Try as he might to change the subject, President Donald Trump can’t escape the coronavirus. In April, the president tried to shift the public’s focus to the economy. In July, to defending the country’s “heritage.” In September, to enforcing “law and order.” But all along the way, the death toll from the coronavirus continued to mount. And now, Trump’s own words are redirecting attention to his handling of the pandemic when he can least afford it — less than two months before Election Day. “I wanted to always play it down,” Trump said of the threat from the virus. That was in a private conversation with journalist Bob Woodward last March that became public on Wednesday with the publication of excerpts from Woodward’s upcoming book “Rage.” In taped conversations released along with the excerpts, Trump insisted he didn’t want to create “panic.” But his comments also raised fresh questions about how he has managed the defining crisis of his presidency, one that has killed more than 190,000 Americans so far, with no end in sight. Trump’s team would much rather center the November vote around the economy, cracking down on protests spawned by racial injustice, and the president’s promise that he could appoint more conservative justices to the Supreme Court. Trump released a list of 20 potential nominees for the high court, part of an effort to animate conservative and evangelical voters. But his announcement was overshadowed by a cascade of unwelcome developments, including Woodward’s revelations, a move by Nevada officials to cancel upcoming Trump rallies in the state because of the virus, and a whistleblower’s charge that Trump aides had pressured him to cover up intelligence reports about Russian election interference on the president’s behalf. The president unleashed a barrage of tweets Thursday morning, some in an effort to change the subject, and others taking on the Woodward book head-on, defending his comments and charging the media with conspiring against him. “Bob Woodward had my quotes for many months,” Trump wrote. “If he thought they were so bad or dangerous, why didn’t he immediately report them in an effort to save lives? Didn’t he have an obligation to do so? No, because he knew they were good and proper answers. Calm, no panic!” Woodward has defended his decision to hold off by saying he needed time to make sure Trump’s private comments were true. Revelations from the Woodward book emerged just as Trump’s campaign was beginning to feel that the virus was receding from public view. The president himself has been thumbing his nose at public health experts’ warning against the sort of large gatherings — with few people wearing masks — that his campaign has been staging around the country. For all of that, Trump has faced devastating revelations of his own creation before and survived them. They stretch back to his 2015 comments questioning the heroism of Sen. John McCain, a decorated Vietnam prisoner of war, or the notorious “Access Hollywood” tape that emerged just before the 2016 election in which Trump described sexually assaulting women. On Wednesday, Trump didn’t deny his remarks playing down the virus, he sought to justify them. “The fact is I’m a cheerleader for this country. I love our country and I don’t want people to be frightened. I don’t want to […]
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