Index – Foreign – Trump knew Covid was a deadly threat, but downplayed it



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The US president admitted that he was aware of the danger posed by the coronavirus, but downplayed it because he wanted to, according to star journalist Bob Woodward’s new book “Rage,” which concluded the Watergate scandal. Woodward says the U.S. president knew before the first confirmed infectious death weeks earlier: The new type of coronavirus is dangerous, airborne, highly contagious, and far more deadly than influenza. Still, he has publicly underestimated the threat, Woodward writes in his book, which is based on a series of interviews, according to a CNN report.

Dangerous things

Trump told reporters on February 7 after Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke on the phone.

Oh, mostly, we talked about the virus. I think it will solve it, but you know, it’s a very cunning situation.

Trump responded.

In Woodward’s book, the US head of state claims that the president’s job is to protect his homeland. However, he told the reporter in February that he knew about the virus, then confessed in March that he had deliberately withheld what he knew from the public.

I always wanted to make a muffin. I still want it because I don’t want to panic

He said in an interview in March, which can be heard in a CNN article, among other details from the interview.

The journalist also writes in his book that on January 28, national security adviser Robert O’Brien warned Trump that the epidemic could pose the greatest threat to the country’s national security during his presidency. On May 6, Woodward asked Trump if he remembered the words of his national security adviser. His answer was that

The US broadcaster recalled that Trump had spoken publicly about the virus many times that it was not a great threat, and that one day it would be absorbed and everything would be fine. He also noted, citing CNN experts, that thousands of lives could have been saved if the president had introduced strict epidemiological closures and restrictions in early February, such as the mandatory use of masks.



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