WASHINGTON—Striking an optimistic note in his daily press briefing about the global pandemic, President Donald Trump spoke to reporters Thursday, detailing his administration’s best case scenario projections for coronavirus where eight million Iranian people are killed. “If we’re very lucky, we could be looking at many millions of dead Iranians, which is why we must do everything in our power to act,” said Trump, confirming that the U.S. government would be pouring resources into continued sanctions and military action against Iran to boost those numbers. “We’re taking this very seriously and monitoring the situation at all times, and we’re hopeful that we could hit this target, or maybe even go past it, but the reality is, this is just a projection and it could tragically be as low as three or four million. We need help from every sector to make sure these citizens are unable to receive medical assistance and continue dying in the street.” When pressed by reporters, Trump acknowledged that the time had come to confront the ugly reality that at least some Iranians would survive.

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