On Friday April 3, 2020 Democratic Coalition Co-Founder Scott Dworkin joined us on the Rick Smith Show to talk about the Trump administration’s response the Coronavirus and to talk about why November 2020 is such an important moment in US history. Take a look or a listen and tell us what you think.

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Rick Smith : So to highlight the reality of the failure of this administration. Bob sent me an email with this article from the Los Angeles times that points out that during the Obama era, they, actually did some smart stuff, like put a bunch of really smart scientists all around the world.

This project that was launched by the U S agency for international development. They did this back in 2009 and evidently this this agency set up by the Obama folks identified 1200 different viruses. All that had the ability to erupt into pandemics, including more than 160 novel Corona viruses.

Guess when they stopped the funding for all of this? The initiative was called PREDICT, trained and supported, staff in 60 foreign countries, including right where this, this one started. I guess when they decided to cut the funding. Last September. Gee, you've got to kind of wonder. Here to share some thoughts on where we are all as we're all holed up in our little spaces.

I've asked our good friend Scott Dworkin to come talk with us. Scott's the co founder of the Democratic Coalition, also the host of the Dworkin report. Scott, thanks for taking time for us.

Scott Dworkin: Oh, what's up Rick? How are you?

Rick Smith : I'm good. So are you surprised by the fact that the Obama administration had tried to do some stuff, thwart a global pandemic only to have it undone by the orange tangerine menace.

Scott Dworkin: No, definitely not surprised that Obama planned for something, you know, especially catastrophe and definitely not surprised that Donald went ahead and ruined that just because he was spiteful and Putin probably told him it was a bad idea, you know, or something along those lines.

It really is, it's disturbing that everything that would have been protecting us under these circumstances, he peeled away. On top of that, he continues to drop the ball. He drop the ball initially and lied about it and committed fraud to American people, which then led to more people getting sick and more people dying.

That's just a fact now, and it's going to be, I don't know how many people will end up getting sick because they thought that it was fine. I mean, they're even talking about today, Oh wait, everybody should wear masks. And it's like, okay, I understand. Like you may have learned some information, but like. That'd be great if you told us that a few weeks ago, it's crazy.

Rick Smith : Here’s the kicker. I bet though everyone should wear masks except me.

Scott Dworkin: Right? Then that's another one of those things where he's trying to isolate himself away from it. I'm a manly man. I don't need to wear a mask.

That kind of stuff. Instead of showing leadership and being like, see, look at this mask. It's not that bad. Like Obama would do that if we needed to wear masks. He doesn't need to add that extra statement. Same thing happened when he, today during his press conference, I'm one of the few people that watch is now, I think.

He sat there and they were talking about the model of hundreds of thousands of Americans that are expected to die at the minimum. He said, well, I had nothing to do with that model, like as the death model. And he's like not like any other, you know, this doesn't involve any models that I've had before. Something along those lines.

Rick Smith : You're telling me he's going to get the Sharpie out and change the model.

Scott Dworkin: Yeah, he's going to come out and change the model. He doesn't, he tries to separate himself from everything. So anytime there's a question about death, he pulls someone else on stage with them and he's like, wait, wait, wait.

I'll let Deb, as in Dr Birx, I'll let Deb answer that question. Donny Fauchi, you know, that kind of stuff. And who was not there today or yesterday and was removed abruptly and he denies that he was removed abruptly, but, CNN has reported that. He was supposed to go on, and then they decided that he shouldn't.

So anyways, we're facing a lot of, a lot of issues. Luckily CNN and MSNBC have listened to our stop airing Trump campaign, and they have pulled away from him. They did a sloppy job today. It was kind of just laziness. So we're going to have to push harder and we'll push as far as we need to go.

You know, we've had a lot of success with boycotts in the past, and I don't want to do anything like that, especially with CNN and MSNBC but we'll do what you need to do until they stop covering this guy because he's killing Americans.

Rick Smith : This is the weird thing. Normally I would say, you know, the news network, they have to get these, he's the president.

You've got to cover it, even if he is a buffoon. But literally, you know his misinformation campaigns and all of the deflection and all of the things, the distraction. It's dangerous.

Scott Dworkin: Yeah, and I think it a lot of the things he said when he downplayed it, that allowed to spread.

When he acted like it wasn't that deadly that allowed it to spread. When he acted like it was going to go away, people went about their business. They weren't careful. They weren't. There's churches that were practicing that believe in Trump, these Republican governors, if you look at the map, the later States, the ones that aren't dark red yet, they're not dark red only because they don't have the testing because they didn't get them because they haven't been scrounging for them.

They haven't been fighting for them. And they're going to get hit the hardest because they believe Trump. And that is one of the saddest things, the rural hospitals, like they're going to be overloaded and they can't forward patients to any other hospital. So they're going to be hit the hardest too. And so this, middle America, uh, not only that, but there's going to be, I don't know how long it's going to take for any money to come out, cause I hear they say two weeks, but we're expecting two months and I don't know who, anybody who can wait two months for money at all.

No one.

Rick Smith : I see Steve Minuchin says immediately the money's going to start coming out. Immediately. Maybe April 9th, and then I see that, well, if you don't have a direct deposit from your last return, or it could be 20 weeks and I'm going, there are very few in the working class can last 20 weeks without some bit of assistance.

Scott Dworkin: Yeah. And I really want to trust Minuchin. Who, funny enough, used to work for George Soros and worked at Goldman Sachs after his dad worked at Goldman Sachs for years. So he's a daddy's money boy, and he's a billionaire per se. Basically an oligarch at this point. I'm not exactly trusting him or any of the members of administration, because a lot of those people in the administration are as close to as corrupt as Trump is. Overall. So you can't really look at the people in the administration cause they're just oligarchs of Trump's. It's kind of like Putin's oligarchs. These are Trump's oligarch. It's not his administration. They're not real. Shake your heads. They don't actually do anything.

Rick Smith : No. Let me ask you this, cause you guys do a lot of freedom of information acts and a lot of investigative work. One of the things I've been saying is I want to know what Alex Azar was doing. I wanna know what communications they had. I want to know what, you know, the folks who from the CDC were telling, I think someone's got to be telling us what those folks were telling Trump.

When they were telling them and who decided not to do anything early on. Does this fall solely on Trump's lap? Is this, that he was given bad information? I think that information has to come out.

Scott Dworkin: Yeah. I agree. I think that a select house committee that speaker Pelosi put together this week, it has subpoena power.

So they have the ability to delve into this stuff. Now, you know, they're gonna wait. Probably a bit until a lot of this money starts getting dulled out, but it's a bipartisan committee. I would say that those are some of the things, you know, who fumbled what, what exactly went on here and what we're going to find.

I can just tell you, let's skip to the end. What we're going to find for sure is correspondence between Trump and Kushner and other adversaries talking about strategic planning of who he can let die in America and who he shouldn't let die. And not only that, as sick as that is, the expectation of, well, I know people are going to die, but let's set up the testing regime so we can make money off of it first.

And that's true. The CADRE Jared Kushner's company. They stalled testing because of that. And he didn't like the numbers, which he publicly admitted, but also privately boasted about the numbers are going to go down. We don't have to worry about that. And he was serious about it and obviously it was just ballooned at that point.

People went about their business. It needed to be a full halt, a full stop, because the first case in the United States was the same date as the first case in South Korea. And so if you think about the build here, obviously we have a bigger population in different country here.

But overall we're getting pummeled and you have to wonder why. Again, I've always said this. He is the worst thing that's happened to the United States of America. This was never gonna end well. Hopefully at the end of this tunnel, it's a November win for, for Democrats.

And especially knocking out the Senate and picking that up and holding the house because that's when we can actually bring true accountability and then make laws to make sure that none of this can ever happen ever again.

Rick Smith : It's disgraceful. And look I want Trump out in November. I want the Republicans out of the Senate. I want them out of anywhere near the halls of power, but I didn't want it this way.

Scott Dworkin: Yeah I never, never hoped for anything like this. I guess I expected him to maybe bomb someone at the wrong time. Do something along those lines militarily.

So I did not expect anything like this and I was rooting for him. Immediately, the second that we find out about this, I'm like, how can we help? How can we help strategically? What can we do to provide you information about things that we've done in the past? Things that we can help out. crickets

That's fine. I understand. But then like. You know, just go out there, talk for 30 seconds, say that, you know, this stinks. We're going to be okay. Here's doctors to talk you through it. You know, don't come out there and do a propaganda Fest and lie about it and lead more people to being sick. I mean, there's a fact.

Well, matter of fact, not only the, there's some people on video saying, well, Donald says it's okay. So like, whatever. So we're here at spring break things like that matter. What you say matters, what you do matters. If you scoff at something and you're the President of the United States, other people will mimic that.

I talked to one of the world's leading psychiatrists from Yale university, and she had told me that his attitudes spreads to other people. So the arrogance, I don't even know how to explain it, but this is that time where the Koolaid that they've been carrying around and sipping, this is when they take the big swig.

This is when they're willing to die to prove that he's right. I don't exactly know what they're trying to do, but they're trying to act like they are not going to be affected by it. And those are the people that are dying. You know what I mean?

Rick Smith : This is the final act of contrition, the final act of contrition, right?

Scott Dworkin: This is when the cult drinks the juice.

Rick Smith : But here's the thing. You know I've had a psychiatrist on the program since inauguration day telling me the exact same thing all along. Our friend has been on the right side from the start. This is instability in chief I, it is exactly what we've been seeing.

The thing that's surprising to me is we've made it this long. Without this happening sooner. That's the thing that's kind of amazing to me, that he has kind of bumbled along. And it took this long for a serious crisis to happen. Yeah.

Scott Dworkin: I'm glad that it took this long for something like this to happen, but you couldn't have a worse person. I was walking along the street the other day. Next to to a dumpster there was a used medical sponge with some blood on it, and I thought to myself, that right there can be a better president of the United States than what's there right now if they just sat there and did nothing. I kind of want it.

Like I said, last time I was on your show, I kind of want them to just go golfing. I know that's against everything we stand for, but at this point, he's just in the way. What are you even doing here? You're just complaining if you're just going to get attacked, if he thinks it's bad now what's going to happen when everyone in this country knows someone who died from it?

Like if you have hundreds of thousands of Americans that die. We're all going to know someone in our family that died of it.

Rick Smith : Six degrees of separation. You're going to know somebody and you know, it's horrible. Here's the thing. I look at a bad decision after bad decision. Yesterday in another one of those moments where you go, how much, how disgraceful can this administration be? They relieved Captain Brett Crozier from his command because the guy had the audacity to expose the fact that his people on his ship were getting sick and he didn't think enough was being done.

So he stood up. In fact, I think they should be given the guy a metal.

Scott Dworkin: Yeah. You could see a hero's departure on the flight deck, you could see them come around and start cheering and chanting his name. It was so sad.

That's not how it's supposed to be for a guy. You're not listening to them. Corona virus is spreading throughout the ship. [00:15:00] People are going to die and these are our soldiers. Get them off the ship, get people to go in there to scrub the ship down, or what do you have to, whatever you have to do minimum staff and then scrub it down and fix it, but don't leave them on their rocks.

And he had every right to do that. That is beyond whistleblower. I'm not sure exactly how it worked, but that's why he was fired. That's why he was relieved of duty. There's no, don't listen, like Vindman same thing. You know what I mean? This is the same thing as Lieutenant Colonel Vindman. This is the same kind of thing.

You blow the whistle on Trump. He's going to try and bury you. And so I hope he comes forward and he tells the truth of like, I was trying to blow the whistle on this and my boys were going to die, and I'm glad I did it and I have no regrets. And that's a 60 minutes interview waiting, I'm sure.

Rick Smith : Yeah, no, I'd look at the end of it.

These people are heroes and I hats off to them, but you're right. You know, it's all about the retribution in the hopes that they silence the next person. Who would, who would have the audacity to, to do something like [00:16:00] this. But you know, I keep, we have these conversations and we've been having them for a couple of years now, and we keep waiting for this moment when the Republican party is going to find his soul, when it's going to find a conscience, when it's going to find a heart, what it's going to find, anything we keep waiting for that moment.

I one would think that this is one of those moments where the Republicans, I've gotta be looking at this guy going, Oh, he's a disgrace. He's taking us in the wrong direction. He's a clear and present danger. We've got to get rid of him yet I see no chance of that happening.

Scott Dworkin: I think Republican governors are going to be the ones to really break when they see their death tolls raise.

They're going to have to blame someone and they're not going to own it all themselves. There's no way. And so that's when it starts to peel off because you can't, that's too big of a rift. And again, I don't think people understand this is right now a tsunami. And we're on the beach. And so you can choose, do you want to stand on the beach?

Are you going to run [00:17:00] for the mountains? Cause that tsunami's coming. So everybody needs to prepare. And the fact that we're not all preparing can lead to beyond catastrophe can lead to the this lasting years. Beyond that. Um, and changing our lives forever. And so people need to, people need to wise up

Rick Smith : now.

I mean, it's, it's, I keep, keep waiting and hoping, and you're right. You know, I look at, you know, Charlie Baker from Massachusetts, um, who, you know, who a couple of days or several days ago said, look, if it's up between, uh, competing with the federal government or, you know, getting something, we're going to lose.

Every time that comes up. And in fact, as I said earlier, I know we had to go to Robert Kraft, the owner of the Patriots, to get a plane to fly to China to get masks for his healthcare folks. That's not how this is supposed to work.

Scott Dworkin: Right. And the, and the governors have been, I think some of the governors I've spoken with, their offices and whatnot, um, have made it clear.

And these are Democrats and Republicans that have [00:18:00] made it clear that they kiss his butt and the more they kisses, but. The more that they get, and there is a direct correlation to that, and that's pathetic. The same thing, like how do you have a president of the United States? I understand the circumstances of before, but like how do you have a president of the United States who's not willing to speak to the speaker of the house during a pandemic.

You know what I mean? You can't have a toddler in chief. You cannot have a person like this in the white house. I mean, and then the governor's, he, he expects, thank you. Thank you, thank you. And you could tell he has this cupboard story of, well, these guys are working all hard or whatever, but they didn't think any loose background.

They didn't thank me. You know? And I want them to be appreciative of me and I want them to do this for me. And it's just like. He's out there today smiling, making jokes. People are dying and people are still running around in the middle of the United States as if nothing's happening. And they're just sitting ducks with governors that are listening to Trump.

[00:19:00] And this is just, it's just not the case. And you can see even dr Burke's breaking with it today and she's like, no, no one is safe. Like it's everywhere. And some of these areas, especially the rural areas. They're not going to have proper equipment at all. They're going to have any of that. And they also will have nowhere to transfer them, and they also will be overloaded.

So what do you do at that point? You're going to drive four hours to the nearest hospital. You know what I mean? Like this is, this is exposing everything that's wrong with our country. And so it's, it's really, I mean, the fact that you won't open up. Uh, the, the healthcare system. So you, Oh, you can enroll in Obamacare.

Again, the fact that you won't actually do your job and make sure that people are actually, what is it, defense production act or whatever. Um, like if you can authorize that just wholly, if you can just make a proclamation that everybody stay inside, you call those Republican governors and you say, shut it down.

The longer you stay open, the longer this lasts, and [00:20:00] he should have shut this down immediately. This is disgusting, disgraceful. And I tell you, it's one of the most hideous displays. It's beyond treason. I mean, we're, we're past that. I don't think people understand exactly what he did here. He lied and people are dying because he lied period.

This is not, there's a direct correlation. I think it's murder period. And I, and I know that this is, I've always been one to go as far as it can go, calling him white supremacist, you know, early on. And, but it, I call it, like I see it, I wouldn't call it like if I didn't believe it, but I, I truly believe that he is murdering Americans and does not care.

And that's, that's just the bottom line. Cause they're going to be people that die directly correlated to the fact that he downplayed it and lied about and committed fraud and to the American people. So, sorry, that's my rent today.

Rick Smith : No, no one. Well-deserved. So let me ask you a last line of questioning because I, I get this a lot.

You know, now's not a time [00:21:00] to point out all of Trump's faults. Now's not the time to point out that he's been apt. Now's not the time to point out that he's golfed for most of the time that he's been president. Now's not the time for any of that. Now we need to unite as a country, Scott, we need to come around and call us the around the idea that now he's finally got it, that now he understands how serious it is and now we need to support it.

And don't swear.

Scott Dworkin: I, you knew exactly what my face is doing. I paused.

Rick Smith : Yeah. Don't swear. F-word,

Scott Dworkin: F-word, effort, effort. Um, you know, there are some people that are evil in the world and there's nothing we can do to change that. And so we're on our own and we need to keep on progressing. Um, that's why we started, um, the mass now coalition where we're building a, we're assembling mass for hospitals and, [00:22:00] um, so we've got over a thousand volunteers.

You can go to masks now. Dot org. Um, check it out. And so if you have projects you want to do at home with your kids, uh, this is a great one. It seems to work out. Um, we're gonna make some, uh, challenges with some prizes and things like that, so we'll try and make it fun. Uh, but at the same time, we'll show direct delivery of the mass that you made to the hospital being received by the patients, so that, uh, obviously some doctors can have more M 95 mass and whatnot.

Um, so I, I say. You know, to, to that fact. Um, what you had said, instead of cussing, I will promote the mass now coalition. Um, but it really is, you know, there's some, there's some people that just are not worth talking about at this point, and there's some actions that are so reprehensible and disgusting that you, um, you just have to, you're right.

You have to just keep on moving on. And I, I pray. I, I hope, um, every day I hope that he just changes and starts to care for one second. And, uh. And that's not going to happen.

Rick Smith : No, it's not going to happen. And even if he did care, he's, he's not competent enough to even make the right choices. So we lose on both fronts.

Uh, but, uh, great. Good on you for the work that you guys are doing. What mosques now. Dot org. Uh, yesterday we had Dr. Kelly Sen holds on, uh, talking about the, the program and terrific. Love her. Wonderful. But good stuff, Scott. I appreciate the time. Keep up the fight. I look forward to talking to you again real soon.

Scott Dworkin: You know me too well catching me. Oh, about the cuss, but thank you very much. It was a great interview. I appreciate your time. Thanks for

Rick Smith : your time. But good stuff. Scott Scott Dworkin, cofounder of the democratic coalition, also co host of the Dworkin report. Make sure you check that out. Quick break right back.

Stick around and listen to the Rick Smith show.