Trump defends his pandemic response, calls Dr. Anthony Fauci 'alarmist'

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump, in a Fox News interview aired Sunday, defended his response to the coronavirus pandemic, called the nation's top infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, "alarmist" and cast doubt on predictions that the country faces more difficulty in the fall and winter.

Trump, fielding questions from Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace, said that increased testing is “creating trouble,” as the nation’s COVID-19 infection rate continues to climb and the number of Americans killed by the disease moved past 142,000.

The president also said he will not mandate wearing a mask at the national level even as public health officials making the rounds of the Sunday morning talk shows reasserted that facial coverings help prevent the spread of the virus. 

“I want people to have a certain freedom, and I don’t believe in that,” Trump said when asked if he would push for a federal mandate on masks.

Trump later said he is “a believer in masks. I think masks are good, but I leave it up to the governors." 

Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” continued to make the case that there is “strong evidence” masks help stop the spread of the virus.

“It is bizarre that we have turned the mask wearing into something political,” Collins said. 

The president, in his nearly hourlong, wide-ranging interview with Wallace, described Fauci as “alarmist,” and questioned the fall forecast by Dr. Robert Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who recently told lawmakers "this fall and winter … are probably going to be one of the most difficult times that we’ve experienced in American public health."

Trump disputed scientific data presented during the interview that illustrated a sharp increase in the nation’s infection rates.

“Many of those cases shouldn’t even be cases,” Trump said in the sit-down interview that was taped Friday outside of the Oval Office.

After Trump praised ramped-up testing efforts, Wallace noted that while “testing is up 37%,” confirmed COVID-19 “cases are up 194%. It isn’t just that testing has gone up. The virus has spread.”

Trump responded that “many of those cases” stem from “young people that would heal in a day.”

Wallace noted that a surge in cases has led parts of California to reinstate stay-at-home orders, and Florida recently recorded its "deadliest day of the entire pandemic,” while some states continue to experience a shortage of testing supplies and personal protective equipment for medical workers.

Asked if he took responsibility, Trump said: “Look, I take responsibility always for everything because it’s ultimately my job, too. I have to get everybody in line. Some governors have done well, some governors have done poorly. They're supposed to have supplies they didn't have. I supplied everybody.”

As Congressional leaders negotiate the prospect of a so-called “Phase 4” coronavirus-relief package, Trump said he would likely not sign any stimulus package without a payroll tax cut included. Republicans and Democrats alike have pushed back on including a temporary payroll tax cut, arguing in part that the move may benefit those who are currently employed in the form of a bigger paycheck, but does not address the vast amount of Americans who remain unemployed.

Trump dismissed recent polls that show former Vice President Joe Biden in the lead as "fake," saying he did not believe the Democratic presidential candidate was “competent” enough to hold the post.

Asked whether he would accept the results of the election if he lost, Trump told Wallace: “I have to see … No, I’m not going to just say 'yes.' I’m not going to say 'no,' and I didn’t last time either.”

Trump denounced his niece, Mary Trump, a Nassau County resident, whose recent tell-all book describes the Trump family patriarch Fred Trump as a “psychopath” who inflicted emotional harm on his children.

“She was not exactly a family favorite,” Trump said of his niece.