Trump Contradicts Experts on Coronavirus Treatment After Months of Denial: A Closer Look

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-Hello, everyone, and welcome back to my attic crawl space.
Of course now that we've shifted
our makeshift studio to this location,
there's one question that has preoccupied our audience
perhaps more than any other and that's, "What's up...
What's up with that tiny little door over there?"
I mean, is it where we keep the kids' toys?
Or is it a Wonka door?
And if it's a Wonka door, is the tiny chair --
right there -- is that for an Oompa Loompa,
waiting to roll me away to the juicing room
after eating an everlasting gobstopper?
Who knows?
The only thing I know is that I'll never tell.
Anyway, you'll have plenty of time to speculate
because we'll be doing these "Closer Looks" here for a while.
Public health officials are urging Americans
to continue observing social distancing rules
even as the president and his son-in-law
contradict those experts
and spread dangerous misinformation.
For more on this, it's time for "A Closer Look."
♪♪
Well, we're less than a week into the month of April.
There's really no way of knowing what day it is.
Every day is a week and every week is a year
and now April just means -- I don't know -- Tuesday?
The calendar app on my phone
is just a shrug emoji holding a glass of wine.
But if it is, in fact, April, then that's great news,
because if you remember,
when public health officials were first warning
about the coming outbreak of the coronavirus,
the President reassured us all by saying this.
-The virus. They're working hard.
Looks like, by April, you know, in theory,
when it gets a little warmer, it miraculously goes away.
I hope that's true.
Now, the virus that we're talking about having to do,
you know, a lot of people think that goes away in April
with the heat, as the heat comes in.
Typically, that will go away in April.
We're in great shape, though.
-President Xi -- I know you spoke to him
recently about coronavirus. -I did.
-Some concerns that their economy
is really going to tank because of this,
and that that could have a spillover effect here.
What's your sense of their transparency right now,
whether they're being more accommodating in terms
of telling us what's going on, and how it affects our economy?
-Well, I think China is very, you know, professionally run
in the sense that they have everything under control.
I really believe they are going to have it
under control fairly soon.
You know, in April, supposedly, it dies with the hotter weather.
And that's a beautiful date to look forward to.
-First of all, you can tell my man
spends too much time at Mar-A-Lago
because he thinks April is when it gets hot.
"In February, the trees begin to bloom, and by April,
I mean, you can barely touch your steering wheel."
But, yes, it's a beautiful day to look forward to.
I remember when we all got
that lovely save-the-date in the mail.
By the way, the anchor who conducted that last interview
was since fired Fox Business host Trish Regan
who called coronavirus an impeachment scam.
Remember her? Evil Connie Britton?
"Friday Night Lights"
would have been a totally different show with her.
"Your team sucks, coach, and so do you.
Also, it's high school football. Who cares?
You know what I say?
'Dumb eyes, fat hearts can lose.'
I'm outta wine."
But credit to Fox News who will not hesitate to fire
a host who peddles dangerous conspiracy theories
as long as they're not Sean Insanity.
Because Hannity will probably end his show tonight
telling people that snorting Advil
is both a cure for coronavirus and erectile dysfunction.
And after that they'll give him a raise.
"Great stuff with the Advil tonight, Sean.
Where'd it come from?"
"Would you believe I pulled it out of my ass?"
"That ass of yours, Sean, it is a --
it is a bottomless gold mine.
Keep up the great work."
Now, in the time Trump was dismissing the virus
and claiming it would go away,
he was repeatedly warned by intelligence briefings
that this was a real threat.
And in that time, "The Washington Post"
reported his administration was beset by 70 days
of denial, delays, and dysfunction.
70 days.
And that's charitable, because for Trump, you could say
it's been 70 years of dysfunction.
When he was born, the doctor spanked him on the butt
to hear him cry, and instead, Trump called him nasty
and served him with a lawsuit.
"There's an expression I use -- 'wah.'
Some people say I invented it."
That's baby Trump.
In a normal world, a story about a 70-day delay
in the face of a pandemic would be cause
for impeachment or removal or,
at the very least, embarrassment and shame.
But the President insisted that April would be the magic date
so we could all just look forward to that.
So let's check in on his daily mini-MAGA
rally in the White House briefing room on Saturday
to see how that prediction is working out.
-This will be probably the toughest week
between this week and next week.
And there will be a lot of death, unfortunately.
But a lot less death than if this wasn't done.
But there will be death.
-There will be death?
That's kind of a 180.
Everything was going to be fine, and now you sound
like the captain of the wrestling team
who just saw a nerd dancing with his girlfriend.
"There will be death."
[ Grunts ] It's a beer can.
What happened to April?
"It's become clear now that the end date
we had been promised was, in fact, an April Fool's joke
pulled on us by the virus.
So now we know corona to be both highly contagious
as well as mischievous in spirit.
A Loki, if you will."
Now, you might hear that new tone and think,
"Oh, I guess the President, like any decent human being,
has admitted he was wrong, made amends by doing everything
he can to rectify the situation, and apologized."
And if you are thinking that,
congratulations on waking up from your 3 1/2 year coma,
but bad news -- there's this thing called coronavirus.
Anyway, your doctor will tell you.
Because, as usual, Trump insisted that he was right
when he said the virus would simply go away.
-You look at those individual statements, they're all true.
Stay calm.
Uh, it will go away.
You know -- You know it is going away.
And it will go away.
-The President was saying this was going to go away.
It's April. -It is going to go away.
-But, Mr. President, you said it was going to
go away in April. -I didn't say a date.
-I said it's going away, and it is going away.
-Ah, yes, very clever.
After all, April as 24 days left,
and it's already down to,
what -- I don't know -- 337,000 cases.
And you did.
You literally said it goes away in April.
That's as close to specific as Trump ever gets.
Usually when you ask him a question,
he waves it away like a dad promising his kids
a trip to Disneyland while watching football.
"Dad, will we have universal healthcare?"
"Yeah, it's going to be so easy, it's going to be a blast.
Now go upstairs and oil your hair before dinner."
And then, last week, the media fell for his fake
somber Trump shtick
and asked him if his thinking had changed from
when he said the virus would go away in April.
-Is there any fairness to the criticism
that you may have lulled Americans
into a false sense of security when you were saying things like
it's going to go away... -Well, it is.
-...and that sort of thing. -Jim, it's going away.
-But when you were saying -- -It's going to go away.
Hopefully at the end of the month and if not,
it hopefully will be soon after that.
-But -- -So it is going away.
-Has your thinking on this evolved?
-It is going away.
-Has your thinking on this evolved?
You're taking it more seriously now?
-I think, from the beginning, my attitude was that
we have to give this country -- I know how bad it was.
All you have to do is look at what was going on in China.
-First of all, no, you didn't know how bad it was.
You treated coronavirus like a [bleep]
high school baseball coach talking to a kid
who just got hit by a line drive to the head.
"How many fingers am I holding up?"
"I don't know. 50?"
"He's good to go! Get him back in there."
Of course his thinking hasn't evolved.
He's barely evolved. I mean, look at him,
he looks like one of those early tetrapods
that crawled out of the water and learned how to walk on land,
but then he didn't learn how to hunt or fish
so he ended up just walking around
in circles like a dude waiting for a crosstown bus.
"Anyone know when the M15 is coming?
Canceled? Why?
Because of coronavirus?
But it's April."
So Trump insists he was right when he said it would go away
possibly by the end of this month.
Now, you could either believe him
or you could believe Bill Gates.
-Well, this is a nightmare scenario
because human-to-human transmissible
respiratory viruses can grow exponentially.
We continue countrywide, and we're testing the right people
to understand what's going on, which is not the case yet,
those numbers will start to go down.
And then, we can look at some degree of opening back up.
Things won't go back to truly normal until we have a vaccine
that we've gotten out to basically the entire world.
-So there you go. Who are you going to believe,
the pioneer of the microcomputer revolution
who founded Microsoft
and is currently working on ending polio and malaria?
Or the guy who once tweeted,
"Victoria's Secret reps were nasty to Kate Upton,
and now she's doing great."
That tweet was from 2013,
and while I don't know what it's about,
I am genuinely, genuinely curious,
and I intend to do some Google investigating as soon as this
[bleep] pandemic is over.
Also, why were you commenting on that?
Is that what you used to spend your time on
before you became president?
"Mr. Trump, we're ready to shoot 'The Apprentice.'"
"Yeah, quiet. I'm taking sides in Upton v. Secret."
And now in part because the president
waved away the problem for 70 days,
we're facing both an unimaginable tragedy
and also an economic collapse
that has already resulted in the worst weekly jobless
claims numbers we've ever seen, and yet Americans
are still having trouble accessing government benefits.
Just take this story from "The New York Times"
about one applicant who saw jobless benefits
and was told to find a fax machine.
Some attempts to apply for benefits
yielded a pop-up message that suggested using Netscape,
a browser that effectively no longer exists.
One applicant said he was taken aback to hear
he had to find a fax machine to complete his claim.
My God, it's 2020, in the richest country on Earth,
but if you need government benefits you have to go
on an early '90s treasure hunt.
"Hey, guys, I found a clue.
If financial aid you wish to get, find yourself a Giga Pet."
They have to use Netscape and fax machines.
What if they want to apply in person?
Do they have to go to a Hollywood Video?
"Great. Okay. Thank you for this.
Now, the last thing you need to do before you collect
your benefits is watch this VHS copy of 'Gremlins.'
That will be followed by a short quiz just so,
you know, we're sure you understand the Gremlin rules
in regards to, you know, sunlight and water,
you know, when is a safe time to feed them."
That's a "Gremlin" bit that I would not have done
if we were in the studio.
But this is not some accident of history.
There's a reason you can get a package of alcohol wipes
from Amazon in 48 hours,
but to apply for unemployment benefits from the government,
you have to download MS-DOS.
The reason is that billionaires and corporations
have hollowed out our public infrastructure
with the help of corporate ghouls
in the political establishment.
Now companies like Amazon are more powerful
than our decrepit federal government.
In fact, our sadistic President Jigsaw over here
won't even help the millions of people
who still don't have health insurance
get that insurance during a pandemic.
One study found that uninsured Americans
could be facing nearly $75,000 in medical bills
if hospitalized for coronavirus,
and yet Trump has refused to open a special enrollment period
on the Obamacare Marketplace for people to buy health insurance.
Now, to be clear, if you had insurance through your job
and lost it, you can buy insurance
on the Obamacare Marketplace.
This is for people who are uninsured that,
if they were to get sick,
they could be ruined financially.
And Donald Trump knows a thing or two
about being ruined financially because remember --
he's done it, like, six times.
He's gone bankrupt so many times,
he's close to getting a free sub.
And that would mean the world to him.
And, yet, sadly, Trump lost the part of his brain
responsible for empathy years ago
when he tried to squeeze himself into a golf cart
and bumped his head on the roof.
"I'm going to give you all bonuses
because every life is precious and everyone deserves to be --
Ow. Ohh.
Also, if you ever need a ventilator,
go [bleep] yourself!"
So, last week, when he was asked
why he wouldn't reopen the Obamacare Exchange,
he turned the question over to Mike Pence
and then bragged that Pence had found a way to talk
for five minutes without answering the question.
-Could you tell us what the rationale was
behind that decision and what you have as an alternative?
-Okay, they took that up under the task force.
And maybe, Mike, you want to say a few words about that?
-Well, thank you, Mr. President.
And what I can tell you is that the President has made
a priority from the outset of our task force's work
to make sure every American knows
that they can have a coronavirus
and they don't have to worry about the cost.
We're -- We're inspired by the spirit of American businesses.
Grocery stores made a commitment to the President a month ago
that no grocery store in America would close down.
The food supply is strong.
We're getting food on the table of every American.
-I think it's one of the greatest answers I've ever heard
because Mike was able to speak for five minutes
and not even touch your question.
I said, that's what you call a great professional.
-Professional liar.
"That's what you call a great professional liar."
And it is true, man.
Pence is great at looking grave and solemnly shaking his head
and talking in hushed tones and acting like
he's the president in a [bleep] low-budget miniseries
about an asteroid headed towards Earth.
"Mr. President, what are you gonna do to stop the asteroid?"
"I can assure you that we're doing everything in our power
to make sure Americans can still buy essential groceries
like Doritos and -- and Pop-Tarts."
"uh, what does that have to do
with the asteroid, Mr. President?"
"Pop-Tarts are the quintessential American meal.
First introduced in the 1960s by..."
Also think about -- think about
how much of a sociopath you have to be
to brag that you didn't answer a question
about whether Americans can get health care during a pandemic.
I know, I'm not a psychologist, but if someone
gets on my subway car wearing a newspaper hat
and carrying a soiled teddy bear, I don't think,
"oh, cool. Another businessman headed to Wall Street."
Trump's like a public defender sitting next to his client
during a murder interrogation saying,
"Notice how he hasn't confessed yet?
I mean, and this guy -- this guy right here,
he loves to brag, a real sicko.
Hey, tell him how you secretly write your name
in your victim's diary.
What? Be quiet? You couldn't stop talking about it earlier.
Oh, I'm sorry. Now it's a secret."
So, if he won't even offer millions of Americans
basic health insurance during a deadly pandemic,
what is Trump offering?
Well, like a true huckster,
he's selling them an unproven medication
that's still in clinical trials, telling people to try it
even though it could have dangerous side effects
before it's approved by actual medical professionals.
-And I hope they use the hydroxychloroquine,
and they can also do it with Z-Pak,
subject to your doctor's approval and all of that,
but I hope they use it, because I'll tell what.
What do you have to lose?
There's a possibility, a possibility.
And I say it. What do you have to lose?
I'll say it again. What do you have to lose? Take it.
I really think they should take it. But it's their choice.
And it's their doctor's choice or the doctors in the hospital.
But hydroxychloroquine.
Try it. If you'd like.
-Jesus.
We've been calling Trump a snake-oil salesman for years,
and now he's literally standing at a podium
trying to sell us a miracle cure.
"They call it hydroxychloroquine!
And let me tell ya, folks, it's a genuine
all-purpose miracle cure.
Hey, you, sir! You look like you want to say something."
"Yes, I tried it,
and both my acne and my coronavirus went away!"
"And you and I have never met, sir!
So, there you have it, folks. There you have it.
What have ya got to lose?"
By the way, you know Trump and his buddies
own stock in hydroxychloroquine because it's a six-syllable word
and he didn't stumble on it once.
Of course it makes sense that a lifelong con artist
like Trump would push another miracle cure.
I mean, this is the same guy who sold people
scam vitamin supplements based on a urine test --
not made up, a real thing.
How would you even tailor vitamins
based on someone's urine, anyway?
By sniffing it? [ Sniffs ]
"Smells like you're... eating too much asparagus.
Here. Try some beef pills. They're just tiny meatballs."
Now, obviously, it would be terrific news
if a genuine antiviral medication
was proven successful in clinical trials,
and we're all hoping that happens as soon as possible.
But it is dangerous to go on TV
and tell people to just try a medication
before that medication is proven safe and effective.
And yet Trump is doing it anyway
because he's already failed to supply
other lifesaving equipment like ventilators.
At this very moment, states are fighting each other
in a perverse bidding war
with a total lack of federal leadership,
and the point man in charge of the ventilator disaster
is Trump's own personal Tom Wambsgans.
Jared Kushner, everybody's favorite Botox 9-year-old.
You know, the real-life Jack Skellington?
The fellow who's always lurking in the background
of every White House photo like a stalker
who suddenly appears in the mirror
when you close your medicine cabinet?
The only guy in the world who creeps out Stephen Miller?
"Jared!
Don't frighten me like that, Jared!
Don't creep on a creeper."
Over the last few days, Trump has openly admitted
that New York may not have enough ventilators to save lives
and called the federal government just a backup...
while Kushner insisted the national stockpile
doesn't belong to states.
-Governor Cuomo was saying that New York
may be days away from running out of ventilators.
Can you assure New York that going into next week,
that they're going to have the ventilators
that they're going to need? -No.
They should have had more ventilators at the time.
They should have had more ventilators.
We happen to think that,
uh, he's well-served with ventilators.
We're going to find out.
And we're backup. Remember, we're a backup.
-And the notion of the federal stockpile
was it's supposed to be our stockpile.
It's not supposed to be states' stockpiles that they then use.
-Oh, that makes sense. It's like my doorman told me --
the front door belongs to the building.
It's not for the people in the apartment.
So if you want to go to work so bad,
climb down the fire escape.
Seriously, it's YOUR stockpile?
Are you writing your name on them like you're
leaving your lunch in the office fridge?
"Guys, come on! Who ate half my burrito?!
It had my name on it.
And who crossed out 'Kush' and wrote 'douche'?
Guys, 'Kush' and 'douche,' they don't even rhyme.
I know it's a near-rhyme, Janet.
I thought you were better than near-rhymes, all right?"
They're not yours. They're ours.
The sniveling weasel thinks everything belongs to him
because he was born into a rich family like his father-in-law.
I'm shocked we haven't seen something called a Kushn-ilator
pop up on Craigslist.
What we're seeing right now is a feeble government
hollowed out by billionaires and corporations
and run by a lifelong scam artist
advocating federal leadership and leaving states
and courageous health-care workers to fend for themselves.
One lesson we're all learning from this
is that, generally speaking,
it's better not to be governed by sociopaths.
And the day they finally leave office will be a...
-Beautiful day to look forward to.
-This has been "A Closer Look."
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