MAJOR BREAKING NEWS: NPR Source Says Trump Blocked Coronavirus Testing in January to Aid His Reelection Chances By Keeping US Infection Figures Low

NOTE: Please RETWEET this—America needs to know what this monster did. Thousands of future deaths will rightly be laid at his feet. https://twitter.com/nprfreshair/status/1238186469690429440

PS/ We don't know—but would assume—Azar raised testing with Trump when he told him coronavirus required a major response in January; such conversations have since been classified by Trump. We also don't know if Dan Diamond's "recent weeks" extends back into January (6 weeks ago).

PS2/ The best-case scenario for Trump—albeit unthinkable—is that not a *single* adviser of his raised the utility of aggressive testing with him until mid-February, meaning that he only had a chance to be opposed to it (thereby actively hampering it) in the middle of last month.

PS3/ Of course, it's Trump's own extraordinary classification of his conversations with Azar—and coronavirus-response debates in the administration generally—that keeps us from knowing if anyone advised Trump to test aggressively in January. But it seems *impossible* no one did.

PS4/ Just so, we have no evidence that Azar told Trump coronavirus was a dire national threat in January, only to see Trump wait (inexplicably) until mid-February to form his vile opinion about the political (re-election) utility of artificially low coronavirus infection figures.

PS5/ I mention this just to lay bare the logical implications of the reporting by @ddiamond of Politico: namely, that Azar went to Trump in January, and advised aggressive testing; Trump pushed back for political reasons; and that pushback blocked aggressive pre-February testing.

PS6/ Needless to say, Trump didn't have to go public with his private opposition to aggressive testing measures—which every one of us assumes Azar pushed, alongside his warnings, in January—until the issue of bringing cruise-ship passengers onto dry land received media scrutiny.

PS7/ So with all that in mind—and the limits of the Politico reporting and our access to Trump's coronavirus deliberations notwothstanding—let us not pretend that Trump blocking proposed aggressive testing in late January versus early to mid-February is a significant distinction.

PS8/ Indeed, even now—in mid-March—what we hear from Trump is an inexplicable (and advised by no one) focus on border control and highly theoretical test "availability," not presidential action to ensure potential coronavirus patients are aggressively tested and in large numbers.

PS9/ So whether Trump determined misleading coronavirus data was in his own political interest on (say) January 31 or February 12—or whether he refused to pursue aggressive testing beginning on January 31 or February 12—the cost in *lives* to be laid at his feet is extraordinary.

PS10/ I don't think we've ever, in our history, had such persuasive evidence that—after being warned of a grave and growing danger to the lives of millions of Americans—a US president decided to ignore and lie about that threat for political gain. There can be no greater scandal.