Fox News primetime star Tucker Carlson has been credited with pushing President Donald Trump to take the coronavirus pandemic seriously and has received mainstream media plaudits for seemingly calling out his own colleagues for actively downplaying the outbreak.Yet, while Carlson has been applauded for preaching concern about the viral outbreak while his fellow pro-Trump hosts on the network attempted to dismiss the COVID-19 fears as a partisan ploy, he has actually played both sides for his audience, giving voice to reckless conspiracies, unserious characters with no expertise, and wholly dangerous rhetoric.Earlier this month, as confirmed cases and deaths began surging across the country, Carlson gained widespread acclaim when he called out those “minimizing” COVID-19, calling the pandemic a “very serious problem.” It was seen at the time that Carlson was calling out both Trump and many of his Fox News colleagues—without naming them, of course—for reacting inappropriately to the impending crisis.That March 9 monologue apparently helped prompt the president to finally take action on the pandemic after waving it away for weeks, with White House sources saying Carlson’s segment was a “turning point” for Trump. The Fox News host, who has informally advised the president on other matters in the past, also traveled down to Mar-a-Lago the previous weekend to convince the president about the gravity of the situation, later saying he felt it was his “moral obligation” to do so.As a result, Carlson has been the focus of several largely sympathetic portraits and interviews in the mainstream press. Various outlets remarked positively on Carlson’s “moral obligation” to convince Trump to take the crisis seriously, with some noting that the Fox host “admirably focused” on pandemic from the beginning.The Fox host’s portrayal in the media as courageously standing alone among his overtly pro-Trump primetime brethren has rankled network brass. According to The New York Times, the network’s PR chief Irena Briganti has complained about Carlson “casting himself to reporters as a heroic truth-teller in contrast with other hosts.”While it is true that Carlson was essentially alone among the network’s key stars in sounding the alarm on coronavirus—for instance, now-former Fox Business host Trish Regan labeled it an “impeachment scam” the same time Carlson was declaring the pandemic was “real”—his early warnings also revolved around peddling baseless conspiracies and blaming “woke” politics for the spread of the virus.Tucker Carlson Appears to Call Out Trump, Fox Colleagues for ‘Minimizing’ CoronavirusThroughout February, Carlson floated the debunked theory that the virus was created by the Chinese government in a research laboratory, potentially as a bioweapon against the United States. The theory began making rounds in the right-wing media ecosystem after former Trump adviser Steve Bannon began pushing it on his radio show.Despite a medical expert shooting down the now-debunked theory earlier in the month, Carlson continued to peddle it on subsequent broadcasts. On Feb. 18, Carlson hosted The Washington Times’ Bill Gertz, whose specious reporting was the basis of Bannon’s theory, to discuss his speculation. During the interview, the Fox host claimed unnamed “experts” were considering the possibility the virus was created in a Chinese lab while adding it is “worth getting to the bottom of.”When he wasn’t wildly speculating that the virus was a Chinese bioweapon, Carlson also spent weeks blaming “diversity” for the virus. Taking aim at progressive writers who warned against racist attacks in the wake of the pandemic—hate crimes against Asian-Americans have been on the rise—Carlson groused that “identity politics trumped public health and not for the first time.”“Wokeness is a cult,” he added. “They would let you die before they admitted that diversity is not our strength.”He would continue to blame “identity politics” for the spread of the virus, resulting in him at one point turning to conservative columnist Eddie Scarry—best-known as the “AOC creepshot guy”—for coronavirus expertise in late February. As financial markets started to experience record drops over COVID-19 fears, Carlson gave primetime airspace to the Examiner writer, who called the disease the “Commie cough” while claiming it originated from Chinese people eating skunks. Carlson, meanwhile, applauded Scarry, claiming “everything” he said “is true” as the trollish columnist railed against political correctness and its supposed impact on the health crisis.In the wake of his call for conservatives to take coronavirus seriously, Carlson kept blasting “wokeness” as one of the central causes of the disease’s spread, at one point insisting that not calling it the “Chinese virus” or “Wuhan virus” could literally kill people. “In times of crisis euphemisms kill,” he said. “You need accuracy and clear language in the way you talk about the threat. It’s essential.” He later applauded Trump for publicly using the term “Chinese virus.”Moreover, and more recently, Carlson seemed to backpedal on his “serious” concerns over the pandemic this week. With the president’s declared desire for an early end to social distancing restrictions, many conservatives backed Trump’s push despite the warning of public health experts.Texas Lt. Gov: Senior Citizens Willing to Die to Save Economy for GrandkidsDuring last Monday’s broadcast of his show, Carlson brought on Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick to defend the president’s suggestion, who subsequently said that elderly people such as himself would be willing to die from coronavirus to save America’s economy for their grandkids.“No one reached out to me and said as a senior citizen, ‘Are you willing to take a chance on your survival in exchange for keeping the America that all America loves for your children and grandchildren?’” Patrick said. “And if that is the exchange, I’m all in.”At the end of the segment, Carlson nodded along with Patrick and added: “We really needed to hear that perspective.”The following night, Carlson hosted Fox News analyst Brit Hume to defend Patrick’s comments after they sparked controversy. In Hume’s opinion, Patrick saying grandparents were willing to sacrifice themselves to reopen the economy was an “extremely reasonable viewpoint.” Carlson, for his part, seemed confused why the lieutenant governor’s remarks “enrages so many people,” prompting Hume to say it was due to anti-Trump sentiment.Other guests that appeared this past week to share their coronavirus wisdom included comedian Adam Carrola, goofy podcaster Dave Rubin, and talk-radio blowhard Buck Sexton.But Carlson’s newfound reputation as a sober and earnest broker on the crisis perhaps looked the silliest on Wednesday when he brought on a self-proclaimed “corona truther” to wax poetic on self-isolation. Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy, a notorious troll and semi-regular guest of Carlson’s, showed up to talk about how he has taken a “financial beating” because the casino business is currently down—before discussing his choice of sweatpants and his TV-viewing habits.Prior to his Carlson appearance, Portnoy had spent weeks mocking concerns about the pandemic, comparing the virus to “the common cold” and saying he didn’t “care about the people dying... I just care about my wallet.”In fact, just two weeks before appearing on Tucker’s primetime show, Portnoy griped about the NBA suspending its season amid the outbreak, calling himself a “corona truther” and insisting that concern over the virus—which has now killed over 25,000 people worldwide—is either a “fraud, overreaction, or media concoction.”Carlson may have won media plaudits for his early concerns about the pandemic, but a closer look at his overall coverage proves we shouldn’t be so easily fooled.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.

For anyone plugged in to the news firehose about the coronavirus pandemic, it has been extremely bizarre to watch President Trump's approval rating. He has botched the crisis beyond belief, and the United States now has the biggest outbreak in the world. Because of his ongoing failure to secure stockpiles of medical supplies, doctors and nurses are re-using protective gear over and over, and suiting up in garbage bags and page protectors to treat COVID-19 patients. Some have already caught the virus and died — along with over 1,300 others at time of writing, which is very likely an underestimate.Yet Trump's approval rating keeps going up. Poll averages show a marked bump in favorable ratings, a recent Washington Post/ABC poll has him above water. He does even better on the coronavirus response, with a Gallup poll finding him at 60 percent approval of his handling of the situation.This is what happens when the Democratic Party, de facto led at this point by its presumptive presidential nominee Joe Biden, refuses to make the case that Trump is in fact responsible for the severity of the disaster. Biden is proving to be about the worst imaginable nominee to take on Trump.Now, Biden is not entirely to blame here. Surely some of Trump's approval bump can be chalked up to the usual "rally around the flag" effect that tends to happen at times of crisis, and the fact that we are likely still in the very early stages of the pandemic.But if we dig into the numbers, some of the bump in Trump's approval rating is coming from changes in Democratic attitudes. A Pew poll, for instance, found that Democratic and Democratic-leaning voters nearly doubled their approval of Trump over the last few weeks, from 7 to 12 percent. It's not a huge change, but it could make the difference between Trump winning or losing in an election which is likely to be close.As has been made abundantly clear, Democratic voters tend to take their cues from Democratic elites. The party rallied around Biden in lockstep right before Super Tuesday, and voters fell in line. Biden won multiple states he has not visited in months and in which he had no campaign offices. And now that he's the probable nominee, Biden is not savaging Trump's response. On the contrary, his campaign says they are hesitant to even criticize him at all. "As much as I dislike Trump and think what a bad job he's doing, there's a danger now that attacking him can backfire on you if you get too far out there. I don't think the public wants to hear criticism of Trump right now," one adviser told Politico.Indeed, Biden has barely been doing anything. As the outbreak became a full-blown crisis, Biden disappeared for almost an entire week. His campaign said it was trying to figure out how to do video livestreams, something any 12-year-old could set up in about 15 minutes. (Hey guys: Any smartphone with Twitter, YouTube, or Twitch installed can become a broadcasting device with the press of a single button.) When Biden did finally appear, he gave some scripted addresses that still had technical foul-ups, and did softball interviews where he still occasionally trailed off mid-sentence.People crave leadership during times of crisis, as evidence by the sudden surge of positive sentiment towards New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, who seriously mishandled the initial crisis response, and is still trying to cut Medicaid, but has been giving reassuring daily press conferences where he seems like he is on top of the situation. Washington state Governor Jay Inslee did a much, much better job (just compare the numbers in New York to those in Washington state), but has gotten comparatively little attention precisely because there are a lot fewer cases and deaths (and there are many fewer reporters in Seattle than New York City).Trump, meanwhile, is similarly out there on TV every day boasting about how what he's doing is so smart and good. What he's saying is insanely irresponsible and has already gotten people killed, but absent an effective response from the Democratic leadership, it can appear to casual news consumers as though he has the situation in hand. Democratic backbenchers and various journalists are screaming themselves hoarse, but it plainly isn't working.Biden's strategy appears to be to coast to the presidency in basically the same way he coasted to the nomination: Keep public appearances and therefore embarrassing verbal flubs to a minimum, and rely on Trump's disastrous governance to do all the work for him. But this is a horribly risky strategy. Biden is already a candidate whose awful record will make it harder to attack Trump on trade, protecting Social Security and Medicare, corruption, mental fitness, and his treatment of women — indeed, just recently a former Biden staffer came forward with an allegation that he had sexually assaulted her 26 years ago. Hunkering down and refusing to criticize Trump's world-historical bungling risks him successfully arguing that it was an unforeseeable disaster and he did the best anyone could have done.Contrary to these half-baked notions that the public doesn't want to hear criticism of Trump, we saw during impeachment that once Democrats actually started going through with it, approval jumped — largely because the liberal rank-and-file took that as a cue it was indeed a good idea. It's just another instance of the Democratic establishment's habit of hiding their desire to avoid conflict and do nothing behind an imagined obstacle of public opinion, when in fact they can change those opinions dramatically by offering a strong and clear alternative.Moreover, if and when Biden does become president, he will be in charge of a country in ruins. Fixing the place up will require extremely energetic leadership. But both Biden, his campaign, and the Democratic establishment seem to believe that if they just pretend hard enough, everything will go back to normal on its own. It is willful blindness on par with the worst Trump loyalists.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 Once coronavirus infects a human body, what happens next? Why Minnesota's coronavirus response is different Elton John to host 'Living Room Concert for America' with stars performing from home

Fox Business Network announced on Friday that it has officially “parted ways” with anchor Trish Regan following her controversial rant against what she called the “coronavirus impeachment scam” earlier this month. “We thank her for her contributions to the network over the years and wish her continued success in her future endeavors,” the network said in a statement. “We will continue our reduced live primetime schedule for the foreseeable future in an effort to allocate staff resources to continuous breaking news coverage on the Coronavirus crisis.”“I have enjoyed my time at FOX and now intend to focus on my family during these troubled times,” Regan said in her own statement. “I am grateful to my incredible team at FOX Business and for the many opportunities the network has provided me. I’m looking forward to this next chapter in my career.”Regan was previously placed on an indefinite hiatus after she delivered a surreal monologue on Monday, March 9th in which she accused Democrats and the media of perpetuating a coronavirus hoax. With the words “Coronavirus Impeachment Scam” on the screen next to her, Regan told viewers, “We've reached a tipping point. The chorus of hate being leveled at the president is nearing a crescendo as Democrats blame him and only him for a virus that originated halfway around the world. This is yet another attempt to impeach the president.”“Many in the liberal media using, and I mean using, coronavirus in an attempt to demonize and destroy the president,” she added. Following what amounted to a suspension, Regan tried to pass off her situation as part of larger safety measures at Fox, tweeting, “FBN has taken prudent steps to limit staffing levels and is prioritizing its coverage during market hours. I fully support this decision — we all must to do our part to keep our colleagues safe.”Since then she has mostly used her Twitter account to encourage private companies to help fight the pandemic and cheer on the stock market during its rare rallies. Sean Hannity: Media Scared Trump Looks ‘Too Presidential’ in Coronavirus BriefingsRead 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.

A Texas man, ranting on social media about the congressional response to the coronavirus outbreak, has been charged with making death threats to Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats, federal prosecutors announced Thursday.Gavin Weslee Blake Perry, 27, of Wichita Falls, Texas, wrote on his personal Facebook page Monday that Pelosi was part of a satanic cult and that she and other Democrats should be killed, authorities said.The posts were still online as of Thursday night.Prosecutors said that Perry wrote, "If youre a dem or apart of the establishment in the democrats side I view you as a criminal and a terrorist and I advise everyone to Go SOS and use live rounds."The post, which used an abbreviation for "shoot on sight," included a screenshot of what appeared to be two tweets by Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader. One, by Schumer himself, was critical of President Donald Trump's handling of the health emergency.The second was written by someone impersonating Schumer and criticized Trump for barring travelers from entering the United States from China."Shoot to kill," Perry wrote, according to prosecutors. "This is a revolution."Perry was charged with transmitting a threatening communication in interstate commerce and faces up to five years in prison.Perry, who was arrested Wednesday and remains in custody, did not have a lawyer as of Thursday night, according to court records. He made an initial appearance in U.S. District Court in Northern Texas on Thursday via videoconference.His alleged screed came as Congress and the Trump administration were negotiating a $2 trillion stimulus package to reduce the economic havoc caused by the coronavirus pandemic. The Senate approved the package Wednesday and it has advanced to the House.Prosecutors said that Perry told the law enforcement officers who arrested him that they were violating his First Amendment right to free speech and that their actions were punishable by death."The Department of Justice takes the security of our public servants seriously," Erin Nealy Cox, the U.S. attorney for Northern Texas, said in a statement. "Americans are entitled to voice their opinions -- but we will not allow them to threaten our officials' physical safety."The threats against Pelosi were posted beneath an article from an anti-abortion website that Perry shared on Facebook."Nancy pelosi is apart of a santanic cult and so are rhe people who work closly with her," Perry wrote, according to prosecutors. "Dems of the establishment will be removed at any cost necessary and yes that means by death."Pelosi's office declined to comment, and Schumer's office said it could not immediately comment Thursday night.This month, a Connecticut man was arrested on charges that he threatened to kill Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., who was the lead impeachment manager in the House. Several other Democratic lawmakers have faced similar death threats.Law enforcement officials said a concerned citizen tipped off local police about Perry's posts."The defendant threatened the life of an elected official and that will not be tolerated," Matthew J. DeSarno, the FBI special agent in charge in Dallas, said in a statement.This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company

This is a tale of two governments. Both were faced with a potential disaster -- a new and deadly epidemic. Both made choices that the world will judge.China. The virus made its first appearance in a Wuhan “wet market,” an emporium (apparently common in China) that featured live and newly slaughtered animals in close proximity. SARS and avian flu are also thought to have originated in these markets, which amount to an ongoing threat to global health.From the first reported case, on December 1, 2019, until January 5, 2020, the Chinese government engaged in a cover-up. As National Review’s Jim Geraghty recounted, in early January, China’s National Health Commission forbade reporting on the new disease. On December 30, Dr. Li Wenliang sent a message to other physicians warning that a SARS-like illness was spreading. He was arrested (along with six others) and obliged to apologize for “spreading rumors.” (Dr. Li Wenliang died of COVID-19 on February 7.)Throughout early January, as cases mounted, the Chinese government issued soothing statements suggesting that the new pneumonia was not transmitted from person to person. As late as January 15, after Thailand and Japan had reported their first cases, official government sources were denying that human-to-human transmission had been proven, saying the risk was “low.”Only on January 23, six weeks after the first case, did China announce a quarantine of Wuhan. By that time, millions had come and gone from the city during the busy holiday season, and cases had been reported in Vietnam, Singapore, Hong Kong, and South Korea.USA. President Trump engaged in a series of soothing statements himself. On January 22, after the first U.S. case was reported, he said “We have it totally under control.” On February 2, he boasted that “we pretty much shut it down coming in from China.” Twice in February, the president promised that “when we get into April, in the warmer weather — that has a very negative effect on that, and that type of a virus.” On February 26, when cases topped 60, Trump claimed that “we’re going very substantially down, not up.” In South Carolina, on February 28, Trump likened criticism of his handling of the pandemic to impeachment, saying “this is their new hoax.” On March 6, he continued this theme. Facing criticism for his false statement that “anyone who wants a test can get a test,” Trump tried to string together a “fake news”/Ukraine theme. He said the tests were “beautiful,” adding “The tests are all perfect, like the letter was perfect, the transcription was perfect, right?” Asked whether he was concerned about the virus’s spread on March 7, the president said “No, we’ve done a great job.”Throughout the first ten weeks of the pandemic, Trump praised China effusively, as The Bulwark’s Jim Swift chronicled. On February 7, for example, Trump said: “Great discipline is taking place in China, as President Xi strongly leads what will be a very successful operation. We are working closely with China to help!” A few days later, he shared with Fox News his view that “China is very, you know, professionally run, in the sense that they have everything under control. I really believe they are going to have it under control fairly soon.”China. When the lies were no longer tenable, the Chinese government pivoted. Through their propaganda arms, they circulated videos of China building new “hospitals” (they were actually “prefab quarantine wards,” not fully equipped hospitals) and fumigating public spaces. This was followed by grand gestures like donating millions of face masks to afflicted countries such as Spain, South Korea, Iran, and the Philippines. Jack Ma, CEO of Alibaba, shipped a million masks and half a million testing kits to the U.S.USA. When the lies were no longer tenable, President Trump pivoted. Two days after claiming that the disease was under control, Trump declared himself a “wartime president” and offered that “I’ve always known this is a real — this is a pandemic. I felt it was a pandemic long before it was called a pandemic.” Trump began to appear daily at press conferences with public-health authorities -- a setting he controls, in which every participant must begin with fulsome praise of himself. He pivoted on China too, dropping the unctuous praise in favor of provocative blame.China. Relentless propaganda lauding Premier Xi’s great leadership in fighting the coronavirus may succeed with many Chinese. Will the world remember the criminal dishonesty that arguably unleashed this pestilence?USA. By consistently downplaying and denying the seriousness of the threat, President Trump cost the American people precious time. By encouraging a false sense of security, he prevented the federal, state, and local governments from gearing up for the worst emergency we have faced in 100 years. Will the world remember the dishonesty that permitted this pestilence to hit us so very hard?© 2020 Creators.com

President Trump's re-election campaign sent cease-and-desist letters to local television stations on Wednesday, threatening them with legal action and potentially their broadcast licenses if they continue to air an ad from a Democratic group, Priorities USA. The ad plays audio of Trump downplaying the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic over a chart of the mounting number of cases in the U.S. — now at more than 69,000 — but the Trump campaign objected only to one clip, of Trump saying "this is their new hoax."That quote comes from a Feb. 28 rally at which Trump repeated called his handling of the epidemic "one of the great jobs" and compared the Democrats "politicizing" of the coronavirus to the Russia investigation and Ukraine scandal. As The Washington Post noted in a fact-check cited by the Trump campaign, Trump said this:> They tried the impeachment hoax. That was on a perfect conversation. They tried anything.... And this is their new hoax. But you know we did something that’s been pretty amazing. We have 15 people in this massive country and because of the fact that we went early, we went early, we could have had a lot more than that. [Trump, Feb. 28 rally]Guy Cecil, who leads Priorities USA, said on Twitter that the point of the letter was "to stop this ad from airing because he doesn’t want Americans to know the truth."A super PAC supporting likely Democratic nominee Joe Biden also released an ad using Trump's "hoax" line, but gave a bit more context."Granted, Trump and members of his administration have played down the spread of the virus and falsely touted the strength of their response, as our numerous fact checks have pointed out," The Washington Post noted. "But that does not excuse this kind of video manipulation. ... This effectively skews reality and leaves the viewer to wonder what or who related to coronavirus is, in fact, a hoax?"More stories from theweek.com Elton John to host 'Living Room Concert for America' with stars performing from home NYU medical students are graduating early to help with the fight against COVID-19 Doctors describe life at a New York hospital hit hard by coronavirus: 'It's apocalyptic'

Fox News chairman Rupert Murdoch was supposed to celebrate his 89th birthday on March 11 with a lavish party at his California estate. But on March 8, with the COVID-19 coronavirus spreading, "the Murdoch family called off a planned party out of concern for the patriarch's health," Ben Smith reports at The New York Times. Lachlan Murdoch, the 48-year-old son nominally in charge of Fox News, "knew the virus was coming" by January, because "he'd been getting regular updates from the family's political allies and journalists in his father's native Australia," Smith reported.But "if you were watching some of the commentators on Fox News and Fox Business in the first 10 days of March, you wouldn't have been too worried about the coronavirus," Smith notes: "It would be no worse than the flu, and the real story was the 'coronavirus impeachment scam.'" Two things changed the network's prime-time downplaying of the pandemic — Fox Business host Trish Regan took things too far, and President Trump started warning about the coronavirus publicly on March 11. The Washington Post rounded up some before-and-after commentary:Smith described a "glaring" gap between how seriously "the elite, globally minded family owners of Fox" took the COVID-19 pandemic and the big shrugs from "many of their nominal stars." But Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott also responded quickly and decisively inside the network's Manhattan headquarters starting in late February, as the apostate Republican Lincoln Project highlighted in its own rebuke of the conservative pro-Trump media's coronavirus coverage.On Tuesday, with a sixth Fox News staffer testing positive for COVID-19, Scott noted in an internal memo that "the vast majority of our workforce is now telecommuting" and ordered a halt to all in-studio bookings and contributor appearances. Smith asked Ashish Jha, director of the Harvard Global Public Health Institute, if he believed people will die because of Fox's coverage in those critical two weeks, and he said yes, this "very specific type of misinformation" has been "very harmful." A Fox News spokeswoman accused the Times of "politicizing this serious threat" by "cherry-picking" clips from "our opinion programs."More stories from theweek.com Biden doesn't want another primary debate: 'We should get on with this' Britney Spears calls for wealth redistribution, general strike on Instagram Nearly half of New York City's coronavirus cases found in adults under 45

President Trump is a clear and present danger to the health and safety of America.The coronavirus pandemic would be a challenge for any leader and any system of government. Nature has thrown a powerful left hook at all of humanity, a blow of the kind that arrives only once a century or so. Even the best and most-capable president would have a difficult time with the health and economic problems caused by the global spread of COVID-19.But Donald Trump is nowhere near being the best and most-capable president that America has ever had. His well-known shortcomings — his disdain for expert advice and evidence, his penchant for grievance, his narcissism and self-congratulation— are problematic in the best of times. During this pandemic, those characteristics are positively dangerous to the country he leads.Even now, President Trump shows more passion for trolling his rivals than for serving the needs of desperate Americans. Consider his response during Sunday's news briefing that four senators — including Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), who voted for Trump's impeachment — were under quarantine for the virus."Romney's in isolation?" Trump sneered. "Gee. That's too bad." Trump had just praised American unity in the face of the pandemic — a stance he couldn't pretend to hold for more than about five minutes.Trump's problems go far deeper than a failure of style or grace, though.Late Sunday night, he sent out an all-caps tweet that suggested he might scrap the quarantine approach to confronting the pandemic in favor of reviving the economy. "WE CANNOT LET THE CURE BE WORSE THAN THE PROBLEM ITSELF," he wrote. "AT THE END OF THE 15 DAY PERIOD, WE WILL MAKE A DECISION AS TO WHICH WAY WE WANT TO GO!" Now Americans have to fear that the president will sacrifice their health — or the lives of their parents — just to goose the stock market.It's part of a pattern: Trump's acts consistently make it more difficult to get COVID-19 under control — and shake confidence in his leadership when that confidence is badly needed.CNN on Sunday documented 33 false claims the president has made about the coronavirus just since the beginning of March, including the untrue assertion that "anybody who wants a test can get a test" for the virus."He understated the extent of the crisis. He overstated the availability of tests. He falsely blamed Obama. He said he didn't shake hands in India despite many photos of him shaking hands in India," CNN's Daniel Dale noted on Sunday. "Trump has been serially dishonest about the coronavirus."Most dangerously, Trump claimed on March 15 that the United States had "tremendous control" of the virus. No such control existed, but the president's unwarranted optimism may have made it more difficult to sell the "stay at home" message that health officials across the country are still struggling — sometimes in vain — to get across to the American public.Trump's utter inability to stick to the truth is endangering lives. So is his effort to hype a pair of anti-malarial drugs as possible answers to the pandemic — describing them last week as "essentially approved for prescribed use." But that's not true — and it's not yet clear at this point if the drugs work against COVID-19. "We've got to determine if they work and if they're safe," said Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who has repeatedly worked to correct Trump's misstatements in real time.Trump's claims, though, have already had one effect. One of the drugs he has hyped — hydroxychloroquine — is used in the treatment of lupus, an autoimmune disease. ProPublica on Sunday reported the president's comments have "triggered a run on the drug. Healthy people are stocking up just in case they come down with the disease." Lupus patients, meanwhile, are suddenly facing a shortage of a drug they need to live."This is endangering lives," one lupus patient tweeted on Sunday.All of this is compounded, as ever, by Trump's demagoguery and perpetual, narcissistic grievance-mongering. He has labeled COVID-19 the "Chinese virus" — a deliberate provocation — while feuding with Democratic governors and inquisitive journalists. He spent an extended portion of Sunday's news conference lamenting that he had never been thanked for giving up "billions" of dollars to serve as president. Trump's focus, even now, is mostly on himself.What to do? A growing number of journalists are calling on news and broadcast networks to quit showing Trump's briefings live — arguing that public safety is best-served by fact-checking the president's statements before reporting them out to the broader public."Even this far into his term, it is still a bit of a shock to be reminded that the single most potent force for misinforming the American public is the current president of the United States," NYU journalism professor Jay Rosen wrote over the weekend. "On everything that involves the coronavirus Donald Trump's public statements have been unreliable."It is difficult to give a president less attention in a moment of national crisis, but that might be required. With the federal government shirking the task, the action of saving America from COVID-19 is taking place at the state and local levels, anyway. That's where journalists should focus their attention.Trump illustrated the depth of the problem Sunday, when he was asked if he had thought about contacting previous presidents to get their help and advice on managing the coronavirus threat.No, the president said. "I don't think I'm going to learn much."That's the problem of course. We have the worst possible president for this crisis. He is making it worse, not better. So it couldn't be more clear: Winning the "war" on coronavirus will happen despite Trump, not because of him.More stories from theweek.com Trump suggests he might soon prioritize the economy over public health Trump complains that all he sees in all the TV he watches is 'hatred of me at any cost' Surgeon general offers 'dire' coronavirus message: 'This week, it's going to get bad'

On Jan. 21, senators gathered in their chamber on Capitol Hill to formally begin the impeachment trial for President Donald Trump. For hours on end, they were unable to leave their seats let alone check their electronic devices or speak with staff. Consumed with listening to hours-long arguments, they paid little attention to much else other than the trial.Then, three days later, in a private briefing, Trump administration officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the State Department told a group of senators that they were growing increasingly concerned about a virus spreading throughout China. The administration first learned of the outbreak Jan. 3, officials have now said. But by the time they convened with lawmakers for the briefing, the novel coronavirus had killed 41 people and infected more than 1,200.According to two individuals with knowledge of the briefing, officials stressed to senators that the coronavirus was contagious, deadly, and would eventually spread beyond China’s borders to the U.S., at which point it would pose serious challenges for the political system and the economy.“It was clear that there would be significant economic effects,” an individual with knowledge of the all-senators briefing said, adding that during the briefing lawmakers pressed for the administration to come up with a plan to handle the economic fallout.The briefing served as a wake-up call for senators who were at the time engrossed in the impeachment trial, spending eight hours a day stuck on the Senate floor for historic and weighty constitutional arguments and even more time off the floor strategizing about the president’s trial.“For a lot of people it was like, ‘why am I being asked to go to this thing?” said one Senate aide. “It was an insane time.”The briefing was hosted by the Senate Health Committee. Afterwards, some members began to sound the alarm more about the spread of the virus. Others insisted that fears were overblown. And at least two—North Carolina’s Richard Burr and Georgia’s Kelly Loeffler—began selling hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars worth of equities. Sen. Kelly Loeffler Dumped Millions in Stock After Coronavirus BriefingThe sales of between $1.2 million and $3.1 million in stocks jointly owned by Loeffler and her husband began the very day of the briefing, The Daily Beast first reported Thursday. On Friday, she insisted that the trades were entirely the work of a third party investment advisor with whom she shared no information and had no conversations about the transactions. Loeffler’s husband is Jeffrey Sprecher, the chairman of the New York Stock Exchange.Burr acknowledged individually selling between $600,000 and $1.7 million in mid-February, but said the sales were prompted purely by public news reporting on the coronavirus, not by nonpublic information gleaned through his official duties.Sources who spoke with The Daily Beast about the Jan. 24 briefing, and other congressional briefings over the last six weeks, said it was clear from what the administration officials said about the coronavirus that the U.S. would suffer financially, especially if there was community spread.“There was a general sense conveyed of a rising crisis and uncertainty that might lead to someone wanting to sell everything,” one person with knowledge of the conversations in the briefing told The Daily Beast.Another individual with knowledge of the Senate-wide briefings said administration officials spoke with senators about how the coronavirus could potentially limit things like cargo shipments and severely restrict essential supply chains. Some aides told The Daily Beast that in other early closed-door briefings, the administration was not providing much information that had not been made public at the time through news reporting. Still, many on Capitol Hill feel that having those briefings—some of which were unclassified—in the open would have armed the public with the same information, coming directly from U.S. public health officials, that lawmakers were benefiting from at the time.  Since the senators’ stock trading was reported on Thursday, Democrats have been swift with condemnation. More notable, however, has been the blowback from the right. On Thursday night, Fox News’ Tucker Carlson called for Burr’s resignation, calling his action a “moral crime.” On Friday morning, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), a staunch ally of the president’s, tweeted that “‘Stock Selloff Senators’ isn’t exactly the most AmericaFirst caucus to be forming in this time of crisis.” Fox News Grills Sen. Kelly Loeffler on Her Stock Dump: How Was This Not Insider Trading?Even Burr’s fellow North Carolina Republican in the Senate—Sen. Thom Tillis, who faces a tough re-election fight this fall—tweeted on Friday that Burr “owes North Carolinians an explanation” and supported a “professional and bipartisan” inquiry into the matter. In a press briefing Friday morning, President Trump told reporters that lawmakers who had been singled out for their sell offs, including Burr and Loeffler, were “all honorable people.”“They say they did nothing wrong,” Trump said. But in a possible bid to get out in front of the backlash, Burr announced that he’d spoken with the GOP chairman of the Senate Ethics Committee, Sen. James Lankford (R-OK), and asked him to open a “full review” of his trading activity. Loeffler told CNBC on Friday afternoon that she’d submit to an Ethics review, too. But it’s unclear when a review by the notoriously secretive Ethics panel will begin, or when it would end.The political ramifications of that probe are more acute for Loeffler than for Burr. The third-term North Carolina senator said his term, which expires in 2022, will be his last. Loeffler, who is expected to use a chunk of her estimated $500 million fortune to win the November special election for the seat she was appointed to on Jan. 6, has been constantly pummeled from both her right and her left over the trading news.“People are losing their jobs, their businesses, their retirements, and even their lives and Kelly Loeffler is profiting off their pain?” asked Loeffler’s primary opponent, Rep. Doug Collins (R-GA), on Twitter. “I'm sickened just thinking about it.” A Collins ally, the GOP Speaker of Georgia’s House, openly fretted on Friday about broader fallout, telling the Atlanta Journal Constitution that “a lot of people are going to associate these activities with some very fine candidates running for the Georgia House and are going to hold that against us.”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.

(Bloomberg) -- Michael Bloomberg said Friday he is transferring $18 million to the Democratic National Committee from his presidential campaign and turning over several of his field offices to state parties in an effort to help Democrats defeat President Donald Trump.Previously, Bloomberg had said even if he wasn’t the nominee, he was willing to spend a lot of money -- but “hopefully not” as much as $1 billion -- to keep staff and offices in six battleground states to help any Democratic nominee defeat Trump and elect other Democrats. His campaign had explored doing that forming an outside group that would not be able to coordinate with a candidate or the national party.But the former New York mayor’s campaign said today because of the need to coordinate efforts and the dynamics of the race changing with Joe Biden in control, he’s giving $18 million to the DNC’s coordinated campaign and transferring leases from several campaign offices to state Democratic parties. A list of “hundreds” of staff members will be given to the DNC with the expectation and hope they would be hired, a campaign aide said.(Disclaimer: Michael Bloomberg, the founder and majority owner of Bloomberg LP, also sought the Democratic presidential nomination. He endorsed Joe Biden on March 4.)Staff in the six battleground states are being notified they will be paid through the first week in April and have full benefits through the end of April, the campaign said.“While we considered creating our own independent entity to support the nominee and hold the president accountable, this race is too important to have many competing groups with good intentions but that are not coordinated and united in strategy and execution,” Bloomberg’s campaign said in a memo to DNC Chairman Tom Perez. “We therefore believe the best thing we can all do over the next eight months is to help the group that matters most in this fight: the Democratic National Committee.”Bloomberg had pledged a robust effort during the campaign and after he left the race and endorsed Biden.“I will not walk away from the most important political fight of my life, and I hope you won’t walk away either,” Bloomberg said in an emotional speech to campaign staff and supporters on March 4, the day after a disappointing showing in Super Tuesday races prompted him to end his Democratic presidential campaign.Bloomberg’s donation will support the DNC’s “Battleground Build-Up 2020” program and continue organizing in key states, funding hundreds of organizers, according to a Democratic official.“This will help us invest in more organizers across the country to elect the next president and help Democrats win up and down the ballot,” Perez said in a statement.Democrats need to compete with “the war chest” that Trump, the Republican National Committee and their allies have amassed, and Bloomberg’s “extraordinary investment” will help ensure that needed grassroots efforts in key states will be funded, Kate Bedingfield, Biden’s deputy campaign manager, said in a statement.The Trump campaign, the Republican National Committee and supporting entities said they had $225 million in the bank at the end of February, according to a statement from the campaign.Besides the the donation to the DNC and transferring of offices to state parties, Bloomberg also plans to continue spending money separately to defeat Trump, but there’s no firm amount and details are still being discussed, the campaign aide said.The former New York mayor has continued spending on the race since ending his campaign, including a $2 million donation to Collective Future to register 500,000 black voters in key states plus $500,000 for Voto Latino to register new voters. He also announced a $2 million donation to Swing Left to help Democrats in competitive races.He also pledged to spend $15 Million to $20 million to register voters in five battleground states and $10 million to help protect House Democrats targeted by Republicans for their support of impeachment proceedings against Trump. He gave $5 million in December to Fair Fight 2020, the group Democrat Stacey Abrams founded in Georgia to encourage voter-registration and oppose voter-suppression measures.Bloomberg had spent a record $687 million of his own money on the race when he dropped out. His campaign said $275 million of Bloomberg’s media blitz was focused against Trump, and it’s making all ads available to the public to download and share on their networks.“By supporting the Democratic Party, we look forward to November and taking on our unified goal of beating Donald Trump,” the campaign said in its memo to the DNC.(Updates with comment from Biden campaign from 11th paragraph.)For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.comSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.