In February, when the novel coronavirus pandemic seemed a distant, abstract threat, former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel published “The Nation City.” It argues that local governments have stepped up to devise innovative policy solutions when the federal government failed to provide leadership.
In a nutshell: As our national political conversation has devolved into a rancorous, never-ending partisan feud, mayors are digging in to do the real work of governing.
Emanuel’s book largely glossed over the role of governors, but it still came to mind this weekend as Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker sparred with President Donald Trump over the federal government’s response to COVID-19. States have been leading efforts to thwart the disease, blanketing much — but not all — of the country with a patchwork of stay-at-home orders and seeking out critical medical supplies on their own.
“The president does not understand the word ‘federal.’ … Individual states can’t possibly do what the federal government can do,” Pritzker said on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday. “If they had started in February building ventilators, getting ready for this pandemic, we would not have the problems that we have today, and frankly, very many fewer people would die.”
We called Emanuel at his Chicago home to talk about how “The Nation City” relates to this pivotal moment. Here’s an edited transcript of our chat.
Q: The government response to the novel coronavirus pandemic seems to prove the thesis of your book. I’m wondering how you feel about that.
A: Part of the premise was the federal government was dysfunctional. I don’t think it’s healthy. That said, it forces governors and mayors to take on responsibilities and be in a leadership role that they didn’t do 10, 15, 20, 30 years ago. All of a sudden this is in sharp focus: the total dysfunction — and it’s total dysfunction in the federal government under President Trump. I won’t mince my words: He is leading from behind. There’s a famous quote, outside Richmond, when President Lincoln says to Gen. McClellan, (to paraphrase) “If you don’t plan on using the Army, do you mind if I follow up to see what it could do?” And that’s what all the governors are doing. If you’re not going to use the leadership — and they’re begging him — we’ll do it.
And it’s not just governors. Up in Boston, Mayor Marty Walsh, who’s a dear friend, hired (retired) Gen. Stanley McChrystal to augment and lead the city’s charge. As Americans, we get Jared Kushner. Boston gets Gen. McChrystal. Now who do you think, based on background and capability, is going to be better prepared and better organized?
Q: Pandemics don’t respect state lines, though. How does a state-by-state response work in a situation like this? Or not work?
A: Even if the president would just take one of those things, like the state shut-down. If another state like Iowa doesn’t do it — you know, Chicago and Illinois can have one that’s pretty strong, but it doesn’t have barriers or boundaries. It’s permeable. And so, to me, this is an example of where a governor can’t do what the federal government only can do. With our governor, we’re lucky. We’re ahead of the curve, because he issued the stay-at-home order way before Illinois saw the numbers that were happening in Washington state, New York, New Jersey, etc. And I think his leadership on that front was very strong. On the other hand, you are only as good as you are comprehensive in a pandemic.
Q: Your book was centered on mayors; has your thinking evolved on governors?
When I wrote the book, I was looking at how power vacuums get filled, and mayors were filling up more and more of that power vacuum. You’ve seen governors in this crisis, in particular, move forward. And that’s a good thing. I was writing it from the perspective of the seat I was sitting in, not to exclude governors but also about unique leadership. But it’s also governors. Again, I want to be clear: There are limits. The power authority and the capability you have in a pandemic is different. But there’s a lot of stuff that you would never have done before (on a local level) that you’re going to do now because you have to. You have no other choice.
Q: So do governors need to start coordinating amongst themselves? New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has said, “It’s like being on eBay with 50 other states, bidding on a ventilator.”
A: There are things that you can do on a regional basis, but at the end of the day, when there’s “X” amount of ventilators, “X” amount of retired nurses and doctors — you know there’s only one math. There’s only the truth. There’s a reason President Clinton (in 1998) set up the federal reserve of healthcare supplies. And in 2005 President Bush really put the key in the ignition and really augmented it. Those are two presidents who saw around the corner.
You look at the memo that (White House trade adviser) Peter Navarro wrote President Trump in January. He didn’t say, “the way to respond to this is just let the 50 states go out and do it themselves.” He was talking about what the national government had to do, because it was uniquely qualified on a national level to do what was required for the public well-being. He was recommending that in a memo to the president in January when President Trump was saying, “this is not a problem; poof, it will just go away.”
Q: Let’s address the president’s role in this. He’s called governors complainers and has said he wants them to be appreciative. He’s directed Vice President Mike Pence not to call certain governors in the midst of the crisis. How does this factor in?
A: Let me just say that incompetence and ignorance are a real toxic cocktail. And we’re seeing it a real time. Those first eight weeks, nine weeks are not like any other nine weeks. That lost time of urgency and mobilization and deployment is why we’re playing catch up in such a dramatic way. That ignorance is costing people their lives and their livelihoods. And that’s wrong.
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Q: You wrote an op-ed for The Washington Post recently in which you reflected back on what you told President Barack Obama during the 2008 financial meltdown: “Never allow a good crisis go to waste. It’s an opportunity to do the things you once thought were impossible.” Help us look ahead to how we should act on the lessons we’ll learn from this pandemic.
A: We’ve talked for decades about a major infrastructure investment. We have the opportunity to finally make massive investments in broadband, in wifi. You’re never going back to work the same way; you’re never doing medicine the same way. Elementary schools, high schools, colleges are going to do a lot more online learning. If you’re going to have equity and fairness, you’re going to have to have universal broadband. The third piece is, in my view, is our public-health system. We have starved our public-health system from critical investment.
Q: But you need political will to do all of that.
A: There’s this great Warren Buffett quote: (to paraphrase) “When the tide goes out, you see who’s swimming without their shorts on.” And our public health and our infrastructure and our internet are really exposed for being weak. We have a patchwork across the system, so we need to upgrade them. I guarantee you that there will be some of the critical investments made going forward.
Q: How do you think the public anger you’re seeing right now — about lack of testing and protective equipment, about significant disparities in health outcomes for African Americans — will translate into political action?
A: This is the wealthiest country, a country that every time there’s a problem anywhere in the world, people turn to America. They turned to it first for its capacity, its capability, its compassion. This was a country that had a can-do spirit and could do anything and do it well. What Americans cannot believe is that every night and every day there are nurses who are literally risking their lives, begging for gowns. That’s not the America projected around the world. And it surely is not the America that people expect here at home.
