Navigating Coronavirus — May 6

It’s been 69 days since President Trump said we’d soon have zero cases in the U.S. We now have 1,237,000 cases and 72,200 deaths — more deaths than any other country in the world.

THE LATEST

Message guidance on the latest developments with President Trump’s handling of the crisis.

1. Trump keeps making this crisis worse and putting more Americans in danger.

Trump is surrendering to the virus and refusing to listen to experts on how to solve the pandemic, even as more than 1,000 Americans have died every day for more than a month, infection rates are spiking as states reopen, and Trump’s own administration estimates we’ll soon hit 3,000 deaths a day.

• NEW >> Trump is actually plotting how to end the coronavirus task force, as deaths and infections keep rising.
• POLITICO: “The undoing of the coronavirus task force comes as the president has turned his attention almost entirely toward reopening the economy”
• Neither Trump nor his aides discussed this with Dr. Fauci at all.
• NEW NAVIGATOR DATA >> 60% of Americans have serious concerns that Trump makes decisions that ignore the advice of health and medical experts.
• NEW WHISTLEBLOWER COMPLAINT >> Dr. Rick Bright, the ousted director of the office involved in developing a coronavirus vaccine, filed a whistleblower complaint Tuesday “after the Trump administration ignored his dire warnings about COVID-19 and a malaria drug President Donald Trump was pushing for the coronavirus despite scant evidence it helped.” (AP)
• Unhappy with his early concerns and calls for immediate response, Azar cut Dr. Bright out of “critical discussions about addressing the COVID-19 pandemic” as retribution. (CNN)
• Bright alleges he was fired after he refused to back “efforts to fund potentially dangerous drugs promoted by those with political connections” — like Trump’s hydroxychloroquine stunt, which has now proven dangerous. (NBC)

As Trump fires trusted experts and neuters the government’s response to the pandemic, he is putting our country’s success in this crisis in the hands of his son-in-law and an inexperienced team of volunteers who has been unable to solve the problem.

• WAPO: “The coronavirus response being spearheaded by President Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, has relied in part on volunteers from consulting and private equity firms with little expertise in the tasks to which they were assigned, exacerbating chronic problems in obtaining supplies for hospitals and other needs.”
• BREAKING NYT STORY: Jared Kushner’s response team failed to get needed medical supplies, prioritizing tips from political allies like Charlie Kirk and a former Apprentice contestant, and leading one member of Kushner’s volunteer team to become so disturbed they’re now blowing the whistle and providing documents to a House Oversight Committee.
• “The nature and scale of the response seemed grossly inadequate,” says the whistleblower.

2. Trump prioritizes the wealthy and big corporations over working Americans.

Trump refuses to support workers and families hurting in this crisis; instead, he is sending more and more money to the wealthy and big businesses, even as they lay off workers and further hurt our economy.

• WAPO: “U.S. companies cut thousands of workers while continuing to reward shareholders during pandemic”
• “As the pandemic squeezes big companies, executives are making decisions about who will bear the brunt of the sacrifices, and in at least some cases, workers have been the first to lose, even as shareholders continue to collect.”
• AND IT GETS WORSE >> “The Trump administration is considering a wide range of tax-cut proposals for businesses and investors in the next coronavirus response bill.” (NYT)
• Trump wants a tax cut on capital gains income: 9 in 10 Americans would get no tax benefit at all from this. Three-quarters of all capital gains income goes to millionaires.
• Trump wants a payroll tax cut: That leaves out 30+ million who have lost their jobs, while giving hundreds of millions of dollars to giant corporations.
• NEW NAVIGATOR DATA >> By 20 points, Americans believe that Trump’s response favors the wealthy/big corporations over workers (53–33%).

NEW NAVIGATOR TRACKING NUMBERS . . .

TODAY’S POLLING DECK >> HERE

FULL TOPLINES >> HERE

• Trump’s coronavirus approval among Independents is just 34%. As he rushes to move past the pandemic, even as it kills and infects more Americans, ratings of his handling of the crisis remain miserable.

• Americans are hearing slightly less from Trump, but they still note his many failures. Since we began daily tracking polls, Americans are hearing less about Trump’s handling of the crisis. But many of his worst actions — like recommending injecting disinfectants and constantly lying — continue to break through.

• The number of Americans who know someone with coronavirus remains at record highs, but optimism — and uncertainty — is up. A third (32%) know someone with the virus, but fewer Americans now say the worst is yet to come — a complicated dynamic as experts warn of more deaths and infections ahead.

ECONOMIC CRISIS IN CONTEXT

The latest on how the economic crisis sparked by coronavirus is actually fueled by years of President Trump’s conservative economic policies, focusing today on Wall Street and big business bouncing back while workers and families continue to suffer.

If there is one thing that should be clear by now, it’s this: Despite what Trump thinks, the economy is not the stock market.

• Because Trump has prioritized Wall Street and big business, the stock market is up over 30% in the last six weeks, the rich continue to get richer, and massive corporations keep shoveling money into the pockets of their shareholders while laying off workers.
• While Wall Street, massive corporations, and the super-rich are doing well, millions of workers are out of a job, millions more don’t have the protection they need when they go to work, and families and small business owners are struggling to access any government relief.

Here is the reality: The economy is made up of people — workers, families, and consumers — and an economy that isn’t working for all of us isn’t going to work at all.

• This crisis has highlighted that our economy is shaped by policy choices, not laws of nature.
• Our country could have been prepared for a crisis like this with robust paid sick leave, universal health care, strong unemployment benefits, and a durable safety net and other policies that invest in and support all people.
• Instead, Trump spent years cutting investments in people, gutting the federal government and its ability to prepare for and respond to a crisis like this, and eroding worker power and safety to help the wealthy and well-connected.
• We can’t change the Trump economic policies that got us into this mess, but Congress should move quickly to help workers and families and enact policies that put our economy on stronger footing.

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Navigating Coronavirus is a joint project of Governing for Impact, Groundwork Collaborative, The Hub Project, and Navigator Research.

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