On June 28, 2020, Trump retweeted a video of protests and counter-protests in The Villages, a Florida retirement community. Within 10 seconds of the two minute video, a man is shown yelling “white power.”
— Fifty Shades of Whey (@davenewworld_2) June 27, 2020
Along with the video, Trump added,
Thank you to the great people of The Villages. The Radical Left Do Nothing Democrats will Fall in the Fall. Corrupt Joe is shot. See you soon!!!
Trump’s retweet was deleted later that same day.
White House Deputy Press Secretary Judd Deere said Trump hadn’t heard the remarks:
President Trump is a big fan of The Villages. He did not hear the one statement made on the video. What he did see was tremendous enthusiasm from his many supporters.
On June 1, 2020, amid national protests and riots following George Floyd’s death at the hands of police, Trump gave a speech wherein he threatened to unilaterally deploy the military to quell unrest.
First, we are ending the riots and lawlessness that has spread throughout our country. We will end it now. Today, I have strongly recommended to every governor to deploy the National Guard in sufficient numbers that we dominate the streets. Mayors and governors must establish an overwhelming law enforcement presence until the violence has been quelled.
If a city or a state refuses to take the actions that are necessary to defend the life and property of their residents, then I will deploy the United States military and quickly solve the problem for them.
After the speech at the White House, Trump headed to St. John’s Church for a photo op. Lafayette Square, which sits between the White House and the Church, was filled with people protesting the death of George Floyd. The park is famed for being a place to voice grievances, seeing hundreds of protests annually.
Map of the White House, Lafayette Square, and St. John’s. Google Earth
Attorney General William Barr gave the order for US Park Police, the federal organization responsible for overseeing and securing the park, to clear the area so Trump could proceed to St. John’s. Without warning, the federal officers equipped in riot gear deployed tear gas and rubber bullets on the crowd.
An Australian news crew on the scene filmed the moment the police began to advance. The cameraman was briefly attacked by one of the officers.
The administration originally claimed that no tear gas had been used, despite CS canisters being found at the scene. A spokesman for the US Park Service later said “It was a mistake on our part for using ‘tear gas’ [in our statement].”
Once Trump reached St. John’s, he posed with a Bible in front of the church briefly before leaving. When asked if it was his Bible, Trump simply responded, “it’s a Bible.”
Patrick Semansky / AP Photo
The pastor of St. John’s said he wasn’t made aware of the photo op. Mariann Budde, the Episcopal Bishop of Washington, DC noted that no one was “given even a courtesy call, that they would be clearing with tear gas so they could use one of our churches as a prop.”
Budde commented further on Twitter:
The Bible teaches us to love God and our neighbor; that all people are beloved children of God; that we are to do justice and love kindness. The President used our sacred text as a symbol of division.
In April 2020, Trump announced a 60-day memorandum on immigration.
In light of the attack from the Invisible Enemy, as well as the need to protect the jobs of our GREAT American Citizens, I will be signing an Executive Order to temporarily suspend immigration into the United States!
The order was limited to would-be immigrants living outside the country seeking a green card. It had some significant exceptions, like for the spouse or child of a citizen, military service members, and medical professionals. It did not affect anyone already within the United States.
Supporters of further immigration controls regarded the provisions as too limited, while immigration advocates worried that the 60-day period and those affected could be easily expanded.
A month after the order, the administration announced an expansion in an attempt to retain more jobs for citizens in the wake of COVID-19. The new regulations banned entry on certain visas through rest of the year, including including high-skilled H-1B visas. The order also had exceptions for agricultural, healthcare, and food industry workers.
At a June 20, 2020 rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Trump said he asked officials to slow their testing for COVID-19.
When you do testing to that extent, you’re going to find more people, you’re going to find more cases. So I said to my people slow the testing down, please. They test and they test. We had tests and people don’t know what’s going on. We got tests, we got another one over here. The young man’s 10-years-old. He’s got the sniffles. He’ll recover in about 15 minutes. That’s a case, add him to it. That’s okay. That’s a case.
White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany responded to questions saying, “any suggestion that testing has been curtailed is not rooted in fact.” and that Trump’s remark “was a comment that he made in jest.”
In a subsequent interview, when asked if the remark was true, Trump failed to answer the question.
TRUMP: If we did slow it down, we wouldn’t show nearly as many cases. You’re showing people that are asymptomatic, you’re showing people that have very little problem, you’re showing young people that don’t have a problem. But we’re doing so much testing, 25 million tests.
ST. GEORGE: But did you ask to slow it down?
TRUMP: Uhh, if it did slow down, frankly, I think we’re way ahead of ourselves, if you want to know the truth. We’ve done too good a job, because every time we go up – with 25 million tests, you’re going to find more people. So then they say, ‘oh we have more cases in the United States.’ The reason we have more cases is because we do more testing than any other country by far.
VIDEO: Just asked President Trump if he actually ordered testing to be slowed down. He said in his Saturday speech he did. He didn't answer the direct question. pic.twitter.com/aDKGu6F2Ok
Though administration officials said Trump was likely joking, when asked if this was the case four days after his original remark, Trump replied, “I don’t kid. Let me just tell you. Let me make it clear.”
On the day of the Tulsa rally when Trump made the original remark, the United States had suffered 192,180 deaths, over twice all the Americans lost in wars from Vietnam to the modern day combined.
I have retained highly respected pollster, McLaughlin & Associates, to analyze todays CNN Poll (and others), which I felt were FAKE based on the incredible enthusiasm we are receiving. Read analysis for yourself. This is the same thing they and others did when we defeated…
The legal filing from Trump’s campaign alleged that the poll was “designed to mislead American voters through a biased questionnaire and skewed sampling,” and demanded an apology.
“We stand by our poll,” said Matt Dornic, a CNN spokesman. CNN also noted that several other polls found Trump trailing Biden by double digits, and that there was nothing unorthodox about the methodology used by their own.
The poll showed Trump trailing Democratic candidate Joe Biden by 14 points ahead of the 2020 election, and found Trump’s approval rating at 38%, among his lowest.
Trump tweeted a clip of a black toddler and white toddler running together to embrace. It was edited to include a fake CNN chyron reading “terrified todler[sic] runs from racist baby” before cutting to a title reading “America is not the problem. Fake news is.”
Twitter labelled it as “manipulated media” before ultimately removing the video when a copyright notice was issued from the rights holder.
CNN did cover this story – exactly as it happened. Just as we reported your positions on race (and poll numbers). We’ll continue working with facts rather than tweeting fake videos that exploit innocent children. We invite you to do the same. Be better. https://t.co/T1nBtejZta
In a string of tweets amid protests at the White House against George Floyd’s death at the hands of police, Trump threatened the use of “the most vicious dogs, and most ominous weapons.”
Great job last night at the White House by the U.S. @SecretService. They were not only totally professional, but very cool. I was inside, watched every move, and couldn’t have felt more safe. They let the “protesters” scream & rant as much as they wanted, but whenever someone….
….have been greeted with the most vicious dogs, and most ominous weapons, I have ever seen. That’s when people would have been really badly hurt, at least. Many Secret Service agents just waiting for action. “We put the young ones on the front line, sir, they love it, and….
In a Fox News interview with Harris Faulkner, Trump repeated past claims that he had done more for the black community than any other President. In doing so, he made a comment about “the end result.”
TRUMP: I think I’ve done more for the black community than any other President. And let’s take a pass on Abraham Lincoln because he did good, although it’s always questionable, you know, the end result-
FAULKNER: Well we are free, Mr. President so I think he did pretty well. [laughter]
TRUMP: But we are free. You understand what I mean.
During a tour of the Center for Disease Control on March 6, 2020, Trump said he preferred to prevent a cruise ship with confirmed COVID-19 cases from docking for fear that the official number of US cases would increase.
They would like to have the people come off. I’d rather have the people stay [on the ship]. But I’d go with them. I told them to make the final decision. I would rather – because I like the numbers being where they are. I don’t need to have the numbers double because of one ship that wasn’t our fault.
In a speech made on May 14, 2020, Trump referred to testing for coronavirus as “overrated.”
So we have the best testing in the world. It could be the testing’s, frankly, overrated? Maybe it is overrated. But whatever they start yelling, we want more, we want more. You know, they always say we want more, we want more because they don’t want to give you credit.
On that day, the US had suffered a total of 87,500 deaths from COVID-19, more than all American deaths in wars from Vietnam to the modern day combined.
