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President Trump's comments at a weekend campaign rally in Oklahoma aboutslowing down testingfor coronavirus were just "a passing observation," Vice President Mike Pence told the nation's governors on Monday.

The president has been widely criticized for seeming to dismiss the importance of testing for COVID-19, especially at rates of infections continue to climb nationwide. Late Saturday after the president's rally, a White House official told CBS News that the president's comments were "in jest."

On Monday, Pence clarified the president's comments about testing under questioning by Nevada Democratic Governor Steve Sisolak, who sought assurance that state and federal leaders would stay on the same page about the importance of testing for COVID-19. Sisolak called the president's comments "not helpful" but neither he nor Pence referred to them as a joke, according to audio of the call obtained by CBS News.

"The president's comments on Saturday night as it related to his order to slow down the testing were certainly not helpful," Sisolak told Pence. "We're doing everything we can in Nevada to increase our testing, to increase the availability of the testing and our cases have gone up. It's not solely a result of more testing, it's also a result of people not wearing masks and not following the social protocols. So, if we could all get on the same page and get a commitment that there's not a federal mandate to slow down testing I think it would be extremely helpful."

Pence told Sisolak the administration is "going to continue to partner with you on testing I think the president's observation was a passing observation in his remarks. But we are seeing that now that we're doing more than 500,000 tests a day, we are finding more people. That has contributed to some of our numbers. So, I'd just say to you and all the governors on the call, as the media has focused on the new cases number, that we all would explain the percentage of that is reflective of an extraordinary national success in testing and that we are identifying people. And that that is a reflection of a great, great collaboration at the federal, state level, as well as with our private sector."

Multiple people listening to Monday's regularly scheduled conference call with governors shared highlights and audio of the meeting with CBS News.

On Saturday night in Tulsa, Mr. Trump called increased testing for coronavirus "a double-edged sword."

"Here's the bad part when you do testing to that extent, you're going to find more people; you're going to find more cases," Trump told the roughly 6,200 people in attendance. "So I said to my people, slow the testing down please."

In a statement after the call on Monday, Sisolak said testing "is a critical component to Nevada's Roadmap to Recovery reopening plan, and the state has made great strides to make testing available to everyone, regardless of whether they are exhibiting symptoms or not. Increased testing helps determine the spread of the virus in the community and gives state and local public health operations critical information to pursue aggressive measures to help monitor and respond to outbreaks."

Pence also told the governors that the Trump administration remains focused on rising cases in nine states, with the situation stable in the other 41, and he told the governors that medical officials are seeing a growing trend of more people under age 45 testing positive for coronavirus.

"We are seeing steady progress in the vast majority of states," Pence told the governors, according to one person listening in on the call.

During the call, Pence also called on Republican governors from Florida, Texas and Arizona to explain how they're handling a sharp rise in infection in their states. Pence and other officials on the call especially praised Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis for his management of a record number of infections in the Sunshine State. DeSantis reiterated what he has said publicly that increased testing among younger, asymptomatic people is driving the rate of infection.

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Pence tells governors Trump comment on slowing testing was "a passing observation" - CBS News

President Donald Trump is receiving criticism for his decision to restart in-person, indoor rallies with an event in Tulsa on June 20. During a White House roundtable on June 15, Vice President Mike Pence defended Trumps decision by praising Oklahomas response to the coronavirus pandemic.

At a discussion of issues affecting older Americans, Pence said, "The president and I have both spoken to (Oklahoma) Gov. Kevin Stitt in the last several days and even earlier today. And Oklahoma has really been in the forefront of our efforts to slow the spread. And in a very real sense, they've flattened the curve. And today, their hospital capacity is abundant. The number of cases in Oklahoma it's declined precipitously, and we feel very confident going forward with the rally this coming weekend."

However, Pences remarks represent an unduly optimistic reading of Oklahomas actual coronavirus data. (The Trump campaign and the White House did not respond to inquiries.)

The state opened some businesses on April 24 and others on May 1.

We looked at the raw data for Oklahoma from the Covid Tracking Project. The following chart shows both the daily number of new, confirmed cases in Oklahoma and the seven-day rolling average, which smooths out day-to-day variations in the data. (For instance, weekends often show artificially low totals because offices are closed.)

The strongest evidence for Pences characterization comes in the early part of the period. From early March to early April, the daily case count skyrocketed, but then it eased and remained more or less in check through the end of May.

This fits the pattern of "flattening the curve," a term that gained currency early in the pandemic to describe a hoped-for phenomenon by which Americans would stay at home to stop the virus spread, thus keeping new infections from overwhelming the hospital system.

However, Pence overstated the case.

First, its incorrect to say that infections in Oklahoma "declined precipitously." As the chart shows, it was, at best, a modest decline between early April and the end of May. It could be more accurately described as a plateau.

Second, any "flattening the curve" period is old news. Over the most recent week, the number of new cases has increased every day and produced a spike beyond anything previously seen in Oklahoma. The seven-day rolling average for new infections is now more than double where it stood at the end of May, just before the spike began.

"It looks from the data that the number of cases is on the rise, and rising quite steeply," said Nicole Gatto, associate professor in the School of Community and Global Health at Claremont Graduate University.

Tara C. Smith, a professor of epidemiology at Kent State University, agreed.

"The seven-day average doesn't look great for the most recent part of June," Smith said. "They had slowed new cases for a while, but the trend now seems to be reversing."

Equally important, the recent spike does not appear to be traceable to a big surge in testing. Heres a chart of the seven-day rolling average of daily tests in Oklahoma:

The number of tests conducted has generally risen over time. But the number of tests actually fell during the period when the number of new infections was spiking.

Our ruling

Pence said, "In a very real sense, (Oklahoma has) flattened the curve. ... The number of cases in Oklahoma it's declined precipitously."

This observation is outdated and inaccurate. In June, Oklahomas daily caseload has risen consistently, and to levels higher than at any point in the pandemic.

We rate the statement False.

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VP Mike Pence says Oklahoma flattened the COVID-19 curve. That's False - PolitiFact

Vice President Mike Pence arrives at a campaign rally at the BOK Center, June 20, 2020 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)

Vice president Mike Pence has reacted pretty much exactly as youd expect to the Supreme Court ruling that you cant just fire people for being gay anymore.

Pence, known for his hardline anti-LGBT+ beliefs, has been core to efforts to roll back equality under the Trump administration.

But his work hit a stumbling block last Monday, when the Supreme Court ruled that existing civil rights laws which outlaw discrimination based on sex can be used to prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.

Pence addressed the ruling at a rally in Tulsa on Saturday night vowing to stack the courts with even more conservatives if Trump is re-elected for a second term.

He told the rally: Joe Biden is making plans to appoint activist judges who will legislate from the bench, but next week, president Trump will appoint his 200th judge to our federal courts, all conservative jurists who are upholding the God-given liberties enshrined in our constitution, like the freedom of speech, the freedom of religion, and the second amendment right to keep and bear arms.

With four more years, this president will appoint even more judges. And like we learned this past week, we need more conservative justices on the Supreme Court of the United States.

Last week, president Trump appeared unaware that his own administration had intervened in the case to argue that the Civil Rights Act does not apply to LGBT+ people.

Asked about the case, Trump said that the Trump administration would live with the decision of the Supreme Court.

However in a subsequent Twitter storm he raged about a stream of losses at the Supreme Court which also slapped down a Trump administration challenge to the DACA immigration program.

Trump wrote: The recent Supreme Court decisions, not only on DACA, sanctuary cities, census, and others, tell you only one thing, we need NEW JUSTICES of the Supreme Court.

If the radical left Democrats assume power, your second amendment, right to life, secure borders, and religious liberty, among many other things, are OVER and GONE!

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Mike Pence thinks the Supreme Court needs 'more conservative justices' - PinkNews

Whats all this talk about a second wave of U.S. coronavirus cases?

In The Wall Street Journal last week, Vice President Mike Pence wrote in a piece headlined There Isnt a Coronavirus Second Wave that the nation is winning the fight against the virus.

Many public health experts, however, suggest its no time to celebrate. About 120,000 Americans have died from the new virus and daily counts of new cases in the U.S. are the highest theyve been in more than a month, driven by alarming recent increases in the South and West.

But there is at least one point of agreement: Second wave is probably the wrong term to describe whats happening.

When you have 20,000-plus infections per day, how can you talk about a second wave? said Dr. Anthony Fauci of the National Institutes of Health. Were in the first wave. Lets get out of the first wave before you have a second wave.

Clearly there was an initial infection peak in April as cases exploded in New York City. After schools and businesses were closed across the country, the rate of new cases dropped somewhat.

But its more of a plateau, or a mesa, not the trough after a wave, said Caitlin Rivers, a disease researcher at Johns Hopkins Universitys Center for Health Security.

Scientists generally agree the nation is still in its first wave of coronavirus infections, albeit one thats dipping in some parts of the country while rising in others.

This virus is spreading around the United States and hitting different places with different intensity at different times, said Dr. Richard Besser, chief executive of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation who was acting director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention when a pandemic flu hit the U.S. in 2009.

Dr. Arnold Monto, a University of Michigan flu expert, echoed that sentiment.

What I would call this is continued transmission with flare-ups, he said.

Flu seasons sometimes feature a second wave of infections. But in those cases, the second wave is a distinct new surge in cases from a strain of flu that is different than the strain that caused earlier illnesses.

Thats not the case in the coronavirus epidemic.

Monto doesnt think second wave really describes whats happening now, calling it totally semantics.

Second waves are basically in the eye of the beholder, he said.

But Besser said semantics matter, because saying a first wave has passed may give people a false sense that the worst is over.

Some worry a large wave of coronavirus might occur this fall or winter after schools reopen, the weather turns colder and less humid, and people huddle inside more. That would follow seasonal patterns seen with flu and other respiratory viruses. And such a fall wave could be very bad, given that theres no vaccine or experts think most Americans havent had the virus.

But the new coronavirus so far has been spreading more episodically and sporadically than flu, and it may not follow the same playbook.

Its very difficult to make a prediction, Rivers said. We dont know the degree to which this virus is seasonal, if at all.

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AP medical writer Lauran Neergaard contributed to this report.

___

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institutes Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

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2nd wave of virus cases? Experts say we're still in the 1st - The Associated Press

In this screengrab, Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms speaks during "Saving Our Selves: A BET COVID-19 Effort" airing on April 22, 2020. Saving Our Selves: A BET COVID-19 Relief Effort will provide financial, educational and community support directly to Black communities hit hardest by COVID-19.

BET2020 | Getty Images for BET NETWORKS

As the nation grapples with racial injustice, presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden is reportedly considering several Black women to be his running mate.

Among the candidates is Keisha Lance Bottoms, the 50-year-old Atlanta mayor who sprung into the national spotlight for her handling of both the coronavirus pandemic and the protests in response to the police killing of George Floyd.

While she doesn't have federal experience like other women said to be under consideration, such as Sen. Kamala Harris or former national security advisor Susan Rice, her executive performance during tumultuous times have put her on the Biden campaign's radar. Harris, Rice and fellow potential nominee Rep. Val Demings are all Black, as well.

"The idea that she's had some experience where she had to manage a bureaucracy and she's had to handle multiple offices would distinguish [Bottoms]," said Andra Gillespie, associate professor of political science at Emory University in Atlanta. Being a federal lawmaker is "very different than actually being in an elected position of power where the buck stops with you."

"It was the same type of argument that Pete Buttigieg was making: that having held executive office would probably make him better qualified than somebody who had been a senator only," Gillespie said. Buttigieg is the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, who ran for president but dropped out just ahead of Super Tuesday.

But Atlanta, far bigger and more complex than South Bend, might demonstrate that Bottoms has even more leadership potential than Buttigieg did, Gillespie said. Atlanta has a population of about 500,000 people, according to U.S. Census records, five times the size of South Bend's population.

Born in Atlanta, Bottoms was elected mayor in 2017, after serving six years as a city councilmember.Her father, Major Lance, was a prominent R&B singer in the 1960s.

As mayor, Bottoms, a mother to four kids, has delivered passionate speeches on Black children experiencing racial profiling.

More recently, Bottoms earned national recognition for her critical response to Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, who she said was rushing the reopening process and endangering the state's population while the coronavirus continued to spread. Kemp announced reopening plans for the state as early as April 24, despite increasing numbers of confirmed cases in Atlanta at the time.

"I think that there was perhaps a way for us to be very thoughtful about a phased reopening," Bottoms said in an interview with NPR. "I don't think that that should have begun with hair salons and barbershops and places that people cannot appropriately socially distance or even have readily available access to the appropriate PPE. So I do think that there could have been a more thoughtful approach."

It was around this time that Rep. Jim Clyburn, the most powerful Black man in Congress, floated the idea that Bottoms could be seen as a compelling VP pick.

"There is a young lady right there in Georgia who I think would make a tremendous VP candidate, and that's the mayor of Atlanta, Keisha Lance Bottoms," said Clyburn, the House majority whip who endorsed Biden ahead of the crucial primary in Clyburn's home state of South Carolina.

Bottoms' leadership was also tested during the protests against Floyd's death, where Bottoms made an impassioned speech calling for the end of destructive behavior that sprung out of the demonstrations.

"What I see happening on the streets of Atlanta is not Atlanta. This is not a protest. This is not in the spirit of Martin Luther King, Jr.," Bottoms said at a news briefing. "This is chaos."

Protests erupted nationwide after video emerged showing a former Minneapolis police officer kneeling on Floyd's neck on Memorial Day for nearly eight minutes. Floyd, a Black man who was handcuffed and face down on the ground, told officers he couldn't breathe. His death was ruled a homicide, and the officer who knelt on Floyd's neck, Derek Chauvin, was charged with murder.

Demonstrators march during a protest against racial inequality and the death of Rayshard Brooks in Atlanta, Georgia, June 15, 2020.

Alex Hicks Jr. | USA TODAY NETWORK | Reuters

In an attempt to model peaceful demonstration, Bottoms herself participated in some of the protests calling for justice for Floyd.

"In some ways she is trying to be responsive to the cries that might be coming from the progressive wing of the party for policing reform," Gillespie said, adding that Bottoms might also be trying to show conservative voters that police reform isn't necessarily something that "looks disruptive and disorderly."

Neither the Biden campaign nor Bottoms' office immediately responded to a request for comment from CNBC.

Bottoms could also help Biden further lock up the black vote for the Democratic ticket, although her lack of name recognition at the national level might be a drawback, experts say.

"I'm certain that the Biden folk understand that at this point African American women are pretty much one of the more significant constituents of the Democratic Party," said William Boone, political science professor at Clark Atlanta University. "But on the other hand, does she have that kind of national appeal? Do other African American women, groups and organizations know her well enough to say, 'Yeah, we pledge to support her.'"

More than 90% of Black women voted for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election.

Given such strong support for the Democratic nominee and given also the nationwide response to Floyd's death, it makes sense for Biden to seriously consider a Black woman as his running mate, Boone and Gillespie said.

Harris and Demings, meanwhile, come with a reputation defined in part by their experience in law enforcement.

"Right now, having had prosecutorial or police experience is not viewed as a plus," Gillespie said. Women like Demings and Harris have a challenge to show Biden why they would complement him best. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, who served as a prosecutor in Minnesota, said on Thursday that she was withdrawing from consideration for VP because "this is a moment to put a woman of color on that ticket."

"Klobuchar is accused, often by law enforcement, of letting the murderers go, and Harris is accused of [putting] so many Blacks in prison," said Marilyn Davis, associate professor of political science at Spelman College in Atlanta.

And while Bottoms isn't as well-known as Harris, that could work in her favor, Gillespie said. Bottoms has the opportunity to "define" herself.

"If you have someone who is much more of a known quantity, it's much harder to drive up the favorable and drive down the negative when people's opinions of them have already been formulated," Gillespie said.

But on the other hand, Bottoms' inexperience at the federal level might inhibit her on the debate stage against Vice President Mike Pence.

Biden's running mate will face Pence on Oct. 7 during the vice presidential debate at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City.

Pence, serving alongside President Donald Trump, has become a seasoned public speaker in national affairs after delivering numerous addresses on the coronavirus and other issues.

Bottoms' performances in the debate for mayor's office fluctuated in terms of quality, Boone said. "Some were fairly good, and others were not so good."

"Pence has far more experience at the national level than Mayor Bottoms. So it becomes about how much prepping you have to do to get her up to speed, in terms of answering some of these questions," Boone added.

But Bottoms, a longtime Biden endorser, has stumped for the presumptive Democratic nominee in Iowa. She pledged support for Biden as early as Junelast year, when there were about two dozen candidates for the nomination.

And in the last few months, her efforts to control the protests and respond strategically to the pandemic showed her speaking power could galvanize the people of Atlanta and makes waves nationally.

She went viral "because she commanded the stage and had presence," Gillespie said.

"Because of the challenges we've faced in the last few months, she's had some opportunity to build a national reputation and has had opportunities to practice that could translate well into her being able to give speeches at conventions, at rallies and to go up against Mike Pence on the debate stage."

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How Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms became part of the Biden VP conversation - CNBC