Trump's pandemic pandering is about campaigning, not governing
People protesting Michigan's stay-at-home order rally last week outside the Michigan State Capitol in Lansing. Credit: AFP via Getty Images / Jeff Kowalsky
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There is a remarkable monotony in President Donald Trump's response to the deepening coronavirus crisis. Not only does he persist in stirring controversy as if all is normal in America, his lack of clarity remains a constant.
Trump never renounces people with extreme views whose support he cherishes. Protesters against state and local stay-at-home measures win his vague approval in tweets. "Liberate Michigan!" he says. "Liberate Minnesota!" "Liberate Virginia!" Liberate them from who? From legitimate authorities taking health measures that the White House even supports? From any elected power that's not the president's? Ask him and you will get no real answer.
At this late date, do we not expect Trump to coddle the fringe as long as he is coddled by the right? After a car driven by a neo-Nazi into a crowd of peaceful counterprotesters killed one person and injured dozens in August 2017 in Charlottesville, Virginia, the president clearly feared alienating those who came out for this "Unite the Right Rally." So he said: "I think there is blame on both sides … You had very fine people on both sides." He left the message opaque.
Once again, we see theatrics that are all about campaigning and not about governing. As before, Trump's expressions of contempt are aimed at mainstream Democrats such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo on the issue of coronavirus. These aren't governmental reactions to a pandemic any more than his attacking FBI and CIA professionals squelched Russian disinformation campaigns.
Once again a federal giveaway has helped the well-fixed. Big hotel and restaurant chains got millions in small-business emergency aid grants before the program ran out of cash Thursday. The massive tax-cut bill signed by Trump in 2017 led big corporations to give record amounts of buybacks in 2018. This recession brings no change in strategy.
Independent oversight for the latest massive new government-spending programs? Just as you'd expect, Trump wants none of it. Nobody anywhere has accused the president of being fiscally cautious or conservative. Under the administration, the federal deficit was heading for the $1 trillion mark well before COVID-19 appeared in the U.S.
The old double game on China endures even as the focus shifts from trade to disease. U.S. tariffs are paid by Americans, but Trump falsely insists they are paid by Beijing. China is portrayed as a wily rival, but he keeps hailing Chinese President Xi Jinping. The administration showed no concern as infection first spread in Wuhan, but Trump now claims to have "cut off China" and blames the World Health Organization for inaction.
This sad tale fits with Trump's almost reflexive rejection of warnings from his intelligence agencies.
Trump's finger-pointing at his predecessor has reached one of its more comical levels. He tried to project his administration's failures on testing and medical supplies on President Barack Obama and his administration, saying: "We inherited — the word is we inherited bad tests. We really inherited bad tests. These are horrible tests. And it was broken. It was all broken. And we fixed it."
This makes absolutely no sense, if only for the fact that Obama left office in 2017 and coronavirus arrived a few months ago. Then again, Trump always blamed Obama when the going got tough. Consider that this gem of a Trump tweet, equally fictitious, is now 3 years old: "President Obama was tapping my phones in October, just prior to Election!”
Dan Janison is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
