President Trump has faced a good deal of criticism for the way he’s handled and responded to the coronavirus pandemic, and his recent interview with Axios’s Jonathan Swan shows why.
When asked about the COVID-19 death rate in the United States, Trump disputed the numbers presented by Swan and pulled out several charts that were supposed to prove Swan wrong. Except it wasn’t quite clear what exactly Trump’s charts were tracking, and the president seemed unable to explain them himself. Finally, Swan figured it out:
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.@jonathanvswan: “Oh, you’re doing death as a proportion of cases. I’m talking about death as a proportion of population. That’s where the U.S. is really bad. Much worse than South Korea, Germany, etc.”@realdonaldtrump: “You can’t do that.”
Swan: “Why can’t I do that?” pic.twitter.com/MStySfkV39
— Axios (@axios) August 4, 2020
“Oh, you’re doing death as a proportion of cases. I’m talking about death as a proportion of population. That’s where the U.S. is really bad, much worse than South Korea, Germany, etc.,” Swan said.
“You can’t do that,” Trump said.
“Why can’t I do that?” Swan asked.
“You have to go by the cases,” Trump insisted, arguing that a case-by-case analysis is more accurate because it shows the recovery rate as well as the death rate.
The point Trump was trying to make was a good one. It matters a great deal how many people catch COVID-19 and recover, because that is the most realistic indicator we have of how dangerous this virus actually is. But the fact that the president couldn’t even explain that during an interview will do little to inspire confidence in a nation that still fears the virus overwhelmingly.
The number of people in the U.S. who are either somewhat or very concerned about the spread of COVID-19 has risen steadily since March, when the outbreak first began, according to a FiveThirtyEight analysis. At the same time, public opinion of Trump’s handling of the coronavirus has dropped significantly. All of this suggests that the public’s concerns about the coronavirus directly relate to the government’s response and what it is doing to stop the spread.
The president seems to understand this because he’s changed his approach to the coronavirus significantly. He’s now encouraging people to wear masks while in public, refraining from pushing back on states that reintroduce certain restrictions, and scaling back the GOP’s in-person campaigning. And again, the polls support these steps.
But Trump is still out of his depth, as we saw in the Axios interview. Several months later and he’s still struggling to provide a clear, sober, and competent message that addresses people’s concerns while restoring their trust in the government’s ability to fight this virus. This shortcoming will not go unnoticed by the American public, and come November, they might decide to do something about it.
