October 15, 2020

Trump Once Again Dismisses Masks and Ducks on Whether He Tested Before Debate

Evan Vucci/ZUMA

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President Trump burst onto NBC’s town hall stage on Thursday, his first major television appearance since testing positive for COVID-19, by dismissing face masks, blaming military families for potentially infecting him with the virus, and refusing to say whether he had been tested on the day of the first presidential debate. 

The string of responses, which came in rapid-fire succession at the start of the event, captured a president unwavering in some of the most widely condemned aspects of his response to the pandemic, even after his own positive diagnosis, a White House outbreak, and his poll numbers continuing to fall.

“I’m okay with masks, I tell people to wear masks,” Trump told NBC’s Savannah Guthrie, before quickly undermining his own claim by falsely asserting that a recent study had concluded that 85 percent of people who use face coverings contract the virus. He added, “People with masks are catching it all the time. Despite testing positive for the virus earlier this month, Trump has been seen on multiple occasions continuing to decline to wear a face covering.

At another point, Trump once again suggested that it was likely Gold Star family members who had attended a White House event on September 27—not his own reckless behavior—that were likely responsible for his diagnosis. In fact, public health officials, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, have blamed a Rose Garden event celebrating the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, where Republican lawmakers and top Trump administration officials gathered in close quarters without a mask, for likely being the “superspreader” event behind the White House outbreak.

“They came up to me,”  Trump said, “and they would hug me, and they would touch me, and I’m not going to not let them.” When directly asked if he had been tested for COVID-19 on the day of the first presidential debate, Trump repeatedly deflected and claimed, “I don’t know. I don’t even remember.”

Asked once more, the president again ducked. “Possibly I did, possibly I didn’t.”

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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