The United States now has the highest rate of confirmed coronavirus cases in the world at 86,000. As the White House grapples with heavy criticism regarding its delayed response, Donald Trump Jr. took to Instagram to share a racist meme about the crisis.
“Hahahahaha “The Kung-Flu Kid,” he wrote about a clip of his father beating the coronavirus in a brawl.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B-MkzW3FuoY/?utm_source=ig_embed
The term “Kung Flu” gained notoriety last week after CBS News correspondent Weijia Jiang, who was born in China and grew up in West Virginia, said a White House official referred to the coronavirus by that name while in conversation with her.
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“Makes me wonder what they’re calling it behind my back,†Jiang wrote on Twitter.
This morning a White House official referred to #Coronavirus as the “Kung-Flu†to my face. Makes me wonder what they’re calling it behind my back.
— Weijia Jiang (@weijia) March 17, 2020
The incident came after President Donald Trump faced scathing criticism for referring to the coronavirus pandemic as “the Chinese coronavirus†in a tweet, a move that earned him a rebuke from a Chinese foreign ministry spokesman who said the U.S. should “take care of its own business†before stigmatizing the nation.
Far-right supporters of the president have falsely claimed that the pandemic is a plot perpetrated by Democrats who are working with the Chinese to remove him from office.
Alan is a writer, editor, and news junkie based in New York.
