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Bob Woodward, 77, is one of the journalists who started the Watergate affair. That issue that finally brought down then-President Richard Nixon. In his new book “Rage” he brings revelations again, this time it is about the president of the United States, Donald Trump (74).
Trump is said to have been informed in early February this year that the corona virus is spreading through the air. And I also knew that it had a higher death rate than the flu. During this time, however, he publicly referred to the low number of cases in the US and repeatedly claimed that the virus would go away on its own.
“Put it down because I don’t want to panic”
Woodward conducted a total of 18 interviews with the President of the USA for his book, which were recorded. Now, on Wednesday, the CNN station published excerpts of Trump’s taped interviews. Among other things, Trump can be heard saying on March 19: “I always wanted to downplay it. I still like to downplay it because I don’t want to panic. “
In another conversation on February 7, according to the recordings, Trump said, “This is deadly.” People don’t have to touch contact surfaces first to get infected: “You just breathe in air and that’s how it spreads.”
Trump spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany denied in a first reaction today any contradiction between Trump’s public statements and his behind-the-scenes knowledge: “The president has never lied to the American public about Covid.” She just made sure that the population stayed calm.
“I knew how deadly it was”
Meanwhile, Trump’s challenger to the White House race, Joe Biden, attacked the president harshly. “He knew how deadly it was and he purposely downplayed it. Worse still, he lied to the American people. “
Tens of thousands of lives could have been saved if Trump had acted faster, Biden said. So far, about 190,000 people have died in the United States after becoming infected with the coronavirus: many of them because they did not take seriously the warnings of the experts and the precautionary measures like the masks, mainly because of the Trump speeches downplaying its importance. (support)
