President Donald Trump's response to the health crisis facing the United States has been widely criticized.
He initially dismissed the virus as a hoax before his administration bungled a rollout of testing kits and ordered governors to fend for themselves. Against the near-unanimous advice of health officials, Trump said as recently as Tuesday that he hopes to scale back crucial social distancing measures by Easter—in 18 days.
But rather than Trump's slowed response to a health emergency, at least one Republican Senator is blaming the impeachment proceedings against the President for the United States' lack of preparation.
Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) accused Democrats of hindering Trump's ability to respond.
The President hardly concerned himself with impeachment hearings past Twitter. His administration complied with no congressional subpoenas and the President himself didn't testify.
Trump was acquitted on February 5. There were 11 cases of the virus in the United States. Trump would continue to minimize the threat of the virus until March 16.
Even in his own words, Trump contradicted the idea that impeachment in any way inhibited his response to the virus.
Trump said on March 5:
"We got hit with the virus really three weeks ago, if you think about it, I guess. That's when we first started really to see some possible effects."
Like many of Trump's claims, this was false (the first confirmed case of the virus in the United States was in late January), but Trump himself admitted he didn't really "see some possible effects" until a week after his acquittal.
The President held campaign rallies throughout the impeachment proceedings and, after his acquittal, held a lengthy speech at the White House to boast.
People pointed out that Trump didn't participate in official impeachment proceedings, and only addressed it to mock Democrats and mobilize his supporters.
Even if Trump had participated in the impeachment proceedings, what President has never had to multitask?
Try again, Senator.
