During an appearance on CNN on Monday, former Vice President Al Gore offered his thoughts on President Donald Trump’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic after being prodded to by network host Don Lemon.

Gore said he was reluctant to spend time on it given Trump supporters were being hurt by the crisis and argued the president’s early statements were having a lasting effect.

“[I] was one of many who, when he said I accept no responsibility for it — I kind of shook my head, remembering Harry Truman saying ‘the buck stops here,'” Gore said. “But here’s why I don’t want to dwell on that, Don. I feel especially badly for those who really follow President Trump and believe in him, and, you know, there are quite a few people in our country that do.”

“I don’t agree with his policies, but those who follow him, I’m afraid many of them have been misled into thinking that some of his earlier statements about using the word ‘hoax,’ and used it in a specialized way, but saying it was going to disappear, those kinds of things — I feel badly for those who believe that stuff and have not been protecting themselves,” he continued. “And we still have states that have not adopted the kind of policies that Dr. Fauci and the real experts have advised, partly because they — they’ve made it kind of a political, partisan kind of issue.”

Gore added Trump was forced to learn one cannot “gaslight a virus,” and that he was forced to accept facts, which he said should be a process applied to the so-called climate change issue.

“Now, I think the president, to his credit, has been moving away from that. Now, I think he’s learned that you can’t gaslight a virus. You’ve really got to pay attention to what the scientific facts are. And by the way, we need to do that where the climate crisis is concerned, too, because it’s exactly the same thing.”

“I don’t want to get into political potshots at him,” Gore added. “I want to encourage him to continue the kind of change we’ve seen in the last 24 hours.”

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