truthout--2020-04-30--Trump Reportedly Lashed Out at His Campaign Manager Over Grim Reelection Polls

President Donald Trump is denying reports that he erupted last week at his own campaign manager over numbers that showed he was down in the polls in a head-to-head general election matchup against presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden .
Trump , during a phone conversation with campaign manager Brad Parscale on Friday , reportedly ran the gamut of emotions when confronted with the data , berating and shouting at him during the call .
Sources familiar with what was said described how Trump blamed others for his dwindling numbers .
The president also said the numbers didn ’ t matter @ @ @ @ @ @ @ race regardless .
He further blasted the data as wrong , and he blamed Parscale specifically for his dismal ratings .
The president even threatened a lawsuit against his campaign manager , according to the sources familiar with the exchange , mentioning income Parscale had earned as a result of Trump becoming president .
Parscale had a tongue-in-cheek response to the president ’ s harsh words against him .
“ I love you , too , ” the campaign manager said , according to the sources .
Later in the day , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hours of Thursday morning , Trump denied the reporting of the incident , which initially came from CNN .
“ Just told that Fake News @ CNN is falsely reporting that I was recently shouting at my campaign manager over made up nonsense , ” Trump tweeted just after midnight .
“ Actually , he is doing a great job , I never shouted at him ( been with me for years , including the 2016 win ) , & have no intention to do so .
Just FAKE NEWS !
” “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ didn ’ t yell at me , ” he wrote in a tweet of his own .
“ There ’ s absolutely no daylight between us .
We have a great relationship that spans almost 10 yrs.
” Parscale further suggested that media had obtained errant information “ from bitter anonymous sources whose clear goal is to hurt POTUS.
” Trump has lashed out at campaign workers in the past , however , including last summer when he unceremoniously fired a pair of campaign pollsters .
When internal numbers were leaked demonstrating that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ like Michigan and Wisconsin , he fired the pollsters who had conducted the surveys .
It ’ s likely that the termination was due to the leak and not the numbers , but at least one source said Trump was upset with the pollsters ’ job performances .
Whether he got upset with his campaign manager or not last week , the incumbent president has a very narrow path toward reelection at this time .
According to the Cook Political Report , states representing a total of 232 Electoral College votes appear to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ this time , while 220 Electoral College votes look as though they will lean in Trump ’ s direction ( a candidate must receive 270 Electoral College votes to win the election ) .
Five states , totaling 86 Electoral College votes , are toss-ups at this time .
However , those five toss-up states — Arizona , Florida , Michigan , Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — all appear to be trending toward the Democratic candidate , according to aggregate polling data from Real Clear Politics .
All five were won by Trump in @ @

Aggregate polling numbers from five swing states show Trump currently behind Biden in every one of them.
President Donald Trump is denying reports that he erupted last week at his own campaign manager over numbers that showed he was down in the polls in a head-to-head general election matchup against presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden.
Trump, during a phone conversation with campaign manager Brad Parscale on Friday, reportedly ran the gamut of emotions when confronted with the data, berating and shouting at him during the call.
Sources familiar with what was said described how Trump blamed others for his dwindling numbers. The president also said the numbers didn’t matter, that he’d win the race regardless. He further blasted the data as wrong, and he blamed Parscale specifically for his dismal ratings.
The president even threatened a lawsuit against his campaign manager, according to the sources familiar with the exchange, mentioning income Parscale had earned as a result of Trump becoming president.
Parscale had a tongue-in-cheek response to the president’s harsh words against him. “I love you, too,” the campaign manager said, according to the sources. Later in the day, the two made amends.
In the early hours of Thursday morning, Trump denied the reporting of the incident, which initially came from CNN.
“Just told that Fake News @CNN is falsely reporting that I was recently shouting at my campaign manager over made up nonsense,” Trump tweeted just after midnight. “Actually, he is doing a great job, I never shouted at him (been with me for years, including the 2016 win), & have no intention to do so. Just FAKE NEWS!”
Parscale also denied the report’s authenticity.
“Attn #FakeNews media: @realDonaldTrump didn’t yell at me,” he wrote in a tweet of his own. “There’s absolutely no daylight between us. We have a great relationship that spans almost 10 yrs.”
Attn #FakeNews media:@realDonaldTrump didn’t yell at me. There’s absolutely no daylight between us. We have a great relationship that spans almost 10 yrs. Curious how multiple outlets had the same false story from bitter anonymous sources whose clear goal is to hurt POTUS. — Brad Parscale – Download our Trump 2020 App today! (@parscale) April 30, 2020
Parscale further suggested that media had obtained errant information “from bitter anonymous sources whose clear goal is to hurt POTUS.”
Trump has lashed out at campaign workers in the past, however, including last summer when he unceremoniously fired a pair of campaign pollsters. When internal numbers were leaked demonstrating that he was losing to Biden in states like Michigan and Wisconsin, he fired the pollsters who had conducted the surveys.
It’s likely that the termination was due to the leak and not the numbers, but at least one source said Trump was upset with the pollsters’ job performances.
Whether he got upset with his campaign manager or not last week, the incumbent president has a very narrow path toward reelection at this time. According to the Cook Political Report, states representing a total of 232 Electoral College votes appear to be in Biden’s column at this time, while 220 Electoral College votes look as though they will lean in Trump’s direction (a candidate must receive 270 Electoral College votes to win the election). Five states, totaling 86 Electoral College votes, are toss-ups at this time.
However, those five toss-up states — Arizona, Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin — all appear to be trending toward the Democratic candidate, according to aggregate polling data from Real Clear Politics. All five were won by Trump in 2016.
Tired of reading the same old news from the same old sources? So are we! That’s why we’re on a mission to shake things up and bring you the stories and perspectives that often go untold in mainstream media. But being a radically, unapologetically independent news site isn’t easy (or cheap), and we rely on reader support to keep the lights on.
If you like what you’re reading, please consider making a tax-deductible donation today. We’re not asking for a handout, we’re asking for an investment: Invest in a nonprofit news site that’s not afraid to ruffle a few feathers, not afraid to stand up for what’s right, and not afraid to tell it like it is.
Copyright © Truthout. May not be reprinted without permission.


truthout--2020-04-30--Trump Embraces the Role of Killer-in-Chief

“ Be assured of one thing : whichever candidate you choose at the polls in November , you aren ’ t just electing a president of the United States ; you are also electing an assassin-in-chief.
” So I wrote back in June 2012 , with a presidential election approaching .
I was referring then to the war on terror ’ s CIA and military drone assassination programs , which first revved up in parts of the Greater Middle East in the years of George W. Bush ’ s presidency and only spread thereafter .
In the process , such @ @ @ @ @ @ @ I wrote at the time , “ thoroughly institutionalized , normalized , and bureaucratized around the figure of the president.
” In Barack Obama ’ s years in the Oval Office , they were ramped up further as he joined White House “ Terror Tuesday ” meetings to choose individual targets for those attacks .
They often enough turned out to involve “ collateral damage ” ; that is , the deaths of innocent civilians , including children .
In other words , “ commander-in-chief ” had , by then , gained a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ personally took on the role of a global assassin .
I had little doubt eight years ago that this wouldn ’ t end soon — and on that I wasn ’ t wrong .
Admittedly , our present commander-in-chief probably doesn ’ t have the time ( given how much of his day he ’ s spent watching Fox News , tweeting his millions of followers , and , until recently , holding two hour press-briefings-cum-election-rallies on the coronavirus pandemic ) or the attention span for “ Terror Tuesday ” meetings .
Still @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he ’ s managed to make himself America ’ s assassin-in-chief par excellence .
After all , not only have those drone programs continued to target people in distant lands ( including innocent civilians ) , but they have yet again been ramped up in the Trump years .
Meanwhile , still in our pre-Covid-19 American world , President Trump embraced the role of assassin-in-chief in a newly public , deeply enthusiastic way .
Previously , such drones had killed non-state actors , but he openly ordered the drone assassination of Major General @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and number-two man in Iran , as he left Baghdad International Airport for a meeting with the prime minister of Iraq .
Of course , for American presidents such a role was not unknown even before the development of Hellfire-missile-armed drones .
Think of John F. Kennedy and the CIA ’ s ( failed ) attempts on the life of Cuban leader Fidel Castro or the successful killings of Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba , South Vietnamese leader Ngo Dinh Diem , and Dominican Republic head Rafael Trujillo .
Or , for a change @ @ @ @ @ @ @ CIA assassination campaign known as the Phoenix Program in which tens of thousands of supposed “ Vietcong ” supporters ( often enough , civilians swept up in the murderous chaos of the moment ) were murdered in that country , a program that was no secret to President Lyndon Johnson .
And it ’ s true as well that , in this century , our commanders-in-chief have overseen endless conflicts in distant lands from Afghanistan , Iraq , and Syria to Yemen , Somalia , Niger , and beyond , none of them @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , they had the ultimate responsibility for the deaths of , at a minimum , tens of thousands of civilians , as well as for the uprooting of millions of their compatriots from settled lives and their flight , as desperate refugees , across significant parts of the planet .
It ’ s a grim record of death and destruction .
Until recently , however , it remained a matter of distant deaths , not much noted here .
A New Kind of Drone War on the Pandemic Front However , the assassin-in-chief @ @ @ @ @ @ @ time , in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic .
Little did I imagine that , by 2020 , an American president without a lick of empathy for other human beings , even Americans who loved him to death ( so to speak ) , would be targeting not just civilians here in “ the homeland ” ( as it came to become known after the 9/11 attacks ) , but his most fervent followers .
In the age of Donald Trump , the assassin-in-chief now seems to be in the process of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ That reality — at least for me — came into focus only recently .
True , until then , even beyond those drone strikes , American presidents have had the ultimate responsibility for the deaths of startling numbers of civilians in faraway lands where the U.S. military has been making war ( remarkably fruitlessly ) for almost 19 years .
The devastating use of American air power generally has only increased during the Trump years in , for instance , both Afghanistan and Somalia , where U.S. airstrikes have hit new levels of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at the Intercept — more of them in the first four pandemic months of 2020 than in all of the Obama years combined .
Still , historically speaking , killing Afghans or Iraqis or Syrians or Yemenis or Somalis has always been one thing , but Americans ?
That ’ s another story entirely , no ?
As it happens , the answer is indeed no , not in 2020 , and once again , in a sense , air power is at the heart of the matter .
In this case , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the spread of Covid-19 , in part through respiratory droplets ( think of them as microscopic Hellfire missiles ) .
In that new air-powered context , with the equivalent of a drone virus in the hands of one Donald J. Trump , the president is bringing the role of assassin-in-chief home .
He is , in fact , in the process of becoming a killer-in-chief for his very own base — anyone , that is , who listens to what he says and believes fervently in him .
Set aside for a moment @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for because of , as Juan Cole put it recently at his Informed Comment website , “ those two months he pissed away calling [ Covid-19 ] a hoax and setting up the country for Vietnam War-level death tolls.
” Put aside as well his repeated and dangerous medical advice to find and take anti-malarial drugs .
Put aside as well his suggestion that perhaps people fearing they have the coronavirus should try to inject or internally take disinfectants ( which , a recent study showed , do kill that virus on surfaces @ @ @ @ @ @ @ act medical experts assure us could result in death .
Think of each of those potential death sentences for his most fervent believers as a striking combination of grotesque ignorance and narcissism .
But what about an actual decision , as commander-in-chief and president , to kill off members of his base ?
Until a couple of weeks ago , that would have been harder to imagine — until , that is , President Trump noticed the first demonstrations against state shutdowns focused on preventing the deadly Covid-19 virus from spreading .
Those @ @ @ @ @ @ @ organized or encouraged by what the New York Times describes as “ an informal coalition of influential conservative leaders and groups , some with close connections to the White House , ” have continued to bring out demonstrators in Trump-election-like rallies by the dozens , hundreds , or even ( in a few cases ) thousands .
Often , the demonstrators are not wearing the very masks that the president has recommended for other people ( but not himself ) ; nor are they keeping the social distance he has also officially backed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to keep ) .
They sport bizarre signs ( “ Don ’ t cancel my golf season , ” “ My body/my choice , Trump 2020 ” [ with an image of a face mask crossed out ] , “ Give me liberty or give me Covid-19 , ” “ We demand haircuts ” ) , carry American flags and occasional Confederate ones , and are sometimes armed to the teeth ( not exactly surprising , given that the protests have been supported by conservative pro-gun or armed militia groups ) .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of those demonstrations , being so eager himself to “ reopen ” America and “ the greatest economy in the history of our country ” ( then headed for the pandemic subbasement ) .
It mattered little that , despite the grim pressures of the moment , polling showed significant numbers of Americans , including Republicans , preferred to keep the U.S. largely shut down for now .
In response , he tweeted : “ LIBERATE MINNESOTA , ” “ LIBERATE MICHIGAN , ” and then “ LIBERATE VIRGINIA , and save your @ @ @ @ @ @ @ siege !
” All were states run by Democratic governors .
And his focus on supporting such demonstrations quickly got the media ’ s attention , as they began to spread elsewhere .
At one of his nightly coronavirus briefings , the president then said this of the demonstrators : “ These are people expressing their views .
I see where they are and I see the way they ’ re working .
They seem to be very responsible people to me , but they ’ ve been treated a little bit rough.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ in his sightlines and his base in the forefront of his brain , he then began to encourage more of the same from both protesters and governors — and the Republican governor of Georgia broke the ice , so to speak , by attempting to reopen everything down to nail salons and movie theaters ( something even the president would later criticize ) , while the Republican governor of Florida reopened that state ’ s beaches .
Now , here ’ s the obvious thing in this pandemic moment : if you ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ( no less the governor of Georgia , Florida , or other Republican administrations or legislatures in a hurry to reopen the country ) , you ’ re encouraging people to sicken and die .
To support citizens turning out to protest without either protection or any sense of social distancing is to support people potentially giving each other Covid-19 , a disease which clearly spreads best in close quarters like nursing homes , prisons , crowded housing of any sort , or assumedly protests of this very kind .
As one epidemiologist @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of perhaps 2,500 protesters in Seattle , Washington , “ I predict a new epidemic surge ( incubation time — 5-7 days before onset [ of ] symptoms , if any , and transmission to associates around that time , even among asymptomatics ) … so increase in 2-4 weeks from now.
” At this point , in a country leading the world by a long shot in known cases of , and deaths from , Covid-19 , none of this should exactly be rocket science .
It ’ s beyond obvious that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ re increasing the odds that the protesters will both catch and pass on a disease that ’ s already killed 60,000 Americans , more than U.S. fatalities from 20 years of war in Vietnam .
And that , of course , makes the president of the United States a killer , too .
Or thought of another way , the assassin-in-chief in distant lands has just transformed himself into an assassin-in-chief right here at home , a man who might as well have fired Hellfire missiles into such crowds or put a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ those protesters and their wives or husbands or lovers or parents or children ( to whom the disease will undoubtedly be spread once they go home ) and pulled the trigger .
The act of encouraging members of his base to court death is clearly that of a man without an ounce of empathy , even for those who love and admire him most — and so of a stone-cold killer .
You couldn ’ t ask for more proof that the only sense of empathy he has lies overwhelmingly in his deep @ @ @ @ @ @ @ matches his staggering sense of self-aggrandizement ) and perhaps for his children , other billionaires , and fossil-fuel executives .
Them , he would save ; the rest of us , his base included , are expendable .
He ’ d sacrifice any of us without a second thought if he imagined that it would benefit him or his reelection in any way .
But there ’ s no point in leaving it at that .
After all , as he pushes for a too-swiftly reopened country , he ’ s declaring open @ @ @ @ @ @ @ And every one of us who will die too soon should be considered another Covidfire missile death and chalked up to a president who , by the time this is over , will truly have given a new meaning to the phrase assassin-in-chief .
You could say , I suppose , that he ’ s just been putting his stamp of approval on the recent statement of Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick , another politician in a rush to reopen his state not to business , but to the business of pandemics .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ s position ( and those of the protesters as well ) in this fashion : “ there are more important things than living.
” Indeed , how true , though not , of course , for Donald Trump , or the Trump Organization , or that hotel of his in Washington , or his other presently sinking properties , or for his reelection in November 2020 .
As for the rest of us , in Covid-19 America , we are all now potential Suleimanis .

“Be assured of one thing: whichever candidate you choose at the polls in November, you aren’t just electing a president of the United States; you are also electing an assassin-in-chief.” So I wrote back in June 2012, with a presidential election approaching.
I was referring then to the war on terror’s CIA and military drone assassination programs, which first revved up in parts of the Greater Middle East in the years of George W. Bush’s presidency and only spread thereafter. In the process, such “targeted killings” became, as I wrote at the time, “thoroughly institutionalized, normalized, and bureaucratized around the figure of the president.” In Barack Obama’s years in the Oval Office, they were ramped up further as he joined White House “Terror Tuesday” meetings to choose individual targets for those attacks. They often enough turned out to involve “collateral damage”; that is, the deaths of innocent civilians, including children. In other words, “commander-in-chief” had, by then, gained a deadly new meaning, as the president personally took on the role of a global assassin.
I had little doubt eight years ago that this wouldn’t end soon — and on that I wasn’t wrong. Admittedly, our present commander-in-chief probably doesn’t have the time (given how much of his day he’s spent watching Fox News, tweeting his millions of followers, and, until recently, holding two hour press-briefings-cum-election-rallies on the coronavirus pandemic) or the attention span for “Terror Tuesday” meetings. Still, in his own memorable fashion, he’s managed to make himself America’s assassin-in-chief par excellence.
After all, not only have those drone programs continued to target people in distant lands (including innocent civilians), but they have yet again been ramped up in the Trump years. Meanwhile, still in our pre-Covid-19 American world, President Trump embraced the role of assassin-in-chief in a newly public, deeply enthusiastic way. Previously, such drones had killed non-state actors, but he openly ordered the drone assassination of Major General Qassim Suleimani, the top military figure and number-two man in Iran, as he left Baghdad International Airport for a meeting with the prime minister of Iraq.
Of course, for American presidents such a role was not unknown even before the development of Hellfire-missile-armed drones. Think of John F. Kennedy and the CIA’s (failed) attempts on the life of Cuban leader Fidel Castro or the successful killings of Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba, South Vietnamese leader Ngo Dinh Diem, and Dominican Republic head Rafael Trujillo. Or, for a change of pace, consider the Vietnam War-era CIA assassination campaign known as the Phoenix Program in which tens of thousands of supposed “Vietcong” supporters (often enough, civilians swept up in the murderous chaos of the moment) were murdered in that country, a program that was no secret to President Lyndon Johnson.
And it’s true as well that, in this century, our commanders-in-chief have overseen endless conflicts in distant lands from Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria to Yemen, Somalia, Niger, and beyond, none of them congressionally declared wars. As a result, they had the ultimate responsibility for the deaths of, at a minimum, tens of thousands of civilians, as well as for the uprooting of millions of their compatriots from settled lives and their flight, as desperate refugees, across significant parts of the planet. It’s a grim record of death and destruction. Until recently, however, it remained a matter of distant deaths, not much noted here.
A New Kind of Drone War on the Pandemic Front
However, the assassin-in-chief may now be coming home, big time, in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic. Little did I imagine that, by 2020, an American president without a lick of empathy for other human beings, even Americans who loved him to death (so to speak), would be targeting not just civilians here in “the homeland” (as it came to become known after the 9/11 attacks), but his most fervent followers. In the age of Donald Trump, the assassin-in-chief now seems to be in the process of transforming himself into a domestic killer-in-chief.
That reality — at least for me — came into focus only recently. True, until then, even beyond those drone strikes, American presidents have had the ultimate responsibility for the deaths of startling numbers of civilians in faraway lands where the U.S. military has been making war (remarkably fruitlessly) for almost 19 years. The devastating use of American air power generally has only increased during the Trump years in, for instance, both Afghanistan and Somalia, where U.S. airstrikes have hit new levels of destructiveness, as Nick Turse reported recently at the Intercept — more of them in the first four pandemic months of 2020 than in all of the Obama years combined.
Still, historically speaking, killing Afghans or Iraqis or Syrians or Yemenis or Somalis has always been one thing, but Americans? That’s another story entirely, no?
As it happens, the answer is indeed no, not in 2020, and once again, in a sense, air power is at the heart of the matter. In this case, though, we’re talking about the spread of Covid-19, in part through respiratory droplets (think of them as microscopic Hellfire missiles). In that new air-powered context, with the equivalent of a drone virus in the hands of one Donald J. Trump, the president is bringing the role of assassin-in-chief home. He is, in fact, in the process of becoming a killer-in-chief for his very own base — anyone, that is, who listens to what he says and believes fervently in him. Set aside for a moment the deaths he’s undoubtedly responsible for because of, as Juan Cole put it recently at his Informed Comment website, “those two months he pissed away calling [Covid-19] a hoax and setting up the country for Vietnam War-level death tolls.” Put aside as well his repeated and dangerous medical advice to find and take anti-malarial drugs. Put aside as well his suggestion that perhaps people fearing they have the coronavirus should try to inject or internally take disinfectants (which, a recent study showed, do kill that virus on surfaces and in the air), an act medical experts assure us could result in death.
Think of each of those potential death sentences for his most fervent believers as a striking combination of grotesque ignorance and narcissism. But what about an actual decision, as commander-in-chief and president, to kill off members of his base?
Until a couple of weeks ago, that would have been harder to imagine — until, that is, President Trump noticed the first demonstrations against state shutdowns focused on preventing the deadly Covid-19 virus from spreading. Those protests against “stay-at-home” orders, organized or encouraged by what the New York Times describes as “an informal coalition of influential conservative leaders and groups, some with close connections to the White House,” have continued to bring out demonstrators in Trump-election-like rallies by the dozens, hundreds, or even (in a few cases) thousands.
Often, the demonstrators are not wearing the very masks that the president has recommended for other people (but not himself); nor are they keeping the social distance he has also officially backed (but continues to find it impossible to keep). They sport bizarre signs (“Don’t cancel my golf season,” “My body/my choice, Trump 2020” [with an image of a face mask crossed out], “Give me liberty or give me Covid-19,” “We demand haircuts”), carry American flags and occasional Confederate ones, and are sometimes armed to the teeth (not exactly surprising, given that the protests have been supported by conservative pro-gun or armed militia groups).
The Donald was clearly pleased with the earliest of those demonstrations, being so eager himself to “reopen” America and “the greatest economy in the history of our country” (then headed for the pandemic subbasement). It mattered little that, despite the grim pressures of the moment, polling showed significant numbers of Americans, including Republicans, preferred to keep the U.S. largely shut down for now. In response, he tweeted: “LIBERATE MINNESOTA,” “LIBERATE MICHIGAN,” and then “LIBERATE VIRGINIA, and save your great 2nd Amendment. It is under siege!” All were states run by Democratic governors. And his focus on supporting such demonstrations quickly got the media’s attention, as they began to spread elsewhere.
At one of his nightly coronavirus briefings, the president then said this of the demonstrators: “These are people expressing their views. I see where they are and I see the way they’re working. They seem to be very responsible people to me, but they’ve been treated a little bit rough.”
With his future election campaign undoubtedly in his sightlines and his base in the forefront of his brain, he then began to encourage more of the same from both protesters and governors — and the Republican governor of Georgia broke the ice, so to speak, by attempting to reopen everything down to nail salons and movie theaters (something even the president would later criticize), while the Republican governor of Florida reopened that state’s beaches.
Targeting His Base
Now, here’s the obvious thing in this pandemic moment: if you’re the president of the United States (no less the governor of Georgia, Florida, or other Republican administrations or legislatures in a hurry to reopen the country), you’re encouraging people to sicken and die. To support citizens turning out to protest without either protection or any sense of social distancing is to support people potentially giving each other Covid-19, a disease which clearly spreads best in close quarters like nursing homes, prisons, crowded housing of any sort, or assumedly protests of this very kind. As one epidemiologist put it in response to a gathering of perhaps 2,500 protesters in Seattle, Washington, “I predict a new epidemic surge (incubation time — 5-7 days before onset [of] symptoms, if any, and transmission to associates around that time, even among asymptomatics)… so increase in 2-4 weeks from now.”
At this point, in a country leading the world by a long shot in known cases of, and deaths from, Covid-19, none of this should exactly be rocket science. It’s beyond obvious that if you encourage such demonstrations, you’re increasing the odds that the protesters will both catch and pass on a disease that’s already killed 60,000 Americans, more than U.S. fatalities from 20 years of war in Vietnam.
And that, of course, makes the president of the United States a killer, too. Or thought of another way, the assassin-in-chief in distant lands has just transformed himself into an assassin-in-chief right here at home, a man who might as well have fired Hellfire missiles into such crowds or put a gun to the head of some of those protesters and their wives or husbands or lovers or parents or children (to whom the disease will undoubtedly be spread once they go home) and pulled the trigger.
The act of encouraging members of his base to court death is clearly that of a man without an ounce of empathy, even for those who love and admire him most — and so of a stone-cold killer. You couldn’t ask for more proof that the only sense of empathy he has lies overwhelmingly in his deep and abiding pity for himself (which matches his staggering sense of self-aggrandizement) and perhaps for his children, other billionaires, and fossil-fuel executives. Them, he would save; the rest of us, his base included, are expendable. He’d sacrifice any of us without a second thought if he imagined that it would benefit him or his reelection in any way.
But there’s no point in leaving it at that. After all, as he pushes for a too-swiftly reopened country, he’s declaring open season on Americans of all sorts. And every one of us who will die too soon should be considered another Covidfire missile death and chalked up to a president who, by the time this is over, will truly have given a new meaning to the phrase assassin-in-chief.
You could say, I suppose, that he’s just been putting his stamp of approval on the recent statement of Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick, another politician in a rush to reopen his state not to business, but to the business of pandemics. Patrick classically summed up the president’s position (and those of the protesters as well) in this fashion: “there are more important things than living.” Indeed, how true, though not, of course, for Donald Trump, or the Trump Organization, or that hotel of his in Washington, or his other presently sinking properties, or for his reelection in November 2020.
As for the rest of us, in Covid-19 America, we are all now potential Suleimanis.
Tired of reading the same old news from the same old sources? So are we! That’s why we’re on a mission to shake things up and bring you the stories and perspectives that often go untold in mainstream media. But being a radically, unapologetically independent news site isn’t easy (or cheap), and we rely on reader support to keep the lights on.
If you like what you’re reading, please consider making a tax-deductible donation today. We’re not asking for a handout, we’re asking for an investment: Invest in a nonprofit news site that’s not afraid to ruffle a few feathers, not afraid to stand up for what’s right, and not afraid to tell it like it is.
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truthout--2020-04-30--If We’re at War, the Weapons We Need Are Tests and PPE, Not Pork

As President Trump invokes the Defense Production Act to bar local governments from closing meatpacking plants around the United States , we get response from a longtime adviser to the World Health Organization .
“ When Congress passed that act , it certainly did not have in mind that the president has the power or the right to put workers ’ lives and health at risk , ” says Lawrence Gostin , professor of global health law at Georgetown University and director of the World Health Organization Center on National and Global Health Law .
Gostin also discusses why he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ declaration this week that urges Trump and Congress to restore and increase WHO funding .
This is a rush transcript .
Copy may not be in its final form .
AMY GOODMAN : This is Democracy Now !
, democracynow.org , The Quarantine Report .
I ’ m Amy Goodman , with Nermeen Shaikh .
This week , President Trump invoked the Defense Production Act to bar local governments from closing meatpacking plants around the United States .
His executive order comes as U.S. beef , pork and poultry processing plants are linked @ @ @ @ @ @ @ coronavirus transmission in the country .
Topping the list is a region around Sioux City , Iowa , where confirmed coronavirus cases are more than doubling every day , with outbreaks at a massive Tyson Foods beef plant and a Seaboard Triumph Foods pork plant .
Trump ’ s order declares meat plants critical infrastructure .
He announced it on Workers ’ Memorial Day , an international day of remembrance and action for workers killed or disabled on the job .
At least 20 meatpacking workers have died from COVID-19 .
Thousands have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ comes as federal guidelines for social distancing are set to expire today , leaving states to determine their plans for reopening .
The Iowa governor , Kim Reynolds , has threatened workers who don ’ t want to return to work because of the coronavirus , saying they will not receive unemployment benefits .
Nebraska workers also risk losing unemployment if they refuse to turn to their jobs .
This is Trump responding to a reporter in the Oval Office Wednesday .
REPORTER : Mr. President , what can you do to help @ @ @ @ @ @ @ back in states that have opened up ?
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP : Well , as you know , we just worked with the meat processors , and if you think about it , a form of delivery .
We have tremendous product .
We have ample supply .
But there was a bottleneck caused by this whole pandemic , and it was pretty — it was potentially pretty serious .
And I just got off the phone with the biggest in the world , I mean , the biggest distributors there are , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been reading about .
They are so thrilled .
They ’ re so happy .
They ’ re all gung-ho .
And we solved their problems .
We unblocked some of the bottlenecks .
AMY GOODMAN : In a statement , Stuart Appelbaum , president of the Retail , Wholesale and Department Store Union , said , quote , “ We only wish that this administration cared as much about the lives of working people as it does about meat , pork , and poultry products.
” Well , for more , we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ professor of global health law at Georgetown University , directs the World Health Organization Center on National and Global Health Law and has served as a senior adviser to the WHO for three decades .
He is also the global editor for JAMA .
That ’ s The Journal of the American Medical Association .
He ’ s joining us from his home in Washington , D.C. Lawrence Gostin , interestingly , last time you joined us on Democracy Now !
several years ago , it was to discuss the Obama administration caving @ @ @ @ @ @ @ guidelines despite World Health Organization findings that processed meat can cause cancer .
I want to welcome you back to Democracy Now !
In a minute , we ’ re going to ask you about Trump ’ s attack on the World Health Organization , removing its funding .
But right now I want to ask you about this massive decision he has made .
As thousands of workers have taken ill with COVID-19 , President Trump issues this executive order saying states can not close meatpacking plants .
Talk about the significance @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Well , let me — remember , the Defense Production Act was really to kind of marshal our production for kind of a warlike state .
And so , if you think about , you know , if we ’ re in a war now , the weapons we need is not meat and pork .
The weapons we actually need are testing equipment , ventilators , and particularly personal protective equipment for our brave health workers , our doctors and nurses and other staff in hospitals .
So that ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , not for producing actually quite unhealthy products like beef and pork .
But that ’ s even a sideshow .
The real thing — AMY GOODMAN : Not to mention the very concern of the workers , as they don ’ t have protective equipment or the tests that they need .
LAWRENCE GOSTIN : No , they don ’ t .
Exactly .
No , that ’ s a really good point .
Thank you .
You know , also , the act , when Congress passed that act , it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the president has the power or the right to put workers ’ lives and health at risk .
And remember , it ’ s not just the workers that are being put at risk .
It ’ s the workers ’ spouses .
It ’ s their children .
It ’ s their wider families all being placed at risk .
No president does have the right to endanger the people of the United States , and certainly not to produce an unhealthy product .
So , what do we do now ?
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ know , I would urge states , while — they might still want to close those meatpacking plants down and let the federal government try to litigate it .
But if not , they certainly should exercise their public health powers , because Congress clearly did not intend to prevent states from assuring the health and safety of the population , and particularly the workforce .
And so , just for a start , state public health departments and governors should slap on really major sanctions against firms that don ’ t provide @ @ @ @ @ @ @ distancing , and to take every possible rigorous measure to ensure the health and safety of these women and men .
Now , this is , remember — you know , would any of you want to go to — any of your listeners want to go to work — AMY GOODMAN : These men and women are overwhelmingly immigrants and African Americans .
LAWRENCE GOSTIN : They are .
And , you know , to say that we can just trust the meatpacking operators and the industry to do this , well @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
If you go back into history , there ’ s a long history of abusing immigrant labor in meatpacking plants .
And also self-evidently , safety precautions haven ’ t been taken , because people have died , and they ’ re getting sick in their thousands .
And so , why would we — why would we want to put hard-working Americans and their families at risk ?
Why would we want to have them choose between their livelihoods and their lives or the lives of their children ?
It ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
It has no compassion .
And a leader , first and foremost — the first responsibility of any leader , any government , is the health and safety and well-being of its population .
So this is really unforgivable , I think .
NERMEEN SHAIKH : Professor Gostin , to turn now to the World Health Organization , you ’ ve advised the WHO for decades .
President Trump , of course , first accused China , as well as the WHO , for being responsible for the pandemic .
Could you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ course , Trump then cutting funding to the WHO .
Could you respond to his decision to do that , as well as the fact that you ’ ve said repeatedly that whatever the failings of the WHO and China , the U.S. is responsible itself for its lack of preparedness for the pandemic ?
Could you talk also about what the U.S. should have done differently and should do now ?
LAWRENCE GOSTIN : Yeah , I mean , there ’ s so much — so many levels there .
Let me @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , I have worked with the World Health Organization under many director-generals for many years .
And the current director-general , the first African head of the World Health Organization , Dr. Tedros , is — I know him well .
He ’ s a man of great integrity , great compassion .
He cares a lot .
So , working with WHO , it can be — sometimes can be maddening .
Yes , they can be slow .
They can be bureaucratic .
But , my god , what they ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ eradicated smallpox .
They ’ re on the verge of eradicating wild polio .
They work in child and maternal health .
They save the lives of under-5 children .
They save the lives of women undergoing childbirth .
They work in diet and obesity and cancer and heart disease , mental health , injury prevention .
I could go on and on .
So , to actually just try to kick the World Health Organization after all it ’ s done , on a budget around the size of one large U.S. @ @ @ @ @ @ @ criticizing WHO , we should be dropping our jaw and thanking them for all the things that they ’ ve done .
So , what about this particular episode with the coronavirus in China ?
President Trump has said WHO took China ’ s side , but there is no sides to a pandemic .
And yes , Dr. Tedros did praise China , but he has also praised President Trump .
That ’ s just diplomacy .
I don ’ t think that Dr. Tedros thinks that either President Trump or Xi @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on this .
And basically , WHO has been caught in a geopolitical power struggle between the world ’ s two superpowers .
And at a time of a once-in-a-century public health crisis , that couldn ’ t be more destructive .
So what should the United States do ?
It should lead a global coalition to at least double — and at least double — the funding of the World Health Organization .
Right now we have the WHO we deserve , because we ’ ve provided it with pitiful financing .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ less than one-quarter of its budget , because we just earmark all the funds that we want for our pet projects .
We don ’ t give it any political backing .
And the proof positive is , as soon as you get on the wrong side of the American president , he withdraws funding .
So , how is that providing the kind of political capital the director-general needs to speak truth to power ?
So , I see this as a — you know , it ’ s a once-in-a-lifetime crisis @ @ @ @ @ @ @ once-in-a-lifetime opportunity .
Out of every major catastrophe , we have to make an opportunity of it .
And for me , that opportunity would be to provide an emboldened and strengthened , well-funded , politically backed World Health Organization , so in future pandemics and for future health crises , we have the WHO we so richly need , which is a powerful one that will stand up to big governments and stand for science , health and equity .
And that ’ s what the WHO is there for .
And @ @ @ @ @ @ @ : We have five seconds .
LAWRENCE GOSTIN : — it was the first United Nations agency .
AMY GOODMAN : I want to thank you so much , Professor Lawrence Gostin , founding O ’ Neill chair in Global Health Law at Georgetown University , director of the World Health Organization Center on National and Global Health Law , also global editor for JAMA : The Journal of the American Medical Association .
That does it for our show .
I ’ m Amy Goodman , with Nermeen Shaikh , for another @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .

As President Trump invokes the Defense Production Act to bar local governments from closing meatpacking plants around the United States, we get response from a longtime adviser to the World Health Organization. “When Congress passed that act, it certainly did not have in mind that the president has the power or the right to put workers’ lives and health at risk,” says Lawrence Gostin, professor of global health law at Georgetown University and director of the World Health Organization Center on National and Global Health Law. Gostin also discusses why he joined 40 leading center directors in a declaration this week that urges Trump and Congress to restore and increase WHO funding.
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The Quarantine Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh. This week, President Trump invoked the Defense Production Act to bar local governments from closing meatpacking plants around the United States. His executive order comes as U.S. beef, pork and poultry processing plants are linked to areas with the highest rates of coronavirus transmission in the country. Topping the list is a region around Sioux City, Iowa, where confirmed coronavirus cases are more than doubling every day, with outbreaks at a massive Tyson Foods beef plant and a Seaboard Triumph Foods pork plant. Trump’s order declares meat plants critical infrastructure. He announced it on Workers’ Memorial Day, an international day of remembrance and action for workers killed or disabled on the job. At least 20 meatpacking workers have died from COVID-19. Thousands have fallen ill from the disease.
This comes as federal guidelines for social distancing are set to expire today, leaving states to determine their plans for reopening. The Iowa governor, Kim Reynolds, has threatened workers who don’t want to return to work because of the coronavirus, saying they will not receive unemployment benefits. Nebraska workers also risk losing unemployment if they refuse to turn to their jobs. This is Trump responding to a reporter in the Oval Office Wednesday.
REPORTER: Mr. President, what can you do to help businesses with liability issues as workers come back in states that have opened up? Related Story Op-Ed | Environment & Health COVID Deaths in US Will Soon Surpass Number of Americans Killed in Vietnam War Before the weekend, known U.S. COVID deaths will surpass 58,000 -- the number of Americans who died in the Vietnam War. Truthout PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Well, as you know, we just worked with the meat processors, and if you think about it, a form of delivery. We have tremendous product. We have ample supply. But there was a bottleneck caused by this whole pandemic, and it was pretty — it was potentially pretty serious. And I just got off the phone with the biggest in the world, I mean, the biggest distributors there are, the big companies that you’ve been reading about. They are so thrilled. They’re so happy. They’re all gung-ho. And we solved their problems. We unblocked some of the bottlenecks.
AMY GOODMAN: In a statement, Stuart Appelbaum, president of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, said, quote, “We only wish that this administration cared as much about the lives of working people as it does about meat, pork, and poultry products.”
Well, for more, we’re joined by Lawrence Gostin, professor of global health law at Georgetown University, directs the World Health Organization Center on National and Global Health Law and has served as a senior adviser to the WHO for three decades. He is also the global editor for JAMA. That’s The Journal of the American Medical Association. He’s joining us from his home in Washington, D.C.
Lawrence Gostin, interestingly, last time you joined us on Democracy Now! several years ago, it was to discuss the Obama administration caving to the meat lobby in its dietary guidelines despite World Health Organization findings that processed meat can cause cancer. I want to welcome you back to Democracy Now! In a minute, we’re going to ask you about Trump’s attack on the World Health Organization, removing its funding. But right now I want to ask you about this massive decision he has made. As thousands of workers have taken ill with COVID-19, President Trump issues this executive order saying states cannot close meatpacking plants. Talk about the significance of this.
LAWRENCE GOSTIN: Yeah. Well, let me — remember, the Defense Production Act was really to kind of marshal our production for kind of a warlike state. And so, if you think about, you know, if we’re in a war now, the weapons we need is not meat and pork. The weapons we actually need are testing equipment, ventilators, and particularly personal protective equipment for our brave health workers, our doctors and nurses and other staff in hospitals. So that’s what the act should be used for, not for producing actually quite unhealthy products like beef and pork. But that’s even a sideshow. The real thing —
AMY GOODMAN: Not to mention the very concern of the workers, as they don’t have protective equipment or the tests that they need.
LAWRENCE GOSTIN: No, they don’t. Exactly. No, that’s a really good point. Thank you.
You know, also, the act, when Congress passed that act, it certainly did not have in mind that the president has the power or the right to put workers’ lives and health at risk. And remember, it’s not just the workers that are being put at risk. It’s the workers’ spouses. It’s their children. It’s their wider families all being placed at risk. No president does have the right to endanger the people of the United States, and certainly not to produce an unhealthy product.
So, what do we do now? I mean, I think, you know, I would urge states, while — they might still want to close those meatpacking plants down and let the federal government try to litigate it. But if not, they certainly should exercise their public health powers, because Congress clearly did not intend to prevent states from assuring the health and safety of the population, and particularly the workforce. And so, just for a start, state public health departments and governors should slap on really major sanctions against firms that don’t provide adequate personal protection equipment, adequate social distancing, and to take every possible rigorous measure to ensure the health and safety of these women and men. Now, this is, remember — you know, would any of you want to go to — any of your listeners want to go to work —
AMY GOODMAN: These men and women are overwhelmingly immigrants and African Americans.
LAWRENCE GOSTIN: They are. And, you know, to say that we can just trust the meatpacking operators and the industry to do this, well, self-evidently, we can’t. If you go back into history, there’s a long history of abusing immigrant labor in meatpacking plants. And also self-evidently, safety precautions haven’t been taken, because people have died, and they’re getting sick in their thousands.
And so, why would we — why would we want to put hard-working Americans and their families at risk? Why would we want to have them choose between their livelihoods and their lives or the lives of their children? It’s really — it has no heart. It has no compassion. And a leader, first and foremost — the first responsibility of any leader, any government, is the health and safety and well-being of its population. So this is really unforgivable, I think.
NERMEEN SHAIKH: Professor Gostin, to turn now to the World Health Organization, you’ve advised the WHO for decades. President Trump, of course, first accused China, as well as the WHO, for being responsible for the pandemic. Could you respond to that? And, of course, Trump then cutting funding to the WHO. Could you respond to his decision to do that, as well as the fact that you’ve said repeatedly that whatever the failings of the WHO and China, the U.S. is responsible itself for its lack of preparedness for the pandemic? Could you talk also about what the U.S. should have done differently and should do now?
LAWRENCE GOSTIN: Yeah, I mean, there’s so much — so many levels there. Let me just start with this. You know, I have worked with the World Health Organization under many director-generals for many years. And the current director-general, the first African head of the World Health Organization, Dr. Tedros, is — I know him well. He’s a man of great integrity, great compassion. He cares a lot.
So, working with WHO, it can be — sometimes can be maddening. Yes, they can be slow. They can be bureaucratic. But, my god, what they’ve done for the world. They eradicated smallpox. They’re on the verge of eradicating wild polio. They work in child and maternal health. They save the lives of under-5 children. They save the lives of women undergoing childbirth. They work in diet and obesity and cancer and heart disease, mental health, injury prevention. I could go on and on. So, to actually just try to kick the World Health Organization after all it’s done, on a budget around the size of one large U.S. hospital — I mean, rather than criticizing WHO, we should be dropping our jaw and thanking them for all the things that they’ve done.
So, what about this particular episode with the coronavirus in China? President Trump has said WHO took China’s side, but there is no sides to a pandemic. And yes, Dr. Tedros did praise China, but he has also praised President Trump. That’s just diplomacy. I don’t think that Dr. Tedros thinks that either President Trump or Xi Jinping have done a particularly great job on this. And basically, WHO has been caught in a geopolitical power struggle between the world’s two superpowers. And at a time of a once-in-a-century public health crisis, that couldn’t be more destructive.
So what should the United States do? It should lead a global coalition to at least double — and at least double — the funding of the World Health Organization. Right now we have the WHO we deserve, because we’ve provided it with pitiful financing. We’ve given it control over less than one-quarter of its budget, because we just earmark all the funds that we want for our pet projects. We don’t give it any political backing. And the proof positive is, as soon as you get on the wrong side of the American president, he withdraws funding. So, how is that providing the kind of political capital the director-general needs to speak truth to power?
So, I see this as a — you know, it’s a once-in-a-lifetime crisis, but it’s also a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Out of every major catastrophe, we have to make an opportunity of it. And for me, that opportunity would be to provide an emboldened and strengthened, well-funded, politically backed World Health Organization, so in future pandemics and for future health crises, we have the WHO we so richly need, which is a powerful one that will stand up to big governments and stand for science, health and equity. And that’s what the WHO is there for. And that’s why —
AMY GOODMAN: We have five seconds.
LAWRENCE GOSTIN: — it was the first United Nations agency.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you so much, Professor Lawrence Gostin, founding O’Neill chair in Global Health Law at Georgetown University, director of the World Health Organization Center on National and Global Health Law, also global editor for JAMA: The Journal of the American Medical Association.
That does it for our show. I’m Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh, for another edition of Democracy Now! Stay safe.


truthout--2020-04-30--Jared Kushner Calls US COVID Death Toll of 60,000 a “Great Success Story”

Jared Kushner , much like his father-in-law President Donald Trump , wants the American people to believe that the administration ’ s response to the coronavirus has been stellar so far , in spite of the fact that tens of thousands have died of the disease within the United States .
Appearing on “ Fox & Friends ” on Wednesday , Kushner portrayed the White House ’ s response to the pandemic in a positive light , and suggested that the narrative needed to be repeated more often .
“ The federal government rose to the challenge and this is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ think that that ’ s really what needs to be told , ” Kushner explained on the Fox News morning program .
The president ’ s son-in-law , who also serves as a senior adviser to Trump , added that he believed the economy would be repaired by the end of this summer , detailing a timeline of what he thinks will happen over the next few months .
“ May will be a transition month … I think you will see by June , a lot of the country should be back @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that by July the country is really rocking again , ” Kushner said .
It ’ s unclear how things could be “ rocking again ” in the eyes of many who have been affected by this disease , however , especially given how devastating a toll COVID-19 has already had on the country .
As of 10 am Eastern Time , there have been more than 1.06 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 identified in the U.S. Additionally , 61,734 Americans have died from the disease so far .
Kushner is not alone @ @ @ @ @ @ @ success ” during this pandemic should look like .
Trump himself has been consistent in saying his administration has been doing a “ good job ” — using that phrase on separate occasions to describe how well he had done when there were zero deaths counted , as well as how successful he would be if the administration ’ s efforts were able to allow just 100,000 Americans to die .
On February 26 , when there were just 15 documented cases in the U.S. , Trump predicted that number would diminish within @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his administration for that outcome , which never arrived as he promised it would .
“ When you have 15 people , and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero , that ’ s a pretty good job we ’ ve done , ” Trump said at the time .
A few weeks later , the president changed his standard for success again — this time , implying he would do better than former President Barack Obama did when he dealt with the H1N1 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ argued the response by his predecessor was a “ catastrophe ” because 17,000 individuals had died , he wrote in a tweet last month .
Trump ’ s numbers were off , however , overstating how many had died in that crisis by more than 25 percent .
But as it became clear that the number who would die from COVID-19 would be significantly higher ( even with the errant numbers cited ) , Trump changed his standard once more .
When estimation models began to suggest that 100,000 to 200,000 Americans could @ @ @ @ @ @ @ keeping to those numbers was itself a success .
Had he done nothing , he explained , it could have been millions who would have died .
“ And so , if we could hold that down , as we ’ re saying , to 100,000 – it ’ s a horrible number , maybe even less , but to 100,000 , so we have between 100 [ thousand ] and 200,000 – we altogether have done a very good job , ” Trump said at the end of March .
Due to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s not quite clear what the barometer of success might be for this White House .
The only consistent thing that can be observed from comments by Kushner and Trump , as well as from others in the administration , is that no matter what the outcome may be , chances are high they will be described as successful , even if the American people judge Trump ’ s actions on the issue in a less-than-favorable light .

Jared Kushner, much like his father-in-law President Donald Trump, wants the American people to believe that the administration’s response to the coronavirus has been stellar so far, in spite of the fact that tens of thousands have died of the disease within the United States.
Appearing on “Fox & Friends” on Wednesday, Kushner portrayed the White House’s response to the pandemic in a positive light, and suggested that the narrative needed to be repeated more often.
“The federal government rose to the challenge and this is a great success story, and I think that that’s really what needs to be told,” Kushner explained on the Fox News morning program.
The president’s son-in-law, who also serves as a senior adviser to Trump, added that he believed the economy would be repaired by the end of this summer, detailing a timeline of what he thinks will happen over the next few months.
“May will be a transition month … I think you will see by June, a lot of the country should be back to normal, and the hope is that by July the country is really rocking again,” Kushner said.
Jared Kushner thinks it’s a great success story that over 55k Americans have died from the Coronavirus. The cruelty is staggering. pic.twitter.com/AePzs3fr3y — Sunny Hostin (@sunny) April 29, 2020
It’s unclear how things could be “rocking again” in the eyes of many who have been affected by this disease, however, especially given how devastating a toll COVID-19 has already had on the country.
As of 10 am Eastern Time, there have been more than 1.06 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 identified in the U.S. Additionally, 61,734 Americans have died from the disease so far.
Kushner is not alone, however, in redefining what “success” during this pandemic should look like. Trump himself has been consistent in saying his administration has been doing a “good job” — using that phrase on separate occasions to describe how well he had done when there were zero deaths counted, as well as how successful he would be if the administration’s efforts were able to allow just 100,000 Americans to die.
On February 26, when there were just 15 documented cases in the U.S., Trump predicted that number would diminish within a matter of days — and credited his administration for that outcome, which never arrived as he promised it would.
“When you have 15 people, and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero, that’s a pretty good job we’ve done,” Trump said at the time.
A few weeks later, the president changed his standard for success again — this time, implying he would do better than former President Barack Obama did when he dealt with the H1N1 Swine Flu pandemic in 2009. Trump argued the response by his predecessor was a “catastrophe” because 17,000 individuals had died, he wrote in a tweet last month.
Trump’s numbers were off, however, overstating how many had died in that crisis by more than 25 percent. But as it became clear that the number who would die from COVID-19 would be significantly higher (even with the errant numbers cited), Trump changed his standard once more.
When estimation models began to suggest that 100,000 to 200,000 Americans could die from COVID-19, Trump said that keeping to those numbers was itself a success. Had he done nothing, he explained, it could have been millions who would have died.
“And so, if we could hold that down, as we’re saying, to 100,000 – it’s a horrible number, maybe even less, but to 100,000, so we have between 100 [thousand] and 200,000 – we altogether have done a very good job,” Trump said at the end of March.
Due to inconsistent statements like these, it’s not quite clear what the barometer of success might be for this White House. The only consistent thing that can be observed from comments by Kushner and Trump, as well as from others in the administration, is that no matter what the outcome may be, chances are high they will be described as successful, even if the American people judge Trump’s actions on the issue in a less-than-favorable light.
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