theintercept--2020-03-25--Is the Trump Cult a Death Cult?

Is the Trump Cult a Death Cult?

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This week , President Donald Trump began asserting that the United States would once again be “open for business” by Easter, on April 12. He provided no scientific or medical justification for that timeline, which Dr. Anthony Fauci of the White House coronavirus task force has emphasized is “flexible.” The Atlantic’s Adam Serwer joins Mehdi Hasan to discuss the president’s continuing refusal to take the Covid-19 pandemic seriously.
Reporter: You hope to have the country re-open by Easter, you said earlier you would like to see churches packed, who suggested Easter?
Donald J. Trump: I just thought it was a beautiful time. I’d love to see it come even sooner, but I just think it’d be a beautiful timeline.
[Music interlude.]
Mehdi Hasan: Welcome to Deconstructed, I’m Mehdi Hasan, coming to you from my home near Washington D.C. And very much still social distancing perhaps to President Trump’s great disappointment.
Adam Serwer: When they say they’re willing to die for the economy what they really mean is they’re willing to let you die for the economy. That’s what they mean.
MH: That’s my guest today, the brilliant chronicler of the Trump era, Atlantic writer Adam Serwer.
And yes, to be clear, Trump and his Fox News media echo chamber want to ‘reopen the economy’ by Easter and perhaps kill hundreds of thousands of people in the process. But why? Why would anyone in a position of such power defy the medical experts and risk so many innocent American lives? What goes on inside that deranged orange head of his?
On Sunday night, Fox News host Steve Hilton, who I’m embarrassed to say is a fellow British immigrant, he said this on his show:
Steve Hilton: Our ruling class and their TV mouthpieces whipping up fear over this virus, they can afford an indefinite shutdown. Working Americans can’t. They’ll be crushed by it. You know that famous phrase, “the cure is worse than the disease?” That is exactly the territory we are hurtling towards. You think it’s just the coronavirus that kills people? This total economic shutdown will kill people.
MH: Hours later, Donald Trump was repeating that line “WE CANNOT LET THE CURE BE WORSE THAN THE PROBLEM ITSELF” in all capitals on Twitter. And like the man-child that he is, having just discovered a new rhetorical toy to play with, Trump’s been repeating it ad nauseum ever since.
DJT: I said, you know, I don’t want the cure to be worse than the problem itself. The problem being obviously the problem… We cannot let the cure be worse than the problem itself. We’re not going to let the cure be worse than the problem… It’s like this cure is worse than the problem… That’s why I talk about the cure being worse than the problem. We can’t have the cure be worse than the problem.
MH: So too have his advisers. In fact, it was a perfect Fox News feedback loop – as Trump adviser Larry Kudlow, who’s been wrong about almost everything related to the US economy over the past two decades – he went on Fox and said:
Larry Kudlow: The president is right. The cure can’t be worse than the disease.
MH: By Wednesday, the president had made it clear – he wants social distancing and self quarantining and working from home, he wants it all over as soon as possible. Because he wants the US economy back up and running. Those vulnerable old people, those immuno-compromised folks, they can look after themselves. They’ll be fine. In fact, every time you think this president can’t say anything crazier on the subject of the coronavirus, he outdoes himself – here’s what he said to Fox News on Tuesday:
DJT: Easter’s a very special day for me and I see it sort of in that timeline that I’m thinking about. And I say wouldn’t it be great to have all of the churches, you know the churches aren’t allowed essentially to have much of a congregation there and most of them, I watched on Sunday, online. And it was terrific, by the way, but online is never going to be like being there. So I think Easter Sunday and you’ll have packed churches all over our country. I think it would be a beautiful time and it’s just about the timeline that I think is right.
MH: Let’s be clear how mad this is – the idea of not just reopening the economy so soon but having packed churches anytime soon. We are in the midst of a pandemic. Almost every other country is trying to lockdown their population, keep them from going out, keep them away from gathering in big groups. This is not a left-wing or anti Trump conspiracy. Trump’s closest allies, British prime minister Boris Johnson and Indian prime minister Narendra Modi, both of them this week announced a lockdown of their respective countries. Modi is trying to prevent a billion Indians from leaving their homes over the next three weeks in order to prevent the spread of Covid-19.
And yet this same week, Trump is saying he wants the few and belated restrictions that some US states put in place lifted. He wants the U.S. economy to go back to ‘normal,’ whatever that is, and he also wants packed churches, despite the fact that a study by scientists and doctors at Imperial College in the UK found that if this virus was left to spread, with no restrictions in place, it would lead to around 2.2 million deaths in America by the end of the summer.
2.2 million deaths, think about that. Trump, the president hailed by white evangelicals as a saviour of Christianity, could be the president who not only kills liberals, if that’s what they want, but also decimates the churchgoing population in this country. So why do it? Why go against the advice of his own top scientists, doctors, epidemiologists, people like Dr. Anthony Fauci, who want to keep social distancing in place?
I have three reasons. Number 1: corporate greed. There’s the Wall Street/big business crew who don’t want anything to get in the way of their obscene, never-ending profits and bonuses and share buybacks, certainly not a pesky little pandemic. This week you had Gary Cohn, former COO at Goldman Sachs, former Trump economic adviser saying “it’s time to start discussing the need for a date when the economy can turn back on”. His fellow former Goldman Sachs boss, Lloyd Blankfein, a Democrat, tweeted: “Within a very few weeks let those with a lower risk to the disease return to work.” Yeah, it’ll be fine.
Fox News hosts weighed in too:
Ed Henry: Now, every life matters and you don’t want to minimize any of them but when the mortality rate is that low, what is the balance? What would be your advice to the president if say he’s trying to make this decision this coming weekend ahead of the expiration of the 15 days to slow the spread?
MH: “Every life matters…but -” There really shouldn’t be a but after the words “every life matters.” Remember: this is supposed to be the pro-life party! But: The market is God. What the market wants, the market gets, even if you have to make human sacrifices at the altar of that market God.
So number 1, there’s the market-driven, profit-obsessed angle. Number 2: there’s the personal greed, there’s Trump’s own personal bottom line. This is a president who wants to make money out of the White House, not lose money from it. As investigative reporter David Fahrenthold of the Washington Post tweeted this week, six out of seven of Trump’s biggest-name, biggest-revenue-generating resorts and golf clubs are closed right now. He obviously wants them back open again, and by the way, he also refuses to say whether he’ll accept or decline federal government bailout money for his own businesses:
Reporter: Do you expect your family company to seek government assistance if it’s eligible?
DJT: I don’t know. I mean, I just don’t know what the government assistance would be for what I have, I have hotels. Everybody knew I had hotels when I got elected. They knew I was a successful person when I got elected so it’s one of those things.
MH: But, number 3, perhaps above all else, Trump wants to get re-elected and he can’t get re-elected if the economy is in the middle of a Great Depression; if unemployment, as some predict, hits 30% and growth falls by 50%. He knows he can’t. His entire re-election strategy was to point to both a booming jobs market and a booming stock market as evidence of his presidential success. So let’s be clear: this is a president who is willing to sacrifice potentially hundreds of thousands if not millions of American lives in order to get himself a second term for a presidency which by the way he never really wanted in the first place.
What’s so frustrating though is that according to the polls, 6 out of 10 Americans approve of his handling of the crisis. Approve. I want to cry. I want to scream. What is wrong with them? Now, of course, part of that is just a rallying-around-the-flag-in-a-time-of-national-crisis phenomenon, a rallying-around-of-institutions – the presidency chief among them. As economist Stephanie Kelton pointed out in this show last week. And it’ll dissipate. That aspect of it will. Lest we forget, after 9/11, George W Bush had approval ratings of above 90% but he still left office as the one of the most unpopular presidents in modern American history. Now, of course Bush is popular again because he’s NOT Trump – and because Michelle Obama and Ellen have a soft spot for him. And because he paints. But I digress.
Trump has the whole ‘patriotism in a time of crisis’ thing going for him, but he also has benefited from the fact that the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, Joe Biden, was missing in action for much of last week and and when he turned up this week, I am sorry to say, he was typically wooden, underwhelming and uninspiring, especially for the moment we’re in:
Joe Biden: President Trump and Mitch McConnell are trying to put a corporate bailout ahead of millions of families. You know, it’s families. It’s simply wrong.
MH: And Trump has benefited because the Congressional Democratic leadership has not been radical enough – yes they’ve pushed back against Senate Republican attempts to give the Trump administration a half a trillion dollar corporate slush fund. Yes, they’ve pushed back against any kind of bailout for big corporations that allows share buybacks or bonuses for bosses. Yes, they’ve demanded some extra protections and income for workers, especially in the form of a boosted unemployment insurance payment, which is good… but overall their response is still very tame, given the scale and scope of this unprecedented economic crisis, given the severity and extent of the human suffering. I mean, if you want to see how far the Democrats still really need to go, just think about what other Western countries are doing to try and prevent this turning into another Great Depression.
France has a put a moratorium on all rent and utility payments. Italy and Spain have done the same with mortgages. Denmark has promised to cover 75% of salaries for businesses that don’t lay off their employees. And in the Netherlands, they’re paying up to 90% of wages for companies hit hardest by the pandemic.
Why can’t the United States do any of this? Why are we now being told that the choice, the false choice, is only between saving the economy and fighting the virus? Why in the U.S., the richest country in the history of the world, which every couple of years seems to find a trillion or so dollars down the back of a couch in order to pay for the new invasion of some poor brown country or another, why can’t the U.S. do any of this? Why aren’t Democrats calling for a much bigger role for the government, in terms of bailing out people, not just corporations? Why aren’t they calling for much bigger checks for ordinary people, delivered not just as a one-off payment, but every month, going forward, until this crisis is over as Bernie Sanders and AOC and others have called for?
You know, a week or two ago, when the coronavirus pandemic started to really to take its toll here in the U.S., I thought for a moment, maybe this is the Donald Rumsfeld “unknown unknown” that finally knocks Trump off his pedestal, the crisis that causes him to lose the forthcoming presidential election. Now, I’m not so sure.
He still, after all, has his cult behind him, and what we’ve discovered in recent days, is that it’s not just a loyal cult, it’s a death cult. It is! Listen to devout Trumpist, the lieutenant governor of Texas, Dan Patrick, speaking on – where else – Fox News this week:
Dan Patrick: Tucker, no one reached out to me and said as a senior citizen are you willing to take a chance on your survival in exchange for keeping the America that all America loves for your children and grandchildren. And if that’s the exchange, I’m all in. And that doesn’t make me noble or brave or anything like that. I just think there are lots of grandparents out there in this country like me, I have six grandchildren, that what we all care about and what we love more than anything are those children.
MH: Grandpa’s gotta die for the grandkids to enjoy eating out again. Sorry. Ali Soufan, the former FBI agent who led the bureau’s investigation into Al Qaeda in the run-up to 9/11, watched that clip of Patrick and tweeted, and I quote: “I’ve dealt with suicidal cults before. I encountered people who are willing to die for their faith, ideology, race, etc. But, I never encountered anyone who is willing to die for someone else’s 401k. This is a whole new level of craziness,” he tweeted.
Indeed it is. And so to talk more about this new level of craziness to try and make sense of, and deconstruct, this weird political terrain, and to try and understand the sheer insanity of the Trump posture on the coronavirus pandemic in particular, I’m joined by perhaps the chronicler of the Trump era, the Atlantic’s Adam Serwer, who is the author of such brilliant and memorable essays as “The Nationalist’s Delusion”, “White Nationalism’s Deep American Roots” and, of course, the must-read that is “The Cruelty Is the Point.”
He joins me now from his home in San Antonio, Texas. Adam, thanks for joining me on Deconstructed.
Adam Serwer: Thank you for having me.
MH: You wrote in the Atlantic, Adam that after the coronavirus outbreak emerged in China, the rest of the world began to regard it as a threat to public health while Trump has seen it as a public relations problem, explain what you mean by that.
AS: Well, you can see from the moment that Trump was first asked about the coronavirus publicly on CNBC in late January, he said, you know, “China’s handling it, it’s fine”. And he repeated that line of “it’s fine” even when Americans started becoming infected. He said, you know, the cases are gonna be down to zero in a couple of days, you know, we were over 500 deaths in the United States. He simply thought that this was another issue, that if he repeated whatever his, you know, whatever message that he had settled on, if he just repeated his talking points over and over, he would be able to overwhelm whatever else anybody was saying about it which is a strategy that has honestly worked for him many times before. It may even work here, who knows? Even though the bodies are starting to pile up. But what’s certainly true is that it has not solved the problem, which is that the United States is being hit by a deadly pandemic, and hospitals are being overwhelmed and people are dying.
MH: But as you say, it may even work here. That’s the big kind of political question in all of this separate to the scientific and public health question because it has worked before. And Bill Gates talked this week about, you know, a pile of bodies in the corner. Are you saying that even with that pile of bodies, God forbid in the corner as the death toll is mounting day after day, that he can still get away with it? You think that his blustering through like he did in this “Fox News townhall” this week that might work politically?
AS: I mean, I think that there is a large segment of the electorate that rationalizes, ignores or denies anything, any negative information associated with Trump that they see as incongruent with Trump as they see him. And so it’s really you know, it’s really a question of, you know, to what extent these people still have the ability to sway a national election. But the truth is also that in the absence of you know, for the most part the Democrats have been really absent from this debate over whether or not Trump has properly handled their coronavirus pandemic. And so Trump has been on TV every night and there is getting edited down into local news clips to where he sounds coherent and responsible. Despite the way he actually handled this which is by ignoring his own advisers and treaties to prepare for a serious possible outbreak here in the United States.
MH: And despite the fact that when you don’t edit him down to bite sized chunks for evening news, he’s mad and rambling.
AS: Right, he sounds rambling, he says things that aren’t true. He says things like, you know, I don’t want to let infected Americans off a cruise ship because I don’t want the number of infected to go up in the United States as though that was the main issue. But you know, to the extent that the Democrats have absented themselves from the political debate over this issue, you can see Americans who are, you know, even Democrats are starting to approve of the way that Trump is handling this, which is honestly given the way that he’s handled it, which was waiting until it became an undeniable problem to do anything about it is actually insane.
MH: So I want to talk to you about the Trump base that you rightly said rationalizes his behavior, but I also want to talk about the Democrats. But let’s just stick with the Thanos-like figure that we have running the government right now, given what you know about Trump and how he behaves, were you surprised to hear the President say what he said on Tuesday that he wanted the economy up and running again, open again in time for Easter, and, “packed churches?” Did that surprise you? Shock you?
AS: No, it doesn’t because I mean, the only thing that has ever motivated Trump is what’s good for Trump. And to the extent that the whole country doesn’t see that it’s because of a propaganda apparatus that surrounds him that has built up a cult of personality that is, you know, to some extent, impervious to outside intervention. You know, so for him to say, you know, he did not take this seriously until the stock market started crashing which threatened his political prospects. And so now, you know, he sees an economic downturn as a result of these social distancing strategies which are meant to contain a pandemic, and he’s saying, well, we need to get the economy running again no matter what it costs. The problem with that, obviously, is that when people start dying again, the economy is going to slow down anyway. So there isn’t a choice here. I mean, obviously, eventually, we have to like, eventually, when the epidemic is contained, we need to ease people back into you know, something resembling a normal life, but you can’t do that if a deadly disease is still ravaging everything. People aren’t going to go to restaurants, they’re not going to send their kids to school. They’re not gonna go out and buy cars and iPhones or whatever.
MH: Yes, you’re right. It’s stating the obvious that if hundreds of thousands of people die, which is what epidemiologists say will happen, if these restrictions are lifted the know the economy can’t continue as normal if millions of members of the workforce are dropping dead and overwhelming hospitals. Just going back to your propaganda machine point you wrote in The Atlantic about this sort of toxic symbiosis that exists between the President and his right wing media echo chamber, especially Fox News, which both amplify his false statements about the virus, but also provide him with crazy fodder to repeat you know, this line this week about the cure is can’t be worse than the disease which you just lifted from Fox. You also mentioned an Arkansas pastor who was quoted in the Washington Post saying, “In your more politically conservative regions, closing is not interpreted as caring for you. It’s interpreted as liberalism, or buying into the hype.” Have we ever seen a public political party media response to a pandemic like this before, just so loaded and so, so filled with kind of partisan meaning and baggage?
AS: Well, I’m not a historian of infectious diseases, so I can’t answer that. But I can say that, you know, the behavior of Fox News has been really extraordinary here. Because what they did was when the President was downplaying the epidemic, Fox News was downplaying the epidemic. And when the President decided that he needed to sort of take charge and show everybody he was doing his job, Fox News, talked about how heroic the President was being. And now that, you know, the President is worried about his re-election, Fox News is encouraging him to think about opening up the economy again, which is, I mean, it’s not even clear to me what that entails except exposing people to potential infection.
MH: But which of them Adam is the dog and which of them is the tail?
AS: I don’t think – It’s not actually clear. I mean, I don’t think that’s actually fair because in one sense, Trump looks at Fox is a kind of like pipeline to his base. And also Fox sees Trump as an important asset for their political project. So, they sort of mutually stand each other up. Fox defends the president no matter what he does, and when they think he’s, and you can see this sometimes on Fox, when people on Fox think of President is getting himself in danger as you know, Fox News host Tucker Carlson did earlier this month, he tried to convince the president that actually the epidemic was a serious thing, and he should start taking it seriously. But until then, you know, Fox News was endangering its own audience by telling them that the coronavirus was nothing to worry about.
And what’s fascinating about that, is that Fox imagines itself as a corrective to the mainstream media, which supposedly lies to you all the time for political reasons. But what we have here is Fox which, you know, internally, they were saying we need to take precautions to worry about this epidemic, but they were broadcasting the message that there was nothing to worry about. And that’s because their role is to protect the president and make sure that conservative base sees them as infallible. It’s not to actually inform the conservative base about information that is vital to their well being. In fact, when they had the opportunity to do that what they did was endanger them by lying to them about how serious this was.
MH: So you’ve followed this presidency closely. You’ve written extensively about Trump. Do you believe his handling of this crisis is a product of ignorance, of his sheer dumbness, of his conspiratorial anti-scientific mindset? Or is he just a sociopath who knows what he’s doing could kill millions of people, but he just doesn’t care because he firmly believes his reelection is more important to the world than social distancing or saving American lives?
AS: I think the most simplest thing to understand about Trump is he thinks that everything is about him. So he will always look out for number one. The federal government there is to do what he wants. Even the governors of states who are begging him for aid have to be nice to Mr. Trump if they want to get it. So you know, the sort of authoritarian cult of personality that has been built up around him sees the same thing. Trump is basically the nation to them. So, Trump cannot betray the nation. He can’t betray the public trust because he is all of those things. He is those things manifested. So there’s nothing that he can do that is actually selfish, whatever acts that might be selfish in another context by another chief executive, by another human being are not selfish because Trump is the country and therefore he is serving the country. So when Trump is pursuing his own self interest, no matter the human cost, even when it’s a pursuit that exposes Americans to a deadly disease because he doesn’t feel like dealing with it until the stock market crashes, he is still serving the country loyally because after all, to serve Trump loyally is to serve the country loyally. And this is a sort of very dangerous political mentality, and one that unfortunately, the country is going to be dealing with the consequences of for a very long time.
MH: And it’s not just a dangerous political reality and tendency, but also the public health aspects here are bizarre because in China which is a dictatorship, they actually used the authoritarian powers some would argue, to shut down things in a way a democracy can’t and therefore contain the infection, contain the pandemic. Here in the U.S., the authoritarianism that we have in the White House is actually hampering the response to this crisis because instead of people going out and locking down the country, the authoritarianism is manifesting itself in public health officials, scientists standing up in public and lavishing praise on Trump, because they know that’s the only way he’ll even vaguely entertain what they have to say. So you have respected members of the scientific establishment, public officials beginning each and every statement in front of a camera by praising Trump.
AS: So I want to push back on this a little bit because the Chinese government did actually suppress the understanding of the disease. They said that it wasn’t transmissible between humans, they silenced a doctor who was saying this was a very serious problem.
MH: They have a lot to answer for.
AS: And when that doctor died, there was a huge, you know, one of the biggest public outcries we’ve seen in China because of you know, he had been trying to inform the public about the deadliness of this disease. So the thing about authoritarian figures is that they will always pursue the path that they think is necessary for their political survival. And in terms of public benefit, you know, the public will only benefit as long as the interests of the authoritarian figure align with the public interest. So as long as those two things are not aligned, in other words, as long as Trump thought that he could bluster his way through the disease in the early months of this year by saying, “Oh, it’s not a big deal, it’s gonna go away,” he was doing that. And now that, you know, it’s obviously a serious problem, he’s pursuing his own self interest and you know, signing a stimulus package that’s going to, you know, try to cushion the impact of this on the economy. But he’s actually still only pursuing his own self interest in the same way that China was.
MH: Do you think and I hate to ask this question, because I’ll probably feel like a naive fool as I say the word but I’m gonna say it anyways, do you think this is the moment that the Republican party or at least some congressional Republicans dare to split with him? There’s been reporting from Politico that fear is stalking the corridors of Capitol Hill as people are getting infected. Even GOP Congresswoman Liz Cheney, daughter of the ghoulish Dick, normally loyal Trumpist was tweeting this week that now is not the time to end social distancing or reopen the economy. Now is the time to fight the pandemic. If you have Republicans, who, unlike the base, actually realize that their lives are at stake. Do you think this might be a moment they think, “You know what? We need to push back against Donald Trump. He’s risking our lives and our family’s lives”?
AS: No, I do not. And I’ll tell you why because if you look at those statements, do you notice that they exempt the president from, the criticism is implied, it’s implicit, the only thing that will break Donald Trump’s grip on the Republican Party and the cult of personality that surrounds him is political defeat.
MH: And we don’t know what’s going to happen. I want to come back to political defeat and whether it’s happening or not. Just in terms of the grip on the party, then just sticking with your point. There is this irony that when people like Dan Patrick, of your state of Texas and Glenn Beck even say stuff like “Well, we’re old and we’re willing to die for our economy to survive,” which has become a weird right-wing talking point this week –
AS: When they say they’re willing to die for the economy, what they really mean is they’re willing to let you die for the economy. That’s what they mean.
MH: Of course, because Glenn Beck wasn’t the guy who went to volunteer to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan even as he kind of praised all that nonsense. But when they say stuff like that, and when Trump says he wants to see packed churches in a couple of weeks time, old people and evangelicals in churches are basically the Trump base. They’re risking killing off their own base, aren’t they?
AS: I mean, look, if you’re asking me whether I think that Trump actually cares about the well being of these people, or whether Fox or whether conservative media actually cares about these people’s well being, the answer is no. But I think, you know, the issue here is that they are appealing to a sentiment that I think is actually quite widespread and that people should not dismiss which is that it is very scary to be out of work. It is very scary to wonder whether you’re going to be able to pay the rent on your apartment, get food for your family, you know whether you’re gonna be able to pay your bills, your student loans, this is very scary. This is a very scary moment. So when a used car salesman comes up to you and says we can just reopen the economy and it’s going to be fine. It is tempting to say, okay, hopefully this guy is telling the truth, hopefully he’s right because this is a very scary situation that I’m in. And what that means, to me that makes this all the more despicable because everybody knows what the danger is here to thousands, if not possibly millions of people all over the country based on some of the most pessimistic epidemiological assessments. You know, people really are scared and they really want to hear that this is going to be over soon.
MH: But here’s where I would slightly push back against you and say you’re being a little bit too generous is that the people who really are scared aren’t necessarily all of the people we’ve being hearing this week.
AS: No, I think that’s right.
MH: I think there’s a definite issue for the left. And we discussed this last week on the show with AOC and with Stephanie Kelton, which has come up with an actual solution to stop the bleeding now, a big economic plan that actually helps people. The choice is not between let people die and save the economy. You can save the economy and prevent people from dying, as European countries seem to be doing slowly.
AS: That’s exactly right. And you can’t actually save the economy by letting people die. You can’t actually save the economy that way.
MH: So coming back to the let people die, that seems to just be some kind of weird, you know, macho Trumpist, you know, push back against basically conventional science and, and the libs.
AS: There is a tremendous temptation for people on Twitter who are never going to have to put their actions to their words to act like tough guys. It happens all the time. It’s extraordinarily stupid.
MH: So on that basis, let me ask you this question: We’ve always known that Trump is in charge of a cult, or at least some of us, as you and I have pointed that out before. Do you think it’s now fair to call the Trump cult a death cult?
AS: I mean, I don’t know whether I would put that label on it. But I can say that the rationalizations that I’m seeing on social media with regards to either the death toll in New York, or the human cost of simply, you know, ending social distancing before we have the epidemic under control is absolutely sociopathic. It is cruel, it is wrong, and it’s disgusting.
MH: And it’s not just disgusting. It’s totally hypocritical because these are the same people Glenn Beck, who went crazy in 2009 over so-called death panels that were involved in Obamacare, and now we have the president of the Unites States a Republican, literally implementing the idea of death panels, saying some people need to die for the rest of us to get what we want economically. And the whole cult aspect is fascinating because the writer Ed Solomon tweeted this week, and I quote, “It’s happening. Trump is now literally killing people on Fifth Avenue.” And he was right, his followers don’t care.
AS: I mean, look, there are doctors who are having to make horrible decisions about who’s gonna be put on a ventilator and who’s not. You know, this is scary stuff. And it’s really extraordinary for a bunch of big guys who essentially shitpost on Twitter for a living, to go out and talk about the great sacrifice they’re willing to make. They’re doing nothing, absolutely nothing. And it’s a disgrace that they think of themselves as offering something to the country, some great sacrifice while there are people working, medical workers working 12 and 14-15 hour shifts, trying to keep human beings alive and have to, you know, in an epidemic that they initially said wasn’t a big deal.
MH: I want to read you a quote from journalist Tom Kludt. On Twitter this week, he said, “We’re days away from calls for social distancing being met with a series of cry laughing emojis and conservatives gathering in large groups to trigger the libs.” He’s right, isn’t he? The Republicans, the right have successfully made a pandemic and medical advice on how to handle a pandemic into part of the culture wars.
AS: Well, look, the writer Jonathan Katz, who’s covered a lot of disasters, you know, the way he put it is that we’re not actually in the disaster yet. So despite the fact that we’ve you know, we’ve reached hundreds of deaths already, it’s actually going to get worse this week. And so, you know, I’m not going to make any predictions about what’s going to happen or to what extent this is going to become a culture war issue. But I think that, at the moment, part of the right’s reaction to this is a callous disregard for the lives of people in cities like New York, whom they consider lesser than them. You know, because it’s happening in blue areas. It’s not a big deal. Well, look, it’s a disease. It does not discriminate based on political affiliation. It’s going to come for other areas of the country, too. And it’s not going to be funny when it does. It’s going to be terrible.
MH: Yep. And Louisiana has already had to declare an emergency as it’s spreading there. We have Rand Paul testing positive and behaving irresponsibly wandering around the halls of the Senate while he was waiting for his test results. How worried are you, Adam, about the poll that came out this week showing almost 50% approval rating for Trump and 60% approval for his handling of the crisis which of course defies reality in many ways? Is that just a patriotic rallying around the flag? Because 60% approval means Democrats are saying he’s handling the crisis well.
AS: I’m not a polling expert. But what I would say is that I think it reflects two things. One is that there is a rally effect. And when you look at the polls of George W. Bush after 9/11, this is actually a pretty small rally effect, if that’s what’s happening. The other thing is, like I said earlier, the Democrats have essentially ceded the political conversation to the president. So it’s not a surprise that people who are only hearing one side of the story, you know, think that side is right.
MH: Why do you think that is? Why do you think the Democrats have ceded it?
AS: I don’t know. I mean, this is a story for someone who’s in Washington on Capitol Hill, who’s talking to these people who can explain what’s going on. I mean, I think they would probably say, “Well, look, we’re trying to save the country right now. You know, unlike Trump, we actually have to do our jobs. We can’t just go on TV every day and do nothing.”
MH: Well, they could go on TV every day, if they wanted to. They could hold a simultaneous press conference saying everything he just said is a lie.
AS: They could put someone on TV every day. You know, and who knows, maybe they will after this deal is done and after they’ve managed to secure some form of aid for the people who are going to be suffering because of this. But I think you know what you’re saying, like, I don’t want to trivialize politics. Politics is how societies make collective decisions. It is not, you know, to say that, oh, we’re not going to play politics, what you’re really saying is that you’re going to take yourself out of that process of making decisions. It’s not really an option. You know, so I don’t know what’s going to happen. I don’t know what the future holds. I think, you know, things are going to get worse before they get better. And I think that the president has obviously done an awful job. And that’s going to become apparent when you compare the impact of the pandemic in the United States compared to other countries, whether or not that affects his political fortunes, I have no idea. You know, I’m not going to make any predictions about that.
MH: The problem with the comparison with other countries, of course is by the time we have it, it may well be too late. And I’m glad you made the point about politics because it really drives me up the wall when people say, let’s not politicize this, it’s not a time for politics, especially when liberals and centrist say this. Because if you’re distributing hundreds of billions of taxpayer money, billions of dollars and you have to choose between whether it goes to corporations or to real people, that is a political decision, that cannot be un-politicized. And I just find it bizarre when people who should know better say this. Just before we finish, you mentioned the Democrats. We saw the return of Joe Biden this week, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, the front runner. He gave a speech from his home. He did a bunch of TV interviews, in some of which he made some good strong points about what to do next. And then some of which he failed to complete simple sentences and coughed into his hands. Do you have faith that Joe Biden can beat Donald Trump in November, especially after or in the midst of this crisis?
AS: I don’t have any political prognostications to make about Biden. I mean, look, I’ve been very critical of Joe Biden and very critical of his past record. I do think that you know, the primary showed that he has more of a political strength with sort of average Democrats than I think a lot of people in the press anticipated, whether or not that makes you happy or it makes you sad, it’s obviously true. I think the question really is, is does that strength persist in a general election with Donald Trump? And does it work to neutralize the ideal geographic distribution of his support and the electoral college? And I don’t think we know the answer.
MH: Just before you go, Adam, there was a very powerful tweet you did last week that really got to me. I shared it with friends and family of mine on WhatsApp and text. I just want to read it out to our listeners, as we end our conversation. You wrote, “Adults can’t visit their parents. Parents can’t visit their adult children. And if they could, they couldn’t even embrace each other. I don’t know how many, but some of us hugged our loved ones for the last time, and we don’t know it yet,” is what you wrote. When I read that, it really got to me because I hadn’t really thought about it in those terms. And my parents, I’m in the United States, my parents, elderly parents are abroad. I have no idea when I’m next going to see them, praying that I see them soon. I’m sure many people listening to this show. What do you think people are going through? When you wrote that tweet, what were you thinking? What were you going through? What do you think people are going through right now when it comes to that very fundamental issue of human relationships?
AS: I think I think it’s just crushing. I mean, I miss my parents. My parents are old enough to be in the risk group. So you know, they were actually supposed to come visit before air travel shut down, and I didn’t get to see them. And I think you know, and I was looking on Instagram and a friend who lives in the same city as their parents, their parents came over, but they had to, they couldn’t touch each other. They had to stay far away from each other. While they were able to see each other they weren’t even able to embrace and it just made me think about, you know, the extent to which, you know, we’re all like, we cannot do this. This epidemic has deprived us of one of the simplest, like simplest human comforts that have helped sustain people in the worst times in the history of humanity, which is the embrace of our loved ones. And it is just extremely tragic and sad. And it also makes me extremely angry about how this government has handled, you know, what it saw coming way in advance long enough to prepare for it and it did not.
MH: Me too, Adam, which is why I wanted to get you on the show today. Thank you so much for taking time out. Stay safe, my friend, talk soon.
AS: Thank you for having me.
MH: Thanks, Adam.
AS: Take care.
MH: That was Adam Serwer, staff writer at The Atlantic. Check out his pieces for them, they’re always, always brilliant and insightful. Adam says that Trump and Fox don’t actually care about the people in their base who could die from this disease and from believing that it isn’t a threat and doesn’t require social distancing and other precautionary measures. The thing is – how do you get through to a cult, a death cult? And how do you stop them from endangering all the rest of us too? It’s one of the biggest questions of our time and one we’ll continue to examine and explore here on Deconstructed.
[Music interlude.]
MH: But for now, that’s our show. Stay safe and indoors, if you can.
Deconstructed is a production of First Look Media and The Intercept. Our producer is Zach Young. The show was mixed by Bryan Pugh. Our theme music was composed by Bart Warshaw. Betsy Reed is The Intercept’s editor in chief.
I’m Mehdi Hasan. You can follow me on Twitter @mehdirhasan. If you haven’t already, please do subscribe to the show so you can hear it every week. Go to theintercept.com/deconstructed to subscribe from your podcast platform of choice, iPhone, Android, whatever. If you’re subscribed already, please do leave us a rating or review – it helps new people find the show. And if you want to give us feedback, email us at Podcasts@theintercept.com. Thanks so much!
See you next week.


theintercept--2020-03-25--Gilead Sciences Backs Off Monopoly Claim for Promising Coronavirus Drug

Wednesday announced that it has submitted a request to the Food and Drug Administration to rescind the exclusive marketing rights it had secured for remdesivir , an antiviral drug that shows promise in treating Covid-19 , the disease caused by the new coronavirus .
As The Intercept reported on Monday , the FDA had awarded Gilead seven years of exclusive marketing rights to the drug through the Orphan Drug Act , even though the statute was designed to induce pharmaceutical companies to make treatments for rare diseases that affect fewer than 200,000 people in the United States .
Although the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ many people , Gilead had exploited a loophole that grants orphan drug status if a company files for it before the official number of cases hits 200,000 .
As of Wednesday afternoon , there were more than 438,000 confirmed cases worldwide , with more than 59,000 in the United States .
Gilead has submitted a request to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to rescind the orphan drug designation it was granted for the investigational antiviral remdesivir for the treatment of Covid-19 and is waiving all benefits that accompany the designation .
Gilead @ @ @ @ @ @ @ expedited timeline in seeking regulatory review of remdesivir , without the orphan drug designation .
Recent engagement with regulatory agencies has demonstrated that submissions and review relating to remdesivir for the treatment of Covid-19 are being expedited .
Still , public health experts remain concerned about the potential for Gilead and other pharmaceutical companies to engage in price gouging during the global pandemic .
And while pharmaceutical companies are testing dozens of drugs as potential vaccines and treatments for the new coronavirus , some legal scholars have pointed to an obscure statute to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ price critical drugs out of reach .
The law , known as Section 1498 , gives the government the right to override a patent at any time as long as the company receives “ reasonable compensation.
” Essentially functioning as a kind of eminent domain for patented products , the provision breaks the monopoly and permits low-cost competition .
And if drugs such as Gilead ’ s antiviral remdesivir and other potential treatments and vaccines for the coronavirus are priced out of reach , it could give the government critical leverage to negotiate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Act , the government could even start producing lifesaving treatments itself .
“ The government should use every tool that it has to make sure that any coronavirus treatment or vaccine is affordable , including taking away monopolies through 1498 , ” said Zain Rizvi , a drug-pricing expert at Public Citizen .
In a statement , Public Citizen said that “ Gilead must do more than make vague promises of reasonable pricing .
It should commit right now to license the right and needed know-how to manufacture remdesivir to all qualified producers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” The federal government regularly used Section 1498 in the 1960s and 1970s to purchase generic drugs when the patented versions were far more expensive .
But pharmaceutical companies railed against the provision and while it has been used for other inventions it has rarely been used for drugs since .
In 2001 , during the anthrax scare , just the threat of using 1498 proved effective when the government was trying to secure access to the antibiotic ciprofloxacin , which could be used to treat people who were exposed to anthrax .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Tommy Thompson raised the possibility of using the provision , Bayer cut the price of ciprofloxacin in half .
In 2017 , a group of academics at Yale Law School made the case for the government ’ s use of Section 1498 to procure a lifesaving treatment for hepatitis C called Sofosbuvir , also manufactured by Gilead , which is too expensive for many people who need it .
Sofosbuvir costs $ 48,000 for a 24-week course , or about $ 1,000 a pill .
Because of the exorbitant price , insurers have @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the roughly 5 million people infected with hepatitis C , instead making the drug available to only the sickest patients .
Gilead , which is valued at more than $ 100 billion , has repeatedly come under fire for its pricing .
Although its preventative HIV drug Truvada costs only $ 6 to manufacture , it costs almost $ 2,000 a month in the U.S — out of reach for many people who could use it to avoid infection .
“ Gilead is notorious for price gouging , ” said Rizvi .
“ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and ending both HIV and hep C epidemics , and in both cases , prices have played a real factor in our inability to stop both epidemics .
And that ’ s terrifying.
” Joseph Grogan , who has led the Trump administration ’ s efforts on drug pricing in addition to serving on the White House coronavirus task force , served as head of federal affairs for Gilead from 2011 to 2017 , while it was setting prices for both drugs .
When asked about price gouging , Gilead provided The Intercept @ @ @ @ @ @ @ acutely aware of the urgent medical needs of people and communities around the world in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic .
We are working around the clock to study the safety and efficacy of remdesivir as a potential Covid-19 treatment and to responsibly provide emergency access to remdesivir while these studies are ongoing , to respond to this public health crisis .
If remdesivir is proven to be safe and effective to treat Covid-19 , we are committed to making remdesivir both accessible and affordable to governments and patients around the world @ @ @ @ @ @ @ public health and individuals ’ lives is particularly terrifying as Covid-19 infections soar .
When private companies have exclusive rights to these drugs , they not only have complete discretion over the price , but they also have a monopoly over supply .
“ It makes no sense for one company to have the power to dictate who gets what , when , where , ” said Rizvi .
“ There ’ s going to be unprecedented global demand if it proves to be effective .
”

Gilead Sciences on Wednesday announced that it has submitted a request to the Food and Drug Administration to rescind the exclusive marketing rights it had secured for remdesivir, an antiviral drug that shows promise in treating Covid-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus. As The Intercept reported on Monday, the FDA had awarded Gilead seven years of exclusive marketing rights to the drug through the Orphan Drug Act, even though the statute was designed to induce pharmaceutical companies to make treatments for rare diseases that affect fewer than 200,000 people in the United States.
Although the new coronavirus will almost certainly infect that many people, Gilead had exploited a loophole that grants orphan drug status if a company files for it before the official number of cases hits 200,000. As of Wednesday afternoon, there were more than 438,000 confirmed cases worldwide, with more than 59,000 in the United States.
After a public outcry, Gilead issued a press release stating:
Gilead has submitted a request to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to rescind the orphan drug designation it was granted for the investigational antiviral remdesivir for the treatment of Covid-19 and is waiving all benefits that accompany the designation. Gilead is confident that it can maintain an expedited timeline in seeking regulatory review of remdesivir, without the orphan drug designation. Recent engagement with regulatory agencies has demonstrated that submissions and review relating to remdesivir for the treatment of Covid-19 are being expedited.
Still, public health experts remain concerned about the potential for Gilead and other pharmaceutical companies to engage in price gouging during the global pandemic. And while pharmaceutical companies are testing dozens of drugs as potential vaccines and treatments for the new coronavirus, some legal scholars have pointed to an obscure statute to help ensure that companies won’t price critical drugs out of reach.
The law, known as Section 1498, gives the government the right to override a patent at any time as long as the company receives “reasonable compensation.” Essentially functioning as a kind of eminent domain for patented products, the provision breaks the monopoly and permits low-cost competition. And if drugs such as Gilead’s antiviral remdesivir and other potential treatments and vaccines for the coronavirus are priced out of reach, it could give the government critical leverage to negotiate lower prices. Through the Defense Production Act, the government could even start producing lifesaving treatments itself.
“The government should use every tool that it has to make sure that any coronavirus treatment or vaccine is affordable, including taking away monopolies through 1498,” said Zain Rizvi, a drug-pricing expert at Public Citizen.
In a statement, Public Citizen said that “Gilead must do more than make vague promises of reasonable pricing. It should commit right now to license the right and needed know-how to manufacture remdesivir to all qualified producers, in exchange for a modest royalty.”
The federal government regularly used Section 1498 in the 1960s and 1970s to purchase generic drugs when the patented versions were far more expensive. But pharmaceutical companies railed against the provision and while it has been used for other inventions it has rarely been used for drugs since. In 2001, during the anthrax scare, just the threat of using 1498 proved effective when the government was trying to secure access to the antibiotic ciprofloxacin, which could be used to treat people who were exposed to anthrax. After then-Secretary of Health and Human Services Tommy Thompson raised the possibility of using the provision, Bayer cut the price of ciprofloxacin in half.
In 2017, a group of academics at Yale Law School made the case for the government’s use of Section 1498 to procure a lifesaving treatment for hepatitis C called Sofosbuvir, also manufactured by Gilead, which is too expensive for many people who need it. Sofosbuvir costs $48,000 for a 24-week course, or about $1,000 a pill. Because of the exorbitant price, insurers have refused to cover it for all of the roughly 5 million people infected with hepatitis C, instead making the drug available to only the sickest patients.
Gilead, which is valued at more than $100 billion, has repeatedly come under fire for its pricing. Although its preventative HIV drug Truvada costs only $6 to manufacture, it costs almost $2,000 a month in the U.S — out of reach for many people who could use it to avoid infection.
“Gilead is notorious for price gouging,” said Rizvi. “Gilead holds the key to bringing down and ending both HIV and hep C epidemics, and in both cases, prices have played a real factor in our inability to stop both epidemics. And that’s terrifying.”
Joseph Grogan, who has led the Trump administration’s efforts on drug pricing in addition to serving on the White House coronavirus task force, served as head of federal affairs for Gilead from 2011 to 2017, while it was setting prices for both drugs.
When asked about price gouging, Gilead provided The Intercept with the following statement:
Gilead is acutely aware of the urgent medical needs of people and communities around the world in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic. We are working around the clock to study the safety and efficacy of remdesivir as a potential Covid-19 treatment and to responsibly provide emergency access to remdesivir while these studies are ongoing, to respond to this public health crisis. If remdesivir is proven to be safe and effective to treat Covid-19, we are committed to making remdesivir both accessible and affordable to governments and patients around the world.
The penchant for putting profits over public health and individuals’ lives is particularly terrifying as Covid-19 infections soar. When private companies have exclusive rights to these drugs, they not only have complete discretion over the price, but they also have a monopoly over supply.
“It makes no sense for one company to have the power to dictate who gets what, when, where,” said Rizvi. “There’s going to be unprecedented global demand if it proves to be effective.”


theintercept--2020-03-25--Mehdi Hasan and Jeremy Scahill on Coronavirus, the “Bailout,” and the 2020 Election

U.S. Official Hints at Possible Plea Deal for Julian Assange
The U.S. ambassador to Australia said there could be a “resolution” to the Justice Department’s pursuit of Assange.


theintercept--2020-03-25--America’s Crisis Daddy Andrew Cuomo Exploits Coronavirus Panic to Push Bail Reform Rollback in New Y

America’s Crisis Daddy Andrew Cuomo Exploits Coronavirus Panic to Push Bail Reform Rollback in New York

pandemic grips the United States , prosecutors , sheriffs , and public officials have raced to reduce the populations held in local jails , where it is next to impossible to protect elderly and otherwise vulnerable incarcerated people .
In New York , however , Gov .
Andrew Cuomo is bucking this trend , pushing for a new law that would roll back newborn bail reforms that went into effect in January and instead expand judges ’ power to put defendants in jail .
Cuomo has backed this agenda for years , but his evident insistence on including it in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a public health crisis is nonetheless remarkable .
“ Every other elected official across the country is thinking about how they can reduce their jail and prison population , ” Rena Karefa-Johnson , the New York state director for criminal justice reform for the advocacy group FWD.us , said in an interview .
“ But in New York , we have elected officials still trying to change legislation that would put thousands more people back in jail and slowing up an emergency budget process to do it .
It ’ s wildly out @ @ @ @ @ @ @ across the country , and it ’ s wildly at odds with this narrative of New York taking Covid-19 seriously and keeping people safe .
It ’ s bonkers.
” The governor ’ s move comes as his power is ascendant .
Cuomo has always wanted to be a crisis governor , engaging in well-documented disaster heroics whenever roadways get slippery .
But that instinct , risible in peacetime , is playing differently in the pandemic .
People in New York and around the country are terrified , and the erratic federal response @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from reassuring .
Cuomo ’ s sober , authoritative daily briefings have filled the vacuum .
In the last weeks , Cuomo has become America ’ s Governor , its crisis daddy .
In recent days the hashtag # PresidentCuomo has been trending on Twitter .
With his popularity soaring , and his constituents preoccupied with looming mass fatalities as the coronavirus threatens to overwhelm the state ’ s health care capabilities , Cuomo is well positioned to drive through his preferred agenda with hardly anyone noticing .
Cuomo ’ s office did @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for this story , but in recent weeks the Governor has repeatedly declared his intention in to put changes to bail reform in the budget .
In New York , state budget negotiations are opaque at the best of times .
The governor and the leaders of the two houses of the legislature — the proverbial “ three people in a room ” — hash out a series of horse-trades and concessions , which are then presented to legislators as an omnibus mash for a single take-it-or-leave-it vote .
These are not the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ already been diagnosed with coronavirus infections , and the statehouse has been evacuated , with legislators sent home to shelter in place , unable to meet or debate .
They ’ ve been told to be ready to return to the state capitol in Albany on short notice to approve a budget they ’ ve yet to see and are unlikely to have a chance to even read before they vote on it .
For the advocates and legislators who helped pass New York ’ s landmark bail reforms last year , Cuomo @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by slipping language into an under-scrutinized , must-pass disaster budget is the height of antidemocratic shock-doctrine misgovernment .
“ If we ’ re going to talk about this , then let ’ s talk about it when everyone is in Albany , when everyone is at the table , ” said Assembly Member Latrice Walker , who sponsored last year ’ s bail reforms .
“ These backroom deals just don ’ t make sense.
” But with the help of Democrats in the state Senate , there ’ s a good chance @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
In the first weeks of this year , a coalition of police , prosecutors , and state Republicans , aided by a fear-mongering news media , launched a coordinated campaign against the new bail laws , which eliminated money bail for most offenses , meaning that instead of going to jail , most defendants would be released to prepare for their trials from home .
The campaign seemed to be effective : a January 21 poll showed popular opinion , which had backed the reforms , swinging the other way .
Clearly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Senate announced legislation to reverse the reforms they ’ d approved the previous year , granting judges the power to lock defendants up before trial if the judges deemed them “ dangerous.
” Now the possibility that some version of the Senate initiative winds up in the budget bill has become very real .
But the details remain fuzzy : Would this new “ dangerousness ” standard be based on algorithmic predictive tools , which have been shown to produce racist outcomes ?
Or would judges have free reign to use their discretion @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to fill New York ’ s jails by setting unaffordable bail ?
Just what Cuomo and Senate Democrats want is unclear , because the precise shape of this proposal remains a closely held secret .
If the Senate has draft legislation it ’ s bringing to budget negotiations , it hasn ’ t been publicly released .
Even among legislators , few will admit to having seen anything specific .
Senate Democrats ’ insistence on rolling back bail reforms is especially perplexing because the political forces that had driven them to scuttle their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ moment at least , dissipated ; as the pandemic set in , state Republicans appeared to ease off their efforts to paint the Democrats as soft on crime .
In a March 17 statement , state Senate Minority Leader John Flanagan called on the legislature to hold off on controversial policy debates during the pandemic .
“ It is undemocratic to slip policies into a budget that can not be discussed by stakeholders who visit Albany or debated on the floor , ” Flanagan wrote .
“ We can pass a streamlined budget @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the state and that pertains solely to the coronavirus crisis and go no further than those bounds.
” But Senate Democrats seem to have worked themselves into such a frantic lather defending against Republicans ’ Willie Horton attacks that they ’ re now unable to stop .
They ’ re chasing their own tails in a self-sustaining panic of triangulation even as there ’ s no one left to surrender to .
If criminal justice reformers are able to stave off the imposition of a dangerousness standard , it will likely be thanks @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Heastie has declared his unwillingness to undo last year ’ s bail reforms before any data on whether they ’ re working can be gathered .
That may involve other concessions though — perhaps expanding the list of alleged crimes for which judges would still be able to set money bail and jail defendants who can ’ t afford to pay it .
That would be a bitter disappointment to criminal justice reformers , who foresee relentless efforts by opponents in coming years to nibble away at bail reform , adding bit by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which a defendant ’ s wealth can determine her freedom .
Still , reformers say , that compromise would be far preferable to a dangerousness standard , which many consider even more pernicious than money bail itself .
With so much confusion swirling around the New York capitol , it ’ s still possible that the governor and Senate Democrats will relent and put off debate on bail reform until a time when it can be thoroughly discussed .
If not , Cuomo will have to figure out how to balance his new @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a reputation as the man who , with the help of fellow Democrats , took advantage of the coronavirus crisis to strangle criminal justice reform in its crib .

As the coronavirus pandemic grips the United States, prosecutors, sheriffs, and public officials have raced to reduce the populations held in local jails, where it is next to impossible to protect elderly and otherwise vulnerable incarcerated people.
In New York, however, Gov. Andrew Cuomo is bucking this trend, pushing for a new law that would roll back newborn bail reforms that went into effect in January and instead expand judges’ power to put defendants in jail. Cuomo has backed this agenda for years, but his evident insistence on including it in the state’s budget negotiations amid a public health crisis is nonetheless remarkable.
“Every other elected official across the country is thinking about how they can reduce their jail and prison population,” Rena Karefa-Johnson, the New York state director for criminal justice reform for the advocacy group FWD.us, said in an interview. “But in New York, we have elected officials still trying to change legislation that would put thousands more people back in jail and slowing up an emergency budget process to do it. It’s wildly out of step with what’s happening across the country, and it’s wildly at odds with this narrative of New York taking Covid-19 seriously and keeping people safe. It’s bonkers.”
The governor’s move comes as his power is ascendant. Cuomo has always wanted to be a crisis governor, engaging in well-documented disaster heroics whenever roadways get slippery. But that instinct, risible in peacetime, is playing differently in the pandemic. People in New York and around the country are terrified, and the erratic federal response under President Donald Trump has been far from reassuring. Cuomo’s sober, authoritative daily briefings have filled the vacuum. In the last weeks, Cuomo has become America’s Governor, its crisis daddy. In recent days the hashtag #PresidentCuomo has been trending on Twitter. With his popularity soaring, and his constituents preoccupied with looming mass fatalities as the coronavirus threatens to overwhelm the state’s health care capabilities, Cuomo is well positioned to drive through his preferred agenda with hardly anyone noticing.
“It’s wildly out of step with what’s happening across the country, and it’s wildly at odds with this narrative of New York taking Covid-19 seriously.”
Cuomo’s office did not respond to a request for comment for this story, but in recent weeks the Governor has repeatedly declared his intention in to put changes to bail reform in the budget.
In New York, state budget negotiations are opaque at the best of times. The governor and the leaders of the two houses of the legislature — the proverbial “three people in a room” — hash out a series of horse-trades and concessions, which are then presented to legislators as an omnibus mash for a single take-it-or-leave-it vote.
These are not the best of times. Several legislators have already been diagnosed with coronavirus infections, and the statehouse has been evacuated, with legislators sent home to shelter in place, unable to meet or debate. They’ve been told to be ready to return to the state capitol in Albany on short notice to approve a budget they’ve yet to see and are unlikely to have a chance to even read before they vote on it.
For the advocates and legislators who helped pass New York’s landmark bail reforms last year, Cuomo’s drive to reverse those gains by slipping language into an under-scrutinized, must-pass disaster budget is the height of antidemocratic shock-doctrine misgovernment.
“If we’re going to talk about this, then let’s talk about it when everyone is in Albany, when everyone is at the table,” said Assembly Member Latrice Walker, who sponsored last year’s bail reforms. “These backroom deals just don’t make sense.”
But with the help of Democrats in the state Senate, there’s a good chance Cuomo is about to have his way.
In the first weeks of this year, a coalition of police, prosecutors, and state Republicans, aided by a fear-mongering news media, launched a coordinated campaign against the new bail laws, which eliminated money bail for most offenses, meaning that instead of going to jail, most defendants would be released to prepare for their trials from home. The campaign seemed to be effective: a January 21 poll showed popular opinion, which had backed the reforms, swinging the other way.
Clearly frightened, Democrats in New York state Senate announced legislation to reverse the reforms they’d approved the previous year, granting judges the power to lock defendants up before trial if the judges deemed them “dangerous.” Now the possibility that some version of the Senate initiative winds up in the budget bill has become very real. But the details remain fuzzy: Would this new “dangerousness” standard be based on algorithmic predictive tools, which have been shown to produce racist outcomes? Or would judges have free reign to use their discretion, the same discretion that they used to fill New York’s jails by setting unaffordable bail? Just what Cuomo and Senate Democrats want is unclear, because the precise shape of this proposal remains a closely held secret. If the Senate has draft legislation it’s bringing to budget negotiations, it hasn’t been publicly released. Even among legislators, few will admit to having seen anything specific.
“It is undemocratic to slip policies into a budget that cannot be discussed by stakeholders who visit Albany or debated on the floor.”
Senate Democrats’ insistence on rolling back bail reforms is especially perplexing because the political forces that had driven them to scuttle their own landmark achievement have, for the moment at least, dissipated; as the pandemic set in, state Republicans appeared to ease off their efforts to paint the Democrats as soft on crime.
In a March 17 statement, state Senate Minority Leader John Flanagan called on the legislature to hold off on controversial policy debates during the pandemic. “It is undemocratic to slip policies into a budget that cannot be discussed by stakeholders who visit Albany or debated on the floor,” Flanagan wrote. “We can pass a streamlined budget that deals solely with the finances of the state and that pertains solely to the coronavirus crisis and go no further than those bounds.”
But Senate Democrats seem to have worked themselves into such a frantic lather defending against Republicans’ Willie Horton attacks that they’re now unable to stop. They’re chasing their own tails in a self-sustaining panic of triangulation even as there’s no one left to surrender to.
If criminal justice reformers are able to stave off the imposition of a dangerousness standard, it will likely be thanks to State Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie. Heastie has declared his unwillingness to undo last year’s bail reforms before any data on whether they’re working can be gathered. That may involve other concessions though — perhaps expanding the list of alleged crimes for which judges would still be able to set money bail and jail defendants who can’t afford to pay it. That would be a bitter disappointment to criminal justice reformers, who foresee relentless efforts by opponents in coming years to nibble away at bail reform, adding bit by bit to the list of offenses for which a defendant’s wealth can determine her freedom. Still, reformers say, that compromise would be far preferable to a dangerousness standard, which many consider even more pernicious than money bail itself.
With so much confusion swirling around the New York capitol, it’s still possible that the governor and Senate Democrats will relent and put off debate on bail reform until a time when it can be thoroughly discussed. If not, Cuomo will have to figure out how to balance his new status as America’s Governor with a reputation as the man who, with the help of fellow Democrats, took advantage of the coronavirus crisis to strangle criminal justice reform in its crib.


theintercept--2020-03-26--The Pandemic Could Overwhelm the Insurance Industry. We Must Expand Tricare for Everybody Who Needs

The Pandemic Could Overwhelm the Insurance Industry. We Must Expand Tricare for Everybody Who Needs It

An insurance industry bailout would be bad policy , leaving corporations whole , while patients still faced massive bills .
But it would also be dreadful politics .
A political system that hopes to avoid such a brutal vote needs to act now .
Fortunately , there is an option that Congress could make available with a one-page piece of legislation .
It ’ s called Tricare , and it ’ s the least known of the three major public health care plans , after Medicare and Medicaid .
It is designed for the families of service members , as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ nearly 10 million people .
President Donald Trump and congressional leaders have spoken of putting America on a “ wartime footing ” to take on the novel coronavirus .
Tricare — and , specifically , Tricare Select — is the match for the moment .
Deepening the problem , however , is that our private health insurance system is also woefully unprepared and threatens to buckle under the weight of the coronavirus pandemic , leaving major corporations pleading for a bailout and people with symptoms resisting treatment for fear of the cost .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ survive a pandemic .
The ACA exchanges are a very poor solution as well .
Beyond the numerous current problems with the system , it was simply not built for the massive churn and the special needs we will see in the worst-case pandemic .
It normally takes weeks between signing up and being covered .
Due both to the law ’ s design and to the Trump administration ’ s decision to end the Cost Sharing Reduction , choosing the best plan has become a very complicated mess depending on your income @ @ @ @ @ @ @ during this economic downturn is that they are going to have no idea when they will get back to work .
Consequently , they have no idea where their yearly income will end up .
Medicaid , by comparison , uses your monthly income , so depending on whether your income is low enough , that is a good option for some period of time , if you don ’ t live in a red state that refused to expand Medicaid .
Many employer plans are self-insured .
That means the insurance company @ @ @ @ @ @ @ administrator , while your company is the one directly paying all your medical bills .
That encourages companies to engage in mass layoffs to mitigate the risk of getting hammered with high health care costs and makes other options , like cutting hours but keeping benefits , less attractive than they were in past downturns .
The measures currently in place for people who lose their job — such as COBRA , which allows people to continue their employer insurance by paying large premiums , or the Affordable Care Act exchanges — are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ totally inadequate for a pandemic .
COBRA is meant to be a temporary bridge for those between jobs , but with no idea of how long whole sectors will be out of work due to quarantine measures , that is now a bad choice for individuals and a unique problem for businesses .
If and when things go really bad , the United States is going to need an off-the-shelf solution it can deploy at a huge scale .
The potential size of the problem and its ability to crush our private insurance @ @ @ @ @ @ @ both a huge surge in costs as more people use hospitals and a huge drop in revenue as companies hit by quarantine measures engage in massive layoffs of workers with employer-provided insurance .
That ’ s not to mention the added cost caused by less critical treatments being delayed , allowing those issues to worsen as all bed space is reserved for Covid-19 patients .
Very rough calculations would indicate that in a pessimistic scenario we could potentially see a 20 percent increase in the average claims and more than a doubling of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ insurance market .
First , let ’ s explain why our system of health insurance isn ’ t built to withstand or mitigate a pandemic , then run through the other options available to policymakers , none of which are sufficient .
Then let ’ s map the benefits of Tricare against the problem we ’ re up against .
Furthermore , the ACA exchange policies are very poorly designed for a pandemic .
For many people who are normally reasonably healthy , they are meant to be merely catastrophic insurance .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ high cost-sharing compared to employer insurance ( in-network , out-of-pocket costs are capped at $ 8,150 for individuals and $ 16,300 for families ) and very narrow networks .
Many exchange plans have even higher caps or no cap at all on out-of-network costs .
That is the last thing you want in a pandemic , where in an emergency , you will be sent to whichever hospital has open beds , regardless of your network status .
For many who lose their jobs right now , their exchange options will effectively be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to discourage them from getting treatment .
Individuals who lose their jobs could face both serious illness and crippling costs due to high out-of-pocket limits and/or surprise billing .
Fixing the flaws of the ACA would require multiple massive changes , since high cost-sharing to discourage people from getting too much care is at the core of the entire design .
Creating a New Plan Would Take Too Long Something like Sen. Bernie Sanders ’ s Medicare for All likely couldn ’ t be set up in time .
Any new system would @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to work out the specific new rules and regulations .
The same issue exists for ideas like a “ coronavirus crisis insurance program ” based on Medicare to cover those with the virus .
Meanwhile , a narrow program would do little for those who lost their jobs due to Covid-19 quarantine measures .
The same goes for those suffering because treatment for conditions that would have been relatively cheap to treat were delayed , or those who depend on hydroxychloroquine but can ’ t get their prescription filled due to the crisis @ @ @ @ @ @ @ treated for Covid-19 , but it turns out they merely had regular pneumonia ?
You want a program that is fully formed — and all you need to do is change one line of a bill to add millions of people to it .
Of the Existing Government Insurance Programs , Tricare Is the Best Choice Dramatically expanding Medicaid to cover more people would be a good option but is legally not viable .
Thanks to the Supreme Court case National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius , the federal government can ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ which is why 14 red states still haven ’ t taken part in the ACA ’ s Medicaid expansion .
Existing Medicare is both not really designed for younger people and has some needless complexity that makes quick expansion in a pandemic a problem .
Medicare doesn ’ t have an out-of-pocket cap , something you want during this pandemic .
The gap is normally addressed with seniors buying Medigap coverage or choosing a Medicare Advantage plan .
All new rules would be needed for providing these for younger people .
Traditional Medicare @ @ @ @ @ @ @ requiring people to select a Medicare Part D plan .
This is why Tricare , particularly Tricare Select , makes the most sense .
Tricare currently covers 9.4 million Americans and could relatively easily be scaled up by just changing a few lines of legislation about who qualifies .
Tricare Select is the PPO military insurance plan designed for people under 65 who aren ’ t in the military .
It ’ s the broad network plan for military family members and those retired from the military .
It offers full coverage , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ are already based off Medicare .
It also has very modest cost sharing , which would make sure that people who think they might need care seek it out , exactly what you want from a public health perspective when confronting a highly contagious disease .
Co-pays are small : the deductible is only $ 156 for an individual , with a much more reasonable catastrophic cap plus existing rules that prevent large surprise bills from unscrupulous hospitals and physician companies trying to take advantage of this crisis .
It is exactly the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have during this crisis , and , most importantly , it already exists .
We Need an Anti-Bailout Position Ready to Go The reality of the pandemic , the economic conditions , and the political climate is changing on a daily basis .
Ideas that were unthinkable a few weeks ago now have majority support .
Private insurers are also asking for their own indirect bailout by infusing them with more money .
If things get worse , expect them and every other industry to come back again for another round .
We @ @ @ @ @ @ @ makes companies whole but leaves people with thousands of dollars of medical debt just because they were “ covered ” by high-deductible exchange plans .
Or one that only directly pays for Covid-19 treatment but is full of holes , leaving people with huge bills because they went in for treatment but ultimately just had the flu .
Or one that does nothing for the millions of people who merely lost their job and their quality coverage due to necessary quarantine measures .
Or does nothing for the people who will suffer longterm @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The alternative out there needs to be comprehensive , and most importantly , ready to be immediately deployed .
We need a solution that can be used even faster than any industry bailout or targeted reinsurance program that has the government take on the insurers ’ cost for covering Covid-19 patients .
The best answer is a massive expansion of Tricare Select .
Expand it to all the people who have lost coverage due to the pandemic , all those “ contractors ” providing critical delivery right now , everyone keeping our @ @ @ @ @ @ @ needs it , to as many people as possible .
You can even rename it to whatever self-flattering name gets a president to sign it .

Photo illustration: Soohee Cho/The Intercept, Getty Images
We know that
our hospitals aren’t ready, nor is much of our health care industry, if the spread of Covid-19 continues on its current trajectory.
Deepening the problem, however, is that our private health insurance system is also woefully unprepared and threatens to buckle under the weight of the coronavirus pandemic, leaving major corporations pleading for a bailout and people with symptoms resisting treatment for fear of the cost. The status quo simply can’t survive a pandemic.
An insurance industry bailout would be bad policy, leaving corporations whole, while patients still faced massive bills. But it would also be dreadful politics. A political system that hopes to avoid such a brutal vote needs to act now. Fortunately, there is an option that Congress could make available with a one-page piece of legislation. It’s called Tricare, and it’s the least known of the three major public health care plans, after Medicare and Medicaid. It is designed for the families of service members, as well as retirees, and currently covers nearly 10 million people. President Donald Trump and congressional leaders have spoken of putting America on a “wartime footing” to take on the novel coronavirus. Tricare — and, specifically, Tricare Select — is the match for the moment.
First, let’s explain why our system of health insurance isn’t built to withstand or mitigate a pandemic, then run through the other options available to policymakers, none of which are sufficient. Then let’s map the benefits of Tricare against the problem we’re up against.
If and when things go really bad, the United States is going to need an off-the-shelf solution it can deploy at a huge scale. The potential size of the problem and its ability to crush our private insurance system is unprecedented. It could cause both a huge surge in costs as more people use hospitals and a huge drop in revenue as companies hit by quarantine measures engage in massive layoffs of workers with employer-provided insurance. That’s not to mention the added cost caused by less critical treatments being delayed, allowing those issues to worsen as all bed space is reserved for Covid-19 patients. Very rough calculations would indicate that in a pessimistic scenario we could potentially see a 20 percent increase in the average claims and more than a doubling of average hospital day usage in the individual/employer insurance market.
Our Current System Is Not Designed to Handle This Double Shock
Many employer plans are self-insured. That means the insurance company on your insurance card is just the administrator, while your company is the one directly paying all your medical bills. That encourages companies to engage in mass layoffs to mitigate the risk of getting hammered with high health care costs and makes other options, like cutting hours but keeping benefits, less attractive than they were in past downturns. The measures currently in place for people who lose their job — such as COBRA, which allows people to continue their employer insurance by paying large premiums, or the Affordable Care Act exchanges — are problematic at the best of times and totally inadequate for a pandemic. COBRA is meant to be a temporary bridge for those between jobs, but with no idea of how long whole sectors will be out of work due to quarantine measures, that is now a bad choice for individuals and a unique problem for businesses.
The ACA exchanges are a very poor solution as well. Beyond the numerous current problems with the system, it was simply not built for the massive churn and the special needs we will see in the worst-case pandemic. It normally takes weeks between signing up and being covered. Due both to the law’s design and to the Trump administration’s decision to end the Cost Sharing Reduction, choosing the best plan has become a very complicated mess depending on your income. The problem for people laid off during this economic downturn is that they are going to have no idea when they will get back to work. Consequently, they have no idea where their yearly income will end up. Medicaid, by comparison, uses your monthly income, so depending on whether your income is low enough, that is a good option for some period of time, if you don’t live in a red state that refused to expand Medicaid.
Read Our Complete Coverage The Coronavirus Crisis
Furthermore, the ACA exchange policies are very poorly designed for a pandemic. For many people who are normally reasonably healthy, they are meant to be merely catastrophic insurance. The most common plans tend to have very high cost-sharing compared to employer insurance (in-network, out-of-pocket costs are capped at $8,150 for individuals and $16,300 for families) and very narrow networks. Many exchange plans have even higher caps or no cap at all on out-of-network costs. That is the last thing you want in a pandemic, where in an emergency, you will be sent to whichever hospital has open beds, regardless of your network status.
For many who lose their jobs right now, their exchange options will effectively be financial Russian roulette, with plans designed to discourage them from getting treatment. Individuals who lose their jobs could face both serious illness and crippling costs due to high out-of-pocket limits and/or surprise billing. Fixing the flaws of the ACA would require multiple massive changes, since high cost-sharing to discourage people from getting too much care is at the core of the entire design.
Creating a New Plan Would Take Too Long
Something like Sen. Bernie Sanders’s Medicare for All likely couldn’t be set up in time. Any new system would require months, if not years, to work out the specific new rules and regulations. The same issue exists for ideas like a “coronavirus crisis insurance program” based on Medicare to cover those with the virus. Meanwhile, a narrow program would do little for those who lost their jobs due to Covid-19 quarantine measures. The same goes for those suffering because treatment for conditions that would have been relatively cheap to treat were delayed, or those who depend on hydroxychloroquine but can’t get their prescription filled due to the crisis. And what about people who were treated for Covid-19, but it turns out they merely had regular pneumonia? You want a program that is fully formed — and all you need to do is change one line of a bill to add millions of people to it.
Of the Existing Government Insurance Programs, Tricare Is the Best Choice
Dramatically expanding Medicaid to cover more people would be a good option but is legally not viable. Thanks to the Supreme Court case National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, the federal government can’t force states to expand Medicaid, which is why 14 red states still haven’t taken part in the ACA’s Medicaid expansion.
Existing Medicare is both not really designed for younger people and has some needless complexity that makes quick expansion in a pandemic a problem. Medicare doesn’t have an out-of-pocket cap, something you want during this pandemic. The gap is normally addressed with seniors buying Medigap coverage or choosing a Medicare Advantage plan. All new rules would be needed for providing these for younger people. Traditional Medicare also doesn’t cover drugs, requiring people to select a Medicare Part D plan.
This is why Tricare, particularly Tricare Select, makes the most sense. Tricare currently covers 9.4 million Americans and could relatively easily be scaled up by just changing a few lines of legislation about who qualifies. Tricare Select is the PPO military insurance plan designed for people under 65 who aren’t in the military. It’s the broad network plan for military family members and those retired from the military. It offers full coverage, including drugs. Its provider reimbursement rates are already based off Medicare. It also has very modest cost sharing, which would make sure that people who think they might need care seek it out, exactly what you want from a public health perspective when confronting a highly contagious disease. Co-pays are small: the deductible is only $156 for an individual, with a much more reasonable catastrophic cap plus existing rules that prevent large surprise bills from unscrupulous hospitals and physician companies trying to take advantage of this crisis. It is exactly the kind of insurance we want people to have during this crisis, and, most importantly, it already exists.
We Need an Anti-Bailout Position Ready to Go
The reality of the pandemic, the economic conditions, and the political climate is changing on a daily basis. Ideas that were unthinkable a few weeks ago now have majority support. Private insurers are also asking for their own indirect bailout by infusing them with more money. If things get worse, expect them and every other industry to come back again for another round. We can’t have a solution that makes companies whole but leaves people with thousands of dollars of medical debt just because they were “covered” by high-deductible exchange plans. Or one that only directly pays for Covid-19 treatment but is full of holes, leaving people with huge bills because they went in for treatment but ultimately just had the flu. Or one that does nothing for the millions of people who merely lost their job and their quality coverage due to necessary quarantine measures. Or does nothing for the people who will suffer longterm health consequences even after surviving the virus.
The alternative out there needs to be comprehensive, and most importantly, ready to be immediately deployed. We need a solution that can be used even faster than any industry bailout or targeted reinsurance program that has the government take on the insurers’ cost for covering Covid-19 patients. The best answer is a massive expansion of Tricare Select. Expand it to all the people who have lost coverage due to the pandemic, all those “contractors” providing critical delivery right now, everyone keeping our supply chains moving, to everyone who needs it, to as many people as possible. You can even rename it to whatever self-flattering name gets a president to sign it.