By now, it’s custom for those who take the podium at the daily White House coronavirus briefings to offer up some “dear leader”-ish praise for Donald Trump. But even by the standards that sycophants like Mike Pence have set, MyPillow Founder Mike Lindell was over the top. “God gave us grace on November 8, 2016, to change the course we were on,” the bedding baron said during a surreal appearance in the Rose Garden Monday. “God had been taken out of our schools and lives. A nation had turned its back on God...Our president gave us so much hope.”

Even Trump, who relishes praise and revels in superlatives, was apparently caught off guard by the impromptu glorification. “I did not know he was going to do that,” Trump said. “But he is a friend of mine, and I do appreciate it.” It was a surreal spectacle as coronavirus deaths reached 9/11 levels and could climb into the hundreds of thousands. But Lindell was only the latest in a parade of business leaders Trump has placed front-and-center at his daily coronavirus briefings, seemingly in an effort to put the corporate world at ease as the COVID pandemic ravages the United States economy.

Declaring a national emergency earlier this month, Trump gathered retail leaders like Thomas Moriarty of CVS and Richard Ashworth of Walgreens in the Rose Garden—to thank him for his response to the crisis and to offer a brief summary of how their companies are involved against the fight against the virus. “They’re celebrities in their own right,” Trump said in that March 13 briefing. “They’re the biggest business people, the greatest retailers anywhere in the world.” Trump has continued to tout his conversations with business executives at subsequent briefings, emphasizing a private-public dual approach to addressing the pandemic, and on Monday brought out a cast of the “greatest business executives in the world today,” including Lindell, a big-time Republican donor, Fox News advertiser, and Trump friend.

There’s always been something unseemly about these briefing testimonials, especially considering the coronavirus press conferences already tend to be dominated by non-experts like Trump and his political allies at the expense of public health officials like Anthony Fauci. But Lindell, with his effusive praise for Trump, underscored just how self-serving these things tend to be. Trump introduced Lindell by complimenting his business success: “Boy, do you sell those pillows,” he told Lindell. After returning the president’s praise and then some, the CEO and pitchman explained the role his company is playing in the response—to his credit, it will be making medical masks sorely needed by medical personnel—while repeatedly promoting his business. “Thank you, Mr. President, for your call to action,” he said, “which has empowered companies like MyPillow to help our nation win this invisible war.”

A day earlier, Laura Lane president of global public affairs at UPS, began by thanking Trump for his “incredible leadership.” She later told the Washington Post it was an “easy decision” to go to the White House and not based on partisanship. “I know there’s a lot of people who love President Trump and a lot of people who probably don’t love President Trump,” Lane said, adding that she “tried to do is deliver a message of hope.”

Trump is clearly relishing having networks tune in daily, even bragging over the weekend about his ratings. The cameos and namedrops—Trump also on Monday referenced a recent conversation with restaurateur Wolfgang Puck—seem aimed at assuring uneasy industries that he’s in control, even amid epic economic uncertainty and freaked out markets. They also seem designed to comfort a panicked country that, despite appearing to get caught flat-footed by the pandemic, his supposedly business-minded approach to handling the crisis will work out. Lindell and others vouching for him might not be enough, though; such companies may help address resource shortages, but Trump’s crisis management theater will only be as convincing as the reality on the ground.

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