Nevertheless, there’s little doubt governors feel life-or-death pressure to flatter the president. “Several governors made clear they fear inadvertently harming their own citizens if they are too strident in demands for desperately needed medical supplies, or if they clash too publicly with Trump over pandemic policy as the contagion spreads,” reported The Los Angeles Times. A New York official told The Post that Gov. Andrew Cuomo and others in the state are “working under the assumption they will not get much help from the federal government, but that criticizing Trump could jeopardize any help they could receive.”

Trump isn’t just trying to feed his ego by coercing blue state governors into pretending that he’s doing a good job. He’s getting help with the November election. His campaign just rolled out a new ad, titled “Hope,” featuring appreciative quotes from Cuomo and Gov. Gavin Newsom of California. With the lives of their constituents at stake, they’ve given him the made-for-TV sound bites he was never able to extract from Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky.

For the many New Yorkers who loathe this president, it’s hard to imagine a more profound insult. Due in part to Trump’s failures, the United States has the world’s worst coronavirus outbreak, and New York State is its biggest hot spot, with over 1,200 deaths as of Monday afternoon. There are ventilator shortages and makeshift morgues.

A little more than three years ago, Democrats gathered in Javits Center in Manhattan thinking they were going to celebrate Hillary Clinton’s election. Now it’s a temporary hospital. And in order to secure lifesaving assistance, our leaders have to grovel to the man who has helped create our tragedy.

Besides Ukraine, there is another precedent for Trump’s behavior: Puerto Rico. After Hurricane Maria, Trump grew incensed when the female mayor of San Juan called out the administration’s inadequate response, and he’s been punishing the island ever since, slowing the release of aid and slashing its Medicaid funding. No doubt, Trump’s racism and Puerto Rico’s lack of national political representation exacerbated his mistreatment of that beleaguered territory. But it was a preview of how he’d use his power.

“I don’t think anyone was that surprised when he was as vindictive as he was after the trial in firing people and having them marched out of the White House, and I don’t think anybody can be all that surprised now,” Schiff said of Trump. “Dismayed, horrified, appalled, yes. Their worst fears realized once again, yes. Surprised, probably not.”

Republican senators knew who Trump was and they refused to remove him. Now we’re all, as the president said of the former ambassador Marie Yovanovitch, going to go through some things.