The new guidelines come as lawmakers and business leaders press the administration to expand virus testing, and days after Mr. Trump said that he—not governors—was the final arbiter on when to reopen the country.
“America wants to be open, and Americans want to be open,” Mr. Trump told reporters at the White House on Thursday, adding later, “We must have a working economy, and we want to get it back very, very quickly.”
The new guidelines, formally known as Opening Up America Again, outline a three-phase process for opening up the country based on the scope of the outbreak in individual states.
“We are not opening all at once, but one careful step at a time,” Mr. Trump said.
The guidelines don’t suggest specific reopening dates. Instead, they encourage states to base their decisions on data. The White House’s plan says states should move to the first phase of reopening after exhibiting a downward trend of documented cases or positive tests over a two-week period. States could move onto the other stages after showing that cases aren’t surging.
Under the first phase, movie theaters, restaurants, sports venues, places of worship, gyms and other venues could open with strict social-distancing guidelines in place, though bars would stay closed. Schools and day-care centers that are closed would remain shuttered. The plan recommends that vulnerable individuals remain at home during the first phase, and prohibits visits to nursing homes and hospitals. Some people could return to work in phases, though telework is still encouraged under the plan.
In the second phase, nonessential travel could resume and bars could open with some restrictions. Schools and youth activities could reopen. Vulnerable individuals would still be told to stay home and visits to nursing homes and hospitals would still be barred. Telework would continue to be encouraged.
For phase three, there would be no restrictions on workplaces and vulnerable people could resume social interactions, but should seek to follow social distancing. Visits to hospitals and nursing homes could resume, and bars could increase their standing-room capacity.
The president said some states with few cases could proceed to the first phase as early as Friday if they meet the criteria. He declined to name any specific states, deferring to governors, but said there are as many as 29 states that could soon begin the process of opening.
But officials stressed that the virus could make a comeback in some states.
“There may be some setbacks. Let’s face it,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, the administration’s top infectious-disease expert, cautioned. “We may have to pull back a little, and then go forward.”
The president told governors during a videoconference earlier Thursday that they will make the final decision on opening their states.
“You’re going to call your own shots,” Mr. Trump told the governors, according to a recording of the call reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. “We’ll be standing right alongside of you and we’re going to get our country open.”
Mr. Trump praised the guidelines and said he wanted to get the country running again. He told the governors that some states were in “good shape” to open quickly, even before May 1 if they want, though other states may need to take longer.
He also said the country’s testing capabilities are excellent, adding that the testing process has improved from early versions that involved sticking a swab into the nasal cavity.
“I was a victim of the first test, meaning I had to go through it and I didn’t like what was happening when they tell you that it goes up your nose and they hang a right at your eye and it goes right to your eye,” Mr. Trump said. “You’ve got to be kidding. I called it an operation, not a test.”
Mr. Trump said the new guidelines have been approved by the administration’s public-health advisers, including Deborah Birx, the White House coronavirus coordinator, and Dr. Fauci.
“The dominating drive of this was to make sure that this is done in the safest way possible,” Dr. Fauci told reporters on Thursday.
Lifting the restrictions has been the subject of fierce debate both inside and outside the Trump administration, at times pitting economic-policy makers eager to reverse massive job losses against public-health experts concerned about a resurgence of cases.
It will ultimately be up to individual governors to formally lift state stay-at-home orders. While some governors are looking to the federal government for guidance and may feel political pressure to follow Mr. Trump’s lead, most governors will make the decision based on evolving conditions in their states.
Some states have already extended restrictions past April 30. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, said Thursday that nonessential businesses in his state would remain closed at least through May 15.
Mr. Cuomo is part of a coalition of East Coast governors consulting each other on coronavirus guidelines. A similar group exists on the West Coast, and a bipartisan group of seven Midwestern governors said Thursday it would do the same.
In a news briefing after the call with Mr. Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said a task force he created to plan for a reopening would meet for the first time on Friday, and he hopes to announce a plan within a week.
“The first phase is a gradual reopening, and then if the trends continue good, then you do a larger reopening,” said Mr. DeSantis, a Republican.
In recent days, Mr. Trump has touted his relationships with governors, stressing that he will work closely with them as they weigh plans to reopen.
At the same time, the president has emphasized that states have responsibility for obtaining crucial medical supplies and coronavirus tests, positioning the federal government, which has faced criticism for its response to the outbreak, as a backup. The president has criticized some governors, including Mr. Cuomo, with the two men publicly trading barbs in recent days.
Public-health experts, including some in the Trump administration, have warned that reopening the country too soon could prompt a second wave of coronavirus cases, undercut ongoing mitigation efforts and overwhelm the health-care system. Dr. Fauci said this week that the country lacked the testing and virus-tracing capabilities needed to reopen. Some business executives raised similar concerns during a teleconference with Mr. Trump on Wednesday.
Mr. Trump held phone briefings on Thursday with House and Senate lawmakers. The White House announced a coronavirus advisory group made up of elected officials, part of a broader task force of more than 200 business executives that Mr. Trump established this week.
The bipartisan group includes all Republican members of the Senate, except Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, who voted to convict Mr. Trump in the impeachment trial in February. Twelve Senate Democrats will serve on the committee, alongside 32 House members—22 Republicans and 10 Democrats.
The president opened a call with several House lawmakers by touting his response to the coronavirus pandemic, saying he had done a lot of things right, according to people who were on the call.
Lawmakers from both parties repeatedly told the White House that testing for coronavirus needed to be expanded to reopen the government, as well as contact tracing.
On a separate call with senators, Mr. Trump again heard bipartisan calls to ramp up testing. He said the country’s testing system had steadily advanced, according to a person familiar with the matter. He pointed to a newly developed saliva test, arguing it would make it easier for people to determine whether they have the virus.
The U.S. has conducted more than 3 million tests for Covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, since the start of the outbreak. Experts say the level of testing would need to increase to millions of tests a week before Americans can return to work in large numbers.
Dr. Birx said on Thursday the U.S. has the capacity “for at least a million more tests per week.”
“We have a whole team working lab by lab to see what it would take to turn on all of those labs that aren’t running the pieces of equipment now,” she said.
Mr. Trump is eager to reopen the country as soon as possible, according to White House officials, who are closely tracking the ailing economy. Another 5.2 million Americans filed for unemployment benefits last week, bringing the total seeking aid in a month of coronavirus-related shutdowns to 22 million.