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

***********************

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

PFAW Member,

This week, the United States continued to hit one dangerous record high
after another, with the country [ [link removed] ]passing 300,000 deaths due to COVID-19.
That toll is roughly the equivalent of losing the entire population of
Pittsburgh or St. Louis.

From day one, Donald Trump, his administration, and his Republican allies
in Congress have minimized or ignored the crisis. Their negligence
continues to exacerbate the pandemic’s devastating impact on our country.
This week was no different.

* On December 16, Politico [ [link removed] ]reported that a Trump appointee at the
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) badgered top officials
to adopt a “herd immunity” approach in the U.S. In emails written in
July, former HHS science advisor Paul Alexander argued that millions
of Americans should be infected with the virus, writing to his boss,
HHS assistant secretary [ [link removed] ]Michael Caputo, that “infants, kids, teens,
young people, young adults, middle aged with no conditions etc. have
zero to little risk ... we want them infected.” In addition to
Alexander’s horrific suggestions and [ [link removed] ]factually incorrect claims,
officials confirmed that he “spoke for Caputo” and that his
recommendations were supported by the White House.
* Two former employees at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
(CDC) [ [link removed] ]spoke out about their experiences at the agency during the
pandemic, including the Trump administration’s blatant disregard for
scientific data and “the White House’s slow suffocation of the
agency’s voice, the meddling in its messages and the siphoning of its
budget.”
* The economic impact of the pandemic continues to inflict serious
hardships on millions of Americans, with the recent rise in confirmed
cases “[ [link removed] ]battering” the U.S. labor market.

* The Department of Labor [ [link removed] ]reported on December 17 that there
were 935,000 new unemployment claims last week, the highest level
of unemployment claims [ [link removed] ]since the beginning of September. At
the end of November, more than 20 million Americans were
collecting state or federal unemployment benefits.
* With multiple federal pandemic relief unemployment benefit
programs set to expire by the end of the year, between 2.4 and 5
million households are [ [link removed] ]at risk of eviction in January 2021,
which would disproportionately [ [link removed] ]harm Black and Latino
communities and compound racial disparities in housing – and
cause more Black and Latino people to contract COVID-19.
* In the past five months, the U.S. poverty rate has [ [link removed] ]surged,
with at least 7.8 million Americans newly falling into poverty
since August.
* Around 60 percent of businesses – approximately 100,000
individual establishments – that closed temporarily during the
pandemic have now shuttered [ [link removed] ]permanently.

* Trump’s refusal to abide by social distancing, mask wearing and other
pandemic safety protocols, which encouraged others in his orbit to do
the same, sparked [ [link removed] ]several [ [link removed] ]waves of [ [link removed] ]outbreaks within the
White House and his administration. And on December 14, Bloomberg
[ [link removed] ]reported that a White House security official has been gravely ill
for three months after contracting COVID-19, which resulted in the
amputation of his right foot and lower leg. It is the most serious of
any known cases of the virus connected to the White House.
* With the distribution of the Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine
underway this week, the Trump administration is [ [link removed] ]rushing to roll
out a public education campaign to promote it. Its failure to create a
coordinated communications rollout plan – and the lack of trust in
Trump overall – has resulted in public skepticism about the vaccine.
On December 16, White House coronavirus advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci
[ [link removed] ]said that at least 75 percent of the population must be vaccinated
for the U.S. to “approach some level of normality.” Trump himself has
been [ [link removed] ]“notably absent” from the current communications plans and
activities surrounding the vaccine.
* Because the Trump administration established no centralized plan for
distributing the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, there has been significant
[ [link removed] ]confusion in states about how much they were going to receive. The
Federal Drug Administration is likely to [ [link removed] ]approve Moderna’s vaccine
as early as this evening, and the administration has not provided any
additional planning resources for the second vaccine’s rollout.

On December 16, the U.S. [ [link removed] ]reported more than 3,600 deaths, over 245,000
new [ [link removed] ]infections, and more than 113,090 hospitalized patients, all of
which set pandemic records for single day reports. For the second week in
a row, the U.S. has [ [link removed] ]reported more COVID-19 deaths than at any other
point during the pandemic. In the last two weeks, deaths have increased by
60 percent, cases have increased by 28 percent, and hospitalizations have
increased by 17 percent – and those [ [link removed] ]numbers are only expected to keep
going up as we move through the holiday season.

Despite widespread devastation, neither the Trump administration nor
Senate Republicans are taking sufficient action to address Americans’
urgent needs. After a week of bipartisan [ [link removed] ]negotiation, Republicans have
insisted on eliminating $160 billion in desperately [ [link removed] ]needed [ [link removed] ]state
and local government aid and cutting the pandemic unemployment benefits
down to just $300 a week in the current draft.

And even if Congress successfully passes a bill before the federal
budget’s deadline tonight, it’s likely [ [link removed] ]too late to change the outcome
of the current aid programs’ rollbacks. Many state unemployment systems
are now programmed to cut off benefits before the end of the year and will
take weeks to reinstate or reestablish them.

Trump, Mitch McConnell, and their Republican cronies have made their
disregard for the catastrophic [ [link removed] ]human cost of this pandemic all too
clear. Nearly a year into this pandemic, too many Americans are still
sick, dying, losing jobs, falling into poverty, and facing unimaginable
suffering and grief. It’s time for Congress to act immediately and provide
relief to the American people.

-------------------------

The [ [link removed] ]Falsehoods and Failures series will appear every week on our blog.
[ [link removed] ]You can find the previous post here. For ongoing coverage of 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, People For the American Way

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

[ [link removed] ]donate:

 


***********************

Do not reply directly to this e-mail. Please use [email protected].

Trouble viewing the email?
VIEW AS WEB PAGE:
[link removed]

This email was sent to [email protected]. Reaching you over email
is the best way we have to let you know about the ways you can take
action to fight the Right Wing and defend our constitutional rights
and values. If you have any thoughts, comments, or criticisms, or if
there's a better email address at which to reach you, please
let us know. If you'd like to unsubscribe from our list, you
can do that here:

You can unsubscribe from this mailing list at any time:
[link removed]
. But know that if you leave, it will be harder for you to stay involved with People For the American Way and continue our
crucial work. PFAW is able to win policy battles and elections, and
counter the Right's extremism and hate, because of dedicated
activists like you, and we're always eager to hear your thoughts.
Thanks for your support.

[link removed]

CONTACT:
[link removed]

PRIVACY POLICY:
[link removed]

FACEBOOK:
[link removed]

TWITTER:
[link removed]

YOUTUBE:
[link removed]

1101 15th Street, NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC xxxxxx-5002,
202-467-4999



You can unsubscribe from this mailing list at any time:
[link removed]