to reopen states to explore plans governors agree · men revealed a rapprochement forged amid...

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With the number of new deathsand the rate of hospitalizationsfalling in New York, Gov. AndrewM. Cuomo said on Monday that“the worst is over” in the coro-navirus pandemic, and he an-nounced an alliance with six otherNortheastern governors to ex-plore how to eventually lift restric-tions — a move that appeared tobe an implicit rebuke to PresidentTrump.

The governors from New Jer-sey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania,Delaware, Massachusetts andRhode Island said they would be-gin to draw up a plan for when toreopen businesses and schools,and how quickly to allow people toreturn to work safely, although thetimeline for such a plan remainedunclear.

“If you do it wrong, it can back-fire, and we’ve seen that withother places in the globe,” Mr.Cuomo said. “What the art form isgoing to be here is doing thatsmartly and doing that in a coordi-nated way.”

The joint effort was the first oftwo announced on Monday: Thegovernors of California, Oregonand Washington — three Westernstates that were among those thatfelt the impact of the virus beforeit spread rapidly in the Northeast— announced a similar pact. Allbut one of the 10 governors on thetwo coasts are Democrats.

In moving ahead on their own,the governors were all but disre-garding Mr. Trump just as he wastrying to assert control over the

question of when and how to re-open the country — a move thatset up the possibility of a collisioncourse between the states andWashington.

The president spent Mondayassembling a task force to advisehim on a path to restoring somesemblance of normal life in Amer-ica. He rejected the notion that thedecision would be left to the gov-ernors, even though they havebeen the ones to close the schoolsand issue the stay-at-home or-ders, not the federal government.

“For the purpose of creatingconflict and confusion, some in theFake News Media are saying thatit is the Governors decision toopen up the states, not that of thePresident of the United States &the Federal Government,” hewrote on Twitter. “Let it be fullyunderstood that this is incorrect.It is the decision of the President,

GOVERNORS AGREETO EXPLORE PLANS

TO REOPEN STATESCautiously, Cuomo Says ‘Worst Is Over’

as Pacts Appear to Rebuke Trump

By LUIS FERRÉ-SADURNÍ and JESSE McKINLEY

Empty streets in Manhattan’sEast Village on Monday.

BRITTAINY NEWMAN/THE NEW YORK TIMES

Continued on Page A12

The nation’s food supply chainis showing signs of strain, as in-creasing numbers of workers arefalling ill with the coronavirus inmeat processing plants, ware-houses and grocery stores.

The spread of the virus throughthe food and grocery industry isexpected to cause disruptions inproduction and distribution of cer-tain products like pork, industryexecutives, labor unions and ana-lysts have warned in recent days.The issues follow nearly a monthof stockpiling of food and other es-sentials by panicked shoppersthat have tested supply networksas never before.

Industry leaders and observersacknowledge the shortages couldincrease, but they insist it is moreof an inconvenience than a majorproblem. People will have enoughto eat; they just may not have theusual variety. The food supply re-mains robust, they say, with hun-dreds of millions of pounds ofmeat in cold storage. There is noevidence that the coronavirus canbe transmitted through food or itspackaging, according to the De-partment of Agriculture.

Still, the illnesses have the po-tential to cause shortages lastingweeks for a few products, creatingfurther anxiety for Americans al-ready shaken by how difficult itcan be to find high-demand sta-ples like flour and eggs.

“You might not get what youwant when you want it,” saidChristine McCracken, a meat in-dustry analyst at Rabobank inNew York. “Consumers like tohave a lot of different choices, andthe reality is in the short term, we

Outbreak PutsStress on Links

Of Food ChainBy MICHAEL CORKERY

and DAVID YAFFE-BELLANY

Continued on Page A16

WASHINGTON — Walter Isen-berg is the sort of business ownerPresident Trump has in mindwhen he talks about the need tostart lifting coronavirus lock-downs and reopen the Americaneconomy. Mr. Isenberg’s hotel andrestaurant group in Denver hasseen its revenues drop from $3million a day last year to $40,000 aday now.

But Mr. Isenberg has no expec-tation that his company, Sage Hos-pitality Group, will see the quickeconomic “boom” that Mr. Trumphas predicted, even after state of-ficials allow his properties to be-gin hosting customers again.

“It’s just going to be a very longand slow recovery until such timeas there is a therapeutic solutionor a vaccine,” Mr. Isenberg, whohas furloughed more than 5,000 ofhis 6,000 employees, said in an in-terview. “I’m not a scientist, but Ijust don’t see the psyche of people— I don’t see people coming out ofthis and rushing out to start trav-eling and having big conventions.”

The president is in a rush to liftquarantines and stay-at-home re-strictions that have brought an 11-year economic expansion to anabrupt end and knocked millionsof people out of work. Mr. Trumphas predicted that once the econ-omy restarts, it will rocket itselfout of a deep recession and lead toan economic boom “perhaps likenever before.”

Companies affected by theshutdowns say restarting theeconomy will not be that easy. Sodo a wide variety of economic andsurvey data, which suggest thatthe economy will recover slowlyeven after the government beginsto ease limits on public gatherings

Consumer FearSeen as Foiling Quick Recovery

By JIM TANKERSLEY

Continued on Page A11

The lines start forming thenight before, as people with glassyeyes and violent coughs try to gettested for the virus. In the dark-ness, they park their cars, cuttheir engines and try to sleep.

The backlog for coronavirustesting in New Jersey, the statewith the second-highest caseloadin the country, has been gettingworse, not better, officials say.

So far, New Jersey has con-

ducted over 115,000 tests, aboutone for every 75 residents. Acrossthe river in New York, the epicen-ter of the crisis, there is about onefor every 40. The tests are a criti-cal tool in measuring the disease’sspread and a requirement for cer-tain forms of treatment. Yet theyremain hard to get, and many areactively discouraged from trying.

“It’s unequivocally worsening,”Gov. Philip D. Murphy of New Jer-sey said recently, adding, “We’vegot constraints in the entire foodchain.”

Initially, the strain came from alack of test kits, but now there arenot enough nasal swabs, notenough nurses. There is a pileupat the labs themselves and a lim-ited supply of the chemicalsneeded to identify the virus.

Two weeks ago at the BergenCommunity College in Paramus, a

drive-through testing site in thehardest-hit area of New Jersey,residents had to arrive by 3 a.m. toget a spot. Within days, they weretold to show up at 11 p.m. the nightbefore.

On Monday of last week, AnitaHolmes-Perez felt so sick that sheasked her husband to drive herthere even earlier, at 10:45, but acar was already ahead of her. Theentrance to the site, run by theFederal Emergency ManagementAgency, was blocked off by an ar-

Agonizing Waits and Few Nurses: New Jersey Testing Is in ChaosBy RUKMINI CALLIMACHI

DRIVE-THROUGH Joanne Massarotti approved a patient for testing last week in Paramus, N.J. Residents waited overnight to get swabs.

ROUTING May Carrillo sorting samples at Quest Diagnostic’s facil-ity in Teterboro. Its proximity to New York has left it swamped.

FLIGHT George Fendley and Jamahl Carter loading bags of coro-navirus test samples onto a plane at Teterboro Airport.

PHOTOGRAPHS BY RYAN CHRISTOPHER JONES FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Sample Shipping TurnsInto a Relay Race

Continued on Page A10

Senator Bernie Sanders en-dorsed Joseph R. Biden Jr. as theDemocratic nominee for presi-dent on Monday, adding theweight of his left-wing support toMr. Biden’s candidacy and takinga major step toward bringingunity to the party’s effort to unseatPresident Trump in November.

The decision by Mr. Sanders toback his former rival is an unmis-takable signal to his supporters —who are known for their intenseloyalty — that they should do so aswell, at a moment when Mr. Bidenstill faces deep skepticism frommany younger progressive vot-ers.

In a surprise joint appearanceover live-streamed video, the twomen revealed a rapprochementforged amid extraordinary cir-cumstances just five days afterMr. Sanders withdrew, a sign ofhow profoundly the coronaviruspandemic has changed the race.The uncertainty caused by the vi-rus, the vast damage to the Ameri-can economy and the fervent de-

sire to deprive Mr. Trump of a sec-ond term prompted an earlier-than-expected alliance betweentwo ideological rivals, aimed atbringing together disparate fac-tions of the party.

“We need you in the WhiteHouse,” Mr. Sanders said to Mr.Biden. “And I will do all that I canto see that that happens.”

Mr. Biden said: “I’m going toneed you. Not just to win the cam-paign, but to govern.”

The coalescence behind Mr. Bi-

Sanders Endorses Biden, Saying,‘We Need You in the White House’

By SYDNEY EMBERand KATIE GLUECK

Former Vice President JosephR. Biden Jr. at the Iowa debatewith Senator Bernie Sanders.

TAMIR KALIFA FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Continued on Page A22

Roy Coleman, a 69-year-old liv-ing in a homeless shelter onWards Island, was taken away byambulance after showing symp-toms of Covid-19. The other shel-ter residents were relieved — un-til Mr. Coleman was allowed to re-turn last week after testing pos-itive at Harlem Hospital.

At another shelter, AlphonsoSyville, 45, said that as much as hetried, he could not block out the in-cessant coughing that he heardfrom a man a few feet away.

At Delta Manor, a shelter in theBronx, Christian Cascone recalledhow a roommate confronted an-other resident who had poor hy-giene and would not wash hishands. The resident “said some-thing like, ‘Well, if God chooses forme to die, I’ll die,’” said Mr. Cas-cone, 37.

“My roommate said, ‘Well, thegood Lord also wants the rest of usto be healthy, too,’” he said.

While much of New York City isstaying inside, a crisis has takenhold among a population forwhom social distancing is nearly

impossible: the more than 17,000men and women, many of them al-ready in poor health, who sleep inroughly 100 group or “congre-gate” shelters for single adults.Most live in dormitories that arefertile fields for the virus, withbeds close enough for peoplesleeping in them to hold hands.

And rather than keeping peopleaway from shelters, the virus hasdriven them in.

Some inmates released fromRikers Island to control the out-

23 Die in a Virus ‘Time Bomb’ At Packed New York Shelters

By NIKITA STEWART

Alfonzo Forney, left, and Ro-berto Mangual near the ClarkeThomas shelter in New York.

JONAH MARKOWITZ FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Continued on Page A13

Beijing appears to have directly causedthe record low river levels in Thailand,Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. PAGE A19

INTERNATIONAL A19-20

Squeezing Its Neighbors DryChildren’s shows like “Sesame Street”and “Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood,”above, take on the coronavirus. PAGE C1

ARTS C1-8

Even Elmo’s Social Distancing

A liberal challenger was the surprisewinner over the Trump-backed incum-bent in the race for a seat on the StateSupreme Court of Wisconsin. PAGE A24

NATIONAL A21-24

Stunning Loss for Trump PickTop oil-producing nations have pledgedto cut some 10 percent of global produc-tion, but demand is down by much morethan that. PAGE B1

BUSINESS B1-6

Oil Deal Probably Falls ShortA NASA trip this decade should be saferthan Apollo 13, which nearly killed threeastronauts, but it won’t be safe. PAGE D1

SCIENCE TIMES D1-10

Back to the Moon and Back

A pandemic and a seismic shift in oilmarkets have shaken President NicolásMaduro’s hold on power. PAGE A20

Crises Test Venezuela’s LeaderIn 1970, John Pasche created theRolling Stones’ “tongue and lips” logo,the most famous in rock ’n’ roll. PAGE C1

The Mouth Where the Money Is

Is taking an experimental drug worsethan taking nothing at all? PAGE D6

A Clinical Trial in a Pandemic

Madeleine Albright PAGE A27

EDITORIAL, OP-ED A26-27Robert Barth, 89, was a pioneeringdeep-sea diver in the Navy’s Sealabunderwater habitat program. PAGE B12

OBITUARIES B11-12

The ‘Ultimate Aquanaut’

Craig Gilbert, 94, created “An AmericanFamily,” the 1973 show that turned theLoud family into stars. PAGE B11

A Trailblazer of Reality TV

Tornadoes and severe weather carved adestructive path across six states,killing more than two dozen. PAGE A21

Deadly Storms Strike South

The N.F.L. commissioner will announcedraft picks from his basement, silencingthe usual cheers and boos. PAGE B8

SPORTSTUESDAY B8-10

A Football Draft With No Hugs

Late Edition

VOL. CLXIX . . . No. 58,663 © 2020 The New York Times Company NEW YORK, TUESDAY, APRIL 14, 2020

Today, sunshine followed by clouds,cooler, not so windy, high 58. To-night, mainly cloudy, low 40. Tomor-row, cloudy, morning rain, high 52.Weather map appears on Page A28.

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