[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 161 (Thursday, September 17, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5681-S5682]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            PRESIDENT TRUMP

  Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, this morning I was planning to address 
a number of topics, but the President held a press conference yesterday 
afternoon that was so callous, so uninformed, so egomaniacal, so 
divisive that I am compelled to respond to it this morning.
  We are in the middle of a global pandemic that has killed nearly 
200,000 Americans, far more than the number of Americans who died in 
World War I--more than any other Nation on God's green Earth, more than 
countries with larger populations, and more than countries with mere 
fractions of our wealth and power.
  Here is how the President spoke about the number of American deaths 
yesterday at his press conference:

       If you take the blue states out, we're at a level that I 
     don't think anybody in the world would be at . . . [If you 
     take the blue states out,] we're really at a very low level.

  Yes, Mr. President, if you don't count the total number of Americans 
who have died, you might think it is not so bad. If you close your eyes 
and pretend that half of the country doesn't exist, maybe some might 
think you didn't do such a spectacularly awful job.
  What kind of person looks at the number of dead citizens in the 
country he is supposed to lead, and in an attempt to glamorize himself, 
dismisses every American who died in a State that didn't support the 
President politically? What a disgrace. It is monstrous. There is not a 
shred of empathy, not an ounce of sorrow. What kind of President do we 
have?
  The President just wants you to see a graph about how his 
catastrophic failure to fight COVID-19 could have been worse.
  I suggest President Trump spend some time reading the stories of the 
men and women across the country who have passed away from this 
terrible virus.
  This isn't about a number. Oh, no, it is about the people families 
and communities have lost, whether they be in red States or blue 
States. Many of these families have been unable to hold

[[Page S5682]]

funeral services to properly mourn their loved ones for fear of 
spreading COVID to another member of their family. That is why these 
remarks by the President are so horrific.
  What does the outcome of an election determine if these lives should 
be counted? Isn't that awful? Why does the outcome of an election 
determine if these lives should be counted? Does he mean that the loss 
of Americans who lived in States with Democratic Governors shouldn't 
count? If that is the case, President Trump is saying that the deaths 
of David Pickman of Somerset, CT; and Patrick McNamee of Ypsilanti, MI; 
and Virgil Sutton of Dallas, NC, don't count--don't count. How about 
Ralph Davis, the high school basketball coach in Milwaukee, WI? Did his 
life not count because he lived in a State with a Democratic Governor? 
What kind of demented person would say that those American lives don't 
count?
  The President also said: ``But some of those states, they were blue 
States and blue-state managed.''
  I suppose that means that the life of Dennis Wilson shouldn't count 
because he was an educator in Lenexa, KS. If only Mr. Wilson had lived 
17 miles east in the Hickman Hills neighborhood of Kansas City, MO, 
maybe the President would think his life should have counted.
  How about Captain Doug Hickok? If he lived--I don't know--in 
Cheyenne, WY, I suppose the President might have valued his life. 
Unfortunately for Captain Hickok, he lived 1,700 miles east in Bangor, 
PA, so President Trump says his life isn't worth counting.
  Maybe I am giving the President too much credit. You never really 
know what the heck he means when he talks. So it is possible that his 
definition of blue States isn't limited to States with Democratic 
Governors. Maybe his definition of blue States includes States with 
more Democrats than Republicans in their congressional delegations. 
That would mean Valentina Blackhorse's life didn't count because she 
lived in Kayenta, AZ, nor would the life of a Des Moines toddler who 
died from COVID in June.
  What kind of demented person would make that calculation? President 
Trump, that is who.
  Of course, there is no bottom with President Trump. He is so 
contemptuous of every virtue, so dishonorable, so dishonest that the 
vices parade themselves forward one after another.
  At the press conference after his disgusting comments about ignoring 
American lives from blue States, President Trump lied, once again, 
about his support for Americans with preexisting conditions, a lie he 
has told and retold while his administration is in court suing to 
eliminate those very protections.
  Don't worry, though. President Trump promised that a brandnew, 
fantastic Republican healthcare plan is just around the corner. He said 
you will see it in 2 weeks, just like he told FOX News in July when he 
said he would sign a healthcare plan in 2 weeks, a full and complete 
healthcare plan, and again in August, just 2 weeks away--just like his 
infrastructure bill, a new middle-class tax cut, lower prescription 
drug costs, a new stimulus package, a report on COVID-19's impact on 
minorities, and new COVID tests, all of which the President said would 
be ``2 weeks'' away but, in fact, never materialized, not in 2 weeks, 
not ever.
  He must think the American people are chumps that he can say anything 
he wants with no accountability, not do it, and then do it again and 
again and again.
  For centuries, American Presidents have faced challenges with honor 
and with courage. They have stepped up to the podium and used their 
bully pulpit to give honor to American lives. But when this President, 
President Trump, stands at that great podium, he reveals his cowardice, 
his callousness, his selfishness, his ignorance, and, most of all, his 
insistence on dividing us. His inability and unwillingness to unite a 
grieving nation will be his legacy.
  When Donald Trump took the stage at the 2016 National Republican 
Convention, he painted a false portrait of a country in crisis, and 
declared, ``I alone can fix it.''
  Four years later, the country faces actual crises--the greatest 
economic crisis in 75 years, the greatest public health crisis in a 
century--and President Trump now says: ``It is what it is.''
  ``Could you have done more to stop it?''
  ``I don't think so,'' he says.
  ``If you take the blue States out. . . . We're really at a very low 
level.''
  ``I don't take any responsibility at all.''
  ``It's going to disappear.''
  ``A lot of people think the masks are no good.''
  ``[W]hen it gets a little warmer, it miraculously goes away.''
  ``I see the disinfectant, [where it] knocks it out in a minute . . . 
and is there a way [we] can do something like that, by injection?''
  ``I'm not a doctor, but I'm, like, a person that has a good, you know 
what.''
  This man, who said all these ridiculous, harmful things, is leading 
the country through the worst public health crisis in a century.
  Americans don't have to ask themselves, as Reagan once asked, if they 
are better off now than 4 years ago. President Trump has told everyone 
exactly what the score is.
  When Donald Trump said he was running for office, he said: ``I alone 
can fix it.'' When Donald Trump is running the country during the worst 
pandemic in this century, he says: ``It is what it is.'' Five words. 
Both times, five words. Five words that sum up an approach to 
government and leadership that is completely antithetical to everything 
the word ``leadership'' means.
  Promise big, deliver zero, deliver small. That is President Trump's 
view of government. Boast when you don't have any responsibility; 
shrink from it when you do. That is President Trump's view of public 
service.
  It has diminished our institutions and our democracy. He has cost our 
country its moral standing in the world; he has threatened the future 
of our planet; and he has cost Americans their healthcare, their jobs, 
and their lives. But it is not so bad if you don't count the numbers.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
order for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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