Elizabeth Warren has a plan for this, too

Apr 6, 2020

Senator Elizabeth Warren, a champion of economic equality and consumer protection, discusses her proactive plans for tackling the COVID-19 pandemic and its economic fallout. She criticizes the government's lack of a coherent pandemic strategy and emphasizes the need for robust public health measures. Warren argues for student loan debt cancellation as a moral imperative and explores the interdependence of health and economic stability. She also assesses the inadequacies of traditional security measures in addressing modern threats like climate change and pandemics.

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ADVICE

National Crisis Response Plan

Create a national plan to combat crises like pandemics.
This plan should include healthcare delivery, testing, and economic support.

INSIGHT

Federal Government's Role

The federal government plays a crucial role in crisis response that states can't handle alone.
They can use the Defense Production Act and control resource allocation, unlike individual states.

INSIGHT

Post-Social Distancing

Social distancing needs a clear plan for the next phase.
Identify and utilize immune individuals as a resource for restarting the economy and healthcare system.

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In January, Sen. Elizabeth Warren was the first presidential candidate to release a plan for combatting coronavirus. In March, she released a second plan. Days later, with the scale of economic damage increasing, she released a third. Warren’s proposals track the spread of the virus: from a problem happening elsewhere and demanding a surge in global health resources to a pandemic happening here, demanding not just a public health response, but an all-out effort to save the US economy.

Warren’s penchant for planning stands in particular stark contrast to this administration, which still has not released a clear coronavirus plan. There is no document you can download, no web site you can visit, that details our national strategy to slow the disease and rebuild the economy.

So I asked Warren to return to the show to explain what the plan should be, given the cold reality we face. We discussed what, specifically, the federal government should do; the roots of the testing debacle; her idea for mobilizing the economy around building affordable housing; why she thinks that this is exactly the right time to cancel student loan debt; why America spends so much money preparing for war and so little defending itself against pandemics and climate change; whether she thinks the Democratic primary focused on the wrong issues; and how this crisis is making a grim mockery of Ronald Reagan’s old saw about “the scariest words in the English language.”

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