President Donald Trump tweeted Saturday that he suddenly believes his White House daily press briefings are no longer “worth the time” and the “effort” — just days after his comments that a disinfectant “injection” might work to battle COVID-19 triggered an uproar.
Trump’s lightning-fast pull-back from his rambling, daily briefings that often last close to two hours comes amid reports that aides have been desperately trying to convince him to scale back his often-problematic participation. Advisers fear that Trump’s disjointed, often confusing, inaccurate and contradictory musings may be frightening voters, and are hurting his poll numbers.
Trump’s tweet makes it seem that if he no longer appears at the briefings, it was all his idea.
“What is the purpose of having White House news conferences when the Lamestream Media asks nothing but hostile questions” and “refuses to report the truth or facts?” he asked. “Not worth the time & effort!”
Trump on Thursday suggested that an “injection” of disinfectant or a burst of “powerful light ... inside the body” might work against COVID-19. Stunned health experts immediately issued warnings that ingesting or injecting any kind of disinfectant would be toxic and possibly fatal. Trump scrambled to walk back the shocking comments the following day, claiming he was speaking “sarcastically” when he suggested the dangerous action.
Trump gave a short briefing on Friday and took no questions from reporters. There was no briefing on Saturday. It was the first time since Easter weekend two weeks ago that Trump has not held a press conference on COVID-19 developments. Since March, he and Vice President Mike Pence have held some 50 briefings along with members of the coronavirus task force on COVID-19.
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