While aides have lobbied Trump to more fully acknowledge the severity of the virus’s spread, he again offered a dissonant and optimistic assessment.
Trump declared that “large portions of our country” are “crown-free,” despite the fact that no region of the United States is truly free of the virus. While noting concerns about the high levels of cases in California, Arizona, Texas and Florida, he said: “That is beginning to go in the right direction. And I think you’ll see it quickly go down very soon.
However, a new federal report found that the number of states with outbreaks severe enough to put them in the “red zone” has grown to 21. It demanded more restrictions on social activity. Those states include those named by Mr. Trump, along with Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah and Wisconsin. They all had more than 100 new cases for every 100,000 people in the past week.
The findings in the new report were sent to state officials by the White House coronavirus task force and obtained by The New York Times.
Trump reiterated that he had a “very good relationship” with Dr. Fauci while reiterating his routine complaint that Dr. Fauci had opposed his January ban on most air travel from China to the United States. . (Dr. Fauci initially doubted the idea but supported the final decision.)
The president, who said he was invoking the Defense Production Law for the 33rd time since the virus outbreak, this time to provide a $ 765 million loan to Kodak to produce pharmaceuticals, part of a new effort to achieve “independence US Pharmaceutical “from China and other nations – insisted that he deserved more credit than Dr. Fauci for his administration’s efforts to obtain more ventilators and personal protective equipment and to allow more virus testing across the country.
“He has this high approval rating, so why don’t I have a high approval rating regarding – and the administration – regarding the virus?” Trump asked. “So it’s funny.”
