Donald Trump Takes Ghoulish Victory Lap Over 2021 Covid Death Toll Surpassing Last Year’s
ANDY JACOBSOHN/AFP via Getty Images
Former President Donald Trump took a ghoulish victory lap with a statement pointing out that total reported deaths from COVID-19 in 2021 surpassed the total reported in 2020.
In a format usually reserved for endorsements by Iowa newspapers or influential editorial boards, Trump issued an “ICYMI” statement Thursday on a weightier topic: the horrific death toll from the pandemic that dominated most of his final year in office.
ICYMI: Covid-19 Deaths in 2021 Surpass Entirety of 2020
“As of Wednesday, U.S. localities have reported 353,000 deaths since January 1, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
That surpasses the 352,000 deaths reported in 2020 in the 10 months following the first recorded domestic outbreaks of the disease in March…” — Forbes, Oct. 6, 2021
The statement quoted a Forbes article, and also contained a fundraising plea.
Since the very beginning of the pandemic, Trump took a ghoulish scorekeeping approach to the human misery that was most starkly illustrated during a March 2020 visit to the CDC at which he said, of a cruise ship that carried infected people, “I like the numbers being where they are. I don’t need to have the numbers double because of one ship.”
Trump’s eagerness to celebrate the milestone belies the fact that he was, in fact, in office for twenty days this year, during which over 80,000 Americans died, with tens of thousands more dying in the weeks following from infections they contracted before Trump left office, following Trump’s refusal to facilitate an orderly transition to President Joe Biden’s administration — against which Trump fomented a violent insurrection — and with the current Delta surge being fueled overwhelmingly by Trump supporters who were even more resistant to taking a Covid vaccine while Trump was president than they are now.
But congratulations?
