The global pandemic has highlighted both the strength, and weakness of humanity, but it has also clarified that US President Donald Trump is living in a world of denial. Just take his recent trainwreck interview with Axios reporter Jonathan Swan, which has gone viral for all the wrong reasons.
During the interview, Swan told Trump, “I’ve gone to your rallies. I’ve talked to your people. They love you. They listen to you. They listen to every word you say. They hang on to your every word.”
“And so when they hear you say, ‘everything’s under control. Don’t worry about wearing masks,’ I mean, these are people – many of them older people,” he told the President.
“Well, what’s your definition of control?” Trump asked Swan. “I think it’s under control.”
“How? A thousand Americans are dying a day,” Swan responded.
“They are dying. That’s true. And you – it is what it is,” Trump said. “But that doesn’t mean we aren’t doing everything we can. It’s under control as much as you control it.”
While Trump might think the COVID-19 death toll “is what is what it is,” there’s no denying it’s devastating impact on the United States.
According to the CDC, the US has confirmed over 49,700 new cases of coronavirus in the last 24 hours, including 733 new deaths. WHO also reports that America is currently the worst affected country, with a total of over 4.6M confirmed cases.
Hear about how Trump got trolled by TikTokers and K-Pop stans below:
Later during his interview with Jonathan Swan, Trump claimed the “United States is the lowest in numerous categories. We’re lower than the world, we’re lower than Europe.”
When Swan argued that Trump should be measuring death as a proportion of population, rather than as a proportion of cases, the President hit back, “You can’t do that…you have to go by the cases. The cases of death.”
“It’s surely a relevant statistic to say if the US has X population and X percentage of death of that population, versus South Korea,” Swan said to Trump causing a tense exchange between the pair.
It’s mind-blowing to hear Trump blatantly ignoring the facts, but it’s not that surprising considering he recently suggested putting an end to COVID-19 testing would result in less cases.
Once again, we’re watching Trump talk, and once again we are left scratching our heads.
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