Since 1978, first-term presidents held ceremonies in the East Room to unveil the portraits of their immediate predecessors. Trump, who long accused the Obama administration of illegally spying, broke the four-decade-long tradition and refused to unveil Obama’s presidential portrait. Reports said that the Obama family also had little interest in attending any such event.
2012 unveiling ceremony of Bush’s portrait. Official White House Photo by Lawrence Jackson
During a September 16, 2020 town hall hosted by ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos, Trump attacked Biden and Democrats for not passing a mask mandate. Biden held no office, and Democrats only had control of the US House of Representatives.
He went on to describe how people don’t like wearing masks:
TRUMP: Well, I do wear them when I have to and when I’m in hospitals and other locations. But I will say this. They said at the Democrat convention they’re going to do a national mandate. They never did it, because they’ve checked out and they didn’t do it.
And a good question is, you ask why Joe Biden — they said we’re going to do a national mandate on masks.
STEPHANOPOULOS: He’s called on all governors to have them. There’s a state responsibility…
TRUMP: Well no, but he didn’t do it. I mean, he never did it. Now there is by the way, a lot of people don’t want to wear masks. There are a lot of people think that masks are not good. And there are a lot of people that as an example you have…
STEPHANOPOULOS: Who are those people?
TRUMP: I’ll tell you who those people are — waiters. They come over and they serve you, and they have a mask. And I saw it the other day where they were serving me, and they’re playing with the mask…I’m not blaming them…I’m just saying what happens. They’re playing with the mask, so the mask is over, and they’re touching it, and then they’re touching the plate. That can’t be good.
Twitter makes sure that Trending on Twitter is anything bad, Fake or not, about President Donald Trump. So obvious what they are doing. Being studied now!
In April 2020, the USPS planned to deliver five reusable face masks to every residence and PO box. A press release had been drafted to announce the effort, but the plan was ultimately scrapped due to intervention from the Trump administration.
Instead, the Project America Strong program was established, which sought to distributed masks “to critical infrastructure sectors, companies, healthcare facilities, and faith-based and community organizations across the country.”
An administrative official explained that “There was concern from some in the White House Domestic Policy Council and the office of the vice president that households receiving masks might create concern or panic.”
In an August 26, 2020 interview with The Washington Examiner, Trump claimed without evidence that his Democrat opponent for the 2020 election was taking performance-enhancing drugs.
He repeated the claim in a September 11, 2020 interview on Fox News.
He has also called for Biden to be tested for drugs on Twitter.
I will be strongly demanding a Drug Test of Sleepy Joe Biden prior to, or after, the Debate on Tuesday night. Naturally, I will agree to take one also. His Debate performances have been record setting UNEVEN, to put it mildly. Only drugs could have caused this discrepancy???
Amid wildfires across California, Oregon, and Washington that claimed dozens of lives, Trump visited the governor of California on September 14, 2020.
While being briefed on the fires, which left 10% of Oregon’s population under an evacuation order, Trump shrugged off concerns about climate change, saying instead that it would get cooler.
CROWFOOT: …I think we want to work with you to really recognize the changing climate and what it means to our forests and actually work together with that science, that science is going to be key, because if we ignore that science and put our head in the sand and think it’s all about vegetation management, we’re not going to succeed together protecting Californians.
TRUMP: Okay. It’ll start getting cooler.
CROWFOOT: I wish-
TRUMP: You just watch.
CROWFOOT: I wish science agreed with you.
TRUMP: Well, I don’t think science knows, actually. Tom, please.
The Defense Department long produced annual reports on climate change, acknowledging it as a national threat. The 2019 report specifically notes that “climatic factors including increased wind and drought can lead to an increased severity of wildfire activity.”
San Francisco’s red sky during the wildfires. Brittany Hosea-Small / AFP
Sleepy Joe Biden has spent 47 years in politics being terrible to Hispanics. Now he is relying on Castro lover Bernie Sanders to help him out. That won’t work! Remember, Miami Cubans gave me the highly honored Bay of Pigs Award for all I have done for our great Cuban Population!
The award in question was a hand-painted of the Brigade 2506 shield, which Trump received in 2016 during a visit to Miami’s Bay of Pigs museum. Brigade 2506 was the CIA-sponsored group of Cuban exiles formed to overthrow Fidel Castro’s government.
Trump receiving a plaque of the Brigade 2506 shield in 2016. @TrumpWarRoom
The New York Times was the first to report in 2017 that Trump watched between 4 and 8 hours of cable television per day. Trump dismissed the reports as fake news.
During a September 10, 2020 press conference in which Trump responded to claims that he called fallen US soldiers “suckers” and “losers,” he named some 8 hours of television programming he’d watched the day prior.
In a taped interview with Bob Woodward for an upcoming book, Trump said he knew that COVID-19 was transmitted through the air and was five times deadlier than the flu. The tapes, released September 9, 2020, were recorded during a February 9 interview. On the day the tape was released, the United States totaled 6,549,475 cases and 195,238 deaths.
It goes through air, Bob. That’s always tougher than the touch. The touch, you don’t have to touch things, right? But the air, you just breathe the air and that’s how it’s passed. And so that’s a very tricky one. That’s a very delicate one. It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flus…This is more deadly. This is 5% versus 1%, and less than 1%. So this is deadly stuff.
In a response the same day, Trump said he downplayed concerns to prevent panic and to act as a cheerleader for the nation.
During a press conference the following day, Trump blamed Woodward for not releasing the tapes sooner if he believed that COVID-19 would be dangerous.
Dr. Anthony Fauci, leading epidemiology expert in the United States, also said in February that there was not yet any need to change habits over COVID-19. However, while his option changed as cases spread throughout the nation, Trump continued to dismiss concerns.
On September 14, 2020, another tape was released of an April conversion:
This thing is a killer if it gets you. If you’re the wrong person, you don’t have a chance…so this rips you apart.
On September 2, 2020, Trump told supporters in North Carolina that they should vote by mail, and then vote in person to ensure it counts. Because double voting in such a manner is felony fraud, the North Carolina Board of Elections issued a statement urging people not to follow Trump’s advice. Trump has alleged widespread fraud since the 2016 election, though an investigative commission found none.
…send it in early and then go and vote and if it’s not tabulated, you vote and the vote is going to count. You can’t let them take your vote away. These people are playing dirty politics, dirty politics.
So if you have an absentee ballot, or as I call it a solicited ballot, you send it in, but I would check it in any event. I would go and follow it and go vote.
When Trump repeated his suggestion via Twitter, the company flagged the tweet with a special notice:
We placed a public interest notice on two Tweets in this thread for violating our Civic Integrity Policy, specifically for encouraging people to potentially vote twice. https://t.co/UU9kJfqptz
In an interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, Trump’s Attorney General William Barr evaded questions on the issue by claiming that he didn’t know state voting laws well enough to comment.
