Former President Donald Trump was widely criticized after President Joe Biden's campaign posted a startling reminder of what Trump was saying about COVID-19 four years ago today.
This comes amid a presidential campaign during which Trump regularly asks Americans if they are "better off" now than 4 years ago. The Biden campaign is eager to remind people why the answer to that question is an unequivocal "Yes."
"Four years ago today," the Biden campaign noted that Trump had asked Dr. Deborah Birx—a physician and diplomat who at the time served as the White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator—the following question:
"Doctor, wouldn't you say there's a good chance that COVID will not come back?"
It's worth noting that Trump asked the question of Birx the same day the United States confirmed a total of over 200,000 cases and 4,076 new deaths nationwide. The total number of deaths nationwide at the time was at least 49,835.
Birx did not push back against Trump's question, merely responding:
"I don't know."
You can see BidenHQ's post and the video below.
Four years ago, the United States was grappling with the initial impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. The country had entered shutdowns the month prior that had severe economic consequences, leaving businesses and industries on the brink of collapse.
Well over 1.2 million Americans have died since the pandemic began. Many of these people could have been saved had Trump's administration taken the situation seriously from the start.
Many prominent Trump surrogates have downplayed the fact that Trump raged against shutdowns, attacked healthcare professionals, frequently undermined the efforts of the White House COVID-19 Task Force, and openly pushed conspiracy theories about the virus and the vaccination campaign that were embraced by his followers, hindering the country's ability to rebound from the pandemic's economic shock.
According to a 2021 Lancet commission tasked with assessing Trump's health policy record, the US could have prevented 40% of Covid-19 deaths if its death rates had aligned with those in other high-income G7 countries. The commission stated that Trump "brought misfortune to the USA and the planet" during his four-year tenure.
The commission emphasized the increasing evidence that Trump's rollbacks of regulations led to a rise in death and disease. From 2016 to 2019, annual deaths related to environmental and occupational factors surged by more than 22,000, reversing a trend of steady decline.
The negative effects of the rescinded regulations were especially pronounced in states that had been strong supporters of Trump in 2016, which were also the most impacted by cuts to health insurance coverage, as the report noted.
Many were quick to point this out, reminding everyone how Trump's leadership—or lack thereof—worsened the crisis.
The footage the Biden campaign posted was of course not the first time Trump had made nonsensical claims about when the pandemic would end.
In February 2020, he told the public that the coronavirus should “go away” by April. The following month, when shutdowns officially began, he said that the virus may “wash” away by summer, openly complained about school closures meant to curb the virus' spread, and was criticized for lamenting worsening stock market performance.
Trump also falsely told the public that the virus “won’t be coming back in the form that it was" by wintertime. Ultimately, the pandemic worsened by then, with cases driven by Americans spending more time indoors. Wintertime has long been associated with coughs, colds and other respiratory illnesses, with seasonal influenza and the common cold peaking during these periods.
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