The Trump Administration’s Predictions About the Pandemic
Let’s take a little trip down memory lane and look at the various predictions made by Trump and his Administration on the corona virus.
January 22:
Trump: “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China. It’s going to be just fine.”
January 31:
Hannity: “Coronavirus, how concerned are you?” Trump: “Well, we pretty much shut it down coming in from China. “
February 2:
Trump: “We pretty much shut it down coming in from China.”
February 10:
Trump: “A lot of people think that goes away in April with the heat — as the heat comes in.”
February 24:
Trump: “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA. . . . Stock Market starting to look very good to me.”
February 25:
Larry Kudlow, director of the National Economic Council: “We have contained this. I won’t say [it’s] airtight, but it’s pretty close to airtight.”
February 26:
Trump: “[The number of people infected is] going very substantially down, not up.” “The 15 [cases] within a couple of days, is going to be down to zero.”
February 27:
Trump: “It’s going to disappear one day, it’s like a miracle.”
March 10:
Trump: “It will go away. Just stay calm. It will go away.”
March 13:
Trump: “I don’t take responsibility at all.”
April 24:
V.P. Mike Pence: “ I believe by early June we’re going to see our nation largely past this epidemic. I think honestly, if you look at the trends today, , that I think by Memorial Day weekend we will have this corona virus epidemic behind us.”
May 7:
Trump: “Gov. Abbott, when you look at the job he’s done in Texas, I rely on his judgment.”
May 11:
Trump: “We have met the moment and prevailed.”
June 16:
V.P. Mike Pence: “There Isn’t a Coronavirus ‘Second Wave.” WSJ opinion piece.
June 22:
Lawrence Kudlow: “There is no second wave coming. It’s just hot spots. They send in CDC teams, we’ve got the testing procedures, we’ve got the diagnostics.”
July 1:
Trump: “I think we’re going to be very good with the coronavirus. I think that at some point that’s going to sort of just disappear, I hope.”
July 8:
Trump: “Well, I think we are in a good place…We’ve done a good job. I think we are going to be in two, three, four weeks, by the time we next speak, I think we’re going to be in very good shape.”
July 15:
Trump: “”We’re doing well in a lot of ways, and our country is coming back very strong. When you look at those job numbers — we’ve never had job numbers like we have right now. So it’s coming back very strongly.”
August 20:
Trump: We’re in the “closing moments of the pandemic.”
Trump: The coronavirus crisis is “nearing the final turn.”
August 21:
Pence: “We think there is a miracle around the corner…a tribute to President Trump’s leadership.”
How have these bold predictions held up? Let’s take a look at the record.
The U.S. is the only first world country on the planet that has failed to bring the pandemic under control. The U.S. has 4% of the world’s population and approximately 26% of the world’s corona virus cases. Similarly, the U.S. has suffered about 24% of the world’s deaths from this disease.
According to the New York Times: “(T)he country shattered its single-day record for new cases on Thursday — more than 74,000 with some numbers still to be announced…This was the 11th time in the past month that the record had been broken, and as of Wednesday the country’s seven-day average case number exceeded 63,000, up from about 22,200 a month before.”
The rest of the first world has essentially returned to normal. Children are safely returning to school, businesses are open and sports have resumed. In the U.S., we see a defeatist exceptionalism from Trump and his followers. Apparently, they believe the U.S. can’t solve this problem.
Why would anybody believe anything these people said? Why would anybody reward these demoralized losers with another four years?
I would recommend that you commit your time and/or money to good Congressional and legislative candidates. Elections have consequences. Let’s chase the money changers out of the temple in 2020! Together, we can whip the corona virus and take our country back!