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As Trump gaslights America about coronavirus, Republicans face a critical choice
Jul 06, 2020 2 mins, 42 secs
Playing with fire at a time when public health experts say the spread of the virus appears to be spiraling out of control, Trump continued gaslighting Americans about the threat to their health during a Fourth of July speech from the South Lawn of the White House, where he minimized the dangers of Covid-19 with a baseless statement that 99% of coronavirus cases are "harmless," a claim his Food and Drug Administration chief could not back up Sunday morning.

With many Americans flouting public health guidelines during the holiday weekend, Trump's conduct is creating an inflection point for the GOP at a time when his poll numbers have tumbled.

Joni Ernst of Iowa, who faces a competitive reelection in November, told CNN's Dana Bash on "State of the Union" on Sunday when asked whether she thought Trump had exhibited "failed leadership" on coronavirus, as she criticized former President Barack Obama on Ebola in 2014.

On Saturday night at the White House, he compared his attempt to defeat "the radical left" to the efforts by the United States to eradicate the Nazis.

While Friday's and Saturday's speeches marked new heights in terms of inflammatory language from the President, many Republicans have long been uncomfortable with Trump's penchant for falling back on culture war tropes and racially incendiary language that he thinks stirs fealty to him within his base.

Late last month as Trump's poll numbers continued to sink over his handling of the protests, Senate Majority Whip John Thune, a South Dakota Republican, told CNN Trump was "good with his base," noting that the people who will "decide in November are the people in the middle."

Afraid to contradict the President on coronavirus

The President's view that the US has turned the corner on Covid-19 has also increasingly isolated him from key Republican leaders, like Texas Gov.

Stephen Hahn to explain the President's false statement that 99% of coronavirus cases are "totally harmless."

"I'm not going to get into who is right and who is wrong," Hahn, a member of the White House coronavirus task force, told Bash during CNN's "State of the Union" when she asked him to explain why the President made the claim when his public health experts have said exactly the opposite.

"What I'll say is that we have data in the White House task force.

Scott Gottlieb warned Sunday on CBS's "Face the Nation" that there's "no clear line of sight on how we're going to get this under control."

The political polarization of the virus, driven in no small part by conflicting messages from Trump and his public health experts, was in the spotlight over the holiday weekend.

In direct contradiction to Trump's "totally harmless" assertion, the US case fatality rate from coronavirus stood at 4.6% this weekend, according to Johns Hopkins University data.

The World Health Organization has said that 20% of all people who are diagnosed with coronavirus are sick enough to need oxygen or hospital care.

Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber, a Democrat, told CNN's Boris Sanchez Sunday that the situation in Miami is "going to get much worse," and he said the disconnect between the reality on the ground and the President's message is making it much harder to force Floridians to heed the guidance of health experts.

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