I am sick and tired of Trump ruining my game show every weekday morning. Lies and excuses are boring. Here are five blatant falsehoods he told during his daily “briefings.”
- Two naval ships: the USNS Comfort and the USNS Mercy: would be dispatched to aid victims of the coronavirus pandemic. “So those two ships are being prepared to go, and they can be launched over the next week or so,” Trump said, calling the ships in “tip-top shape.”
The truth: The ‘Comfort’ is actually in Norfolk, Virginia, undergoing repairs. The ‘Mercy’ is in San Diego and it will take several days to be fitted with doctors, nurses, and medical equipment before it can be sent to a western port.
- Trump claimed that the FDA had approved an anti-malaria drug for use against the virus. “We’re going to be able to make that drug available almost immediately,” Trump said, calling it “a tremendous breakthrough” and a potential “game-changer.”
FDA commissioner Stephen Hahn tried to tamp down Trump’s enthusiasm, saying that “a large, pragmatic clinical trial” would be needed first to determine the drug’s usefulness before making it available to coronavirus patients.
Hahn said he couldn’t “speculate about a timeline” for the drug’s availability.
- Trump claims that 1,700 Google engineers are completing a website which will help the American people decide if they should be tested. “Google is helping to develop a website,” Trump said. “It’s going to be very quickly done — unlike websites of the past — to determine whether a test is warranted and to facilitate testing at a nearby convenient location.”
Google responded that the website they were working on, called ‘Verily,’ would only be available in the San Francisco Bay area in the near future.
“Verily is in the early stages of development,” Google said, “and planning to roll testing out in the Bay Area, with the hope of expanding more broadly over time.”
- While meeting with nurses at the White House Trump claimed that the supplies they desperately needed, including ventilators, would be ‘readily available. “We’ve ordered 500 million N95 masks to drive private production,” Trump said. He also said that construction companies were being asked to donate unused masks. The next day at a briefing, Vice President Mike Pence stated: “We’ve vastly increased the supply of medical masks.”
Hospitals are reporting that they are running out of masks acceptable for healthcare use. Many of the ‘donated’ masks’ fit too loosely to be used in a healthcare facility. Trump claimed that he implemented the ‘Defense Production Act to hurry the production of much-needed equipment, including ventilators.
Not one of the companies which manufacture the supplies can offer a timeline for when they will be available. It has not been confirmed whether or not Trump signed the executive order.
- Trump and Pence continue their blatant lie that tests are available for anyone who needs to be tested. When he visited the CDC in Atlanta earlier this month, Trump claimed that “They have the tests. And the tests are beautiful. Anybody that needs a test gets a test. Pence made a similar statement, claiming that “tests are in the field” and that “by the end of this week, another 4 million tests will be distributed.”
Thousands of men and women have been turned away from medical facilities across America because the tests are not available. We know that initially the total number of tests available from the CDC were approximately 25,000.
Informed Americans are fully aware that everything coming from the mouths of Trump and Pence are lies. However, this is a crisis and lying to the American people about their safety is unforgivable. Trump, Pence, and his entire administration is unfit and must be evicted from Washington.
The Truth Lives Here
Op-ed by James Turnage
My eight novels, including “DOING THE RIGHT THING FOR GOD AND COUNTRY,” are exclusively available on Amazon; CLICK HERE; the Kindle app is a free download
The Truth With No Restrictions 