If anyone doubts for an instant that Trump is using the pandemic for his own purposes, one only has to look at his pandering to the religious right over the reopening of houses of worship. To make Trump’s naked opportunism clear, it’s important to remember that, early on, Trump signed off on the view that citizens should “Listen and follow the directions of…state and local authorities.” Now that local leaders are arguing for the continuing closure of houses of worship, Trump is claiming that he has the authority to override closure orders.
To remember, the CDC issued the postcard March 16th precisely describing that local leaders indeed had authority over public health decisions. Furthermore, Trump had his name included in the postcard in a desperate effort to lay claim to be doing something about the pandemic–weeks after his own national security apparatus warned him of the impending cataclism. The Democratic party should be running ads with Trump’s February 24th claim that the pandemic was under control. Is it poor sportsmanship or politicking to be reminding voters of how Trump’s incompetence led to a worse disaster? Absolutely not.
When it was imperative to take credit, Trump was all over the CDC postcard in terms of receiving accolades for doing something. Trump’s inaction was criminal. As of this writing, close to 100,000 Americans have died of Covid-19, with 1.7 million total confirmed cases in the US. Out of a world total of 5.5 million, that means that the United States accounts for 30% of all worldwide cases. With 4.25% of the world’s population, it does not take a biostatistician to see that the United States has fared far worse than the rest of the world. A report claims that Trump’s delays in taking action cost 36,000 lives. So, nearly 40% of deaths could have been avoided if Trump had taken action sooner. But also, there’s the pesky postcard giving authority to state and local leaders.
The postcard was dated March 16th, signaling the beginning of Trump doing something. Now Trump wants to be seen by his core supporters as doing something by provoking armed intimidation against the governor of one state, and promising to “override” any state that keeps houses of worship closed. But it’s not even as if all religious leaders want houses of worship to reopen. Some leaders have pointed out that the message of Christianity is to love one’s neighbor, and that reopening too soon is the opposite of caring for one’s neighbor.
To recapitulate, when it came time to take claim to doing something, Trump used the CDC to issue a postcard to all Americans saying that state and local officials were responsible for all pandemic planning and mitigation. And, when it comes time to rile up his base against Democratic governors and other officials, Trump says that no, he is in control of the way in which we go back to our normal lives. Trump does this in order to sow division. Trump is a clear and present danger to the good of the nation and the Democratic party should not fall for Trump’s latest con. While the commonsensical path to take is to comply with the advice of health professionals, it is also common sense to attack Trump’s incompetence in this disaster.