Jake Tapper Expresses Shock at RNC’s ‘Potential Superspreader Event’: ‘Forget the Hatch Act Violations, We’re Getting Into a Matter of Life and Death’

CNN’s Jake Tapper reacted with shock and disgust at the scene outside the White House Thursday evening, as a crowd of about 2,000 people began gathering to watch President Donald Trump accept the Republican nomination for president on the final night of the Republican National Convention, calling it a “potential superspreader event.”

As Mediaite covered earlier, the setup on the White House South Lawn several hours before Trump’s speech showed rows of folding chairs crowded closely together, making it clear that the CDC’s recommended six feet of social distancing would be completely impossible.

Host Wolf Blitzer introduced the segment, noting that “as many as 2,000 people” were gathering to hear Trump speak, “without much of any social distancing that we can see, or any mask requirements.”

Tapper responded, noting that health officials across the country had “breathed a sigh of relief” when Trump finally wore a mask after refusing to do so for months — “finally we were going to get a good example set by the president” — but the scene tonight was deeply disturbing.

Earlier in the evening, Tapper had reached out to several of these health officials who were “just abjectly mortified by what they’re seeing from the South Lawn, which looks like a potential superspreader event.”

One expert from the Harvard Global Health Initiative, Dr. Ashish Jha, told Tapper it was “deeply irresponsible,” something that “goes against all we know about keeping people safe.”

“We should expect better from our national leaders,” continued Tapper, clearly perturbed. “The idea that 2,000 individuals with no mass testing, no social distancing, very few of them wearing masks, coming together. Forget the Hatch Act violations, we’re getting into a matter of life and death here.”

“It’s really alarming. And I have to say that idea of this is happening while this pandemic is going on, and the President and the White House trying to convince us that it isn’t, is just otherworldly.”

Tapper then offered a sobering statistic: “Since the Republican convention began on Monday, until 5:00 p.m. today Eastern, 3,688 Americans have died of coronavirus. Just since the Republican convention began, we have had more losses due to this virus than were lost due to 9/11.”

Watch the video above, via CNN.