Trump Casually Doubles the Number of Americans He’d Be Okay Losing to the Coronavirus

If your sense of time has become a flat circle these last couple of months, it might be hard to remember what was going on in February 2020. But as a reminder, that was when Donald Trump declared that there would be no more than 15 coronavirus cases total in the U.S. Shortly thereafter, he nudged that number up just slightly, claiming that the disease would prove nowhere near as bad as the 2009 H1N1 flu outbreak, which killed roughly 12,500 Americans. At the end of March, he shifted expectations a tad, saying that if the U.S. death toll clocked in between 100,000 and 200,000, it would mean his administration had “done a very good job.” Later, when strict social distancing measures began to flatten the curve, he opined that 60,000 dead Americans would be a win. Now, as the U.S. has surpassed that figure, the president has adjusted his yardstick for success once again, casually declaring that, actually, maybe 100,000 people will die.

Speaking to reporters before departing for a weekend at Camp David, Trump shared that “hopefully we’re going to come in under 100,000 lives lost,” and if that’s the case, it’ll mean he saved something like 1 millions lives, or 1.5 million or hey, let’s just call it 2.5 million lives.

The president did not take questions but if he had, and someone had asked him about the fact that he tacked on another 40,000 Americans from his latest prediction, one can assume he would have claimed to have never said such a thing because that’s what he does every time he’s caught in a monumental lie which is frequently. Presumably this won’t be the last time between now and November that he revises both the number of dead Americans the country should consider a success, and how many he’ll take credit for saving. Next month, 250,000 coronavirus deaths will presumably mean he did a bang-up job and hey, how about those 300 million people he saved?

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Surprise: the Trump administration doesn’t want Anthony Fauci testifying before Congress

Surely this has nothing to do with the White House wanting to avoid any expert testimony that could make the president look bad:

The White House issued a statement about Fauci’s testimony shortly after The Washington Post published a story Friday afternoon quoting a spokesman for the House Appropriations Committee, who said the White House was refusing to allow Fauci to appear at a subcommittee hearing next week…. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, has been a prominent face in the Trump administration’s response to the coronavirus as a lead scientist in the coronavirus task force. He has walked a fine line in delivering scientific information to the public that at times has contradicted President Trump’s statements. Trump at one point retweeted a Twitter post that called for Fauci to be fired, but he later denied he was considering firing him. Fauci has urged extreme caution as some cities and states move to reopen businesses, warning that doing so imprudently could lead to a resurgence of the coronavirus.