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OPINION

Trump Is Spreading Disinformation About Coronavirus — and There’s No Way to Stop Him

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President Donald Trump is actively spreading disinformation about the coronavirus outbreak in the United States, and there’s nothing we can do about it.

Late Thursday morning, for example, Trump sent the following tweet:

This is not so. There are undoubtedly more than 129 cases in the United States; the problem is, testing has been so slow — and at times completely botched — that we don’t have a good sense of how many cases of coronavirus there are in the country. So Trump is trying to use his own administration’s ineptitude as a reason to think the crisis is less severe than it is. And some analysts believe that the actual number of cases is much higher than the number of confirmed cases. The outlet Stat reported on one analysis that looked just at Seattle:

The author of the analysis, a computational biologist named Trevor Bedford, said there are likely already at least 500 to 600 cases of Covid-19 in the greater Seattle area. He urged health authorities and the public to immediately begin adopting non-pharmaceutical interventions — imposing “social distancing” measures, telling the sick to isolate themselves, and limiting attendance at large gatherings.

“Now would be the time to act,” Bedford, who is at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, told STAT.

As long as a large number of cases are unconfirmed, the virus will be more likely to spread.

All of which makes it obvious that Trump’s claim that he closed the borders to reduce the spread of the virus is false. He never did such a thing. The Trump administration did limit entry to the U.S. from non-Americans who had traveled to China, where the virus originated, but this is not “closing the borders.” (Closing the borders is a bad idea, anyway.) And when Americans who had been in China and were potentially carrying the virus were repatriated to the United States, U.S. officials were improperly to work with them and lacked the necessary medical protection, according to a whistleblower. These workers may have spread the infection further.

This isn’t the first time that Trump has intentionally deceived the American people about the number of cases in the United States. In his first press conference on the crisis, Trump repeated and erroneously referred to “15” Americans who had at that time been found to be infected with the virus; this number was actually a subset of the 60 who had been found to be infected. And he predicted this number would soon go down close to zero, even though none of the administration’s health experts were making such a claim.

His effort to downplay and mislead the public about the crisis is particularly disturbing when you consider that Trump said: “We are working very hard to keep these numbers as low as possible!” Taken literally, this suggests that they care more about keeping the reportednumber of infections down more than they care about keeping the actual number low. Usually, this would be an unfair and uncharitable way to interpret a public official’s statement, but Trump long ago lost the benefit of the doubt. As we’ve seen, he’s actively inclined to obscure the truth about the outbreak. And one way in which his administration has been deficient in responding to the virus is in its failure to provide enough test kits and information to the medical professionals on the front lines responding to the crisis. While the actual cause for this delay remains unclear, it’s tempting to conclude that the president’s active disinterest in the truth about the crisis could be playing some role.

Trump has promoted other dangerous falsehoods about the outbreak:

  • Trump said the World Health Organization’s estimate of a 3.4 percent death rate for infections was “really a false number. “Now this is just my hunch, but based on a lot of conversations,” Trumps said on Fox News, “personally, I’d say the number is way under 1 percent.” The true death rate is unknown and disputed in good faith, and the WHO figure may not be accurate, but Trump’s dismissal of it as “false” is baseless.
  • Trump discussed the fact that people could go to work while carrying the virus and get better, seeming to suggest this would be fine. In fact, public health experts are urging people not to go to work if they are sick or infected.
  • He repeatedly compared the virus to the flu, even though estimates suggest the Covid-19 is much deadlier. And its impact on society could be much more severe than the flu because it has the potential to overburden the medical system.
  • Trump has repeatedly said that a vaccine for the virus could be coming soon, even though administration officials have consistently told him and the public that a year to a year-and-a-half is the best-case scenario for having a vaccine ready for widespread use.
  • When asked whether he agreed with his supporters, such as Rush Limbaugh — who falsely claimed the coronavirus was the “common cold” and that it was being weaponized against Trump — Trump said he agreed. He later said the coronavirus was the Democrats’ new “hoax,” though he later said he meant the reactions to the outbreak were the “hoax.”

Many of these claims are actively dangerous. Trump consistently downplays the state of outbreak, and he used the issue to attack the media, which the public will need to rely on for vital information for their own protection. By promoting lies and deceptive spin about the crisis, Trump can encourage dangerous behavior in his supporters and an inadequate response from his administration.

But he remains the president. Democrats tried to remove him for office for a scandal in which he did the same exact thing he’s doing now — placing his own short-sighted interests above the needs of the country — but they failed. Republicans refuse to do anything significant to check his behavior. So until at least January 2021, the United States will be stuck with a man leading the federal government who seems to be acting in ways that make a public health threat worse.

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OPINION

‘Ridiculous and Weak’: Trump’s ‘Triple Sabotage’ Mocked as Fox Hypes Escalatorgate

Published

8 months ago

on

September 25, 2025

By

In a 358-word early Wednesday evening diatribe, President Donald Trump lashed out at the United Nations once again, attacking the 80-year-old institution for three issues — two of which it has said were the result of his own team’s actions.

These were not matters of the august body’s mission to end world hunger or foster global peace. Instead, the President of the United States fumed because the escalator stalled as he and the First Lady stepped on to ride toward the blue, green, and gold General Assembly Hall — where he would soon deliver a speech derided by the foreign press as “deranged,” “staggering,” and “incoherent,” meticulously fact-checked and debunked by U.S. reporters, yet lauded by Fox News, right-wing media, and Republican allies.

President Trump also expressed anger that his teleprompter stopped in mid-sentence, forcing him to deliver his remarks from paper.

On Wednesday in his Truth Social rant, the President added an additional grievance to his list: he claimed his speech could only be heard in the great hall if attendees were wearing the ubiquitous earpiece interpreter translation devices.

READ MORE: Vance: FCC Chairman’s Kimmel Threat Was Just a ‘Joke’

Calling these three issues “sinister,” “a real disgrace,” “sabotage,” and even “triple sabotage,” Trump described the escalator ride, declaring that it “came to a screeching halt.”

“It stopped on a dime. It’s amazing that Melania and I didn’t fall forward onto the sharp edges of these steel steps, face first. It was only that we were each holding the handrail tightly or, it would have been a disaster.”

As video showed, and Fox Business noted, the First Lady appeared unfazed. Pausing and looking back at her husband, she simply walked up the escalator.

Trump pointed to a piece in The Times of London that claimed some UN workers had joked about turning the escalator off for Trump, but according to multiple reports, the culprit was a member of Trump’s own team.

Nevertheless, Trump called for the perpetrators to be “arrested!”

He then complained about his teleprompter, explaining, “as I stood before a Television crowd of millions of people all over the World, and important Leaders in the Hall, my teleprompter didn’t work. It was stone cold dark. I immediately thought to myself, ‘Wow, first the escalator event, and now a bad teleprompter. What kind of a place is this?'”

Telling his supporters, “I’m sending a copy of this letter to the Secretary General, and I demand an immediate investigation,” Trump lashed out again at the UN: “No wonder the United Nations hasn’t been able to do the job that they were put in existence to do.”

Fox Business once again jumped on the bandwagon on Thursday morning, declaring the escalator stopping put the President in danger.

READ MORE: Podcaster Factchecks Vance After VP Uses Crude Epithet to Attack Him

Host Maria Bartiromo told viewers that Trump “wants answers after the escalator stopped as soon as he and the First Lady stepped on it.”

In contrast to Trump’s diatribe, Bartiromo remarked, “Look how great Melania was. She’s unfazed. She walks on it, it stops, she turns around to the president, and she just leads the president up and walks.”

Bartiromo then declared, “this could have been a massive, massive issue,” with “the president being frozen there in one place, makes him vulnerable.”

She appeared to be suggesting he could have been a sitting (or standing) target.

“The UN reports,” Bartiromo continued, “that they’ve had, they ordered a thorough investigation, and are, quote, ready to cooperate in full transparency, with relevant U.S. Authorities.”

But the UN has also stated that the escalator being stopped happened after a member of Trump’s team, a videographer, at the top of the escalator may have accidentally tripped a safety device.

“The escalator had stopped after a built-in safety mechanism on the comb step was triggered at the top of the escalator,” UN Secretary-General spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric said, according to NBC News. “The safety mechanism is designed to prevent people or objects accidentally being caught and stuck in or pulled into the gearing. The videographer may have inadvertently triggered the safety function described above.”

NBC added that a United Nations official “told NBC News that the White House was responsible for operating Trump’s teleprompter.”

Sarah Longwell, founder and publisher of The Bulwark, remarked, “Trump not being able to go up an escalator is definitely more important than the things going up in voter’s lives: grocery prices, insurance premiums, inflation, consumer goods impacted by tariffs, etc. But sure, Escalator-gate!”

Former Obama official Tommy Vietor asked, “Do the Trump stooges pushing this line not realize that it makes him look ridiculous and weak?”

Former Hillary Clinton advisor Zac Petkanas observed: “People can’t afford to pay for groceries and small businesses are failing thanks to the Republican tariffs. But Fox News is focused on Trump having to walk up some stairs and the White House is focused on building a $200 million ballroom. They just have the wrong priorities.”

The Atlantic’s Dr. Norman Ornstein, a political scientist, snarked: “Wow, walking up an escalator! That alone is worth a Nobel prize!”

In a video posted to social media, Katherine Clark, the Democratic Whip of the U.S. House of Representatives, remarked: “I’ll tell you what triple sabotage is. One, it is making life harder and more expensive with his policies on the American people. Two, it is his attitude of the beatings will continue on working people until their morale improves. And three, he is now threatening to shut down government in order to take away your healthcare. Think about that.”

READ MORE: ‘Stark Raving Mad’: Trump Declares UN Speech ‘Very Well Received’ — Diplomats Disagree

 

Image via Reuters

 

 

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OPINION

‘Maoist’ ‘Soviet’ ‘Communist’: As Trumpism 2.0 Takes Shape, Experts Endeavor to Define It

Published

1 year ago

on

May 5, 2025

By

In the 105 days since Donald Trump began his second term as President, political observers and experts have been working to define and explain what Trumpism 2.0 is—and what it is not.

For some, the “not” is obvious. Critics suggest the United States is no longer a fully functioning democracy, but a nation sliding toward authoritarianism. Under Trump, they say, this is not a country growing stronger—or moving toward a brighter future.

That may explain the increasingly stark language used by his critics. One likened his recent televised Cabinet meeting to “something that frankly I would’ve expected out of North Korea.” Another said, “I didn’t sign up to live in the f—— Soviet Union,” in response to Trump’s claim that “a beautiful baby girl that’s 11 years old” doesn’t need 30 dolls or 250 pencils. “They can have three dolls or four dolls… they can have five” pencils. Others argue that Trumpism is now “primarily about the acquisition of power—power for its own sake.”

Political observers, experts, scholars, and critics are increasingly focused on signs of Trumpism’s extremism, authoritarianism, fascistic demagoguery, and even its apparent support for movements some say verge on fascism itself.

The current Trump administration “is supportive of a German political party that is the direct successor to National Socialism”—Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Party—national security attorney Mark Zaid warned on Sunday. He appeared to be referring to Alternative for Germany (AfD), which German authorities have officially designated a “right-wing extremist endeavor.” Germany’s state media outlet, DW, recently published a video titled: “How much of a neo-Nazi party is the German AfD?”

READ MORE: ‘What Drunk on Power Looks Like’: Trump Goes on Attack in Wild Rants

The Atlantic’s James Surowiecki, author of “The Wisdom of Crowds,” on Monday pointed to a Wall Street Journal op-ed by Trump Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. Surowiecki remarked: “Trump says he will set the prices for all imported goods. He tells us we’ll have 5 pencils and like it. Now we have the Treasury Secretary talking about preventing the ‘spiritual degradation of the working class.’ Trumpism is becoming perversely, farcically Maoist.”

Noah Smith, the former Bloomberg opinion columnist, made that “Soviet Union” remark, above, in response to Trump’s comments to NBC News “Meet the Press” moderator Kristen Welker in an interview that aired on Sunday—the same comments that Surowiecki cited.

Those remarks—Trump defending his tariff war and the expected results, namely, higher prices and fewer available goods—appear to have hit a nerve.

Former U.S. Ambassador to Russia, Michael McFaul, now a Professor of Political Science at Stanford, added: “This is just incredible — a billionaire telling working people they need to reduce their consumption. This is the opposite of the free market. Sounds a lot like communism to me. Soviet leaders also dictated to consumers their limited choices.”

He also noted: “Soviet communist leaders also dictated the consumption patterns of their citizens.”

“Enjoy MAGA Maoism,” remarked political writer and former congressional speechwriter Rotimi Adeoye, also commenting on Trump’s “dolls and pencils” utterance. And Adeoye pointed to his recent Washington Post piece:

“What we’re seeing is a kind of MAGA Maoism, remixed for the algorithm age. Like the Chinese Cultural Revolution, it glorifies physical labor as moral purification, only now the purification is from the supposed “wokeness” of desk work, filtered through TikTok, X and Twitch. It’s not about creating jobs. It’s about creating vibes: strong men doing hard things, reshared until they become ideology.”

Professor of Political Science Robert E. Kelly noted that “MAGA loves to call its opponents ‘communists,’ but this is literally a neo-Marxist critique of consumerism.”

“The Department of Central Planning and Child Rearing has figured out the optimal number of dolls and pencils each child should have to make beautiful Republic,” snarked Professor of Economics and Public Policy, Justin Wolfers.

And The Atlantic’s David Frum, quipped: “One serving per person, no second helpings, until we have won the great patriotic war against Chinese pencil exporters.”

Frum added: “Second-term Trump messages: ‘America’s over-indulged 11 year old girls own too many pencils.’ And also: ‘I’m not sure whether president needs to obey the Constitution.'”

READ MORE: ‘Absolutely No Clue’: Trump Roasted Over Unique Declaration of Independence Interpretation

CNN senior reporter Edward-Isaac Dovere on Sunday noted: “In the space of 48 hours, the President of the United States has tweeted an image of himself as the new pope, said he doesn’t know if he has to abide by the Constitution, cited multiple completely false statistics, and announced that he wants to reopen a prison closed in 1963.”

Trump’s comment about his duty to uphold the Constitution—”I don’t know“—drew tremendous anger.

“The thing is that he’s being honest here,” Surowiecki observed. “He doesn’t know, because he’s totally incurious, doesn’t care about policy other than tariffs, and doesn’t have any interest in or knowledge of American constitutional law.”

Then there is the latest theater of Trump’s tariff war: the film industry.

The President of the United States has decided that any film “produced” outside of the U.S. will also be subjected to his tariffs.

“The Movie Industry in America is DYING a very fast death,” Trump claimed. “Other Countries are offering all sorts of incentives to draw our filmmakers and studios away from the United States. Hollywood, and many other areas within the U.S.A., are being devastated. This is a concerted effort by other Nations and, therefore, a National Security threat. It is, in addition to everything else, messaging and propaganda! Therefore, I am authorizing the Department of Commerce, and the United States Trade Representative, to immediately begin the process of instituting a 100% Tariff on any and all Movies coming into our Country that are produced in Foreign Lands. WE WANT MOVIES MADE IN AMERICA, AGAIN!”

Professor Wolfers sounded the alarm.

“Given that this White House leaks about everything,” Wolfers, who is frequently seen on cable news, wrote, “and there was no chatter about movie tariffs, it seems likely that policy reshaping the lives of millions of Americans was made by an old man sitting alone in a room with a remote in his left hand, aided by no expert advice.”

“The party of small government would like you to watch fewer foreign films,” he also snarked.

And calling it “a very dangerous escalation,” Wolfers noted: “Tariffs have not traditionally been applied to services, and the United States is a massive net exporter of services. We would be extremely vulnerable to any service-based retaliation.”

Self-described “Tech policy wonk” Michael Nelson, formerly of Georgetown University, labeled Trump’s film tariffs “Deranged. #EconomicSuicide.”

Senate Intelligence Committee Vice Chairman Mark Warner (D-VA), who made the “North Korea” comparison above, has repeatedly warned about what he sees as corruption in the Trump administration.

“It seems like ages ago that Donald Trump turned the South Lawn into a car showroom to boost the profits of Elon Musk’s sputtering Tesla business. But it was just over a month ago. That’s the kind of daily, open corruption that’s just another day in this administration,” Senator Warner wrote on Friday.

Earlier last week, he summed up his thoughts on the Trump administration: “Corruption in plain sight and tanking the economy. This is what the Trump administration has been all about.”

Some, like The New York Times’ conservative opinion writer David Brooks, say simply that Trumpism is all about power.

Trumpism, Brooks wrote, “is primarily about the acquisition of power — power for its own sake. It is a multifront assault to make the earth a playground for ruthless men, so of course any institutions that might restrain power must be weakened or destroyed. Trumpism is about ego, appetite and acquisitiveness and is driven by a primal aversion to the higher elements of the human spirit — learning, compassion, scientific wonder, the pursuit of justice.”

Watch the videos above or at this link.

READ MORE: He Wanted Hulk Hogan to Run for Senate — Now Scott Jennings Thinks He May Meet That Bar

 

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OPINION

He Wanted Hulk Hogan to Run for Senate — Now Scott Jennings Thinks He May Meet That Bar

Published

1 year ago

on

May 2, 2025

By

CNN opinion contributor Scott Jennings, who this week appeared onstage at a Trump rally, says he would be all in if President Donald Trump asked him to run for U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell’s Kentucky seat. Jennings, a vocal Trump supporter, previously floated professional wrestler Hulk Hogan as a replacement for outgoing Senator Marco Rubio.

“If Marco Rubio does in fact become Secretary of State,” Jennings said on CNN last November, “we’re gonna need a new senator from the state of Florida. And we need someone with Rubio’s national security credentials. Now, there’s one Floridian who can do it. He stood up to the Russians and the Iranians in the 1980s when he defeated the Iron Sheik and Nikolai Volkov, two of America’s most lethal foes. He is a real American. He fights for the rights of every man. He knows that courage is the thing that keeps us free. Ladies and gentlemen, I announce—Ron DeSantis, get on it—Hulk Hogan for U.S. Senate.”

Jennings has been called a “supervillain” and “cable TV’s ubiquitous MAGA Man of the Moment,” by The Daily Beast. His job on the cable TV network appears to be to start fights—and finish them—in defense of President Trump.

READ MORE: ‘What Drunk on Power Looks Like’: Trump Goes on Attack in Wild Rants

That favor may now be returned.

“If the president wants me, I’ll run,” Jennings reportedly has said, according to The Daily Beast. “If he wants somebody else, I’ll support that candidate.”

Jennings may be Trump’s latest choice to fill a congressional seat — or perhaps a job in the White House, as he and the President teased out on Friday:

Kentucky Republican political insiders say Jennings is a definite possibility to run for McConnell’s seat. The former Republican Leader is retiring and not running for re-election. Some note that Jennings’ website certainly looks like a political candidate’s. “Conservative Ideas. Middle America values. Fearless strategy,” it reads.

Critics are not amused.

“CNN is still standing by Scott Jennings,” wrote The Washington Post’s media reporter Jeremy Barr. “On the one hand, it’s great to have on-air contributors who are ‘close to the action.’ On the other hand, networks generally want them to maintain even an iota of distance to give their commentary more credibility.”

“Scott’s relationship with Trump has always been interesting,” Barr added. “He was once harshly critical of him and as recently as 2022 he said on CNN ‘We need a new nominee.’ But he tends to come back to Trump’s camp when he’s in power or about to be.”

READ MORE: Democrats Call for Hegseth’s Ouster After Trump Demotes National Security Advisor

Barr pointed to a piece he wrote last October: “How Scott Jennings became CNN’s go-to GOP pundit — and pugilist.”

“So his being a belligerent a-h— on CNN was all about angling for a job in the Trump administration,” wrote advocacy journalist Lauren Windsor. “Do better, @CNN.”

Watch the video below or at this link.

READ MORE: ‘Absolutely No Clue’: Trump Roasted Over Unique Declaration of Independence Interpretation

 

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