A new message from your friends at People For the American Way.

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[ [link removed] ]45's Falsehoods and Failures: Weekly Coverage of Trump During COVID-19

PFAW Member,

On November 18, the United States surpassed a quarter million deaths due
to COVID-19. This stark reminder of the danger we continue to face stands
in contrast to the near-silence on the pandemic from Donald Trump for the
second straight week, in addition to his decision to eschew coronavirus
task force meetings for the past [ [link removed] ]five months. [ [link removed] ]Instead, Trump has
[ [link removed] ]remained fixated on lying about the election’s results, [ [link removed] ]spouting
false claims of nonexistent voter fraud and [ [link removed] ]firing the senior
cybersecurity official who directly disputed Trump’s falsehoods about the
election.

The number of new cases in the U.S. [ [link removed] ]rose every day in the past month;
we saw an [ [link removed] ]increase of more than a million new cases between November
8-14; and case numbers are currently [ [link removed] ]rising in all 50 states. This is
the worst outbreak of the year, and we’re only just beginning the winter
season in most of the country, which will lead to even greater community
spread as cold weather forces people indoors and as families inevitably
gather, against public health officials’ [ [link removed] ]advice, for the holidays.
Trump, however, made no attempt to support his administration’s health
officials in their recommendations, even [ [link removed] ]trying to reinstate public
holiday celebrations that had been [ [link removed] ]canceled due to safety concerns
amid the pandemic’s surge.

On November 13, after [ [link removed] ]our blog post for the week had been published,
Trump gave an “update” on Operation Warp Speed, the White House
coronavirus task force’s name for their efforts to support the vaccine
research and development process. His [ [link removed] ]address was brief and filled
with familiar [ [link removed] ]falsehoods, although it did foreshadow the content of
the only public statements he has made – exclusively via Twitter – in the
following days about the pandemic. In those, he attempted to
[ [link removed] ]incorrectly take credit for the recent vaccine news announced by
[ [link removed] ]Pfizer and [ [link removed] ]Moderna.

Trump did not hold any further public events or [ [link removed] ]take any meaningful
actions to help [ [link removed] ]reduce Americans’ suffering this week, instead taking
to his favorite social media platform for a variety of vaccine-focused
posts. He implicitly [ [link removed] ]credited himself for the stock market’s vaccine
news bump; [ [link removed] ]implied that New York state should not receive the vaccines
because Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo has [ [link removed] ]insisted on a rigorous
scientific review process; and urged Congress to pass new coronavirus
legislation while falsely [ [link removed] ]suggesting that Democrats haven’t already
supported a “big and focused” bill. (It’s been over 180 days since House
Democrats crafted and passed the [ [link removed] ]HEROES Act.)

That’s all Trump has done [ [link removed] ]regarding the coronavirus pandemic in the
past week – and even his vaccine tweets make up only a small percentage of
his social media posts, most of which focus on spewing vitriol at
Democrats and elections officials. Trump and administration officials are
[ [link removed] ]continuing to actively block the Biden/Harris administration from
[ [link removed] ]accessing vital public health information that will allow their work
to combat COVID-19 to begin on their first day in office. Leaders of
[ [link removed] ]medical and [ [link removed] ]health organizations and national experts,
[ [link removed] ]including Dr. Anthony Fauci, have pleaded with Trump to stop hampering
the transition process, as the delay is [ [link removed] ]resulting in a serious public
health risk – in [ [link removed] ]addition to eroding the foundations of our democratic
process.

Meanwhile, Trump’s cronies are continuing their own bad behavior: Vice
President Mike Pence [ [link removed] ]blamed the current case surge on the media’s
having “cr[ied] wolf” about the coronavirus for the past eight months. The
Health and Human Services Secretary, Alex M. Azar, [ [link removed] ]will not allow his
department to work with the Biden/Harris administration until the General
Services Administration officially announces that Biden won the election
(which [ [link removed] ]he has). And in a particularly dangerous comment, White House
“science advisor” Scott Atlas [ [link removed] ]urged people to “rise up” in response to
Michigan’s new coronavirus restrictions.

As Fauci recently [ [link removed] ]said, we need coordinated federal leadership, not a
patchwork of state regulations and an overreliance on vaccines that are
yet to begin production. Trump and Republicans need to face our dangerous
reality and allow the Biden/Harris transition team [ [link removed] ]access to vital
federal public health resources and information – or we’re all going to
have an even darker winter than we’ve been anticipating.

Late this week, hints of cracks in the Republicans’ wall of denial
appeared in [ [link removed] ]remarks by Sens. [ [link removed] ]Mitt Romney and [ [link removed] ]Ben Sasse, who
blasted Trump’s refusal to accept his election defeat. But it will take
much more to regain the ground we are losing as Trump digs in. The U.S.
already [ [link removed] ]comprises about 18.5 percent of all COVID-19 deaths worldwide,
even though it has just four percent of the global population.

There are still more than two months before the Biden/Harris
administration steps into the leadership roles that Trump’s administration
long ago forfeited. In the meantime, we cannot afford Trump’s indifference
and the Republicans’ complicity.

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The [ [link removed] ]Falsehoods and Failures series will appear every Friday on our
blog. [ [link removed] ]You can find the previous post here. For ongoing coverage of
Trump and the Right Wing's response to the coronavirus, check out PFAW's
[ [link removed] ]Right Wing Watch.

Thanks as always for your ongoing support – stay safe and healthy!

– Sarah, PFAW

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