Leaked Phone Call Reveals Obama Slamming Trump Admin’s Pandemic Response, Dropping of Flynn Case: ‘Absolute Chaotic Disaster’

Photo credit: Pete Souza, official White House photographer.

A leaked private phone call of former President Barack Obama reveals his highly critical take on the Trump administration’s response to the coronavirus outbreak and its recent decision to abandon the case against former national security adviser Michael Flynn.

In a Yahoo News story that includes exclusive audio of the call, Obama is heard reportedly talking to former members of his administration in a nearly two-minute long clip. The former president starts off expressing his dismay and alarm at the Justice Department’s decision to drop the case against Flynn, despite the former Trump adviser twice pleading guilty to lying to the FBI in open court.

“The news over the last 24 hours I think has been somewhat downplayed,” Obama said. “And the fact that there is no precedent that anybody can find for someone who has been charged with perjury just getting off scot-free. That’s the kind of stuff where you begin to get worried that basic — not just institutional norms — but our basic understanding of rule of law is at risk. And when you start moving in those directions, it can accelerate pretty quickly as we’ve seen in other places.”

Obama then emphasized the importance of the upcoming election and his desire to defeat President Donald Trump.

“I am hoping that all of you feel the same sense of urgency that I do,” Obama aded. “Whenever I campaign, I’ve always said, ‘Ah, this is the most important election,’ especially obviously when I was on the ballot, that always feels like it’s the most important election. This one — I’m not on the ballot — but I am pretty darn invested. We got to make this happen.”

Later on during the conversation, Obama laid into the Trump White House’s Covid-19 response, and connected it to the surge of right-wing tribalism across the planet.

“It’s part of the reason why the response to this global crisis has been so anemic and spotty,” he said. “It would have been bad even with the best of governments. It has been an absolute chaotic disaster when that mindset — of ‘what’s in it for me’ and ‘to heck with everybody else’ — when that mindset is operationalized in our government.”