Since the coronavirus pandemic exploded in the U.S., President Donald Trump has largely put the onus on the states to deal with their own outbreaks, rather than coordinate a strong federal response. “As you know I want the governors to be running things,” Trump said, controversially leaving it up to individual states to set their own stay-at-home orders and largely procure their own life-saving medical equipment. On Monday, governors in multiple U.S. regions announced their intention to take the lead when it comes to reopening their states as well, announcing new coalitions among Northeastern states and West Coast states to coordinate regional approaches when the pandemic begins to subside. But in an abrupt about-face from his previous state-based perspective, the president is now insisting that when it comes to getting things back to normal—he has to be the one in charge.

Hours after tweeting that it is “the decision of the president” to reopen the country instead of the governors’, Trump went one step further during his press briefing Monday, as he claimed to have “total” authority to impose his will on the rest of the country. “When somebody’s president of the United States, the authority is total,” Trump said when asked about the regional coalitions to reopen the states. “And that’s the way it’s got to to be. It's total. It’s total. And the governors know that.” Saying that “the president of the United States calls the shots” and that states “can't do anything without the approval of the president,” Trump went on to claim that governors currently pushing their own recovery schedules “will agree to” his plan, claiming, “the authority of the president of the United States, having to do with the subject we’re talking about, is total.” (Vice President Mike Pence, when asked about the president's claim, seemingly had no objection, saying he “support[s] the president's leadership.”)

Given that the United States is not a dictatorship—and that social distancing orders imposed across the country are all state orders, not federal ones—Trump’s authoritarian claim is obviously false, which CNN reporter Kaitlan Collins noted to the president in a follow-up question about his remark. “You said when someone is president of the United States their authority is total. That is not true. Who told you that?” Collins asked, to which Trump claimed that the White House will “write up papers on this” that won‘t be necessary because “the governors need us one way or the other.” When Collins continued to push back, asking whether any governors agreed with his view—“I haven't asked anybody ... because I don't have to,” he responded—the president ultimately shut down the journalist and her questioning how Trump could possibly think he has total authority to do whatever he wants. “Enough,” Trump said. The comments were part of a more broadly unhinged presser on the president’s behalf, as Trump also insisted that he had made zero mistakes in his handling of the pandemic response—which, to be clear, is incredibly untrue—and aired a four minute-long propaganda video of news clips praising his response. “That is the biggest meltdown I have ever seen from a President of the United States in my career,” said CNN journalist Jim Acosta about the briefing, which the network aired alongside a chyron reading, “Angry Trump Turns Briefing Into Propaganda Session.”

Trump’s apparent intention to unilaterally push his view of when the country should reopen comes as the White House faces growing pressure from conservatives to get back to “normal” again, even as death tolls across the U.S. from COVID-19 continue to climb. A coalition of conservative advocacy groups are planning to announce a push to reopen the economy despite the pandemic, the Washington Post reports, and some are advocating for public health experts Drs. Anthony Fauci and Deborah Birx to stop taking the reins on the response. “Obviously, the sooner we get the economy going and back up, the better it’s going to be for conservatives and Republicans in this election year,” tea-party organizer Richard Viguerie told the Post. “A lot of Republicans and conservatives feel there might be an overreaction to all of this. We’re all anxious to get back. Conservatives feel the government has overreacted, and it’s got to end.” While the president has not yet announced a timeline for reopening the country, he suggested Monday that it would be “hopefully ahead of schedule,” suggesting he could give into conservatives’ demands. “We want to have our country opened, and we want to return to normal life,” Trump said. “Our country's gonna be opened, and it's gonna be successfully opened.”