash their hands and practice social distancing. He also confirms Senator Rand Paul has Coronavirus.

The US ambassador to the West African country of Burkina Faso, Andrew Young, has tested positive for Covid-19. Italy’s ambassador to the country, along with several of the nation’s government ministers, have also tested positive for the virus.

The announcement of a statewide shelter-in-place order by the Louisiana governor, John Bel Edwards, is a marker of the growing concern that the state, and specifically the New Orleans metro area, could become a major Covid-19 hotspot.

There are now 837 confirmed coronavirus cases in Louisiana, compared with 15,168 in the state of New York and 1,536 in California – both states with millions more residents. The state, in the deep south of the America, now ranks third in per capita confirmed test results, in states across the US, behind New York and Washington.

Mitt Romney has said he will self-quarantine after his fellow Republican senator, Rand Paul, tested positive for Covid-19. Romney said he had sat next to Paul for “extended periods” in recent days.

Senator Romney’s office issued the following statement: pic.twitter.com/tBSx03ZlTr

The Coronavirus Task Force’s briefing from the White House, which was due to start at 4.30pm then 5pm ET, is now scheduled for 5.30pm. It’s perhaps not encouraging that the people charged with protecting the US from a pandemic can’t get a press conference started on time.

It’s fair to say Arizona’s Kyrsten Sinema is not pleased about unconfirmed reports her fellow senator Rand Paul went to the gym while waiting for the results of his (positive) coronavirus test:

I’ve never commented about a fellow Senator’s choices/actions. Never once.

This, America, is absolutely irresponsible. You cannot be near other people while waiting for coronavirus test results. It endangers others & likely increases the spread of the virus. https://t.co/651TJf8mWf

On Sunday police in Washington DC shut down streets in the nation’s capital that are popular with sightseers out to look at the capital’s cherry blossoms. There were fears that the crowds would help spread Covid-19.

Perhaps no surprise Louisiana has decided to issue a stay at home order – the virus is spreading incredibly fast in the state. Faster than anywhere in the world according to one source:

BREAKING: @LouisianaGov says, by comparison, Louisiana's growth rate of #COVID19 cases has been faster than any state or country in the world, based on analysis from the @ULLafayette.
*2 weeks ago, Louisiana had no known cases
*As of last Sunday: 91
*As of today: 837 as of today

Reports are emerging that Utah senator Mike Lee is in self-quarantine under advice from medical staff, although there has been no confirmation that he has Covid-19. Still, with the news that his fellow senator Rand Paul has the virus it’s not encouraging news for some of the most powerful people in the US that the Senate gym is still open. It should also be noted that Kansas senator Jerry Moran said he saw Paul in the swimming pool this morning, which would be an odd choice seeing as Paul had earlier been tested for the virus. He is also a qualified ophthalmologist, so it’s not like he is unaware of the basics of medicine.

I can't think of a worse place to keep open than the gym used by a bunch of old senators who travel back and forth from all 50 states every week.

Further afield , it appears likely that the 2020 Olympics will be postponed (making them possibly the 2021 Olympics). The IOC has dithered on the matter while sports leagues around the world have postponed or suspended seasons. Here’s our story:

The International Olympic Committee has paved the way for the Tokyo Games to be postponed after giving itself a four-week deadline to consider its options. While the IOC has emphatically ruled out cancelling the Olympics, it will consider a scaled down Games as well as delaying them for a few months or, more likely, a year.

Only last week the IOC president, Thomas Bach, insisted that there was “No Plan B”, but it has since softened its stance amid mounting criticism by athletes amid the coronavirus crisis. The IOC will now examine several scenarios over the next month, but it is thought that deferring to the summer of 2021 is the most likely option.

Related: Olympics postponement on the cards as IOC gives itself four-week deadline

Donald Trump is scheduled to speak at 5pm ET but it looks like the $1tn package to help the battered US economy is in trouble. The Republican-majority Senate is looking to vote despite disagreement from Democrats in Congress. Speaker Nancy Pelosi even said on Sunday that House Democrats may look to pursue their own legislation. “It’s on the Senate side now because that’s their deadline for a vote,” Pelosi said. “But we’ll be introducing our own bill and hopefully, it will be compatible with what they discussed in the Senate.”

Utah has reported its first death from Covid-19. Health officials said the man had been at Lakeview Hospital in Bountiful for two days and tested positive for the virus on Saturday. He has not been named but was over 60 and had existing health problems.

Ohio and Louisiana have now joined states such as Illinois, New York and California in telling residents to stay at home. The orders will come into effect in both states from Monday evening. All non-essential businesses will close but residents will be allowed to leave their homes for activities such as exercise, grocery shopping and medical emergencies.

We are now at a new stage. .@DrAmyActon just signed a statewide #StayHome order for Ohioans.

The Washington Post reports that New York-Presbyterian hospitals have banned visitors - including partners -for women giving birth, due to fears they could help spread Covid-19 among patients and medical staff. “For the time being, we really do need to exclude all visitors, including partners for women admitted in labor. This is intended to protect all of us,” Dena Goffman, the quality and patient-safety leader for obstetrics across the New York-Presbyterian Weill Cornell enterprise, told the Post.

It was hoped drive-thru sites would increase the number of Americans getting access to tests for Covid-19. But the system as a whole appears to be struggling with long delays reported at many sites - for tests and the results of those tests. As of Saturday, around 195,000 people in the US had been tested, although that number does not include private facilities.

“We need to be testing more broadly to fully understand the scope of the public health situation we are facing,” said Joseph Wendelken, a spokesman for the Rhode Island Department of Health.

Hopes of a package being agreed today to stimulate the embattled US economy are fading. Here’s the latest from the Associated Press:

Top-level negotiations between Congress and the White House teetered Sunday on a ballooning nearly $1.4tn economic rescue package, as the coronavirus crisis deepened and Donald Trump called for a deal to steady a shuttered nation.

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin indicated an agreement is within reach, but congressional Republican and Democratic leaders said there was no deal yet after an hour-long meeting at the otherwise empty US Capitol.

Just a reminder, you can follow the wider effect of Covid-19 on our global liveblog, including the news that German Chancellor Angela Merkel is in quarantine after a doctor who gave her a vaccine tested positive for coronavirus. You can follow the full story here:

Related: Coronavirus live news: Angela Merkel in quarantine; Spain set to extend state of emergency

New York governor Andrew Cuomo is on CNN and says he thinks 40-80% of people in his state, which has a population of just under 20 million, will get Covid-19. He wants to “slow that rate so it doesn’t overwhelm the hospital system”. He says slowing the rate of infection is crucial to prevent spikes from putting too much strain on hospitals. New York now has 15,168 confirmed cases - or 5% of cases worldwide. That’s a rise of 4,812 since Saturday, although some of that number is due to more widespread testing. 114 people in the state have died from Covid-19.

On a wider level, he thinks the federal government should nationalize the medical supply system as states are competing against each other to buy equipment like facemasks, which drives up prices for everyone. Peter T Gaynor, of Fema, said earlier in the day that the scramble for equipment would mean some states would have to wait in line. “There’s hundreds of requests – virtually every state in the union looking for the same thing, and it’s not just the demand nationally, it’s a demand globally for these items,” said Gaynor.

Rand Paul of Kentucky has become the first US senator to test positive for Covid-19. A statement on his Twitter account said the 57-year-old is asymptomatic - that may raise questions why he was tested in the first place, although the statement said he was tested due out of “an abundance of caution due to his extensive travel and events”. The statement said Paul was not aware of any direct contact with an infected person. He expects to be back in the Senate once his quarantine ends.

Senator Rand Paul has tested positive for COVID-19. He is feeling fine and is in quarantine. He is asymptomatic and was tested out of an abundance of caution due to his extensive travel and events. He was not aware of any direct contact with any infected person.

It’s been a morning of back-and-forth jabs between the President of the United States and some of the country’s 50 governors.

Check out the highlights:

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CBS’ Face the Nation on Sunday that he has no disagreement with President Donald Trump over whether a drug used to treat COVID-19 is actually on the way.

Trump touts what "possibly" may be "very successful" medicines to help people and help people not get sick, this time not getting into details. (Again, Fauci and FDA commish Hahn have made clear there are no proven safe and effective treatments.)

President Donald Trump responded to critics of the White House’s response to the coronavirus pandemic, tweeting Sunday that they should not be “blaming the federal government for their own shortcomings.”

.@JBPritzker, Governor of Illinois, and a very small group of certain other Governors, together with Fake News @CNN & Concast (MSDNC), shouldn’t be blaming the Federal Government for their own shortcomings. We are there to back you up should you fail, and always will be!

Working very well with States and our Nation’s Governors. #TEAMWORK

As the US braces for the looming impact of the coronavirus pandemic, Americans are looking for an authoritative voice to reassure the nation it’s prepared.

They’re finding that voice in New York governor Andrew Cuomo.

Andrew Cuomo has turned his blunt, slideshow-aided daily press conferences on the Coronavirus into must watch TV for people far beyond New York. And, in doing so, the governor has set up a powerful contrast with Donald Trump.

More here w/ @GregJKrieg: https://t.co/YvS0u29u67

Can we just pretend Gov. Cuomo is President for now?

Listening to Andrew Cuomo’s press conferences are my new daily solace. And I don’t live in New York. pic.twitter.com/TFWhvf9NUu

The Trump administration lashed out at France on Sunday for releasing an Iranian man wanted for prosecution. Jalal Rohollahnejad was the subject of a extradition request on charges of violating American sanctions on Iran.

The United States and France have a shared interest in bringing those accused of serious crimes to justice, particularly in cases with national security implications. It is regrettable in this instance that France failed to uphold its treaty obligations and prevented justice from being pursued.”

Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren urged US Attorney General Bill Barr to close US immigration courts nationwide as the country grapples with the coronavirus outbreak.

According to the New York governor Andrew Cuomo, “18-49 year-olds represent 53%” of the total number of confirmed coronaviruses cases statewide.

Probably not lethal in young people. But you can transfer it to someone who may very well die, Cuomo says. "You can touch a surface, walk away, a day later someone can sit at this table and put their hand in the same place and contract the virus."

“It’s insensitive, it’s arrogant, it’s self destructive. It’s disrespectful to other people and it has to stop and it has to stop now. This is not a joke and I am not kidding.

Bill De Blasio, the mayor of New York City, warned on Sunday that essential hospital supplies would be exhausted in barely more than a week, leading to the deaths of many more people.

In comments sharply critical of what he sees as a botched federal response to the escalating Coronavirus crisis, De Blasio said: “It feels like we’re on our own.”

New York governor Andrew Cuomo called on US President Donald Trump and the federal government to increase its response to the coronavirus pandemic spreading throughout the US.

At his daily press conference Sunday, Governor Cuomo implored the president to enact the Defense Production Act, which would mandate firms to make essential medical supplies such as masks.

Holding a briefing with updates on #Coronavirus. WATCH LIVE: https://t.co/sq3V2qRM8e

Mr. Trump has given mixed signals about whether his administration has actually used the law at all to spur the production of scarce and necessary items like ventilators; testing kits; and protective masks, gloves, and gowns.

Good day and welcome to the Sunday US liveblog. I’m Kenya Evelyn leading off today’s coverage.

We’re following the country’s continued response to the coronavirus pandemic, which you can follow more in depth on our coronavirus live blog

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