Michael Atkinson handled the whistleblower complaint that triggered President Trump's impeachment; Kevin Corke reports.

President Donald Trump on Friday abruptly fired the inspector general of the intelligence community, sidelining an independent watchdog who played a pivotal role in his impeachment even as his White House struggled with the deepening coronavirus pandemic. Trump informed the Senate intelligence committee late Friday of his decision to fire Michael Atkinson, according to a letter obtained by The Associated Press. Atkinson handled the whistleblower complaint that triggered Trump’s impeachment last year.

After spending weeks downplaying the deadly virus that now has nearly the entire U.S. under some form of lockdown, several Fox News stars are now attempting to gaslight viewers by claiming they sounded the alarms over the coronavirus all along while it was actually the media and Democrats who dismissed it.The network’s most-viewed primetime host Sean Hannity has recently devoted much airtime to insisting he has “always taken the coronavirus seriously,” despite no less than a month ago suggesting the pandemic might be a “deep state” plot to hurt the economy or, at another point, claiming concerns over the novel virus was a “new hoax” designed to “bludgeon” Trump.Like many of his Fox colleagues, Hannity suddenly changed his tune late last month on the virus after President Donald Trump finally pivoted to treating it seriously. The Fox star and unofficial Trump adviser has since taken aim at Democrats and critics who have rightly called out his previous coverage, claiming that all along he was the one warning of the coming disaster while they were the ones turning a blind eye.But despite Hannity’s perceived confidence in his coronavirus coverage, video and audio recordings do exist. The Fox star spent weeks misleadingly comparing the deadly virus to the seasonal flu while claiming Democrats were “politicizing and actually weaponizing an infectious disease” to “bludgeon” Trump. (Those comments throughout February and March that Democrats were nearly identical to those infamously made by now-former Fox Business host Trish Regan, who, on March 9, with an on-air graphic blaring “Coronavirus Impeachment Scam,” insisted the outbreak was “another attempt to impeach” Trump and “demonize and destroy the president.” Weeks later, Regan was let go by Fox.)Comparing the novel virus to the seasonal flu, meanwhile, was a tactic Trump and his allies adopted for weeks on end to downplay the deadliness of COVID-19 and excuse the president’s slow response. But that misleading comparison was thrown in Hannity’s face last month during an interview with top infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci. When the primetime host asked Fauci how “dangerous” the virus is “compared maybe to the regular flu,” the top doc replied, “But Sean, to make sure your viewers get an accurate idea about what goes on, you mentioned seasonal flu. The mortality for seasonal flu is 0.1 [percent]. The mortality for this is about two, two-and-a-half percent. It’s probably lower than that, it’s probably closer to one. But even if it’s one, it’s 10 times more lethal than the seasonal flu. You gotta make sure that people understand that!”But now Hannity insists he was sober on the virus all along—and he’s gone to war with any reporter who says otherwise.Having already issued a toothless threat to sue other news outlets for criticizing his coronavirus coverage, the Fox star blew his top on Wednesday, melting down over tech journalist Kara Swisher’s New York Times column blaming Fox News for her mother’s initial lack of concern over the virus. The president’s confidant unleashed his own Trump-like tweetstorm, blasting Swisher on both his radio and television shows, and hinted that he may take her to court.“One far-left media mob maniac over at The New York Times is using the virus to attack her least favorite network and yours truly,” Hannity blared. “Now, if she actually watched our coverage and cared about the truth—actually she should put a correction in her newspaper. She would know that we reported without fear from the very beginning.”The rest of his Wednesday night rant, which included a bevy of childish insults directed at other reporters and networks, largely followed a formula Hannity’s has honed in recent days: Cherry-pick a handful of op-ed headlines to claim mainstream outlets downplayed the crisis in February, credit Trump’s partial China travel ban for saving “thousands of lives,” and highlight an interview he did with Fauci in January as proof he was always concerned about COVID-19.Pointing to one New York Times column from early February by a travel reporter questioning the efficacy of the travel restrictions, Hannity asked on his radio show if Swisher’s mom may have been planning a trip to China. “Maybe she had a planned trip! If she was listening to her daughter’s newspaper at the time, that would have been a really, really, really dumb idea,” he yelled, adding, “I’ll put my timeline up against yours.”Additionally, the Fox News star—infamous for peddling the insidious Seth Rich conspiracy and other assorted “deep state” claims involving Hillary Clinton—has also now taken to framing the rest of the media as the real conspiracy theorists. In a Monday night tirade, Hannity labeled rival network MSNBC “Conspiracy TV” while wondering aloud—without a hint of irony—how the public could trust “outright conspiracy theorists” on the coronavirus.Sean Hannity Absolutely Melts Down Over Kara Swisher’s NY Times ColumnBut Hannity is not the only Fox News personality to pretend he never played a role in peddling the dismissive, often-misleading coronavirus talking points he is on-record as saying.At the top of Wednesday’s broadcast of The Five, Fox’s popular late-afternoon chatfest, co-host Jesse Watters—who made headlines early on for his dismissive, often-cavalier attitude towards the virus—took up the Hannity line of criticizing Democrats and the media for downplaying the pandemic.In a transparent attempt to deflect criticism of Trump’s handling of the pandemic, Watters praised the president for “slapping the travel ban on China” (the only example of early action he can cite, of course, because the president subsequently dragged his feet on preparedness and claimed the virus was not going to severely affect the U.S.) and for briefly mentioning the disease in his State of the Union address in February. “The address that Nancy [Pelosi] ripped up afterwards,” Watters added.Watters continued with the partisan shots: “Not too long ago, Cuomo was saying go eat out in New York City. [Bill] de Blasio had all of the schools open. Nancy Pelosi said bring your friends to Chinatown and go to the bars. Joe Biden said the travel ban was racist.” (On Jan. 27, a group of 31 Democratic senators sent Trump’s health secretary a letter expressing concern that the administration wasn’t prepared to provide a “quick, robust, and comprehensive approach to the outbreak.” A day before that, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer called on HHS to declare a public-health emergency. The following week, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) lamented that Trump officials “aren’t taking this seriously enough.” And Watters fired off at the media: “Every column in The New York Times, The Washington Post, downplaying this thing.” ( On Jan. 22, former White House ebola czar Ronald Klain wrote in the Post that we’re now “past the ‘if’ question and squarely facing the ‘how bad will it be’ phase of the response.” A day later, Yale Institute for Global Health Director Saad Omer warned in the Times that the U.S. was not ready for an outbreak, offering preparedness tips for the administration.)While the Fox News host is now attempting to broadly paint Trump critics or the media as the real coronavirus downplayers, Watters is of course on-record as explicitly telling his viewers that the coronavirus was no big deal.“If I get it, I'll beat it,” he said on March 3. “I’m not lying. It's called the power of positive thinking, and I think America needs to wake up to that.” He patted himself on the back for sitting next to an “Asian guy” on the subway and ordering “Chinese food.” “I'm not afraid of the coronavirus, and no one else should be that afraid either,“ Watters declared.Even after the president finally addressed the nation on the pandemic and cities began to lock down, Watters still adopted a cavalier attitude about the disease.“I’m taking coronavirus seriously but I’m not panicking,” he declared at the top of the March 14 broadcast of his weekend show Watters’ World. “If I get it, I get it. And I’ll beat it, It’s not the plague. I’m a healthy young guy.”Later in his monologue, he compared COVID-19 to the 2009-10 H1N1 pandemic, which was highly contagious but had a low mortality rate of 0.02 percent. “Nearly 13,000 Americans died from swine flu,” Watters stated. “So far, just a few dozen Americans have died from coronavirus. A few dozen versus 13,000. In one year. This isn’t downplaying, this is just context. Now doctors say things will get worse, but that’s how it stacks up to the last big health scare.”Less than three weeks after those comments, more than 6,000 Americans have died from the coronavirus, and the White House task force’s most optimistic projection of the U.S. body count is between 100,000 to 240,000 deaths.At one point, as the president pivoted away from downplaying the pandemic’s risks, Watters admitted on March 16 that he did not take the threat “seriously” enough until then, days after telling Fox viewers that he would “beat it” and touting the then-low death toll.Fox News Host Jesse Watters Admits He Should Have Taken Coronavirus ‘Seriously’Despite these Fox stars’ protestations that they were actually the ones issuing dire warnings, there is empirical evidence that Fox News has directly influenced its (mostly older) viewers to believe that concerns about the pandemic are overblown. According to a recent Pew Research poll, 79 percent of the network’s viewers feel the media has exaggerated the risks.Dozens of journalism professors, meanwhile, recently wrote an open letter to Fox News founder Rupert Murdoch and his son, Fox Corp. CEO Lachlan Murdoch, accusing the network of peddling misinformation on the virus.“The average age of Fox News viewers is 65. It is well established that this population incurs the highest risk from the COVID-19 pandemic. In other words, Fox News viewers are at special risk from the coronavirus,” the letter read. “But viewers of Fox News, including the president of the United States, have been regularly subjected to misinformation relayed by the network—false statements downplaying the prevalence of COVID-19 and its harms; misleading recommendations of activities that people should undertake to protect themselves and others, including casual recommendations of untested drugs; false assessments of the value of measures urged upon the public by their elected political leadership and public health authorities.”Seth Meyers Exposes Fox News’ Sean Hannity Over Huge Coronavirus ‘Hoax’ LieRead more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

President Donald Trump and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi last talked Oct. 16, when Pelosi pointed her finger at the seated president during a heated exchange in a White House meeting that was captured in a widely shared photograph. Pelosi stormed out, and the two leaders’ frayed relationship was soon severed by the House's impeachment of Trump months later. Now, there are worries the broken relationship could hinder the federal government's ability to respond to the growing coronavirus crisis, the extent of the damage reflected in Thursday's report that a record 6.6 million people filed for unemployment, adding to more than 3 million from two weeks earlier.

President Trump sent Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) a letter on Thursday so harsh that Schumer's office said he apologized for it before the missive was even delivered.Earlier in the day, Schumer wrote his own letter to Trump regarding shortages of ventilators and personal protection equipment at hospitals treating coronavirus patients. Schumer asked Trump to choose someone with a military background to oversee production of medical equipment under the Defense Production Act, adding: "America cannot rely on a patchwork of uncoordinated voluntary efforts to combat the awful magnitude of this pandemic. The existing federal leadership void has left America with an ugly spectacle in which states and cities are literally fending for themselves, often in conflict and competition with each other."Schumer's office told Politico the senator and Trump spoke twice on Thursday afternoon, and at one point, Trump said he was in the process of sending a "very nasty letter" to Schumer. Trump promised to try to stop it from going out, and said he would apologize if he wasn't successful.The letter wasn't intercepted. In it, Trump wrote that Schumer was to blame for the high number of coronavirus patients in his state, with New York City "unprepared" because of "the impeachment hoax." He told Schumer he "never knew how bad a senator you are for the state of New York," and pushed back at criticism that the federal government has responded too slowly to the pandemic, despite having months to prepare. "As you are aware, the federal government is merely a backup for state governments," he said. "Unfortunately, your state needed far more of a backup than others."Schumer told MSNBC's Chris Hayes that he was "appalled" by the letter, and said it was time for Trump to "stop the pettiness — people are dying." As of Thursday night, at least 5,850 people have died in the United States from coronavirus.More stories from theweek.com The Secret Service signed an 'emergency order' this week — for 30 golf carts Birx says curve makes it clear not all Americans are following social distancing guidelines Mnuchin says stimulus loan program will be 'up and running' on Friday, despite lenders saying they aren't ready

President Trump sent a scathing letter to Senator Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) after the Senate minority leader criticized the president’s coronavirus response and demanded that he establish someone “unpolitical” to oversee the flow of medical equipment to embattled providers.“No wonder AOC and others are thinking about running against you in the primary. If they did, they would likely win,” Trump wrote. “ . . . I've known you for many years, but I never knew how bad a senator you are for the state of New York, until I became president."> Trump sends a letter to Sen. Schumer and it is worth reading in full. pic.twitter.com/jrvFnEI8oa> > -- Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) April 2, 2020The criticism comes after Schumer claimed Trump was politicizing the government’s coronavirus response, after reports that hospitals and other medical providers are facing shortages of crucial medical equipment. “It is the cruelest irony that this nation is now dependent on China for many of these products,” Governor Andrew Cuomo said at his daily press briefing on Thursday.“I am calling on the administration to put in charge of both production and distribution of materials a military man as czar under the [Defense Production Act],” Schumer said Thursday on MSNBC’s Morning Joe. "We need someone unpolitical to produce the materials more quickly and to distribute them to the places that are most needed — to not have my governor have to call up California and compete with other states.”Trump initially responded on Twitter, saying “we do have a military man in charge of distributing goods,” in reference to Rear Admiral John P. Polowczyk, who is overseeing the supply chain task force at FEMA.> …It wouldn’t matter if you got ten times what was needed, it would never be good enough. Unlike other states, New York unfortunately got off to a late start. You should have pushed harder. Stop complaining & find out where all of these supplies are going. Cuomo working hard!> > -- Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 2, 2020He added in later tweets that “Massive amounts of medical supplies, even hospitals and medical centers, are being delivered directly to states and hospitals by the Federal Government.”Schumer then sent a letter to Trump to further press the issue, accusing the Trump administration of “tardiness and inadequacy” in its response.“The existing federal leadership void has left America with an ugly spectacle in which States and cities are literally fending for themselves,” Schumer wrote. “ . . . The only way we will fix our PPE and ventilator shortage is with a data-driven, organized and robust plan from the federal government.”The president then responded with his own letter. “Thank you for your Democrat public relations letter and incorrect sound bites, which are wrong in every way,” Trump opened.He then reiterated the points from his tweets, before laying into the Democrat further.“If you spent less time on your ridiculous impeachment hoax, which went haplessly on forever and ended up going nowhere (except increasing my poll numbers), and instead focused on helping the people of New York, then New York would not have been so completely unprepared,” Trump leveled. “. . . You have been missing in action, except when it comes to the ‘press.’”

President Trump sent a letter to Democratic leader Sen. Chuck Schumer on Thursday accusing him of leaving New York “unprepared” for the coronavirus pandemic now crippling the state because of the “impeachment hoax.” In a blistering personal attack on Schumer (“I never knew how bad a Senator you are for the state of New York”), the president lashed out over criticism of what many see as a delayed federal response to the coronavirus pandemic sweeping the country. In an earlier letter Thursday, Schumer criticized the administration’s handling of the crisis, saying that “the existing federal leadership void has left America with an ugly spectacle in which States and cities are literally fending for themselves, often in conflict and competition with each other, when trying to procure precious medical supplies and equipment.”Schumer also noted on Twitter that he’d “called for action” as early as Jan. 26 and dismissed as “ridiculous” an argument made by some of Trump’s allies that impeachment proceedings left the country vulnerable to the coronavirus. Trump offered a swift and apparently unrestrained response: “Thank you for your Democrat public relations letter and incorrect sound bites, which are wrong in every way,” he wrote. “We have given New York many things, including hospitals, medical centers, medical supplies, record numbers of ventilators, and more. You should have had New York much better prepared than you did, and as Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx said yesterday, New York was very late in its fight against the virus,” the letter read. “As you are aware, the Federal Government is merely a back-up for state governments. Unfortunately, your state needed far more of a back-up than most others.” Just before the letter was made public, Trump veered off course during the daily White House coronavirus task force briefing to complain about the damage supposedly caused by “witch hunts.” “This is not the time for politics, endless partisan investigations, here we go again, have already done extraordinary damage to our country in recent years,” Trump said. “You see what happens. It's witch hunt, after witch hunt after witch hunt. And in the end the people doing the witch hunt have been losing. And they've been losing by a lot.”His comments came after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters Thursday morning that she was “a big supporter of after‑action review”  when asked about an investigation over the early days of the coronavirus. House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA), a Trump nemesis, has proposed a panel modeled after the 9/11 Commission.“I know that at least two of our chairmen have made a suggestion to that effect,” Pelosi said. “That's something we should discuss. It has to be bipartisan.”Trump, who as recently as just over a week ago compared the new coronavirus to the seasonal flu, has repeatedly been accused of downplaying the severity of the illness and stalling the federal response. Even as health officials warned in late March that the country had still not hit its peak, Trump called for loosening protective restrictions in time for Easter and sending people back to work. After spending weeks insisting the pandemic was contained and would soon go away altogether, he only appeared to acknowledge the gravity of the pandemic earlier this week, when the White House announced that at least 100,000 people would likely die as a result of the coronavirus. As of Thursday evening, the virus has claimed more than 5,800 lives across the country, and more than 240,000 infections have been reported. Worldwide, the coronavirus death toll topped 50,000, with more than 1 million infections. The more criticism Trump has faced over his handling of the pandemic, the more he has seemed to focus on talking up his efforts during the daily briefings, often championing how his administration has dealt with the health care crisis even as some give low marks to the federal government’s response. And despite his plea for everybody to put politics aside to fight the pandemic, his letter to Schumer appears to hark back to advice Trump recalled giving to the vice president in the midst of the coronavirus crisis, when he admitted last week that he had urged Mike Pence not to reach out to state authorities who are “not appreciative” enough of his administration.During the Thursday briefing, he once again placed the blame on the states, saying they “should have been building their stockpile” and “we’re not an ordering clerk.” “And we’ve done an unbelievable job,” Trump added. —Sam Brodey contributed reporting Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio issued a recommendation Thursday to wear face coverings when going outside, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is reportedly set to do the same.The public should use homemade cloth face coverings when outside and reserve medical-grade masks for health care workers, a draft CDC document obtained by Stat News reveals. A CDC official later told The New York Times the same guidance would soon be issued.Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti already told his city to wear masks on Wednesday. Like the CDC guidelines are set to recommend, de Blasio told New Yorkers not to buy N95 masks that hospital workers desperately need.> NEW: NYC Mayor de Blasio issues new recommendation “to wear a face covering when you go outside and will be near other people;” asks NYC residents to preserve surgical masks for health care workers and first responders. pic.twitter.com/AqO42QP3mb> > — NBC News (@NBCNews) April 2, 2020The White House's top coronavirus doctor Anthony Fauci said Tuesday that the CDC would consider issuing a mask recommendation once they were more widely available and that the coronavirus task force would be discussing the proposal that day.More stories from theweek.com The Secret Service signed an 'emergency order' this week — for 30 golf carts Birx says curve makes it clear not all Americans are following social distancing guidelines Schumer says he's 'appalled' by Trump blaming coronavirus in New York on impeachment

Elon Musk's ventilator giveaway may do more harm than good.After weeks of brushing off the COVID-19 pandemic as "dumb," the billionaire Tesla founder earlier this week announced he had 1,000 "FDA-approved ventilators" and ended up donating 40 to New York City's hospital system. Except the devices Musk gave away aren't powerful enough to use in the ICU, and health officials have actually warned against using them on COVID-19 patients because they could spread the virus further.What Musk purchased and gave to New York's hospitals were BiPAP machines made by ResMed, a photo shared by the hospital system reveals. ResMed CEO Mick Farrell later confirmed Musk's purchase of 1,000 5-year-old "bi-level, non-invasive ventilators" known as BiPAPs to CNBC, and said it was "fantastic" that Tesla could transport ResMed's product like it did.But hospitals are far more desperate for ventilators more invasive than BiPAP and CPAP machines, which are usually used to treat sleep apnea — many doctors don't even call them "ventilators," the Los Angeles Times' Russ Mitchell reports. In fact, CPAP machines may have only helped spread COVID-19 through the nursing home outside Seattle that was the center of the U.S.'s initial coronavirus outbreak, NPR reports. These machines can "possibly increase the spread of infectious disease by aerosolizing the virus," NPR writes. Health officials in King County, Washington, have since warned against using CPAP machines on coronavirus patients, as did the American Society of Anesthesiologists back in February.What would actually help, Farrell added to CNBC, is if Musk's Tesla could produce and donate lithium ion batteries — ResMed can use them to make invasive ventilators that hospitals actually need.More stories from theweek.com The Secret Service signed an 'emergency order' this week — for 30 golf carts Birx says curve makes it clear not all Americans are following social distancing guidelines Schumer says he's 'appalled' by Trump blaming coronavirus in New York on impeachment

Because an economy-wrecking pandemic isn't enough to deal with, the Trump administration is making aggressive noises at Iran."Upon information and belief, Iran or its proxies are planning a sneak attack on U.S. troops and/or assets in Iraq," President Trump tweeted on Wednesday. "If this happens, Iran will pay a very heavy price, indeed!"The White House didn't provide any additional information about Trump's tweet or his claim of a "sneak attack" being planned. But it should go without saying that going to war with Iran right now would be a terrible thing.January's near-miss of open war with Iran — triggered when the United States assassinated General Qassem Soleimani, the commander of Iran's elite Quds Force — seems like a million years ago at this point. But even as the COVID-19 pandemic has escalated, White House officials have reportedly been pushing behind the scenes to escalate military action against Iran, despite warnings from military commanders that doing so could destabilize the Middle East and require the commitment of thousands of additional U.S. troops to the region.The pandemic is ravaging both countries. The United States has the most confirmed cases of coronavirus in the world — and is facing shortages of critical equipment and medicines — while the death rate in Iran is so steep that the country has dug mass graves that can be seen from space. Meanwhile, the United States has refused to ease up on sanctions in Iran, making that country's efforts to fight the disease that much more difficult. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said this week there was a chance the sanctions could be loosened, but given this administration's overall history of hawkishness toward Iran, it is probably unwise to expect such a positive development.Iran isn't totally innocent in all of this. Its proxies really are attacking and otherwise making trouble for U.S. troops in Iraq. But going to war with the regime in Tehran was an awful prospect in January, and it's an even worse idea during the health emergency facing both countries, for a number of reasons.First, the Trump administration can't walk and chew gum at the same time. Don't take my word for it — the president's allies have recently been floating the idea that Trump was slow to react to the threat of the virus because he was occupied during the early part of this year with impeachment proceedings. The idea is that it is really Democrats' fault the president didn't keep his eye on the ball."It came up while we were, you know, tied down in the impeachment trial," Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said in a radio interview last week. "And I think it diverted the attention of the government, because everything, every day, was all about impeachment." The president didn't distance himself from that theory.The assertion is nonsense. Impeachment didn't keep the president from golfing or holding rallies after the virus emerged in China. And he seems to be easily diverted from the life-or-death business at hand, regardless of what Democrats do — he bragged during Wednesday's press briefing that he was "No. 1 on Facebook," once again betraying his obsession with popularity metrics. But maybe we should take Republicans at their word: Trump can't concentrate on two things at once. Washington should forget Iran for a few months and focus exclusively on the virus.In addition, the military is having its own troubles fighting the pandemic. In recent days, a debate has been flaring up in military circles: Should the military spend its energy fighting the spread of the virus in its ranks — the armed services have reported more than 1,300 cases including five deaths — or should it prioritize being ready to deploy and fight?Captain Brett Crozier, commander of the USS Theodore Roosevelt, is apparently in the former camp. Dozens have fallen sick in the ship's tight conditions, and Crozier wrote a letter begging superiors to allow the evacuation of 4,000 sailors from the aircraft carrier so they can be quarantined under "social distancing" conditions. "We are not at war," he wrote. "Sailors do not need to die. If we do not act now, we are failing to properly take care of our most trusted asset — our sailors."But his request has proven controversial because standing down means the United States will be less able to go into battle at a moment's notice. "Just as the COVID-19 threat becomes a priority, it does not mean that other threats disappear or enemies stand down," a former defense official told The New York Times.Escalating tensions with Iran is a choice, however. And it is difficult to imagine an uglier choice than sending sick and dying sailors, soldiers, and marines to confront sick and dying Iranian troops. Our service members know they may be called upon to make sacrifices, but they shouldn't have to do so when there are better options available.Finally, we must remember that President Trump is a chronic liar. You should never take his word as truth. His rationale for killing Soleimani — that he was supervising "actively developing plans" for attacks on U.S. troops — dissolved upon scrutiny. His sudden public pivot to Iran this week, coming while he is under fierce criticism for his handling of the COVID-19 crisis, might well be a distraction. The New York Times reported last week the Pentagon had been ordered to plan for military action because some Trump administration officials "see an opportunity to try to destroy Iranian-backed militia groups in Iraq as leaders in Iran are distracted by the pandemic crisis in their country." That suggests administration officials are less interested in defending American troops and more focused on seizing an advantage against a disliked regime. That's a nasty kind of opportunism.There is simply no reason to ever trust this president with matters of life or death.We don't really have a choice, though, do we? Hundreds of millions of Americans are depending on Trump's decisions to protect them from sickness. This is a terrible moment in our history. There is no good reason to compound it by going to war with Iran.Want more essential commentary and analysis like this delivered straight to your inbox? Sign up for The Week's "Today's best articles" newsletter here.More stories from theweek.com Jobless claims double last week's record high with 6.6 million Washington Gov. Jay Inslee is what real coronavirus leadership looks like The coronavirus unemployment plunge hit the Great Recession's peak in just 10 days