How The Trump Presidency’s Most Ingrained Characteristics Caused Early Missteps Exacerbating Crisis
A distrust of the federal bureaucracy, internal White House personality conflicts, lack of a formal policymaking process and President Donald Trump’s own insistence on controlling the public message hampered the country's response to the growing crisis. In other administration news: the flawed tests continue to haunt the CDC; fact-checks of the president's claims; warnings from Americans working with WHO; and more.
Los Angeles Times:
Trump Lagged On Coronavirus Pandemic Plan, Despite Warnings
The first day President Trump mentioned the coronavirus in public, only one American was known to be infected. He assured the rest of the country it had no reason to worry. “We have it totally under control,” Trump said Jan. 22 from Davos, Switzerland. “It’s going to be just fine.” Behind the scenes, however, even some of his close aides thought the virus posed a much greater threat to the nation and to Trump. (Cloud, Pringle and Stokols, 4/19)
The New York Times:
C.D.C. Labs Were Contaminated, Delaying Coronavirus Testing, Officials Say
Sloppy laboratory practices at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention caused contamination that rendered the nation’s first coronavirus tests ineffective, federal officials confirmed on Saturday. Two of the three C.D.C. laboratories in Atlanta that created the coronavirus test kits violated their own manufacturing standards, resulting in the agency sending tests that did not work to nearly all of the 100 state and local public health labs, according to the Food and Drug Administration. Early on, the F.D.A., which oversees laboratory tests, sent Dr. Timothy Stenzel, chief of in vitro diagnostics and radiological health, to the C.D.C. labs to assess the problem, several officials said. (Kaplan, 4/18)
The Associated Press Fact Check:
Trump's Misdirection On Virus Testing, Deaths
President Donald Trump is falsely assigning blame to governors and the Obama administration for shortages in coronavirus testing. For much of the week, he was pretender to a throne that didn’t exist as he claimed king-like powers over the pandemic response and Congress. But by the weekend, he was again saying governors called the shots and they are the ones to blame — not the federal government, not him — for any testing problems. (Yen and Woodward, 4/20)
ABC News:
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi Warns Trump May Put US In 'Further Danger' During Coronavirus Crisis
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi warned against President Donald Trump's actions and rhetoric during the coronavirus public health crisis, insisting that his message could put the U.S. in "further danger." "If he continues to predicate the actions that we take on a false premise, then we're in further danger," Pelosi said during a wide-ranging interview on "This Week" with ABC News' Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos. (Khan, 4/19)
The Washington Post:
Americans At World Health Organization Transmitted Real-Time Information About Coronavirus To Trump Administration
More than a dozen U.S. researchers, physicians and public health experts, many of them from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, were working full time at the Geneva headquarters of the World Health Organization as the novel coronavirus emerged late last year and transmitted real-time information about its discovery and spread in China to the Trump administration, according to U.S. and international officials. (DeYoung, Sun and Rauhala, 4/19)
The Washington Post:
U.S. Sent Millions Of Face Masks To China Early This Year, Ignoring Pandemic Warning Signs
U.S. manufacturers shipped millions of dollars’ worth of face masks and other protective medical equipment to China in January and February with encouragement from the federal government, a Washington Post review of economic data and internal government documents has found. The move underscores the Trump administration’s failure to recognize and prepare for the growing pandemic threat. (Eilperin, Stein, Butler and Hamburger, 4/18)
The New York Times:
The U.S. Tried To Teach China A Lesson About The Media. It Backfired.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is better known for yelling at journalists than consoling them. But when Mr. Pompeo got on the phone with the publishers of The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times on March 21, he said he was there to offer help, according to a person with direct knowledge of the call. And he acknowledged that the Trump administration’s latest shot at China had been, if not wrong, poorly timed. (Smith, 4/19)
The Hill:
Foreign Powers Test US Defenses Amid Coronavirus Pandemic
U.S. adversaries are probing America's defenses as the world is preoccupied with the fight against the coronavirus pandemic. In the past two weeks, Russia, China, Iran and North Korea have all moved to test Washington in the sea, in the air and on land as U.S. forces have become more restricted in movement amid concerns over the spread of COVID-19. “Exactly how distracted is the U.S. military? They want to know,” said Susanna Blume, the director of the defense program at the Center for a New American Security, referring to foreign countries. (Mitchell, 4/19)
