As Donald Trump’s vast incompetence when it comes to dealing with the coronavirus became apparent over the last several weeks, both the president and his allies began pushing a ridiculous, if completely predictable, line of defense: The disease, which has spread rapidly outside of China and killed nearly 3,000 so far, is being hyped by both the media and Democrats in an effort to hurt the president. “The coronavirus is being weaponized as yet another element to bring down Donald Trump,” recent Medal of Freedom recipient Rush Limbaugh told his listeners last week. “They think this is going to be the thing that brings down the president. That’s what this is all about,” acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney said of the press on Friday. News networks are “doing everything they can to instill fear in people,” while Democrats are “trying to gain political favor by saying a lot of untruths,” Trump himself claimed heading into the weekend. “Anything that they can use to try to hurt Trump, they will,” Don Jr. basically screamed into the camera on Friday from CPAC, referring to Democrats. “For them to try to take a pandemic and seemingly hope that it comes here and kills millions of people, so that they could end Donald Trump’s streak of winning, is a new level of sickness.”

Because claiming that one political party wants millions of people to die is kind of a bold statement, Jake Tapper brought it up to Mike Pence on Sunday as the vice president did the TV rounds in an effort to assure people that, as the new point person on the virus, he totally has everything under control. “There’s been a lot of unfortunate rhetoric on the left and on the right about the coronavirus,” Tapper said. “Can we agree that neither Democrats nor Republicans want Americans to get the coronavirus and die from it?”

For most reasonable humans, there’s an easy answer to this question, which is: “Yes, Jake, we can agree that neither Democrats nor Republicans want Americans to get the coronavirus and die from it.” But Pence works for the Trump administration, where saying something that could be interpreted as kind or charitable to the other side is tantamount to treason, even if that something is that they probably aren’t hoping for millions of people to die. So instead, the person who is probably least qualified to handle an outbreak told Tapper: “I think what the president said earlier this week and his charge to me is to remind the American people that the risk is low, to assure the American people that we’re ready, but also to say, as the president said, this is no time for politics.” Then he tried to claim that Don Jr., the president’s oldest and dumbest son, had a valid point. “Frankly,” Pence said, “I think that was Don Jr.’s point, that there has been some very strong rhetoric directed at the president by some members of Congress and political commentators...Responding to the kind of things that have been hurled is—is understandable.”

Then somewhat worryingly, the V.P. added that “with the proper expertise, the proper resources, and the prayers of millions of Americans, we’re going to get through this,” emphasis ours because that’s not actually how you stop an epidemic.

And in related news:

Of course, how Pence “handled” it was that he helped cause the outbreak, having voted to cut funding for Planned Parenthood, which led a clinic that had been the only HIV-testing center in Scott County, Indiana, to close; refused to distribute clean needles despite the fact that the disease was spreading by people sharing them; and then prayed the situation would resolve itself.

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