Writer calls COVID-19 'Trump's plague'

US President Donald Trump has repeatedly referred to the COVID-19 pandemic as "the China virus", but a former speechwriter for George W. Bush argued in a recent magazine article that "this is Trump's plague now", charging that he has mishandled the response to the outbreak.

Staff writer David Frum, author of Trumpocalyse: Restoring American Democracy (2020) and a speechwriter for Bush in 2001-2002, said that Trump's push for reopening and his contempt for mask-wearing are contributing to the current surge of the novel coronavirus in the United States.

Frum listed the trajectory of COVID-19 infections in the US: the virus peaked on April 24 with 36,738 new cases. By mid-May, the country had reduced the rate of infection by nearly half, to 17,618 on May 11.

"On June 26, the country suffered almost 46,000 new infections — nearly 10,000 more in one day than on the worst day in April. All of the sacrifices of the past weeks have been thrown away," Frum wrote.

Among a series of Twitter posts on Monday, the Republican president defended the administration's handling of the virus and went after the media, his Democratic presidential rival Joe Biden and the Democratic Party.

"Why does the Lamestream Fake News Media REFUSE to say that China Virus deaths are down 39%, and that we now have the lowest Fatality (Mortality) Rate in the World. They just can't stand that we are doing so well for our Country!

"The Democrats would not have BANNED travel from heavily infected China, especially so early, therefore, far more people would have died. Corrupt Joe Biden now admits this!!!"

Biden also took to Twitter on Monday to criticize Trump's response to the pandemic.

"With COVID-19 surging across the nation, Donald Trump should be doing everything in his power to increase access to testing. Instead, he's doing the opposite. It's despicable," Biden wrote.

In an earlier tweet Monday, the former vice-president said: "It didn't have to be this bad. But Donald Trump failed to do his job — and we're all paying the price."

Frum wrote that the pandemic was first aggravated by what he called Trump's negligence and indifference. "He had dismantled the country's pandemic preparedness. He denied the disease for two months."

Then Trump pushed for a quick reopening in April which led to the ongoing surge of infections, Frum said. Georgia reopened on April 23. Texas followed on May 1 and Florida on May 4.

The COVID-19 news from mid-May on would be almost all bad, Frum wrote.

"The disease is spiking in places precisely where state governments hastened to reopen bars, casinos, restaurants, shopping malls, and other indoor places of entertainment. Phoenix, Houston, and other southern cities are suddenly reporting caseloads that look like New York City at its worst."

As of 4:15 pm on Tuesday, there were more than 2.93 million coronavirus cases in the US, with approximately 130,000 deaths, according to data compiled by Reuters. New York, with nearly 32,000 deaths, and New Jersey, with more than 15,000, far exceed the death tolls in other states. They are followed by Massachusetts, with more than 8,000 deaths, and Illinois, with more than 7,000.

Alaska and Hawaii each have fewer than 20 COVID-19 deaths. On the US mainland, Wyoming (20) and Montana (23) have the lowest fatality rates.

Frum wrote that early reopening could only have worked if stringent safety measures, including the use of face masks and social distancing, were incorporated.

"Yet the president sabotaged the reopening he himself had forced," Frum wrote. "Throughout his presidency, Trump has subordinated rational policy in order to provoke virulent culture wars. And the mask has become a rallying symbol for his supporters."

Frum pointed out that Trump never wears a mask in public and mocked Biden for wearing one.

"I see Biden. It's like his whole face is covered. It's like he put a knapsack over his face. He probably likes it that way," Frum quoted Trump in a May 21 report by The Wall Street Journal.

Those who supported Trump helped to turn the issue of masks into a political one, Frum said.

For example, commentator Rush Limbaugh mocked the mask as a "symbol of fear". The conservative web publication The Federalist posted a piece headlined, "Mandatory Masks Aren't About Safety, They're About Social Control".

And a local official in Arizona used George Floyd's dying words, "I can't breathe," to mock mask-wearing.

Sebastian Gorka, a former Trump adviser, has called masks "the COVID burqas", equating mask-wearing to an act of submission.

In advance of Trump's rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on June 20, city employees affixed "do not sit here please" stickers to every other seat in the stadium venue. Trump campaign workers were captured on video removing the stickers so that the president could seat attendees closer together.

"Trump's elevation of the needs of his own ego over the well-being of even his strongest supporters is profoundly implicated in the virus's powerful June comeback," wrote Frum.

Frum said that "millions of citizens obeyed the cues from Trump, the right-wing media, and the medical crackpots who predominate Facebook".

"In the face of this worsening crisis, Trump is not taking action; he's instead shifting the goalposts: Don't pay attention to the case rate, he now argues. Look at the death rate," Frum wrote, quoting Trump's tweet.

Frum predicted that the US will see an increase in the COVID-19 death toll in late July, due to the current surge in cases.

"Across the rest of the developed world, COVID-19 has been ebbing. As a result, borders are reopening, and economies are reviving. Here in the US, however, Americans are suffering a new disease peak worse than the worst of April. How lethal will this new peak be? We will learn that the way we seem to learn everything in this era of Trump: the hard way," Frum concluded.