Thursday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” network host and Capitol Hill correspondent Kasie Hunt discussed the impact of the coronavirus pandemic raging on during the 2020 presidential race.

Hunt said the pandemic is “driving a lot” of the decisions being made by the candidates, suggesting President Donald Trump’s decision to reopen the United States economy will largely depend on whether or not he is going to win reelection.

“I think the pandemic is driving a lot of this,” Hunt outlined. “Bernie Sanders acknowledged when he talked to supporters yesterday that, you know, this is a desperate moment for our country. And this is a time where Democrats do all need to be on the same page. I think they’ve got some work to do to get there, on to the same page. I mean, this was really out of character, I actually think, for Bernie Sanders. And it speaks to the gravity of the situation that we’ve just been spending the last half an hour discussing. I think that’s what’s really driving this here because he is an incredibly stubborn politician who did not get out last time. I think he has a good relationship, a better relationship with Joe Biden than he did with Hillary Clinton that could also help them going forward. But, you know, Joe Biden still has a long way to go. There’s a lot of challenges associated with running a campaign in this pandemic.”

She continued, “You know, I was talking a couple of days ago to a really smart Republican who pointed out to me that the president’s going to be judged at the end of the day on how this comes out. Not necessarily how it started. How it started is going to be a huge part of that, but only because it’s driving the end result. And that means that the president’s decisions day in and day out, about whether to open the economy, for example, still stand to be the most important and critical decisions that he is making in the context of whether he is going to win reelection.”

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