CNN’s The Situation Room continued Wednesday to vent the network’s anger with President Donald Trump, upset he hasn’t engaged in mentally-crippling fear-mongering about the coronavirus pandemic, demanded he stop giving a “rosy” outlook, and express disappointment with his pleas for schools to reopen.
CNN anchors and reporters can afford to hire child care to take care of and school their children while they continue their jobs even though most other Americans can't afford it, so it’s unsurprising they’ve been rooting for schools to stay closed well into at least 2021.
Chief White House correspondent Jim Acosta was upset with the idea of schools reopening and life returning to normal. He told host Wolf Bltizer that Trump “was sort of brushing off” safety concerns about reopenings and the possibility students could spread the virus to family members in favor of a “rosy” outlook.
Acosta employed a tried and true liberal media strategy for ending debate on almost anything, which was say that “the science is just not settled on this.” Ah, “the science.”
Speaking of experts and “science,” the great Mary Vought had a lengthy thread hours earlier calling for schools to reopen that debunked the hide-under-the-bed fears the media want to strike in Americans.
Further, he complained the administration “has been turning their attention to studies that support their point of view on 100 percent open schools around the country, but there are just lots of nervous parents out there, lots of nervous teachers and administrators who say, hang on a second.”
And on the fake news front, Acosta asserted “that violent crime across the country, studies have shown, has been on the decline versus where it's been in recent decades,” and thus Trump has been lying in calling attention to how violent crime has been on the rise in major U.S. cities.
To quote Trump rallygoers, Fake News Jim was wrong. If he had consulted any of articles from traditional media outlets cited in this July 8 NewsBusters post, he would have at least thought twice before lying.
Back on the pandemic, former Obama official and frequent cable news guest Dr. Peter Hotez was also unhappy with the idea of schools reopening (click “expand”):
He wants to open the schools, Wolf, regardless of what the science says and the science is pretty clear. If you open schools in areas or school districts where there's a high level of virus transmissions, say if you were going to do this in Houston today or San Antonio or Phoenix, it will fail. It will fail because not only are the kids transmitting the virus but adults, vendors are going in and out of the schools. What will happen within two weeks, teachers will start going into the hospitals, going into ICUs. It'll be bus drivers, it’ll be cafeteria workers and parents will start getting sick. It's — it’s untenable. It's not sustainable and — and again, he keeps on pushing on this concept that we're going to open schools no matter what. Sure, you can open schools in some areas of Maine and Vermont where there's not much virus transmission, but those are going to be the exceptions. You just can't do it now and this is the problem.
The President, although he may call it a national strategy, it's not a national strategy or if it is, it is one called operation chipping around at the edges. He is not willing to confront this and take this on in a substantive way. I mean, he is relooking — he’s revisiting the nursing home issue and that is an important issue. Nursing homes are responsible for about 40 percent of the deaths on COVID-19 in the United States in 2020 and so he’s shoring up nursing homes. Should have been done a while ago, but the fact that he's taking them, that is good, but that's really about it. He sees this massive resurgence across the south as little embers, little hot spots that he's going to knock down. Another one will pop up like some kind of game of whack-a-mole. That’s not the case. It is a massive recurrence across the south. One of the three largest epicenters of COVID-19 globally, along with South Africa and Brazil. That is how bad it is in terms of the numbers. He will not confront that and again, he — you know, he talks about knocking things down, popping up, this inability to get his arms around it and I don't know if it’s the President is in denial or if he’s not getting the right advice from the task force, or they're not communicating, but it’s a failed strategy and it’s hurting the country. And then agin, he talked about the border and the wall as though the virus is going to be stopped by a wall. And again, this is so — this is very disapp — beyond disappointing. It's disheartening and we continue to race toward hundreds of thousands of deaths in the United States.
And with his usual smile, fact-checking dweeb Daniel Dale echoed Acosta’s urging for Trump to focus on scaring people and keep schools closed, griping that Trump’s made “false claims” about the pandemic because “he continues to give Americans a false sense of security.”
Dale also defended Black Lives Matter protests as acceptable and safe in this pandemic (while other things aren’t) and condemned Trump’s insistence about what he’s done for African-Americans (click “expand”):
Wolf, I think it’s also important to note that the President kind of vaguely blamed the antiracial injustice protests for a recent rise in cases and for a relaxation of mitigation measures. We do not have any hard evidence that these protests, which were a largely outdoors [sic] and which many protesters were wearing masks caused the rise in cases or that they were responsible for the loosening of restrictions, which trp, himself, was calling for. We had many cities with big protests where we did not have big spikes in cases.
I think it's also important, Wolf, to — to call out the President's hyperbole, even though we know it is hyperbole when he claims that he did more for black Americans than anybody with the possible exception of Abraham Lincoln. That is a certain exception. We also have Lyndon Johnson signing hugely a monumental civil rights bills [sic] and you can make an argument for many other Presidents but certainly the President, President Trump is not the — the number one accomplisher of important things for African-Americans in this country.
CNN’s fear-mongering and bristling at schools reopening was bought and paid for (and thus supported) by Hello Fresh and Select Quote. Follow the links provided to the MRC’s Conservatives Fight Back page.
To see the relevant CNN transcript from July 22, click “expand.”
CNN’s The Situation Room
July 22, 2020
6:12 p.m. EasternWOLF BLITZER: I don't know what he was referring to, he said within the next 24 hours or so, Jim, he would have an announcement on masks, a nationwide, some sort of announcement on masks. Did you hear an allusion to that?
JIM ACOSTA: There was some allusion to that, Wolf, but it is not altogether clear what that means and we've heard the President make these kinds of pronouncements before saying he'll have an announcement on something and then two weeks will go by and we won't hear anything about that pronouncement and so we'll have to wait and see what — what these details are. But if he were to make some kind of declaration that he wants to see masks worn across the country, that would be just a complete 180 from where he’s been since the very beginning of this pandemic. I mean, obviously he had to be dragged kicking and screaming just about into this — into this notion that people around the country have to wear masks in order to control the coronavirus. The other thing we should point out, Wolf, when the President was asked about his children and grandchildren going back to school, the President not only said that he wants to see schools reopen 100 percent as he put it, but he also said that he believes children have strong immune systems and that there isn't a danger with those children going back home and potentially infecting their parents and grandparents if a grandparent is living in a house with a child. The President was sort of brushing off those concerns. We've heard similar sentiments from White House officials in recent weeks but, Wolf, the science is just not settled on this. The White House has been turning their attention to studies that support their point of view on 100 percent open schools around the country, but there are just lots of nervous parents out there, lots of nervous teachers and administrators who say, hang on a second. I remember the cold and flu season from every year before this year and kids go to school and they come back and they get people infected at home with the common cold and the seasonal flu and there is the expectation that could happen of course once again with the coronavirus.
The other thing we should point out, Wolf, he was pressed a couple of times on this notion that he — he wants to send federal law enforcement officers into cities around the country. He's accusing Democratic mayors in these cities of not being able to control violent crime. Our own Kaitlan Collins pointed out that, back in 2016, President Trump accused Barack Obama of not being able to control violent crime in cities and you know, basically asking the President the question, aren't you responsible for when violent crime flares up in U.S. cities nowadays? And one thing we should note, Wolf, is that violent crime across the country, studies have shown, has been on the decline versus where it's been in recent decades. The other thing we should point out is as the President was presenting these sort of rosy pictures of where things stand in terms of the coronavirus, he was passing on once again, you know, his advice coming from health experts that people should be washing their hands, wearing masks, avoiding crowded spaces, and so on, but at one point the President sort of oddly said, I'm hearing that many people are saying that you should wash your hands. Well, of course, health experts from the very beginning of all of this have been saying, people should be washing their hands. Finally, the other thing that should be pointed out is that Dr. Anthony Fauci and Dr. Deborah Birtx were once again not at this press conference with the President. He obviously wants to have this stage to himself. Dr. Fauci, we're told, was not invited to yesterday's press conference, was instead at home working on his pitching arm because he is going to be pitching or throwing out the first pitch for the Washington Nationals tomorrow night but Dr. Deborah Birx was apparently once again in the next room, could easily join the President and have fielded some of these important scientific and public health questions and instead of the President, obviously not having all of the facts and not all of the information to answer those sorts of questions, he could have called on Dr. Birx to answer those queries and he’s just — he’s seems to be resistant to doing that, Wolf.
BLITZER: Yeah. He’s very resistant. He pointed out that the briefing, he said, Dr. Birx, Dr. Fauci, they're giving me everything they know and I come out and report, tell everyone what’s going on. It is a very concise way he said of doing it.
(....)
6:19 p.m. Eastern
BLITZER: He did say and I want your expertise on this, Dr. Hotez, that young kids, they don't transmit the virus like older people do. There was a study that came out a few days ago that children under 10 may not necessarily be transmitting it as quickly as adults but children over 10 are just the same as adults. If they get it, they may be asymptomatic, they have mild cases but they can pass it along to their parents, their grandparents, their brothers, their sisters, their uncles, and their aunts. If you're over 10 just as easily as older people. That's the study I'm referring to. You saw it.
DR. PETER HOTEZ: Yeah. That's right. He wants to open the schools, Wolf, regardless of what the science says and the science is pretty clear. If you open schools in areas or school districts where there's a high level of virus transmissions, say if you were going to do this in Houston today or San Antonio or Phoenix, it will fail. It will fail because not only are the kids transmitting the virus but adults, vendors are going in and out of the schools. What will happen within two weeks, teachers will start going into the hospitals, going into ICUs. It'll be bus drivers, it’ll be cafeteria workers and parents will start getting sick. It's — it’s untenable. It's not sustainable and — and again, he keeps on pushing on this concept that we're going to open schools no matter what. Sure, you can open schools in some areas of Maine and Vermont where there's not much virus transmission, but those are going to be the exceptions. You just can't do it now and this is the problem. The President, although he may call it a national strategy, it's not a national strategy or if it is, it is one called operation chipping around at the edges. He is not willing to confront this and take this on in a substantive way. I mean, he is relooking — he’s revisiting the nursing home issue and that is an important issue. Nursing homes are responsible for about 40 percent of the deaths on COVID-19 in the United States in 2020 and so he’s shoring up nursing homes. Should have been done a while ago, but the fact that he's taking them, that is good, but that's really about it. He sees this massive resurgence across the south as little embers, little hot spots that he's going to knock down. Another one will pop up like some kind of game of whack-a-mole. That’s not the case. It is a massive recurrence across the south. One of the three largest epicenters of COVID-19 globally, along with South Africa and Brazil. That is how bad it is in terms of the numbers. He will not confront that and again, he — you know, he talks about knocking things down, popping up, this inability to get his arms around it and I don't know if it’s the President is in denial or if he’s not getting the right advice from the task force, or they're not communicating, but it’s a failed strategy and it’s hurting the country. And then agin, he talked about the border and the wall as though the virus is going to be stopped by a wall. And again, this is so — this is very disapp — beyond disappointing. It's disheartening and we continue to race toward hundreds of thousands of deaths in the United States.
BLITZER: 142,000, approaching 143,000 deaths already in the United States over these past five months and it continues. A thousand Americans died only yesterday. Daniel Dale is with us our CNN reporter and fact checker. Alright, so do some fact checking for us, Daniel. What jumped out at you?
DANIEL DALE: Sure. I — Wolf, I think a common thread in the President's false claims throughout this crisis is that he continues to give Americans a false sense of security and so this claim that children don't transmit or a lot of people are saying they don't transmit is another one of these instances as — as you and your guest just talked about we don't have evidence of that to put it generously and we do have some evidence from the South Korean study that older children transmit just as well as adults do and so its premature at best to say that. Wolf, I think it’s also important to note that the President kind of vaguely blamed the antiracial injustice protests for a recent rise in cases and for a relaxation of mitigation measures. We do not have any hard evidence that these protests, which were a largely outdoors [sic] and which many protesters were wearing masks caused the rise in cases or that they were responsible for the loosening of restrictions, which trp, himself, was calling for. We had many cities with big protests where we did not have big spikes in cases. I think it's also important, Wolf, to — to call out the President's hyperbole, even though we know it is hyperbole when he claims that he did more for black Americans than anybody with the possible exception of Abraham Lincoln. That is a certain exception. We also have Lyndon Johnson signing hugely a monumental civil rights bills [sic] and you can make an argument for many other Presidents but certainly the President, President Trump is not the — the number one accomplisher of important things for African-Americans in this country.
