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Rabat – Former US President Barack Obama has described the Trump White House’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic as “an absolute chaotic disaster.”
In a phone call with his former staff, Obama strongly criticized the Trump administration, three former staff members told American news network CNN.
The novel coronavirus pandemic, Obama acknowledged, “would have been bad even with the best of government.”
The former president implied, however, that it was President Trump’s leadership style that has made the US’s COVID-19 outbreak so bad. “It has been an absolute chaotic disaster when that mindset—of ‘what’s in it for me’ and ‘to heck with everybody else’—when that mindset is operationalized in our government.”
President Trump touted his team’s response to the coronavirus as early as February 29. “We’ve taken the most aggressive actions to confront the coronavirus. They are the most aggressive taken by any country,” he said, according to the BBC.
Despite Trump’s assurances, the US has more total coronavirus cases than any other country at over 1.3 million. The figure is nearly a third of the world’s total cases. The US still has slightly fewer cases per capita than some hard-hit European countries, such as Spain, Ireland, and Belgium.
Trump famously also suggested doctors should study whether injecting disinfectants into people would treat COVID-19, prompting intense backlash. Doctors and public health officials immediately warned the public drinking bleach is dangerous.
With an unemployment rate of just under 15% in the US, Trump is eager for employees to get back to work. His support for states’ stay-at-home guidance has wavered.
In his private phone call, President Obama encouraged his former colleagues to support Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.
The presumptive Democratic candidate, Biden will face off against Trump during presidential elections in November.
Read also: Trump Claims Suggestion to Ingest Disinfectants was ‘Sarcastic’
Obama argued, “What we’re fighting against is these long-term trends in which being selfish, being tribal, being divided, and seeing others as an enemy—that has become a stronger impulse in American life.”
He continued, “That’s why, I, by the way, am going to be spending as much time as necessary and campaigning as hard as I can for Joe Biden.”
