President Trump was never going to get good press for his coronavirus response in the months leading up to the election. That comes with the territory of being a Republican president — and especially with being Trump.
But the bad press shouldn’t matter to him. As president, he ought to be above caring about the reaction to or coverage of the federal government’s coronavirus response. He needs to care only about the results from the coronavirus response.
If the results are good, then regardless of the criticism, lives will be saved, the economy will rebound, and the public will give Trump credit.
Trump shot off an intemperate tweet this month, calling Dr. Deborah Birx, his coronavirus response coordinator, “pathetic” because she “hit us,” in his words. Birx hadn’t “hit” the administration though. She had gone on Sunday morning television and stated the seriousness of the threat. She said there was danger of the virus proving deadly to as many as 300,000 people by the end of the year.
No, that isn’t a glowing paean to Trump. But it’s the kind of sober assessment that he needs to start accepting if we are going to quash this pandemic. We can’t worry about ratings or peddle happy-talk in the hope of improving consumer or voter attitudes. Only one thing will improve consumer attitudes or voter enthusiasm toward Trump: effective measures to contain the virus and begin to eradicate the threat it poses.
There’s no obvious way to do this, but Trump cannot afford to focus so intensely on the coverage of his administration’s response. He needs to focus on the response.
To his credit, Trump has recently used his bully pulpit to spread the message of how ordinary people can and should fight the virus. He called on people to wear masks in public and to practice social distancing. These measures, health experts believe, can reduce the likelihood that an infected person will infect someone else. Trump has credibility with a huge portion of the U.S. population, and convincing them, and Republican governors, to follow these simple steps can help reduce the spread.
More important than the bully pulpit, though, is probably the coordinating role the federal government can play in marshaling the efforts of private industry and state governments.
As its name indicates, this virus is novel. We don’t know the best way to fight it. Contrary to the way some commentators and politicians wield the term as a cudgel of absolute certainty, science isn’t about knowing answers with absolute certainty. The scientific method rests on experimentation and constantly testing hypotheses.
In a similar fashion, our federal system is often called a “laboratory of democracy.” We need that laboratory running right now.
Lockdowns have varied in effectiveness. So have mask requirements and other measures. Now, we have more evidence of what works and what’s pointlessly restrictive. States and counties that opened restaurants and bars have found evidence that it’s late-night drinking, particularly indoors, that most often spreads the disease. Some governments are responding in pointless ways (requiring food purchases — buffalo wings don’t count!), whereas others are trying other methods, such as shutting down all establishments at 10 p.m.
Will this work? Maybe. The federal government could act as a clearinghouse.
What’s the best way to test the public? Nobody knows. It could be the nasal swabs currently being used en masse, which give very few false negatives. It could be the less accurate rapid tests being administered to professional athletes. The federal government should be allowing and encouraging multiple approaches and then coordinating the analysis of the results.
Try a whole bunch of things. See what works. Adopt the best practices more broadly.
Trump could continue to lean on federal agencies that are unduly slowing down new tests or treatments. Run federally funded tests on sanitation methods, such as different disinfectants or foggers, and provide federal funding to manufacture and distribute these.
He could direct federal money at mitigation efforts, such as air filtration for schools.
There are a thousand things that Trump could direct the federal government to do. Maybe many of them wouldn’t work — after all, the federal government doesn’t have magic powers. But what definitely won’t work are attempts to spin the virus away.
