CNN’s Anderson Cooper acknowledged Friday that ex-President Donald Trump “certainly deserves” some credit for his administration’s fast-tracking of the COVID-19 vaccine via Operation Warp Speed.
But Cooper argued that “if the former president wants any credit for that, which he certainly deserves, he also has to accept responsibility for the failures of his administration, which were many on testing, prevention, leadership, which contributed to the sickening death toll.”
The irony was that had Trump handled the pandemic successfully, he would “likely have won reelection in a landslide,” said Cooper. But “instead he made recognizing the very existence of a killer virus a test of political loyalty.”
Trump turned his own hospitalization from the coronavirus into “another chance to teach all the wrong lessons,” Cooper continued, which without a vaccine “were lessons in how to get sick and possibly die.”
“Think about that. Without a vaccine, modeling safe behavior is all you can do. Yet he did the opposite. All the time. And reveled in it,” Cooper concluded.
Watch the video here:
A HuffPost Guide To Coronavirus
- Is it safe to see people who have gotten the coronavirus vaccine?
- What it means if your partner tests positive for COVID-19 but you don’t.
- How worried should you be about the new strains of coronavirus?
- The unexpected challenges of co-parenting during a pandemic.
- 19 things we took for granted pre-pandemic but now miss.
- Find all that and more on our coronavirus hub page.
As COVID-19 cases rise, it’s more important than ever to remain connected and informed. Join the HuffPost community today. (It’s free!)