COVID-19 Pandemic will undoubtedly be in voters’ minds as it has disrupted almost every aspect of everyday life.
In November, voters will decide who should lead them in what maybe some of the darkest days of the coronavirus pandemic.
The virus has disrupted almost every aspect of ordinary life. It turned the economy upside down, changed the way people work and travel, challenged workers and healthcare facilities, and forced sweeping changes in education and child care systems. The U.S. has infected more than 8.3 million people and killed more than 220,000, and these numbers are likely to be underestimated.
The United States reports the largest number of infections and deaths of all countries, and one of those 8.3 million people infected was President Donald Trump. He twice required supplemental oxygen and has been admitted to the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. He declared his fight against the virus a “blessing from God” after receiving his illness’s experimental treatment.
Medical experts have warned that the U.S. has entered the third peak of the coronavirus outbreak. As the country moves into autumn and winter and the cold pushes more people in, researchers think the virus spreads more easily. The challenge can also be increased by the flu season.
It has been suggested that life will not return to a “new normal” until there is an effective vaccine. Potential candidates are being developed faster than ever, with many promising results in early studies.
The coronavirus is even turning the election process on its head – from massive queues to vote early to an increase in the number of ballots by mail – although it’s not clear what effect it will have on general turnout.
At the start of the epidemic, the Trump administration created the White House Coronavirus Task Force to coordinate and oversee its “efforts to track, prevent, contain, and reduce the spread of the virus.” The task force’s regular briefings with scientists eventually disappeared and were replaced with Trump’s solo events to tailor his message about the pandemic.
Trump blamed China, where the virus was first discovered, for the deaths in the United States. He called on governors and mayors to take mitigating measures that he did not like. He stopped U.S. funding to the World Health Organization, saying it “has failed to obtain properly, control and share information in a timely and transparent manner.”
“I think he calculated at an early stage that if this were seen to be his responsibility, it would be a problem for him,” Farmer says.
The president has pledged the economy to rebound to its old levels. Congress and his administration passed a series of laws in the early months of the pandemic that approved a series of rules to inject $ 3.4 trillion in aid to the revival of the economy. But it also threw talks with Congress on the possibility of additional funding for economic stimulus in disarray.
Trump, who has not released a detailed coronavirus plan for his possible second term, significantly overstated the timelines for when the virus would subside and for a vaccine to arrive, stating in April that the virus will shrink by the end of summer and that only the coronavirus “embers” could remain to be put out in the fall and winter.
The Trump administration initiated the Operation Warp Speed, which Trump called in May “a massive scientific, industrial, and logistics enterprise, unlike anything our country has been through since the Manhattan Project.”
Operation Warp Speed has spent billions of dollars to encourage vaccine development and production with the plan of inventing 300 million doses by January 2021. So far, no emergency use has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration.
Trump’s deadlines and recommendations have often conflicted with scientists in his administration, and Trump has not hesitated to denounce them. He recently called leading infectious disease expert Anthony Fauci a “disaster”, criticizing the physician’s changing advice on the public’s use of face masks.
Farmer advocates for change by saying, “This is how science works. When you learn things, you change. “And Trump’s challenge of investigating mask-wearing isn’t a new tactic for him.
Biden’s post attempted to portray Trump as an indifferent leader without a plan. He criticized the president for his comments to journalist Bob Woodward that the death toll “is what it is.”
But during Biden’s mayoralty with ABC News in October, he didn’t correctly distinguish his plan from Trump’s, McDermott said. Biden said, “you can’t mandate a mask” and avoided advocating lockdowns.
“He didn’t draw a bright line there to distinguish himself from Trump,” says McDermott.
