#Labor Secretary Eugene Scalia confident US businesses can reopen amid coronavirus

Labor Secretary Eugene Scalia on Sunday said businesses can begin to reopen if safety precautions are followed, despite the rise of coronavirus cases in some states.

“We have new cases, we have to keep an eye on that, [but] I believe we can continue to reopen our workplaces safely,” Scalia said on “Fox News Sunday.”

“It is going to be important that people take social distancing seriously, wear masks in circumstances where they’re not able to social distance and the like,” he continued. “We can reopen safely, we can reopen while the virus is still there but it will get more challenging if people don’t take that seriously.”

Scalia expressed optimism about the US adding roughly 5 million jobs in June, promising retail spending numbers and the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement that took effect on July 1.

Asked about whether the country could see a V-shaped recovery, Scalia responded: “Those are the indications that we see.”

He also acknowledged that “there remain many Americans still out of work” and said the president is considering tax cuts.

Scalia said the Trump administration is prepared to deal with a rise in coronavirus cases as businesses open.

“We knew that as people came out of their homes, emerged from their basements and the like, we knew that cases would go up,” Scalia said. “We are far better prepared to deal with those cases now than we were a few months ago … we have the equipment, the hospital beds to deal with this situation.”

“This is something that we can manage,” he said.