On Saturday night in Tulsa, Donald Trump boasted that he ordered coronavirus testing to be slowed down to prevent a politically inconvenient increase in cases. Since then, White House staff has tried performing mental summersaults to explain away the shocking claim – saying it was “sarcasm” or in “jest.”
Just yesterday, Trump doubled down on that claim by saying, “I don’t kid,” and his administration put those words into action by ACTUALLY closing up coronavirus testing centers in hotspot states while leaving $14 billion in approved testing funds on the table.
“Donald Trump’s latest move to close testing centers in coronavirus hot spots is indefensible,” said Kyle Morse, an American Bridge spokesperson. “It will have deadly consequences and make an economic and public health disaster even worse. American Bridge will work to make sure swing-state voters know the truth about the president’s botched handling of this pandemic that has cost more than 120,000 American lives and thrown us into an economic recession.”
Shortly after Donald Trump’s shocking claim, American Bridge announced a five-figure swing-state digital ad buy in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin highlighting the president’s comments and reminding voters that “Donald Trump’s lost time cost lives.”
Watch CNBC’s coverage of Donald Trump’s closure of coronavirus testing sites below:
Published: Jun 24, 2020 | Last Modified: Jun 29, 2020