Woodward’s book and the timeline it presents has forced the Trump administration into precisely the position it’s wanted to avoid: litigating the early stages of its response to a pandemic that has now killed more than 190,000 Americans
for China’s response. The president appeared committed to keeping the public focused on more upbeat matters such as the rising stock market.
That early response from Trump, top White House aides and health officials across the administration now shows a different picture than the president was presenting to the public. Senior administration officials argue they were all scrambling to figure out the nature of the virus, with the severity of it slowly coming into focus later in February.
“The fact is, there has to be a calmness. You don't want me jumping up and down screaming there's going to be great death. There's going to—. And really causing serious problems for the country,” Trump told reporters in a White House press briefing on Thursday as he defended himself from a growing furor over what his critics decry as covering up a threat to American lives.
The coronavirus by early February had sickened more than 30,000 people in mainland China and killed at least 600, an outbreak worrying enough that the White House’s nascent coronavirus task force — launched in late January — had begun regularly briefing Congress and the press on its progression. Within the administration’s new task force, officials were similarly focused more on the conditions abroad. The group led then by HHS Secretary Alex Azar had prioritized imposing new screening measures at airports and rushed to quarantine those returning from hard-hit Chinese provinces, hoping to prevent infection from circulating more broadly throughout the country.
The Senate acquitted him on two articles of impeachment on Wednesday, Feb. 5., a move that emboldened him to strike down and fire critics and remake the administration even more to his liking. “I'll be reading it on the helicopter, but it was a total win,” Trump said. “It was another phony case.”
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