POLITICO NIGHTLY: Gov. Jay Inslee on the Covid comeback

BY RENUKA RAYASAM

Presented by Facebook

With help from Myah Ward

‘LIKE RUNNING A MARATHON WHILE PULLING AN ANCHOR’ — This weekend, Washington’s Democratic Gov. Jay Inslee ordered residents in Yakima County to wear masks, as case counts exploded in the agricultural area. (After a gentle nudging from his wife, Inslee also reminded your host that Austin, Texas, has a new mask requirement.) Washington was home to the first confirmed case of Covid in the country five months ago in Snohomish County, north of Seattle. After the initial outbreak, Washington state was one of the early examples of a state that successfully bent the curve: Daily deaths have been below 10 since May, from a peak of 34 at the end of March. Case counts were also on the downswing — until now. The state of 7.6 million people now has nearly 29,000 Covid cases and 1,300 deaths. Your host spoke with Inslee this evening about whether he’s prepared to reimpose statewide orders to keep the virus contained, what President Donald Trump can do to address the pandemic and if he’s still focused on climate change. This conversation was edited.

How are you handling these new outbreaks in the state?

We have two or three counties that have very significant outbreaks that demand very aggressive attention. We are being assertive and aggressive on two things: contact tracing and this masking requirement. We also have under active consideration a statewide masking requirement.

How are you ensuring compliance with the masking requirement especially when it’s a challenge to enforce?

The stay home order had huge compliance. We have a very scientifically literate group of people, who want to follow the science rather than ideology. But we do have a real impediment in this race, and it is a race between ourselves and the virus. It’s been like running a marathon while pulling an anchor, a dead weight, something that is retarding progress and unfortunately that's the president.

On masking he has never missed a chance to diminish its importance or somehow feel it’s inconsistent with masculinity. His grossly irresponsible refusal to use his leadership position to help save lives in fact is endangering literally millions of lives right now by his reckless embrace of this anti-masking effort. The jury is out about how successful we are going to be with these requirements, but we're doing everything we can do.

How is your working relationship with the White House?

We do have people in the federal government we communicate with, who I think are trying although they are not getting help from the president: Admiral Polowczyk, the FEMA director, the vice president.

We have had open communications with the vice president. I did have any number of productive conversations with him. He has been able to answer some of our questions and we appreciate that. He has helped us on at least one or two occasions to get the federal government to respond to some of our needs.

Any current requests to the Trump administration?

We’ve been fighting for increased production of testing kids and PPE for months, going back to my very first conversation with the president asking him to use the Defense Production Act for PPE. He said he’s not a shipping clerk and wasn’t interested in that. Ever since then it’s been a daily fight to try to try to get the federal government to work on these subjects.

We just ask the president to stop using the bully pupil to bully physicians and public health experts who know that testing is valuable and masks are valuable and seriousness of purpose is valuable. I don't think it's too much to ask from him that if he's not gonna be helpful, at least don’t be hurtful. His silence would be very much appreciated on this subject.

What additional measures are you considering if cases continue to grow? Would you consider reimposing a stay at home order?

I don’t think any responsible public official can rule out anything that could potentially save lives in the future. But I’m not indulging in that speculation. I’m not planning on it. I do think that there is a good chance robust mask usage and extremely diligent contact tracing and isolation can keep this pandemic relatively under control.

Climate change is one of your huge priorities. How are you handling that crisis while also managing this pandemic?

We're doing what we can do. We should. Our survival depends on both.

Welcome to POLITICO Nightly: Coronavirus Special Edition. Good timing: I just got more masks in the mail this weekend. Reach out with tips: rrayasam@politico.com or on Twitter at @renurayasam.

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THE GLOBAL FIGHT

500,000 DEATHS — Sometime this week, the 500,000th Covid-19 death will occur, Ryan Heath writes. In most of the world’s most populous countries the daily death count is increasing, not decreasing. Of the 20 countries with the worst Covid-19 records, 15 are now developing countries. That’s the wrong trajectory in the wrong countries. Those with the least ability to control the virus are now in the center of the storm.

For the first time the virus is appearing to peak in half a dozen large countries, with populations of 100 million or more. Unlike smaller countries that implemented strict national plans — like Australia, Norway, Italy, South Korea and Taiwan — big countries like India, Brazil, Pakistan and Mexico face pandemics that are spiraling out of control. Other countries with 200 million or more people, such as Indonesia and Nigeria, have little clear view of what is happening with the virus in their territory.

And despite the U.S. being rated as the best prepared country for a pandemic, North America is recording seven times the number of daily deaths as the EU, even though both continents have a similar population.

JOIN WEDNESDAY 1 p.m. EDT - THE SPEED OF SCIENCE POST-COVID-19: What does the future of science in a post-Covid-19 world look like? What lessons can we learn to accelerate medical research outside of the coronavirus? How can newly developed drugs and vaccines be distributed equitably? What can we do to minimize misinformation from flawed or inaccurate scientific studies published during a public health emergency? Join Patrick Steel, CEO of POLITICO, and Alexander Hardy, CEO of Genentech, for this critical and timely discussion. REGISTER HERE.

FIRST IN NIGHTLY

KICKOFF QUESTIONS — Colleges are racing toward a fall sports season unlike any other, as they work to keep the coronavirus from infecting student athletes and staff who bring in billions of dollars and entertain a nation. So far, it’s not going well, education reporter Juan Perez Jr. writes. Across the country, college athletic programs are under financial and political pressure to return, but these efforts come amid safety warnings from public health officials and continued uncertainty about how the academic side of colleges will get back to business this fall. Three months after Covid-19 halted March Madness, college leaders are wading through evolving information about the disease and its ability to spread through contact sports. They’re also asking Congress for protection from legal liability.

A person commutes on the subway in Brooklyn, N.Y., as New York City entered phase 2 today. | Getty Images

TALKING TO THE EXPERTS

Trump told POLITICO on Thursday that mail-in ballots threaten his reelection. Nightly’s Myah Ward talked to Lonna Atkeson, political science professor at the University of New Mexico and a national expert in election administration, about the risks and benefits of mail-in balloting. This conversation was edited.

Does one party benefit more from mail-in balloting?

There’s no evidence that mail-in balloting helps one party at a national level. But certainly, if you’re in a Republican state, it probably helps Republicans. If you're in a Democratic state, it probably helps Democrats. Because you’re sending more ballots to those voters.

Is there any reason to think that mail-in voting is more at risk for fraud than in-person voting? How substantial are these risks?

The risk of fraud in mail-in balloting is greater than the risk of fraud in in-person voting, because in in-person voting, your ballot is completely controlled by the election official.

The tension in election administration is the tension between access and integrity. Because the more we create easy access, we increase the risk of fraud. The more we tighten that access, we reduce the risk of fraud. But we make it harder for people to vote. So how do you balance those two competing norms? They’re both really important to the system. And so you’re always trying to create this balance and there's always a fight. And we don’t really have a good idea about where that point is.

There’s not a lot of election fraud that we’re aware of. I think it’s really hard to find. Since North Carolina, I've been changing my opinion on this. There are actually quite a number of examples of fraud. Is it widespread? I don’t know.

So with the push for mail-in ballots, are you concerned about the integrity of the November election?

I’m certainly concerned about the perception of the integrity of the election. And people’s perception is based on how they view the process and its security. It’s important that people perceive elections as fair and honest.

The president can use the system to promote his beliefs. And you could have train wrecks happening in November as more states end up adopting vote by mail, which makes sense in the pandemic. That could create, in places where they don’t do a lot of vote by mail, a lot more complexity. All of these things could increase the ceiling of perceived fraud because they’re inconsistent with how things have gone before.

 

COVID-2020

MORE PRIMARIES, MORE CONCERNS — Chaos. Confusion. Hours-long lines. That’s what we saw in Georgia’s primary election — and what we might see in New York and Kentucky on Tuesday. Campaign reporter and Morning Score author Zach Montellaro explains why in the latest POLITICO Dispatch.

Listen to the latest POLITICO Dispatch podcast

AROUND THE NATION

FUZZY MATH — There’s no shortage of Covid data, but there’s little clarity — or agreement — on which numbers to follow. How should we determine whether an area is growing into a hotspot or if the virus is contained?

The most commonly cited metrics for the spread of the virus are probably case counts and death counts. But Covid Act Now, a volunteer modeling effort run by former technology executives and advised by public health and medical experts from places like Georgetown and Stanford, thinks we should focus on a different set of numbers. Four metrics, the group believes, should also guide reopening: infection rate, positive test rate, intensive care capacity and contacts traced.

Case counts and death counts track the general prevalence of the virus, but what matters is how quickly the virus is spreading in a particular area and whether the state or county is equipped to handle the cases, said Jonathan Kreiss-Tomkins, a Democratic Alaska state lawmaker and policy lead at the group. Prevalence matters, but the group thinks it’s not always the most important metric to follow.

Paying too much attention to general prevalence can mask larger problems, Kreiss-Tomkins said. An area might have relatively few cases, but a high infection rate, which tracks how many infections stem from each positive case. An infection rate above one means that the virus is spreading and below one means that it is being contained.

The ratio of positive tests to overall tests can help uncover whether more testing is to blame for spikes in cases, as Trump has asserted. Texas, Florida, Arizona and a number of other states have infection rates above 1 and high positive test rates — 9 percent or more. Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott acknowledged today that the virus was growing in his state at an “unacceptable rate.”

Inequality exposed — After the nationwide protests for police reforms and racial justice, video producer Mary Newman explores inequalities within the criminal justice system, and how they can haunt people long after their interactions with the police. Watch now:

NIGHTLY NUMBER

264 The number of new Covid-19 cases reported in Italy on Saturday. On the same day, the U.S. reported nearly 32,000.

JOIN WEDNESDAY AT 4:45 p.m. EDT/1:45 p.m. PDT – CALIFORNIA PLAYBOOK INTERVIEW WITH SAN FRANCISCO MAYOR LONDON BREED: California is gradually re-opening as retail stores, restaurants and churches join other entities in welcoming eager patrons. Join California Playbook authors Carla Marinucci and Jeremy White for a virtual interview with San Francisco Mayor London Breed to discuss the city’s economic comeback, proposals for police reform and funding reallocation. REGISTER HERE.

PARTING WORDS

SPIT TAKE — An unlikely partnership will investigate an alternative to the invasive nasal swab-based testing that’s become synonymous with Covid-19: Yale public health researchers and the NBA. Players who opt in will be tested with a new saliva-based test developed by Yale researchers. The test requires only a small sample of saliva, takes less time for results and is less expensive, according to a Yale statement.

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Renuka Rayasam @renurayasam

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