White House chief of staff Mark Meadows doubled down on President Trump’s baseless claim that 99% of coronavirus cases are “totally harmless” during an interview on “Fox and Friends” Monday morning.
During a Fourth of July event Saturday at the White House, the President insisted without evidence that 99% of coronavirus cases are “totally harmless” due to testing almost 40 million people for the viral disease. The next morning, FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn repeatedly dodged when pressed on Trump’s claim during an interview on CNN, saying that that he’s “not going to get into who is right and who is wrong.”
COVID-19 cases have continued to spike nationwide as the country’s seven-day average for daily new cases hit a record high for the 27th straight day on Sunday.
Meadows then argued that “when you start to look at the stats and look at all the numbers we have,” as well as testing totals in the country, “the vast majority of people are safe from this.”
Meadows also said that those who are at high risk of contracting COVID-19 — such as the elderly or those with underlying conditions such as co-morbidities, diabetes, hypertension and heart issues — should be extra careful.
“Outside of that, the risks are extremely low and the President is right with that and the facts and statistics back us up there,” Meadows said.
Watch Meadows’ remarks below:
White House chief of staff Mark Meadows responds to Trump's claim that 99% of coronavirus cases are "harmless" pic.twitter.com/fZc0jAkGzg
— Talking Points Memo (@TPM) July 6, 2020
It’s really still amazing how much Republicans are supporting every nonsensical utterance of Trump. They must know he doesn’t think any of this through, that it’s just stream of consciousness garbage that he spews out, and yet they continue to go along with him. It really does feel like he’s their king in the way they excuse everything and try to change the meaning of common words to explain away obvious lies. All it seems to be leading to is a huge loss in November, and probably for years afterwards, as support for Trump’s policies is more and more seen as racist and evil.
Why do they continue to do this? It’s going to be interesting to see the Republican party’s destruction under Trump studied in the future as the records come out, because whatever is pushing them down this road really needs to be researched and understood so we can avoid it in the future.
If Coronavirus is so harmless, then why is Trump so mad at China and the WHO about it?
“Outside of massive blood loss and organ damage, being machine gunned is just a flesh wound.”
Aaron Rupar Retweeted
Craig Spencer MD MPH
@Craig_A_Spencer
I’ve seen hundreds of #COVID19 patients. Mark Meadows has seen none. Please do not listen to these damn fools. Nearly half of US adults have high blood pressure. Over 40% are obese. And nearly 10% have diabetes. THE MAJORITY OF AMERICAN ADULTS HAVE SIGNIFICANT COMORBIDITIES!
Ah, the moment when the last wraith of dignity leaves the body. Kind of like seeing the green flash at sunset.
This WHO…
Not This Who