OPINION | This article contains commentary that reflects the author's opinion.
"He's a fool" – @JoeBiden on @realDonaldTrump comments last night in South Carolina regarding coronavirus. More from my interview with him later on @SpecNewsRDU #ncpol @CNNPolitics @MSNBC @foxnewsdesk pic.twitter.com/FLeV9DELNL
— Tim Boyum (@TimBoyumTV) February 29, 2020
Biden pushed a false narrative following Trump’s statement on coronavirus.
Biden promoted the media’s headlines proclaiming that President Trump called coronavirus a “hoax.”
Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank tweeted: “Remember this moment: Trump, in South Carolina, just called the coronavirus a ‘hoax.’” Over 100,000 people either “liked” or commented Milbank’s tweet.
Politico published a headline that read: “Trump rallies his base to treat coronavirus as a ‘hoax.’”
“President Donald Trump on Friday night tried to cast the global outbreak of the coronavirus as a liberal conspiracy intended to undermine his first term, lumping it alongside impeachment and the Mueller investigation,” the report claimed.
NBC published a headline that read: “Trump calls coronavirus Democrats’ ‘new hoax.’”
NBC’s report claimed Trump said “the outbreak is ‘their new hoax,’” even though that is not what he said.
CNBC published a similar headline: “Trump says the coronavirus is the Democrats’ ‘new hoax.’
“Usually, media outlets write a headline like this to get clicks but let the actual article contain accurate information,” Daily Wire reported.
“In this case, each outline kept the inaccurate assumption from the headline throughout their article, claiming Trump said something he didn’t and then dedicating article space to debunking something he didn’t say,” the Daily Wire concluded.
For those who don’t take the time to find and read President Trump’s actual comments, they will only receive the media’s version, which is inaccurate, the Daily Wire claims.
Here are President Trump’s actual remarks:
Trump: “Now the Democrats are politicizing the coronavirus. Coronavirus. They’re politicizing it. We did one of the great jobs, you say, “How’s President Trump doing?” They go, “Oh, not good, not good.” They have no clue; they don’t have any clue. They can’t even count their votes in Iowa. They can’t count their votes!”
Trump continued: “One of my people came up to me and said, “Mr. President, they tried to beat you on Russia, Russia, Russia. That didn’t work out too well. They couldn’t do it. They tried the impeachment hoax. That was on a perfect conversation. They tried anything, they tried it over and over. They’ve been doing it since you got in. It’s all turning, they lost, it’s all turning. Think of it. And this is their new hoax.”
Trump continued: “But you know, we did something that’s been pretty amazing. We have 15 people in this massive country, and because of the fact that we won early, we won early, we could’ve had a lot more than that. We’re doing great. Our country is doing so great. We are so unified. We are so unified.”
Trump’s “hoax” comment was clearly referring to Democrats claiming his administration is not doing a good job containing the virus, the Daily Wire reported.
Trump’s first comments are about how Democrats asked how Trump is doing in regard to the Coronavirus, and he mockingly responds as them: “Not good.”
Trump never said the coronavirus itself is a hoax as the media headlines and articles falsely claim. Instead, Trump criticized the Democrats’ claims that the Trump administration is failing to protect the country.
