President Donald Trump has repeatedly misstated the facts at the White House coronavirus briefings. In this video, we feature five examples from April.
Video: Trump’s Repeated Coronavirus Claims
Issues: COVID-19
Trump’s Flawed China Travel Conspiracy
President Donald Trump has twice now advanced the flawed theory that China nefariously continued to allow flights out of Wuhan, the city where the COVID-19 outbreak originated, to Western cities while blocking flights into other cities in China.
Trump Ad’s Misleading Use of CNN Interview
A Trump campaign ad misleadingly edits a CNN interview to suggest 2 million people would have died from the novel coronavirus were it not for President Donald Trump’s China travel restrictions.
Media Didn’t Misuse Boy’s Photo in Deaths of Three COVID-19 Victims
Social media posts falsely suggest that news outlets are misusing a boy’s image to report the same child died of COVID-19 in three different countries. The posts actually refer to three different young people who died from the novel coronavirus in Portugal, Belgium and the UK.
Kudlow’s Claim About COVID-19 Spread
Despite early warnings about how damaging COVID-19 could be for Americans, White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow defended his late February statement that the U.S. had “contained” the virus, saying on May 3 that the novel coronavirus “spread exponentially in ways that virtually no one could have predicted.”
Gowdy Didn’t Author Viral Conspiracy Theory
A viral Facebook post, spreading a political conspiracy theory about COVID-19, is wrongly attributed to former Rep. Trey Gowdy. Gowdy confirmed to us that he did not write the post in question.
Video: Trump Twists Fauci’s Words
In this video, we show how President Donald Trump misquoted Dr. Anthony Fauci’s remarks in late February about the threat that the novel coronavirus posed for Americans.
Trump Wrong About Ventilators
President Donald Trump falsely claimed that his administration was not initially able to meet the increasing demand for ventilators to treat COVID-19 patients because “we weren’t left ventilators by a previous administration.”
Large Retail Employees Have Been Victims of COVID-19
A viral post falsely claims Walmart, Amazon, Kroger, Target and Costco — while staying open during the COVID-19 pandemic — “have not had any reported cases” of employees contracting the coronavirus. There have been news reports across the U.S. of workers at those companies becoming infected or dying of the disease.
An April Filled with Repeats
The president has used the coronavirus briefings to repeatedly misstate the facts about his administration’s handling of the pandemic, the economy and trade with China.