Before losing the election to President-elect Joe Biden, President Donald Trump pointed a finger at Jared Kushner and said it would be his son-in-law’s fault if November 3 didn’t go well.
‘You’re killing me! This whole thing is! We’ve got all the damn cases,’ Trump yelled at Kushner in August. ‘I’m going to lose. And it’s going to be your fault because of the testing.’
On Thursday The New York Times published a behind-the-scenes look into Trump’s politicized coronavirus response – that he lashed out about too much testing, because the numbers made him look bad – while also dismissing his pollster’s numbers that said his base would, in fact, embrace mask-wearing.
President Donald Trump (left), returning to the White House Thursday with first lady Melania Trump (right), pointed a finger at Jared Kushner and there being too much coronavirus testing predicting he would lose the election, the New York Times reported
IN THE DOGHOUSE: President Donald Trump told Jared Kushner it would be his son-in-law’s fault if he lost re-election as Kushner set up some of the COVID-19 testing. The president wanted fewer Americans to be tested because the high numbers made him look bad
The Times reported that White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows (left) and adviser Stephen Miller (right) both told President Donald Trump that a mask mandate wouldn’t go over well with his base, as the president tried to combat the coronavirus pandemic in an election year
The Times’ reporting makes clear that Trump’s pandemic response was being looked at through a political lens, with the November 3 election always in sight.
The newspaper recalls an August 19 Oval Office meeting where Trump tore into Kushner because American testing was showing too much spread.
‘I want to do what Mexico does,’ Trump said. ‘They don’t give you a test ’til you get to the emergency room and you’re vomiting.’
The paper also reported that Trump’s main pollster Tony Fabrizio presented the president with numbers that showed his supporters would embrace mask-wearing.
But Trump’s political gut said otherwise.
He was also influenced by key aides including Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, who as a congressman led the right-wing Freedom Caucus, and Stephen Miller.
‘The base will revolt,’ Meadows said, according to The Times’ reporting.
Fabrizio’s surveys had found that Trump voters were more concerned about getting sick than the pandemic’s impact on the economic situation.
Hope Hicks, a top adviser, and Kushner, considered embracing mask-weaing a ‘no-brainer,’ because it could stop the spread and help to reopen businesses.
Trump didn’t believe his base would ever sign on to anything that would limit people’s freedom.
‘I’m not doing a mask mandate,’ Trump said.
Not only did Trump not push for mask mandates, he made fun of Biden for his mask-wearing.
Trump supporters made it a badge of pride to pack into the president’s rallies bare-faced.
Meanwhile, moderate and even some Republican voters flocked to Biden.
‘Making masks a culture war issue was the dumbest thing imaginable,’ one former senior Trump adviser told The Times.
Internally, members of Trump’s team were upset with the anti-mask sentiment.
The Times reported that Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar would ask maskless guests at the White House Christmas parties to stand away from him.
Dr. Anthony Fauci and Dr. Robert Redfield were reluctant to show up to the White House for meetings because of the Trump-guided disdain for social distancing and masking.
Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar (right) asked unmasked Christmas party guests to stand away from him while Drs. Deborah Birx (left) and Anthony Fauci (center right) were in a pact with other top health professionals in case Trump fired one of them
The Times also revealed that Fauci, Redfield, Dr. Deborah Birx and Dr. Stephen Hahn had all made a pact that they would stand together if one of them got fired for sticking to their guns.
The outsider in all of this was Dr. Scott Atlas, a neuroradiology professor at Stanford – who is not an infectious disease expert – that Trump brought on.
Atlas had previously appeared on Fox News Channel.
The newspaper recounts a scene where Atlas and Birx got into it, when Atlas said it was perfectly safe for colleges and universities to resume.
Birx yelled at Atlas, asking him if he understood asymptomatic spread – and that students could pass the virus along to more at-risk people.
‘Your strategy is literally going to cost us lives,’ she said, according to The Times.
One outstanding head-scratcher from the report was where, exactly, Atlas came from.
Whiel some aides believed he was discovered by White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, others old the paper that Trump’s personnel chief, the 30-year-old John McEntee, had Google-searched for a Trump-friendly doctor.