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1. Just realized I haven't done one of my This Week In Trump threads for a while. I know y'all miss that special feeling of choking, helpless fury! So let's take a glance at the last week or so of news & see what our Dear Leader has cooked up for us. Buckle up.
2. To begin with, what is Trump doing to mark this solemn Memorial Day weekend, as the virus death toll nears 100,000? Golfing, mostly. Insulting women's looks & weight. Accusing a TV host of murder. Lying about mail-in voting. Just having a normal. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/on-weekend-dedicated-to-war-dead-trump-tweets-insults-promotes-baseless-claims-and-plays-golf/2020/05/24/a1a79876-9dc3-11ea-9590-1858a893bd59_story.html
3. A new study shows that if Trump had listened to the experts & begun physical distancing just *one week earlier*, some 36,000 lives would have been saved. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/20/us/coronavirus-distancing-deaths.html?referringSource=articleShare
4. What about Trump's travel bans? They helped, right? Actually, his announcement that he was going to ban travel from the EU prompted thousands of people to rush home under the deadline, bringing the virus with them. Oops. https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/one-final-viral-infusion-trumps-move-to-block-travel-from-europe-triggered-chaos-and-a-surge-of-passengers-from-the-outbreaks-center/2020/05/23/64836a00-962b-11ea-82b4-c8db161ff6e5_story.html
5. The CDC, meanwhile, understood the threat & was ready to act much earlier, but the agency was "muzzled" by the White House, which feared bad press above all. https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/20/politics/coronavirus-travel-alert-cdc-white-house-tensions-invs/index.html
6. An ex-Trump staffer, just 11 days after registering a new company, received a $3 million contract for medical masks (he had no prior federal contracting experience). The masks turned out to be the wrong kind & ineffective. https://www.propublica.org/article/the-feds-gave-a-former-white-house-official-3-million-to-supply-masks-to-navajo-hospitals-some-may-not-work
7. Against the advice of everyone in the medical profession, Trump has been hyping -- & apparently taking! -- the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine. Now a new study finds that it *increases* mortality risk from the virus. Oops. https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/05/22/hydroxychloroquine-coronavirus-study/
8. The State Dept's Inspector General was investigating Pompeo's sale of billions in arms to Saudi Arabia, which (likely illegally) bypassed Congress. Trump fired the IG. (You'll recall that the Saudi gov't is bankrolling several Trump properties.) https://www.cnbc.com/2020/05/18/state-dept-ig-trump-fired-was-investigating-saudi-arms-sale.html
9. It's not an isolated incident. Trump is waging war on IGs across the gov't -- thwarting their efforts & replacing them w/ loyalists. He explicitly rejects the very notion of independent oversight. His gang won, they get the spoils; that's how it works. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/22/us/politics/trump-inspectors-general.html
10. Trump alleged massive fraud in the 2018 elections in Florida. The state just concluded a 17-month investigation. Guess what? Nothing. No fraud, just a fevered conspiracy theory. Keep this in mind as November approaches. https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2020/05/21/a-trump-election-conspiracy-collapses-1285442
11. Trump blamed his failure to appreciate the virus earlier on intelligence services. But current & former intel officials say he was briefed on it plenty -- he just won't read briefings & won't pay attention. He prefers to get info from cable news. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/21/us/politics/presidents-daily-brief-trump.html
12. This last one
needs emphasis. Trump is incapable of focusing long enough to read a short briefing. He won't/can't absorb objective information from experts. He can ONLY pay attention to RW media, which is packaged to play on his prejudices. It's a nightmare. </fin for now>
needs emphasis. Trump is incapable of focusing long enough to read a short briefing. He won't/can't absorb objective information from experts. He can ONLY pay attention to RW media, which is packaged to play on his prejudices. It's a nightmare. </fin for now>
13. The Paycheck Protection Program has been riddled with incompetence & cronyism, but now, finally, Trumpkins have found some PPP loans they can't abide. They want Planned Parenthood clinics to return their PPP loans. 
https://www.vox.com/2020/5/23/21268539/planned-parenthood-80-million-ppp-loans-coronavirus
https://www.vox.com/2020/5/23/21268539/planned-parenthood-80-million-ppp-loans-coronavirus
14. The Trump Justice Dept. is bullying state & local officials to loosen lockdown orders before it's safe. https://www.vox.com/covid-19-coronavirus-us-response-trump/2020/5/23/21268394/justice-department-lockdown-coronaviruslos-angeles-illinois
