| The White House on Tuesday said COVID-19 and its effects are bleak enough to warrant more legislative help from President Trump and Congress, yet the situation is safe enough for students to go back to classrooms in the fall, according to the president and his advisers. The administration on Tuesday asked Congress to pass a new coronavirus relief bill by August and limit the price tag to $1 trillion. Vice President Pence’s chief of staff, Marc Short, said that in order to get Trump’s signature on another stimulus measure, lawmakers must approve liability protections for businesses whose employees and customers may become infected with the virus as commerce resumes (Bloomberg News, subscription). “I think we want to make sure that people that are still unemployed or hurting are protected, but at the same time, we want to take into consideration the fact the economy is bouncing back and want to try to contain the amount of spending,” Short told Bloomberg Radio. The administration’s priorities for another rescue bill also include a payroll tax cut, tax incentives for businesses during the pandemic and a potential back-to-work bonus. Democrats, who passed a $3.5 trillion measure out of the House in May (which was immediately dismissed by Senate Republicans), understand the next major coronavirus measure could be the last before the November elections. Jostling for advantage will be lively in Congress later this month as many lawmakers seek to deliver more help to the unemployed, families with children, front-line workers, teachers, first responders, and cities and states whose budgets are in tatters because of falling revenues and unanticipated pandemic-related spending. The Hill: Clash looms over the next coronavirus relief bill. The Associated Press: Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who will steer any new stimulus measure to Trump’s desk, is eyeing more federal aid as rental evictions and the end of beefed-up unemployment benefits loom for millions of Americans. During a White House event on Tuesday (pictured above), Trump turned his attention to proposals for “safe” back-to-school options for grade school, high school and university students. The president since April has urged states to reopen schools, although the administration has acknowledged the decision is not up to Washington. Trump views school attendance in the fall as essential to encourage parents to return to work, even as the COVID-19 epidemic worsens in regions of the country. “We’re very much going to put pressure on governors and everybody else to open the schools,” Trump said (The Associated Press). Education Secretary Betsy DeVos on Tuesday rejected proposed part-time school operations. Anything less would fail students and taxpayers, she said during a conference call with governors that was disclosed to the AP. “Ultimately, it’s not a matter of if schools need to open, it’s a matter of how. Schools must reopen, they must be fully operational. And how that happens is best left to education and community leaders,” she said. The Hill’s Niall Stanage writes that Trump appears to bet that cheerleading for in-person school instruction in the fall gives him some political mileage, especially among parents stressed by months of home-schooling. The president and his campaign want to tie former Vice President Joe Biden to teachers unions, a traditional target for GOP presidential candidates. Politically, Trump's position is risky as the epidemic worsens in parts of the United States and public health experts warn that young people are not always spared the health consequences of infection. White House coronavirus task force coordinator Deborah Birx told Bloomberg Radio on Tuesday that schools will need to oversee frequent COVID-19 testing of pupils of all ages and grade levels to hunt for asymptomatic and early onset infections as a way to keep classrooms and school buildings open (Yahoo News). Whether most parents would readily grant permission for such regular disease testing at schools is unclear. Meanwhile, the administration is moving medical support into areas of “recent and intense” outbreaks in Florida, Texas and Louisiana, officials said on Tuesday. > Florida: The coronavirus infection rate in the Sunshine State rose to 16 percent on Tuesday, indicating the spread of COVID-19 is not under control there. Florida, where the president maintains his official address, is now the nation’s coronavirus epicenter (The Washington Post). Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) (pictured below at a Miami press conference) was among governors most reluctant to shut down his state and among the first to reopen for business, but on Tuesday he extended an emergency declaration for 60 days (ABCActionNews) because of the rising number of infections reported by counties daily (Miami Herald). > Texas: New coronavirus cases exceeded 10,000 on Tuesday in the Lone Star State, a record-breaking surge in a region inundated with community spread. There were 9,268 people in the state’s hospitals with COVID-19 as of Tuesday, another daily record (NBC News). … The nearly month long State Fair of Texas in Dallas was canceled on Tuesday for the first time since World War II because of COVID-19 risks (The Dallas Morning News). > New York: Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) announced an expansion to 19 states now affected by New York’s quarantine requirement for people coming domestically into the state from other locales. “If you're traveling to New York from the following states you must self-quarantine for 14 days,” he tweeted on Tuesday. “The states are: AL, AR, AZ, CA, DE, FL, GA, IA, ID, KS, LA, MS, NC, NV, OK, SC, TN, TX, UT.” > Masks (wear them!): Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, on Tuesday said he is “strongly in favor” of mandating mask use amid a rise in COVID-19 cases in Alabama and nationwide. Speaking during a Facebook event with Democratic Sen. Doug Jones, who is in a tough reelection contest in Alabama, Fauci said ordinances requiring mask use — such as one instituted by Montgomery, Ala., last month — send a clear message about containing the outbreak. “If you say, ‘It doesn't matter whether you put it on or take it off,’ you’re giving a wrong, mixed signal,” he said. “The message should be, ‘Wear a mask, period’” (Montgomery Advertiser). > America falls behind the developed world: COVID-19 is out of control in parts of the United States, while European countries and China made greater strides toward containment after five months. Why? Experts say other countries locked down earlier and for longer than the United States, and other nations implemented widespread and better coronavirus testing and tracing for months (The Hill). > Vaccine news: The federal government awarded $1.6 billion to the company Novavax to test and manufacture possible vaccines for the coronavirus, the largest single award to date under the Trump administration's “Operation Warp Speed” program. The funding will also cover a large-scale phase three trial that could begin by October. Novavax wants to deliver 100 million doses of any potential vaccine it may develop by January (Reuters). > Attracting immediate denunciations from Democratic lawmakers on Tuesday, the Trump administration notified Congress and the United Nations that the United States has officially withdrawn from the Geneva-based World Health Organization (WHO) during the COVID-19 pandemic. Trump declared in May his decision to terminate financial support for the international public health body based on what he said was WHO’s solicitous stance with China as the novel coronavirus spread in Wuhan and globally last year. In 2019, U.S. support for the organization amounted to 15 percent of its total budget. Trump, who has blamed the pandemic on China, has been criticized by world leaders for terminating support for WHO during an international public health crisis (NBC News). 
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