In other news, Politico reports that the Trump regime is close to finalizing the new rules that will roll back protections for LGBTQ patients who were protected from discrimination under Obamacare. So, that means me.
Meanwhile, a new Associated Press poll found that just 23 percent of American trust what Trump says during his daily press briefings.
Just 28% of Americans say they’re regularly getting information from Trump about the coronavirus and only 23% say they have high levels of trust in what the president is telling the public. Another 21% trust him a moderate amount.
Confidence in Trump is higher among his supporters, though only about half of Republicans say they have a lot of trust in Trump’s information on the pandemic — and 22% say they have little or no trust in what he says about the COVID-19 outbreak.
Finally, the New York Times reports that Trump is spending literally the majority of every day watching television. He watches news coverage from 5 a.m. to noon, attends his daily briefing, and then watches coverage of his briefing. He does not attend virus task force meetings.
He has been up in the White House master bedroom as early as 5 a.m. watching Fox News, then CNN, with a dollop of MSNBC thrown in for rage viewing. He makes calls with the TV on in the background, his routine since he first arrived at the White House.
But now there are differences.
The president sees few allies no matter which channel he clicks. He is angry even with Fox, an old security blanket, for not portraying him as he would like to be seen. And he makes time to watch Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s briefings from New York, closely monitoring for a sporadic compliment or snipe. [...]
The daily White House coronavirus task force briefing is the one portion of the day that Mr. Trump looks forward to, although even Republicans say that the two hours of political attacks, grievances and falsehoods by the president are hurting him politically.
Mr. Trump will hear none of it. Aides say he views them as prime-time shows that are the best substitute for the rallies he can no longer attend but craves.
Also, that order to "ban all immigration" (which didn't actually ban all immigration) was totally about his feelings and politics.
His own internal polling shows him sliding in some swing states, a major reason he declared a temporary halt to the issuance of green cards to those outside the United States. The executive order — watered down with loopholes after an uproar from business groups — was aimed at pleasing his political base, people close to him said, and was the kind of move Mr. Trump makes when things feel out of control. Friends who have spoken to him said he seemed unsettled and worried about losing the election.
Worried about losing the election? No problem! Just hit the big, red racism button.
We crossed 50,000 (official) deaths today and will probably cross 60,000 next week. We're also inching toward 1 million confirmed cases, but I feel confident in saying that is the very last thing on Trump's mind if it is at all.
Have a good weekend.