House democrats criticized Trump administration’s coronavirus pandemic response, saying the President Donald Trump has misled the public about it.
“President Trump’s deadly denial, distortion and delay has led to the worst federal response to a national emergency in our history,” according to the report released by the house democrats. “His actions are directly responsible for tens of thousands of needless deaths, tens of millions of people out of work, and mass confusion that has crippled our nation’s response.”
The report, titled “A Failure to Lead: The Trump administration’s Disastrous Response to the Coronaviurs Pandemic,” was released by house democrats, led by Rep. James Clyburn, chairman of the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis.
According to White House spokeswoman Sarah Matthews, the US leads the world in coronavirus testing with over 64 million tests. “Our national testing strategy has ensured that states were adequately supplied and that our most vulnerable received needed testing,” she said in an emailed statement.
The US is suffering the worst coronavirus outbreak in the world with over 4.8 million of the world’s 18.8 million confirmed cases so far and at least 158,300 of the 708,469 deaths across the world.
Trump said during a White House press briefing that the coronavirus is “going away. It’ll go away. Things go away. No question in my mind that it will go away.” Trump’s remarks are opposite to what World Health Organization officials and some of his own advisors are saying about the coronavirus.
According to Clyburn, Trump “seems to be in deep denial” and has not acknowledged experts. “These statements aren’t just wrong, they are dangerous,” Clyburn said on a conference call with reporters.
"On another planet"
Other lawmakers on the call slammed the Trump administration’s lack of a coronavirus response strategy. These included Frank Pallone, Jr., chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee; Richard Neal, chairman of the Ways and Means Committee; Carolyn B. Maloney, chairwoman of the Committee on Oversight and Bobby Scott, chairman of the Committee on Education and Labor.
“The fact of the matter is ... the president is completely on another planet and doesn’t look at the facts, doesn’t look at the science,” Pallone said. “Trump is not part of the solution, he’s part of the problem ... he creates even a worse problem for us because he gives the impression that the virus is not real, it’s not spreading.”
The report reveals that Trump dismissed early warning signs that the coronavirus was spreading in the US and then spent months downplaying the outbreak. House democrats blame Trump for not being able to develop “an adequate” national testing strategy or plan for reopening schools. They noted that Trump should have created a coordinated response among all 50 states and did not use use the full power he has under the Defense Production Act to acquire personal protective equipment and supplies to health workers.
“The American people are desperate for leadership from President Trump and his Administration, yet the President continues to make a bad situation worse,” the report reads. “He continues to gamble with the lives of the American people and sow mass confusion that has crippled our nation’s response.”
