Donald Trump was wheeled out of the Oval Office on Tuesday for his daily coronavirus propaganda briefing, and he found a new scapegoat for his failure to respond to this crisis: the World Health Organization (WHO).
With a straight face, the president accused the WHO of “severely mismanaging and covering up” the pandemic, saying the organization failed to act early to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
As a result, as PoliticusUSA’s Jason Easley noted, the president says he is freezing funding for the global health organization, pending an investigation – in the middle of a deadly pandemic that has swept the U.S.
More projection from a president who refuses to accept responsibility
At the beginning of this crisis, Trump refused to take any responsibility for the failures of his response – whether it was downplaying the virus or failing to implement widespread testing.
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On Tuesday, the desperate president continued to point fingers at everyone else for his failures, but the fact remains that the United States coronavirus outbreak and death toll has been uniquely devastating compared to much of the world.
As of this writing, the U.S. leads the world in number of coronavirus infections (more than 600,000) and deaths (about 26,000).
There are two versions of Trump – neither should be president
What stood out more than anything about this particular briefing – even more than the president’s continued refusal to take responsibility for his incompetence – is just how small and out of his depth Trump looked.
After his meltdown during Monday’s coronavirus briefing, Trump appeared out of breath, even deflated, on Tuesday and often struggled to read from the simple script he was given.
Aaron Rupar of Vox highlighted some of Trump’s reading struggles throughout the event.
wut pic.twitter.com/Fqh1wZfVBH
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 14, 2020
adventures in reading with Trump pic.twitter.com/y9r3t2q5if
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) April 14, 2020
Ultimately, there appear to be two versions of Donald Trump: the seemingly doped up, semi-literate version the country saw on Tuesday, and the one who threw out the script during an out-of-control temper tantrum on Monday.
Neither should be president of the United States.
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Sean Colarossi currently resides in Cleveland, Ohio. He earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in Journalism from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and was an organizing fellow for both of President Obama’s presidential campaigns. He also worked with Planned Parenthood as an Affordable Care Act Outreach Organizer in 2014, helping northeast Ohio residents obtain health insurance coverage.
