When the FBI announced in October 2016 that it was reviewing new emails related to its investigation into Hillary Clintons use of a private server as secretary of state, it gave Donald Trump a priceless gift. Not because, as it turned out, Clinton had deliberately mishandled classified information or was about to be charged with a crime, but because it gave the impression of impropriety, which the reality-TV host rode all the way to the White House. Unfortunately for Trump, whose polling couldnt be worse, we are living in the year 2020 and he is running against Joe Biden, not Hillary Clinton. These are the sort of simple questions a doctor might ask a patient to assess whether theyve suffered a traumatic brain injury, yet, weirdly, it appears that neither the president nor his employees know the correct answers.

Speaking to Fox News on Friday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told Dana Perino, Weve got the emails. Were getting them out. Were gonna get all this information out so the American people can see it. Youll remember there was classified information on a private server, should have never been there. Hillary Clinton should never have done that. It was unacceptable behavior. Its not the kind of thing that leaders do.... Classified information needs to stay on the right places. Secretary Clinton, when she was here at the State Department, did not do that.... Well get the information out that needs to get outas fast as we can. I certainly think therell be more to see before the election.

The news that the federal government is working on releasing Clintons emails as fast as it can, as though there are no other pressing issues to deal with, comes one day after Trump called in to Fox Business to rant about the fact that his former opponent hasnt been indicted (which may have something to do with the fact that she was cleared of wrongdoing), saying that he was not happy with Pompeo for failing to get her emails out to the public. (He also complained that his attorney general hasnt indicted Biden and Barack Obama, saying that Bill Barr will go down in history as a very sad, sad situation if he fails to prosecute the presidents enemies.)

In a sign of how utterly bizarre it is that Trump is screaming about Clintons emails and thinks releasing them might help his reelection chances, even some of the gang at Fox Business have wondered why he thinks voters care about any of this. President Trump didnt follow what theWall Street Journalwas saying in terms of staying on policy, anchor Dagen McDowell said following the interview with Maria Bartiromo. I am not sure it helped his campaign to talk about Hillary Clintons emails and going back down that rabbit hole like it was four years ago.... It was kind of, well, all over the place. It didnt really focus on the very issues of what the American people want to hear. Some of it did, but some of it clearly did not.

Anyway, its not clear what the president plans to do with his time should he lose in November and actually vacate the White House, but if he does and those close to him finally get him the help he needs, the odds are pretty high hell still regularly be calling in to Fox in 2024 claiming hes got classified information about Clinton thats going to shock voters like you wouldnt believe. Then hell whisper, I gotta go, theyre here while an orderlys key turns in the lock, adding, The DOJ doesnt want you to know this because its part of the deep state, but her husband had an affair with an intern. Its all there in the documents. Then the phone will drop and well hear him yell Stay back! Keep your hands off of me! Presidential harassment!

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And speaking of Trumps mental faculties

Nancy Pelosi is supporting a bill that would create a panel to assess if the president is a stark raving lunatic who should be removed from office:

Pelosi on Friday backed the creation of a congressionally appointed commission that would determine whether a president is capable of performing his duties, insisting that it wasnt specifically about President Trump while suggesting that his recent diagnosis was the motivation for it. Pelosi said Trumps coronavirus infection has raised questions about presidential succession, which is governed by the 25th Amendment to the Constitution. Trump spent last weekend at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, setting off a flurry of inquiries about whether Vice President [Mike] Pence would assume authority, even temporarily.

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Donald Trump Doesnt Seem to Know What Year It Is, Who Hes Running Against (Hint: Not Hillary Clinton) - Vanity Fair

American society has long portrayed strength as the opposite of disability and feminization, Wool says. Those go together, and are seen to be incapacitating. This is relevant in the case of Donald Trump.

As a patient, Trump has physical traits that place him among the riskiest categories for dying from COVID-19. He is also emotionally brittle, requiring constant validation and reassurance. But as his niece Mary Trump recently wrote, among Trumps family, weakness was the greatest sin of all. So, in lieu of actual strength, Trump excels at performing a specific masculinized version of it, in which aggression, volume, stubbornness, overconfidence, and mockery are stand-ins for might. This is a man who sees wounded veterans and casualties of war as suckers and losers. Hes a caricature of masculinity, says Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, an emerita disability scholar at Emory University.

Read: Trump: Americans who died in war are losers and suckers

But the leaky nature of metaphor allows displays of strength to be mistaken for its presence. Strongman characterizations seem to revolve around the dispositional, temperamental features of a leader, says Martha Lincoln, a medical anthropologist at San Francisco State University, but I think theres some magical thinking about the physical resilience of such a person too. Even when Trump himself fell sick, he and his supporters couched his experience in the language of strength, victory, and courage. Dont let it dominate you, he said in a video.

This strength-centered rhetoric is damaging for three reasons. First, its a terrible public-health message. It dissuades people from distancing themselves from others and wearing a mask, and equates those measures with weakness and cowardice. The more you personify the virus, the more one version of heroism is to ignore it, says Semino. When people take that idea to extremes, they say, Im strong. Im not going to be cowed by this.

Second, it ignores the more than 210,000 Americans who have died from COVID-19, and the uncounted thousands who have been disabled. Such dismissals are already common. In recent years, the ideologies of eugenics, where if youre sick, its your own fault and you dont deserve support, [have] become more and more blatant, says Pamela Block, an anthropologist at Western University. As the pandemic progressed, many saw the deaths of elderly people, or those with preexisting conditions, as acceptable and dismissible. And as COVID-19 disproportionately hit Black, Latino, Indigenous, and Pacific Islander communities, people who believed in the idea of white supremacy felt like the virus was doing their work for them, and could promote the idea that theyre genetically stronger, Block adds. One of Trumps supporters recently predicted that the president would beat COVID-19 because of his god-tier genetics; Trump himself recently told a largely white audience that they have good genes before warning about incoming Somalian refugees.

Read more:

Donald Trump's Strength Did Not Beat the Coronavirus - The Atlantic

The Gallup data -- taken from a poll in the field from September 14 to September 29 -- shows that 56% of Americans said they consider themselves "better off" today than they were four years ago. (Roughly one in three -- 32% -- said they were worse off.)

And as Trump notes, that number is higher than the past times that Gallup has asked the question. In December 2012, 45% said they were better off than four years prior. In October 2004, it was 47%. And, going all the way back to July 1984, that number was at 44%.

In an email touting the "are you better off" numbers, Trump spokesman Steve Guest said, "This is a direct result of President Trump's policies. The American people are resilient, and they know they have a fighter in President Trump at the White House who spends every day working for them."

But here's the thing that both Trump and his campaign seem to miss: It is an incredibly damning indictment of Trump personally that, in a country where a majority of the people believe they are better off than they were four years ago, the incumbent President is currently losing badly in his bid for a second term.

What the Gallup numbers suggest is that even though people feel better off than they were at this time in 2016 -- a somewhat remarkable finding given the ongoing coronavirus pandemic -- they don't ascribe that better feeling to Trump and his policies. Or even if they do give Trump credit for feeling "better off" -- usually a measure of economic stability, optimism and well-being -- there are other things they prioritize when it comes to choosing the next president.

(Important note: The Gallup poll was conducted before the first presidential debate -- and Trump's erratic performance. It was also in the field prior to Trump's diagnosis last week with Covid-19.)

The message voters are sending is pretty clear: Many of them just don't like Trump personally.

That should be extremely worrisome for the President and his team. A majority of people feel better about their own lives than they did four years ago. With any past president, that would be a near-guarantee of a second term. Voters who feel like their own lives -- typically judged by their economic successes (or failures) -- are getting better have little interest in changing out the president.

That's a very, very tough nut for Trump to crack -- even if he had two years to do it. But he doesn't have two years. He has 25 days. Essentially he has to figure out a way to get credit for voters' positive feelings about their personal status while also somehow convincing them to prioritize that feeling over their personal dislike for him and the way he conducts himself in office.

What that Gallup poll that Trump and his campaign have touted actually tells us is that if Trump had been, well, a whole lot less Trump-y, he might be in a strong position to win a second term. But because Trump is Trump, he has managed to separate out voters' positive feelings about their lives from their feelings about him. People feel good about their situations, and Trump doesn't benefit.

Rather than pumping up that poll as proof of his successes, Trump should see the Gallup numbers for what they actually are: A blaring warning sign that he is headed toward a loss on November 3.

Follow this link:

That Gallup poll doesn't say what Donald Trump thinks it does - CNN

Donald Trump was on the phone, and he was talking about dying. It was Saturday, October 3, and while his doctor had told the outside world that the presidents symptoms were nothing to worry about, Trump, cocooned in his suite at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, was telling those close to him something very different.

I could be one of the diers, he said.

The person on the other end of the line couldnt forget that unusual word the president used: dier. A seldom-said dictionary standard, it was a classic Trumpism, at once sinister and childlike. If being a loser was bad, being a dier was a lot worse. Losers can become winners again. Diers are losers forever. But arent we all diers in the end? Donald Trump, the least self-reflective man in America, was contemplating his own mortality.

He said it again: I could be one of the diers.

The previous day, at 12:54 a.m., he had announced that he and the First Lady, Melania, had tested positive for COVID-19 in an outbreak that would sideline dozens across the West Wing, the East Wing, the highest levels of the federal government, the military ranks, Trumps 2020 campaign team, and prominent supporters in the religious community. The virus had barreled into the very White House that allowed its spread throughout the United States, where 213,000 were dead and 7.6 million more were infected amid the biggest economic collapse since the Great Depression.

As infections swelled nationwide, the virus made its way inside the president himself an epic security failure with no modern analog. It was over a century ago, amid a pandemic in 1919, that Woodrow Wilson got sick in Paris. His White House blamed what it called a cold and a fever on the dreary weather. But, in fact, Wilson was sick with the virus now known as the Spanish flu, which killed hundreds of thousands of Americans as his administration looked away. One hundred and one years later, the story of Trumps mild symptoms became less and less true as the hours ticked by. His fever crept up. His cough and congestion grew worse. Doctors gave him oxygen and administered a high dose of an experimental antibody treatment unavailable to the ailing masses and made using fetal tissue, a practice his administration opposes, from the drugmaker Regeneron. Still, he resisted going to Walter Reed. I dont need to go, he said, according to a person who spoke to him. Im fine. Im fine. We have everything we need here.

Persuading him to leave the White House required an intervention from his doctors, members of the White House operations staff, the Secret Service, and his son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner. They had failed to stop the mass deaths of high-risk Americans, but they were going to save Trump, the most important high-risk American of them all. They told him, This isnt just your choice. This really isnt about you. Its about the presidency. Our job is to protect the presidency, and you occupy it. They asked him to think about the military and everyone else whose life would be upended if the state of the countrys leadership was in doubt.

Fine. He agreed to walk across the South Lawn and board Marine One. The White House said the move was made out of an abundance of caution. In a video posted on social media, the president hinted that things werent so great. He put it this way: Im going to Walter Reed hospital. I think Im doing very well, but were going to make sure that things work out.

In the hospital, Trumps world shrank overnight in a way it hadnt since he arrived in Washington from New York to be sworn into office nearly four years ago. Contagious and isolated from his family and closest aides, he was accompanied by Dan Scavino, the social-media director who had first been his caddie and had survived at his side longer than anyone who wasnt blood, and Mark Meadows, his highly emotional chief of staff, who slept in a room nearby, and was attended to by a team of camera-conscious doctors. In this sterilized confinement, he tried to distract himself from his illness. He plotted his escape, planned public-relations stunts, watched TV, and took calls from friends, members of his staff, and Republican lawmakers. But he remained consumed by what the doctors told him about his chances of survival. It wasnt a sure thing.

Nine months into the pandemic and one month away from Election Day, the president considered for the first time that the disease killing him in the polls, threatening his political future, might just kill him, too. On the phone he remarked sarcastically, This change of scenery has been great.

He asked for an update on who else in his circle had contracted the virus, though he expressed no regret, no indication that he understood his own decisions could have led to the infections. Unable to process the irony of his own misfortune, he tried his best to find the Trumpiest spin. Looked at one way, he was having the greatest and most important illness of all time. He had the best care in the world, and he raved about the virtues of the drugs the doctors had him on, including dexamethasone, a steroid pumping up his lungs that can induce euphoria. He was awed by the wonders of modern medicine. He said he was feeling really good, and it didnt sound like he was lying. Then he admitted something scary. That how he felt might not mean much in the end.

This thing could go either way. Its tricky. They told me its tricky, the president said. You can tell it can go either way.

Trump held a press conference on September 26 in the Rose Garden to announce Amy Coney Barretts nomination to the Supreme Court. Photo: Carlos Barria/REUTERS

Statistically, the coronavirus is more likely to cost Donald Trump the White House than his life, though the threat to the latter isnt helping the former. A little more than three weeks before the election, potentially contagious and freaking everybody out, Trump faces what looks like the end of his presidency. Hes mishandled the coronavirus, hes never been popular, and hes gonna lose badly. I think its pretty simple, a senior Republican official said. Of course he was going to say, Oh look, I feel great! Look how badly I beat this puny little virus! Meanwhile, it touches every Americans life every day in multiple different ways, and hes handled it badly and people dont forget that. Or, as exTrump adviser Sam Nunberg put it, Everything has just completely gone to shit.

The polls suggest not just that the president will lose to Joe Biden but that he might lose bigly, in a landslide.

When the coronavirus came to America, the president was preoccupied with more obvious threats. The first positive case was confirmed in Washington State on January 21, and that same day, as he landed in Davos, the Senate was debating an organizing resolution for the presidents impeachment trial. In the Alps, he dismissed the news about the virus at home. We have it totally under control, he said. In fact, the president soon thought that things could hardly be going better.

After three years of crisis, the election year had begun with his acquittal on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of justice brought by the House under Articles of Impeachment. At the same time, the economy was booming. In the Democratic primary, which would select his opponent for the general election, the candidate he most feared, Joe Biden, seemed to be choking. And Michael Bloomberg was threatening to blow the whole thing up anyway. Trump thought about the last campaign and, ever superstitious, how to replicate its magic. He was relieved when Hope Hicks, his closest aide, returned to the White House after two years in exile in Los Angeles. Around the same time, he welcomed back Johnny McEntee, a former aide he believed to be a MAGA whisperer, capable of knowing exactly what would appeal to his base. He didnt think about the coronavirus much. And then the deaths began.

If the president had his way, hed be back in February, Newt Gingrich told me. The former Speaker of the House is an opportunist, and in the era of Donald Trump, that means he must be an optimist. In 2016, Gingrich supported Trumps campaign in the hope that hed be asked to be the vice-president. Instead, Trump repaid his loyalty not with power or higher status in history but with the cushiest gig in Europe: He made Gingrich the husband of the United States ambassador to the Vatican, based in Rome. Before the pandemic, whenever youd call the guy, he was in a loud restaurant Hi! Yeah?! This is Newt! having the time of his life. So one might understand why hes invested in keeping this whole thing going.

Gingrich grasps better than most how to stick to a message, and he keeps a straight face on Trumps behalf even as he argues things he knows cannot be true. That voter surveys are skewed by the left-wing media. I think the election is not quite like the public-opinion polls, he says. That the presidents illness is a political asset. It gives him a better understanding of what people are going through, he says. Or that the president doesnt mean to imply those killed by the virus were weak when he says hell beat it because hes strong. I think hes talking about a national attitude. Should it be Hunker down in the basement or Reopen the schools? he says. Still, he cannot help but break character to admit the obvious: If the president had his way, thered be no virus. Thered be historically high employment among Blacks and Latinos. But you dont get to pick the circumstances in which you run.

And the circumstances have grown less pickable each day. I think some of this is sad to watch, Nunberg said. Its getting to the point where hes almost turning into a laughingstock. What Im worried about is whether he wants to completely self-destruct and take everything down with him vis--vis the election and the Republican Party. He added, This is a guy whos not gonna lose joyfully.

It does appear at times as though self-destruction may be the point. How else could you explain the Plague Parade circling Walter Reed, in which a very sick Trump boarded a tightly sealed SUV with his Secret Service agents so he could wave at the supporters who had come to fly their flags on the street? Or the Evita-inspired return to the White House, in which a still very sick Trump ascended the staircase to the balcony, ripped off his face mask, and saluted to no one as his photographer snapped away? Or calling in to the Fox Business Channel to suggest his infection may be the fault of the Gold Star military families, since they were always asking to hug him? This is what it looks like when the president knows hes losing, but its also close to what it looked like when he won after all, he thought he was losing in 2016, too. We all did. Youre never as smart as you look when you win, and never as dumb as you look when you lose, according to David Axelrod. In Trumps case, it may be more like this: What seems like genius when he manages to survive is the very madness that threatens his survival in the first place.

A senior White House official told me there has been an ongoing effort to persuade the president not to do any of this, as there always is during his episodes of advanced mania. Asked what the effort looked like this time, with Trump physically removed from most of the people who might try to calm him down, the official said, Well, for starters, its unsuccessful.

One former White House official said that stopping Trump from doing something stupid that he really wants to do is possible only if youre actually sitting in front of him. Sick themselves or trying to avoid a sick president, the people he trusts and respects who would be barriers to that behavior dont seem to be around, this person said. It just looks so chaotic. Duh.

On October 5, the night Trump returned, a member of the White House cleaning staff sprayed the press briefing room. Photo: Erin Scott/Reuters/REUTERS

A second former White House official said the problem is now people are so broken down, to the point where everyones been in Jesus, take the wheel mode for the last couple years, and fighting against him is only gonna get them burned. Why even try? The presidents staff, this person said, have no ability to think strategically because the presidents behavior poses new threats to survival every five minutes. I dont think theyre even considering what happens if hes back in the White House and he needs oxygen or a ventilator. Their view is If it happens, well, well fucking figure it out when it happens!

Like Gingrich, they have to stay optimistic. They arent even considering what happens when hes feeling worse than hes feeling now, when hes hopped up full of steroids and other performance enhancers. Hes on the sort of drugs youd see with a Tour de France rider in the mid-90s! Another way to say this, the former White House official said, was that the president is hopped up on more drugs than a Belgian racing pigeon. In keeping with the bird theme, this person said the presidents illness was proof that the chickens are coming home to roost.

Going back to 2016, this person added, you always had these warnings from the Clinton camp and Democrats and the Never-Trump Republicans that, if he takes office and if a crisis hits, its gonna be a mess. But people dont really vote on that when theres not a crisis. People think, A crisis isnt gonna happen! May as well vote for the guy with a good tax policy. Suddenly, this happens, and you always assume it wont happen to you, but when you act like that, bad things happen!

One theory of Trumps self-immolation campaign is that its about gaining a sense of control. I dont think he wants to lose. I think he wants to have excuses for why he did lose, a third former White House official said. If its the ballot, the China virus, if its Nancy Pelosi. I just think he wants an excuse.

As he considers the end, he fakes his way through a performance of political possibility. One person who publicly supports Trump and considers him a friend said that, in conversations with White House and campaign officials following the presidents release from the hospital, it became clear that no one who was supposed to know seemed sure when he would be okay. Theyre putting out a big Oh, everythings fine! face. But I dont think they know how much stamina hes gonna have, this person said. I didnt like the way he looked on that balcony. Last week, I wouldve said that he was definitely going to win. Now, I dont know.

Trump spoke from outside the Oval Office on October 7 about having COVID and the vaccine. Photo: @realdonaldtrump/Twitter

Donald Trump does not often get sick. The philosophy of Fred Trump decreed that sickness was weakness, Mary Trump told me, which obviously Donald has adhered to, which is a big part of the reason were in this horrible mess were in.

Mary Trump is the presidents niece as well as a psychologist, whose best seller, Too Much and Never Enough, analyzes her uncle through the dysfunctional family he came from. In her view, the president is best understood as a self-unaware Tin Man, abandoned as a small child by his sick mother and rejected by his sociopath father until he became useful to him, whose endless search for love and approval plays out as mental warfare on the Free World he improbably represents. In order to deal with the terror and the loneliness he experienced, he developed these defense mechanisms that essentially made him unlovable, Mary said. Over time, they hardened into character traits that my grandfather came to value. When youre somebody who craves love but doesnt understand what it means he just knows he misses it and needs it, but hell never have it because hes somebody nobody loves thats fucking tragic. He still needs to go to prison for the rest of his life. Its not a defense. But its sad.

For two weeks before he died, Fred Trump was hospitalized at Long Island Jewish Medical Center in what Mary remembers as a very beautiful corner room with lots of sunlight. With her uncle at his fathers bedside, she said, everyone just stood around chitchatting, making small talk they just dont understand how to be human. When his mother was in the hospital, often for osteoporosis and once after a brutal mugging, Trump visited with an attitude of Why the fuck do I have to be here? she said. It was of no use to him whatsoever. When Marys father, Fred Jr., was dying in the hospital, her uncle Donald didnt even visit. He went to the movies.

In his 2007 book Think Big, the future president recalled how, a decade before, he unexpectedly came down with a wicked case of the flu in the middle of his negotiations to buy a newspaper (he didnt say which one). I felt terrible. It was so bad that I called the sellers and told them we would have to postpone the closing until I was better, he said, which was very unusual because I never get the flu. Its been ten years and I havent been sick a day since then. Trump didnt share the story of this freak illness to reveal his humanity but to add to his myth. He lost out to another buyer in the end, he said, and he was happy he did because, he claimed, the unnamed paper turned out to be a bad investment that was some other suckers problem. Catching the flu was a lucky break that saved me from ruin, he said. Sometimes luck makes better deals than talent. In other words, the idea that sickness is weakness, except for when it happens to him, took root a quarter-century before he made it his case for reelection.

Trump is aware that he isnt healthy. His wife, an Eastern European former model who eats salmon and greens, lengthens her muscles on a Pilates reformer, and glows as if cast in bronze, is healthy. As a 74-year-old who takes the unscientific position that human beings have a finite amount of energy that exercise needlessly drains, and who thus never engages in any physical activity more strenuous than golf or tweeting, and whose vices include red meat, French fries, ice cream, Oreos, and Diet Coke, he knows he is very much not that.

And he understood that with age and weight comes heightened risk in the coronavirus pandemic. But he couldnt accept that he wouldnt be fine, that he was part of the at-risk seniors his advisers kept telling him he should think about since they were an important voting demographic and they were literally dying by the thousands. What he could accept even less than not being fine was not seeming fine. His supporters like to imagine him as a cartoonish representation of his vigorous, manly spirit, a joke directed at anyone who doesnt find it funny. In memes, he body-slams his enemies. A video from the Trump campaign, released the week of his COVID-19 diagnosis, shows him body-slamming the virus. When I stopped by the home of Willard and Dolly Smith in New Hampshire last month, the flag on the couples front lawn showed Trumps fleshy face on Rambos ripped body. Im back because Im a perfect physical specimen and Im very young, the president joked on Fox Business on Thursday. But the stabs at self-deprecation, more necessary at this moment than ever before, do little to mask deep insecurity. Since his illness, the makeup the president applies himself has gotten so heavy and so dark that rather than obscure his pale coloring, it emphasizes the contrast between his unnatural face and the bare skin of his ears and hands. (All those years spent judging beauty pageants, and he never learned from the contestants the value of body makeup.)

Personality is policy in the Trump administration, and the presidents insecurity has made the uncertainty about the countrys leadership unavoidable when any chief executive falls ill even worse. His unwillingness to admit human frailty has led the White House and its doctors to keep information about his illness not only from the public and the press (three members of which have, so far, been infected at the White House too) but from his own staff. After Hope Hicks began experiencing symptoms at the Minnesota MAGA rally on Wednesday, forcing her to isolate in the back of the plane on the trip home, officials with whom shed had contact remained in the dark. After she tested positive on Thursday afternoon, the White House failed to notify others who would soon test positive themselves. They learned about it when the world did, not with an official disclosure but with a leak to the media. The president couldve given it to her, one of those people told me, in fairness, but I wouldve done things different that day, had I known.

Trump did know, but he didnt change his plans. At 1 p.m. on Thursday, he flew to his Bedminster, New Jersey, golf club, for a fund-raiser with hundreds of his supporters, some of whom he spoke with indoors. Later that night, he tweeted about Hicks being sick. Terrible! he said. The First Lady and I are waiting for our test results. In the meantime, we will begin our quarantining process.

Reading the message, the person said, Iassumed he mustve had a preliminary positive one. The lack of transparency, this person added, is symptomatic about how people I work with always keep the wrong things secret. Suicidal in all senses, this is the Trumpian madness that threatens the presidents political and earthly future as it puts at risk everyone around him.

As one White House official put it: Everybody at the top should be fired.

*This article appears in the October 12, 2020, issue ofNew York Magazine. Subscribe Now!

An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that Donald Trump didnt attend his brother Fred Jr.s funeral. Its been updated to reflect that he didnt visit him when he was dying in the hospital and instead went to the movies.

The one story you shouldn't miss today, selected byNew York's editors.

See original here:

The Entire Presidency Is a Superspreading Event - New York Magazine

The trouble with Trump is that, as he told Bob Woodward, I bring rage out. Its hard to see this picture of him posing maskless on the White House balcony after winning against Covid without the red mist coming down.

To anyone with a sense of history, the echo of Mussolini on the balcony of Romes Palazzo Venezia is unmistakable. But many of his core voters may know as little history as he does and, besides, this is the White House, with American flags flanking him still for many a stage of democracy, not dictatorship. Perhaps the real shock of the pose is its delusion. There is no crowd hes performing for himself and the camera.

Trump imagines it is important for him to show himself, like a medieval monarch recovered miraculously from plague. In this breathless patients manic act of narcissistic theatre he is literally the most important man on earth, the republics first divinely chosen emperor. If Trump falls it will be because people see the gulf between his dream and Americas reality.

In this photograph, President Trumps doctors and nurses assemble like a crack military squad perhaps on instinct since several are army or navy medics.

This surely reflects the unique vision of Trump, turning a medical crisis into a kickass action movie of the kind you cant see in a Cineworld near you. These tough guys were selected to fight the coronavirus hand to hand, by dead of night, after tracking the tiny enemy to its foreign lair. They probably all have easily remembered character quirks like chewing a cigar butt, driving crazily or, in the case of those hidden at the back, being a woman or non-white.

On the other hand these medics may have been arrayed not so much like commandos as contestants in the sweeping opening episode of a reality TV show. Such are the almost indecipherable layers of unreality that seem to surround Trump. There is a kind of grotesque genius in summoning up wacky images like this around you, as if Salvador Dal were the commander in chief. The neat arrangement resembles a game of human chess on a surrealist piazza.

This image may be one of our last chances to enjoy the hyperlucid fantastical world of a presidency in which doctors are warriors and everyone can beat Covid if they too just throw a grenade of expensive drugs in its foxhole.

See the rest here:

A critic's view: the delusion of Trump's Covid-19 victory photo - The Guardian

October 09, 2020

LUMBERTON Domestic violence survivors are doing their part to help others this month, as crisis calls have increased because of isolation brought on by COVID-19.

The Robeson County Sheriffs Office responded to 2,732 domestic violence calls in the county between Jan. 1 and Sept. 30. Those numbers do not include calls to city police. There are 1,588 domestic violence protective orders pending in the county.

Seven people have died in Robeson County this year because of matters related to domestic violence, said Emily Locklear, executive director of Southeastern Family Violence Center.

Quarterly reports from the Rape Crisis Center of Robeson County also show a 63.9% increase in rape and/or sexual assaults in the county when compared to the same time period in 2019, according to Virginia Locklear, the Crisis Centers executive director. Those numbers include children under the age of 18.

But there are agencies working to address the increased need brought on by COVID-19.

My whole goal with Domestic Violence Awareness Month (October) is to let individuals in our community know that we are here, Emily Locklear said.

I just want people to know that domestic violence is present in our community and that there is help for any individual, she added.

Emily Locklear is a survivor of domestic violence herself, and she often shares her story and strength with others at the center.

The executive director recalls enduring dating violence at the age of 18, when her then boyfriend tried to run her over with his vehicle, while she was pregnant with his child. He convinced her not to continue taking college courses, a decision she would regret and remedy later at a community college.

It altered my life, Emily Locklear said.

But she shares a common history with the rest of the staff, all of whom have been affected by domestic violence in some way, including a worker who started working Wednesday at the center.

The worker, who chose to remain anonymous, recalls six months spent at the centers shelter when she was about 10 years old. She and her younger brother formed bonds with center workers as her mother attended counseling and planned her escape from a husband who used mental and verbal tactics to control and abuse her.

The worker does not recall being abused by her father, but remembers the shouting behind closed doors and the escape from the man behind the heated words.

Now that Im older, I just aspire to be a change, she said.

Although she is new at the center, she hopes to share her story with people who need to hear it most, and to offer advice.

Your situation doesnt define your story, she said.

The worker encourages other victims to reach out for resources and to seek help if needed.

The center offers a 22-bed shelter at an undisclosed location, and programs to help victims plan their way out of abusive situations and to secure housing away from abusers. It also helps with obtaining domestic violence protective orders and hosts a domestic violence support group. A confidential 24-hour crisis hotline also is available at 910-739-8622 or 1-800-742-7794.

Also among about 20 staff members is a Latino advocate and three other Spanish-speaking staff members who work across language barriers to provide accessibility and support for victims.

The SFVC is working to share videos, photos and stories of survivors on its Facebook page during the pandemic, which has restricted its usual methods of raising community awareness of the issue. The center will host its annual candlelight vigil on Thursday via Facebook to honor the memory of people who have died as a result of domestic violence. Anyone interested in sharing photos of loved ones during the ceremony should call the center by Tuesday at 910-739-8622.

About one in four women and nearly one in 10 men have experienced contact sexual violence, physical violence, and/or stalking by an intimate partner during their lifetime and reported some form of IPV-related (intimate partner violence) impact, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

There are several types of abuse, including physical, emotional, verbal, financial and sexual, among others.

Victims are encouraged to contact the Rape Crisis Center of SFVC for help, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Sexual assaults have not stopped during the pandemic nor did they stop during the stay-at-home orders. If anything the experience is compounded by the COVID 19 restrictions and isolation, said Virginia Locklear, of the Rape Crisis Center.

If you decide to stay, call our crisis line to devise a safety plan, said Emily Locklear, of SFVC.

When survivors choose to leave, the abuser feels as if his or her power is threatened, which can lead to retaliation, according to the National Domestic Violence Hotline.

As a result, leaving is often the most dangerous period of time for survivors of abuse, the Hotlines website reads in part.

In 2019, SFVC served 1,383 individuals and received 1,151 crisis calls. Ninety-five adults and 84 children used the shelter to escape abuse that year.

Leaving an abusive relationship may be hard to do but its the right thing to do. There is no shame in reporting domestic violence and asking for help. As seen by the numbers in Robeson County, we have an issue, and no one is immune from the threat of domestic violence, Robeson County Sheriff Burnis Wilkins said.

Simply asking for help is the first step in taking charge of your life, Wilkins added.

To find more resources on domestic violence visit http://www.hotline.org. All services provided by SFVC and the Rape Crisis Center are free and confidential. The Crisis Center can be reached by phone at 910-739-6278.

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Donald Trump Jr. stumps for fathers re-election in Rowland - The Robesonian

Donald Trump called into Rush Limbaughs radio show on Friday for what was billed as a rally, and it turned into a two-hour marathon of media bashing, insistence that there is a COVID-19 cure, and a reversal on where the president stands on another coronavirus relief package.

As he did on previous interviews, Trump called for indictments of political rivals, and chided his attorney general, William Barr, for reports that he would not finish an investigation of the Mueller investigation until after the election.

Trump also bashed Fox News, as he has done before, arguing that the network is a much different thing that it was four years ago. Somebody said, What is the biggest difference? I said the biggest difference is Fox.

He singled out Paul Ryan, the former House speaker, who is a member of the board of directors of Fox Corp.

You watch this Fox, and it is a whole different ballgame, Trump said. And you know Paul Ryan is on the board of Fox. So I am sure that has something to do with it.

Limbaugh responded, The obstacles that keep being placed in front of you are no doubt there.

Trump went on. When Roger Ailes ran Fox, I mean Roger had a very strong point of view that is totally gone, and I think it is influenced by Paul Ryan.

The president singled out two commentators,Chris Hahn and Donna Brazile, for criticism, but said that he liked Fox & Friends, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham. Tucker Carlson, he said, is pretty good, and has his moments.

Later, Limbaugh said to Trump, You are a TV expert. I mean, theres no question. The Apprentice.

Well, I have to be. I have no choice because otherwise you couldnt survive it, Trump said.

Trump has devoted a lopsided number of interviews to the channel, and called in to two of its shows, Fox Business Maria Bartiromo and Hannityon Thursday. The president is scheduled to make his first on-camera appearance on Friday night on Tucker Carlson Tonight, where Dr. Marc Siegel will conduct and interview and medical evaluation.

Trump also criticized Fox News Sunday Chris Wallace for the way he moderated the first presidential debate. The president said that he won, and when it came to his repeated interruptions of Joe Biden, he claimed it actually might have spared him.

Id rather let him speak because hes mentally gone, and occasionally hed get off track and start talking about the birds and the bees, Trump said.

Trump also signaled a reversal on the talks for another COVID-19 relief bill. Earlier this week, he said that he was calling off negotiations with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi until after the election. He told Limbaugh, I would like to see a bigger stimulus package than either the Democrats or Republicans are offering.

He also used an expletive when talking about Iran, telling Limbaugh, They have been put on notice. If you f around with us, if you do something bad to us, we are going to do to you, things to you that have never been done before.

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Donald Trump Bashes Fox News In Two-Hour Marathon On Rush Limbaughs Show - Deadline

Just in case you were about to feel an unfamiliar spasm of sympathy for Donald Trump following his contraction of coronavirus, this week has provided a helpful reminder not only of his morally repugnant character but also of the danger he poses to the United States and the wider world.

Firmly in the first category is his attempt to blame his infection on the grieving relatives of slain soldiers, citing Gold Star families tendency to come within an inch of my face. Speaking to Fox Business on Thursday, Trump said, They want to hug me and they want to kiss me, and so perhaps it was them who had made him sick. Clearly keen not to keep all that viral load to himself, Trump later told Fox News in between coughing bouts that he plans to host a rally in Florida on Saturday and another in Pennsylvania. Hell doubtless repeat the gesture he premiered in his bargain-bin Mussolini performance on the White House balcony on Monday night, ripping off his mask with a flourish as if to prove that nothing and nobody will stop him shrouding his devotees in a cloud of his contaminated breath.

More serious are his assaults on democracy, which become ever more explicit. Lashing out at his own henchmen, he channelled Elton John to warn that the slavishly loyal attorney general, William Barr, would find himself in a sad, sad situation if he did not indict Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden for the greatest political crime in the history of our country, namely the federal inquiry into the 2016 Trump campaigns links to Russia. Like strutting on a balcony, threatening to jail your predecessor along with your former and current opponents for political crimes tends to be a feature of darkly authoritarian states rather than democratic ones.

As if to confirm that Trumps threats to democracy are not empty, that the signals he transmits are received, 13 men were arrested in Michigan on Thursday over a violent plot to kidnap the states governor and try her for treason. Youll recall that in April, Trump urged his followers, angry about the states lockdown, to LIBERATE MICHIGAN!. Trumps chief response to the revelation of this episode of domestic terrorism was not contrition, but rather a rebuke to the governor for failing to say thank you to my justice department for uncovering the conspiracy. That my is telling: it is the grammar of the authoritarian strongman.

Most Republicans continue, like Trumps doctors, to act as enablers in all this. Especially eye-catching was a tweet from infected senator Mike Lee of Utah, arguing that democracy was less important than liberty, peace and prosperity and that sometimes Rank democracy can thwart those goals. Few Republicans dare echo the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, who rather generously described Trumps increasingly unhinged ramblings as evidence that hes in an altered state.

And yet, the admission by the Republican leader in the senate, Mitch McConnell, that he had not gone near the White House since 6 August because of the administrations lax approach to masks and social distancing, was striking. Now, McConnell is not a man to speak without prior thought: unencumbered by scruples, he is a political calculating machine. And what that remark suggests is the calculation that Republicans need to distance themselves from a president they suspect is heading towards defeat.

Theyve seen the polls, same as everyone else. Those show Bidens lead growing when the race should be tightening, the Democrat consistently ahead in every battleground state bar Florida, and breathing down Trumps neck in states that should be reliably Republican, including must-win Ohio. Whats more, Bidens lead has increased since Trumps diagnosis a week ago. Hard-headed Republicans are beginning to suspect that the pandemic will be the presidents undoing.

If thats right, there would be a compelling, even karmic, logic to it. For Covid-19 could almost have been designed to expose the essence, and failings, of Trumpism.

Consider that one of Trumpisms defining traits is its contempt for truth, facts and science. It was during Trumps first weekend in office that he had his officials lie about the size of his inaugural crowd and speak of alternative facts. Opponents railed against this epistemic vandalism, but truth always seemed an abstract, even elitist concern. And then came coronavirus, accompanied by Trumps insistence that it would just disappear like a miracle, or that it could be chased away with an injection of bleach, as if to demonstrate in the starkest possible terms where a disdain for facts and for science leads: namely, to the graves of more than 200,000 Americans.

Similarly, Trumpism adapts the traditional Republican attachment to individual freedom and mutates it into a darker, Darwinian belief that the strong individual can and should do whatever they like, and to hell with the suckers and losers who might suffer as a result. In normal times, plenty of Trump supporters saw that as an exhilarating libertinism, one that allowed Trump to cheat on his wives and pay no taxes, all without consequences. Theyd have lived like that if they could. But coronavirus doesnt work that way. Suddenly the suckers and losers included Trump supporters, or their loved ones. The virus even caught up with Trump himself along with everyone who got near him.

And, of course, Trumpism is defined by its toxic brand of masculinity, mocking Biden for wearing a mask Might as well carry a purse with that mask, Joe, quipped one Fox host forgetting that covering your face is mainly to protect others, not yourself. Trump is still bragging that he is a perfect physical specimen, that hes seen off Covid, but he says it while wheezing. This virus has done to Trumpian machismo what its done to Trumpian disrespect for rules and science: its exposed it as hollow and a failure.

We dont know what further twists await in this long, melancholy drama; we dont know who will win next month. But if Donald Trump is ejected from office, Americans will still have to wrestle with a tough question: what does it say about the US if it took a pandemic to do it?

Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist

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Covid-19 has unmasked the true nature of Donald Trump and Trumpism - The Guardian

From getting a helicopter ride to a military hospital with a specialized suite to receiving experimental drugs made available to fewer than 10 people, Donald Trumps experience with Covid-19 has been very different from that of your average 74-year-old American with a serious illness.

The president ignored these disparities after returning to the hospital on Monday night and in a video from the White House Trump said of Covid-19: Dont be afraid of it.

Heres a look at how different the experience of catching Covid-19 is for the most powerful 74-year-old in the US compared with most of his fellow citizens:

First, there is the simple step of realizing someone has the illness.

Trump had access to regular testing, something most, if not all, 74-year-olds do not.

As a white male, Trump was less likely to test positive for the virus. Though testing rates are similar across racial and ethnic groups, Hispanic patients were more than two and a half times more likely to have a positive result and Black and Asian patients were nearly twice as likely to test positive compared with white patients, according to Kaiser Family Foundation (KFF).

This suggests people of color face increased barriers to testing which delay their ability to get a diagnosis until their condition is more serious.

People who test positive for Covid are usually told to monitor their symptoms at home, no matter what their age.

Trump was able to take a helicopter to a military hospital once he tested positive. And at his home, the White House, the president will be receiving an outstanding level of care from a team of well-equipped, dedicated medical staff.

He will have access to an at-home clinic with exam rooms and hospital equipment, including supplies to perform emergency lifesaving procedures. In an emergency, he can also turn to his fleet of helicopters to get him to the hospital in a few minutes.

The president has access to the best specialists, the best medical care and really any medical countermeasure that he would ever want

Dr Krutika Kuppalli, an infectious disease physician at the Medical University of South Carolina, said: The president has access to the best specialists, the best medical care and really any medical countermeasure that he would ever want. That is not the medical care most people have in the United States, or in the world.

If a 74-year-old is admitted to the hospital, they could, like the president, have access to the antiviral drug remdesivir.

But unless they enroll in a clinical trial, they cant access the experimental antibody treatment Trump is receiving. Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, which makes the antibody cocktail, said it had been made available to fewer than 10 people outside of a clinical trial.

After Trumps oxygen levels fell, he also received a steroid usually reserved for people in more severe stages of the illness. Trumps doctors have not clarified if he was given the steroid, dexamethasone, because his illness was more severe than they have described or for a different reason.

Trump is the only person in the world known to be taking that combination of medication treatments. And typically, people are not discharged from the hospital while taking an injectable, experimental drug. The fact that hes able to do that shows how different his care is compared to other people, Kuppalli said.

The president does not have to worry about the cost of his healthcare, even after paying $750 in taxes in 2017, because free health coverage is a perk of being the president.

The other 74-year-olds are mostly looking to the government health insurance for adults 65 and older, Medicare, to cover their costs. Those who arent covered by it either have employer-sponsored health insurance or are not eligible for it because they arent citizens or permanent residents.

After being admitted to the hospital, if a 74-year-old patient has basic Medicare, they would be subject first to the $1,408 deductible, the cost they have to pay before insurance kicks in. Most Medicare beneficiaries have additional coverage which reduces these costs, but 6.1 million people just have the basic package.

If someone with the basic package must stay in the hospital longer than the president, for more than 60 days, they must also pay $352 for each additional day in the hospital.

It is not entirely free for people with Medicare supplements. Add-ons to the program can cost older adults up to $461 in monthly premiums and what is covered depends on what supplement they have.

Like Trump, most 74-year-olds would not need to worry about the cost of treatments such as supplemental oxygen. Much of the other care he is receiving, however, would not be covered for most older adults.

Tricia Neuman, executive director of KFFs program on Medicare policy, said it would be highly unusual for Medicare to cover an air ambulance, experimental drugs like the Regeneron antibody cocktail or remdesivir if it was being administered at home (it should be covered in the hospital).

Medicare patients would, unlike the president, have to pay for the over-the-counter drugs he is taking including vitamin D, zinc, melatonin and aspirin.

Despite the unique level of care Trump has access to, at the end of the day, he is still a 74-year-old man, which puts him at high risk of suffering severe respiratory problems because of his Covid-19 infection.

People between 65 and 74 are also 90 times more likely to die from Covid-19 than people between 18 and 29, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The rates are worse for Black and Hispanic patients. Across age group and sociodemographic factors, they have twice as high a death rate as white patients, according to KFF.

Kuppalli said the presidents existing health vulnerabilities, along with his decision to withhold information about his symptoms, raise questions about his fitness for office.

Kuppalli said: This is somebody who could really have many challenges in the next few years as president, and his ability to execute his functions as president as result of the long-term symptoms of the disease.

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How does Donald Trumps Covid care compare to the average 74-year-olds? - The Guardian

What doBarack Obama,Elizabeth Warren,Hillary Clinton,Kamala Harris,Jimmy Carter andFranklin Rooseveltall have in common? They are all losers. So are Dick Cheney, Newt Gingrich, Jeb Bush and George W. Bush. At least, according to their tax returns.

All of these politicians have attempted to generate income through trading stock, renting real estate or conducting a trade or business but, in at least one year, have failed to post a profit associated with these undertakings, and instead generated a loss. And, just like more thanone million U.S. taxpayers in 2018 have done, all have claimed some type of loss as a deduction on their tax return.

The recent revelation of Trumps tax returns has started a national discussion regarding the deduction of losses. The tone of most news coverage seems to regard deducting a loss as if it were some shady tax planning scheme that requires a Swiss bank account and an expensive accountant in the Cayman Islands. Claiming losses, whether generated by rental real estate, as part of a business, or resulting from the sale of stock, is a fundamental part of our tax system. If you dont make money, you dont pay taxes.

The deduction of losses is geographically universal. Nearly every state in the union and every country on earth allows the deduction of losses on a tax return, and permits such losses to offset income in other years. This has essentially always been in our tax code even the individual tax Form 1040 from 1916 allowed for the deduction of Losses sustained during the year in transactions entered into for profit.

The deduction of losses is nearly universal among businesses too. Especially for businesses that have been operating for a long time, it is common to have claimed a loss in one year and used that loss to offset income in another. For example, the New York Times has persistently had net operating loss carryforwards on its balance sheet for the past decade, resulting in outcomes like the income tax refund of $22,757,000 it received in 2011.

Two years prior to that, the Times had a tax refund of $23,692,000. It received a tax refund in years as recent as 2018. (Incidentally, while the New York Times clamored for Donald TrumpDonald John TrumpFederal judge shoots down Texas proclamation allowing one ballot drop-off location per county Nine people who attended Trump rally in Minnesota contracted coronavirus Schiff: If Trump wanted more infections 'would he be doing anything different?' MOREs tax returns, it had tax disclosure issues of its own. In a study conducted by one of the authors of this op-ed and the Tax Justice Network, the New York Times was found to have been non-compliant with a tax disclosure requirement in the U.K. The U.K. requires companies to report on their tax strategy, tax planning and tax risk. The New York Times simply ignored the requirement.)

Why do we allow losses to be deducted? There are a variety of rationales, but doing so encourages entrepreneurs to take risks, and it also makes the tax system not as one-sided. If the government gets some of your profit when you succeed, it seems reasonable for the government to also take pity on you and leave you alone when you fail (or even give some back when you fail). It is also important to allow losses from one year to offset income in another year. Otherwise, two businesses that earn identical profits over time, but, with different patterns of earnings and losses, can be subject to two very different tax liabilities.

Some of the uproar about Trumps tax returns is that his persistent losses prove he is an inept business person a literal loser in business. And it could be even worse if bad business decisions resulted in personal indebtedness to a person or entity whose goals are at odds with those of the U.S.This perspective is not without merit, and it would be useful to know who this debt is owed to. Moreover, large losses in his core real estate businesses are a far cry from his self-touted image of a thriving entrepreneur.

However, the trouble with judging a business by its tax returns is that it is hard to distinguish a company that takes advantage of legitimate deductions (if the Trump deductions are legitimate; the IRS and the Joint Committee on Taxation are apparently looking into that) that produce losses from a company that loses money because its being poorly run. The rules for tax accounting are different from financial accounting rules the rules which investors use to judge if a business is profitable especially in ways that would affect the Trump empire.

For example, financial accounting rules and tax rules for depreciation are very different, with much larger deductions generally being allowed for tax purposes. Remember that Amazon, Apple and Google are regularly hitting your news feed for paying little to no income taxes. How successful would those companies look if we only considered their tax returns? At a minimum, a tax return does not provide a full picture of a companys financial health. Time will tell whether the Trump empire is a going concern.

Regardless of whether one may change their view of Trump as a businessperson or a taxpayer in light of the losses hes taken, the fact remains that deducting losses against income is no crime. If a business loses more money than it makes, it does not owe taxes and its losses can often reduce a tax liability in other years. It is how our tax system works, and how basically every other tax system on earth works. Its a perfectly acceptable, legal and economically rational practice. Anyone insinuating otherwise does not understand the tax system and is simply lost.

Andrew Belnap is an assistant professor at the University of Texas at Austins McCombs School of Business. Jeff Hoopes is an associate professor of accounting at the University of North Carolina's Kenan-Flagler School of Business and the research director of the UNC Tax Center.

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Donald Trump is a (tax) loser, just like a lot of other people | TheHill - The Hill

President Donald Trump has maintained a steady schedule of campaign rallies, which may have exposed him to SARS-CoV-2.

By Jon CohenOct. 5, 2020 , 12:20 PM

Sciences COVID-19 reporting is supported by the Pulitzer Center and the Heising-Simons Foundation.

On 2 October, the White House announced President Donald Trump received an experimental antibody treatment after a test revealed hesinfected with SARS-CoV-2. At the time, he reportedly hadmild COVID-19 symptoms, including fever and congestion, and he was transferred to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. Later, the presidents medical team confirmed he had started a course of remdesivir, an antiviral drug shown to modestly help hospitalized COVID-19 patients. Two days later, on 4 October, the team revealed Trump had been given a steroid normally reserved for severe COVID-19 cases, although his physician offered optimism about a quick recovery, even suggesting he might soon be discharged from Walter Reed.

Its a combination of two antibodies directed against a key protein of the virus that causes COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2. They bind to a region on the main surface spike protein that helps the virus attach to a receptor on human cells calledangiotensin-converting enzyme 2. The targeted region is dubbed the receptor binding domain. One antibody comes from a human who had recovered from a SARS-CoV-2 infection; a B cell that makes the antibody was harvested from the persons blood and the genes for the immune protein isolated and copied. The other antibody is from a mouse, which was engineered to have a human immune system, that had the spike protein injected into it.

Experiments in bothgolden hamsters and rhesus macaquesthat were intentionally infected with SARS-CoV-2 showed the cocktail could reduce viral levels and disease pathology.

Regeneron, the maker of the cocktail, earlier last week presented preliminary data from its ongoing clinical trial in people who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 but were asymptomatic or, in the most extreme cases, had moderate diseasea group that would appear to mirror Trumps current condition. No serious safety concerns surfaced, andthe treatment reduced viral loadand shortened symptomatic disease in patients who did not have SARS-CoV-2 antibodies at the trials start. Its unclear whether the treatment can prevent severe disease, but there were hints that it might: Participants who received a placebo had more medical visits.

A separate trial is assessing the impact of the treatment on hospitalized COVID-19 patients, but Regeneron has yet to report any results from that study.

Not exactly. Trump received an 8-gram infusion of the treatment. Regenerons data showed a 2.4-gram infusion worked as well as the higher dose at reducing SARS-CoV-2 levels in people. This was widely seen as good news because monoclonals are difficult and expensive to produce, and a lower dose means more people can ultimately receive it.(On7 October, Trumps personal physician said the president was negativefor SARS-CoV-2 antibodies when he received the cocktail.)

Likely out of an abundance of caution by the presidents medical team, says George Yancopoulos, co-founder and chief scientific officer of Regeneron. Yancopoulos does not directly know why Trumpsphysicians chose to use 8 grams, but says the companys data indicate theres very, very limited risk that the antibodies will cause harm at either dose. The higher dose might last longer, he said, and at some time points in the companys study, Regeneron did see trends suggesting the higher dose more powerfully beats back the virusthe company used the amount of viral genetic material found with nose swabs as a proxy for SARS-CoV-2 levels in the entire body.

If I had to treat one patient, Id give the high dose, Yancopoulos says. From a societal point of view and the need to treat as many people as possible, Id give the lower dose.

The Regeneron study found the treatment only worked in people who did not have SARS-CoV-2 antibodies at the start of the study. It also worked best in people who had higher levels of the virus. Whether the president had those antibodies and a high viral load has not been made public. I couldnt speculate because it has to do with an individual patient, Yancopoulos says.

No. The treatment consisted of two monoclonal antibodiesmeaning each was produced by making identical copies, or clones, of an antibody gene in a single B cell. Polyclonal antibody cocktails refer to antibodies made by mixtures of B cells.

The antibodies are typically only available to people who participate in clinical trials. Trump theoretically could have enrolled in the ongoing treatment study that reported preliminary data last week, but that trial randomly assigns half the participants to receive the antibodies; the other half serves as a control group and receives infusions of an inactive placebo. A U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulation called expanded accesstechnically known as21 CFR 312.310allows physicians to request compassionate use of experimental treatments through an investigational new drug pathway used for individual patients or for emergencies. These are designed to be used in these rare and special circumstances, Yancopoulos says. This is not the first time weve done compassionate use for these monoclonal antibodies. This is not a mechanism for widespread distribution.

Yes. Both Regeneron and Eli Lilly, which similarly reported encouraging preliminary clinical trial data last month from a single SARS-CoV-2 monoclonal antibody, are discussing the possibility of an EUA with FDA. Lilly reported signs that its antibody reduced the need for hospitalization, but as with Regeneron, too few participants have so far become seriously ill to reach a convincing conclusion to this critical question.

No. Although the monoclonal antibodies infused into Trump were not made from or in fetal cells, Regeneron did develop that treatment with the help of a long-lived line of cells established from the kidneys of a fetus electively aborted in the Netherlands around 1972. The company relied on those widely used cells, known HEK-293 cells, to make mimics of the coronavirus spike protein. Researchers used these proteins to test the potency of antibodies found in COVID-19 patients or made inmice with a humanlikeimmune system (see initial question).The antibodies selected for the companys cocktail, however, were thenmass produced in nonfetal cells.The creation of the humanized mice also did not rely on HEK-293 cells or other cells from aborted fetuses or human embryos.Regeneron scientists detail their methods inthe supplementary materialtothis paperpublished inSciencein August.

Remdesivir is an antiviral drug developed by Gilead Sciences, originally to treat the hepatitis C virus. It did not perform well against that pathogen but has been tried against Ebola and other viruses, after showing some activity in cells and animal models. The drug inhibits a viral enzyme used for replication of the pathogen. Earlier this year, it demonstrateda modest clinical benefit in a trial with hospitalized COVID-19 patients, leading FDA to grant Gilead an EUA for the drug. That EUA has since been expanded for use in patients with mild disease although its benefit in them is not clear. The drug has become widely used for COVID-19 patients despitecontinuing skepticism that it has a major clinical benefit. Because it and the monoclonal antibodies target different parts of the virus, administering them together may have a synergistic effect. One COVID-19 clinical trial is testing remdesivir and Lillys antibody, for example.

On 4 October, Sean Conley, the White House physician, said in a press conference that Trump had also been started on the steroid dexamethasone. The drug dampens the bodys immune response and can keep it from wreaking havoc in the late stages of COVID-19. It is the onlytreatment so far that has been shown to reduce the mortality in patients with severe COVID-19, but there are some indications that it may actually be harmful if given too early in the disease course. In the United Kingdoms Recovery trial there was a clear benefit for patients requiring oxygen or ventilation but not for other patients. Conley said Trump had experienced two episodes of transient drops in his oxygen saturation. Independent doctors were quick to point out that dexamethasone can have serious side effects including agitation, paranoia, and even psychosis.

The statement released on 2 October by the presidents physician said that in addition to the antibodies, Trump has been taking zinc, vitamin D, famotidine, melatonin and a daily aspirin. That wording leaves unclear whether he was taking those substances before his diagnosed infection. Notably, the statement does not indicate whetherTrump was or is taking hydroxychloroquine, the antimalarial he controversially pushed as a COVID-19 treatment.

Famotidinehas been suggested to be a treatment for COVID-19, but its also a popular heartburn remedy, sold widely under the name Pepcid. A clinical trial testing it in hospitalized COVID-19 patients in New York was not able to recruit enough patients to properly evaluate its impact. The Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research, which initiated that trial, released a statement on 2 October citing evidence it was helpful for COVID-19 but also saying, We have yet to prove [famotidines] efficacy. The institute says its eagerly awaiting FDA approval of a trial that will evaluate whether famotidine can help people who are not hospitalized.

This story was originally published on 2 October at 9:25 p.m.

*Update, 3 October, 1:20 p.m.:Information about Trumps use of remdesivir was added to the story.

*Update, 5 October, 9:15 a.m.:Information about Trumps use of dexamethasone was added to the story.

*Update, 7 October, 3:55 p.m.:Information about the Regeneron treatment was added to this story.

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Update: Here's what is known about Trump's COVID-19 treatment - Science Magazine

In an editorial titled "Dying in a Leadership Vacuum," the editors of the Journal blasted President Donald Trump (although not by name) for his handling of the coronavirus pandemic. Here's the key bit:

"Anyone else who recklessly squandered lives and money in this way would be suffering legal consequences. Our leaders have largely claimed immunity for their actions. But this election gives us the power to render judgment. Reasonable people will certainly disagree about the many political positions taken by candidates. But truth is neither liberal nor conservative. When it comes to the response to the largest public health crisis of our time, our current political leaders have demonstrated that they are dangerously incompetent. We should not abet them and enable the deaths of thousands more Americans by allowing them to keep their jobs."

And, the New England Journal of Medicine isn't some fly-by-night organization. It was founded in 1812(!) by John Collins Warren, a doctor and an academic. It was the first medical journal published in New England. It has continued to be one of the most sought-after places for innovative and important medical research to be published. "Our mission is to publish the best research and information at the intersection of biomedical science and clinical practice and to present this information in understandable, clinically useful formats that inform health care delivery and improve patient outcomes," reads the NEJM website.

So, when the editors of such a prestigious medical journal feel the need to break with their 200-plus year tradition of not weighing in on presidential politics, we need to pay attention. Especially when they conclude things like the Trump administration has "taken a crisis and turned it into a tragedy" and "the magnitude of this failure is astonishing." (Worth noting: The editors never explicitly endorse former Vice President Joe Biden in their piece.)

To be clear: This editorial will not change most peoples' minds about the presidential election. For Trump backers, they will dismiss it as the work of a bunch of academic elitists who never liked Trump anyway. For Trump detractors, this editorial will simply be a(nother) data point in their case for why Trump should be voted out in 26 days' time.

This is a massive crisis. It has already cost us so much -- in terms of lives lost and jobs gone. Not to mention the psychological toll. And the impact on kids of learning virtually for months.

There is no question that Trump's slow response to the crisis, his administration's struggle to expand testing capacity, his advocacy of unproven treatments and his skepticism about mask-wearing have had a decidedly negative impact on how Americans have dealt with the pandemic.

That is not political. That is fact. And it's because of those facts that people and institutions that have never been political before -- like the New England Journal of medicine -- feel compelled to speak out about just how not normal this all is.

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This is a stunning and historic rebuke of Donald Trump's presidency - CNN

Dr. Murtaza Akhter says an experimental drug used to treat President Donald Trump for COVID-19 is "not a cure" despite what the president says. Trump was treated with Regeneron's antibody drug and he credited it with improving his health. (Oct. 8) AP Domestic

WASHINGTON President Donald Trump has lashedout both in public and private at Attorney General William Barr after realizingthe Department of Justice investigation into the origins of the Russia probe won't be made public before Election Day, administration officials told USA TODAY.

Trump has rampeduphis criticism of Barr in recent days ashe seeks to make the origins of the Russia probe a major election issue. The president has long cast the Russia investigation as a political hoax meant to undermine him and has called for the indictment of his political enemies, including former President Barack Obama and former vice president and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden.

But Barr has said previously that neither Obama nor Biden are under a criminal investigation, despite the president's assertions that his predecessor committed criminal offenses. Administration officials also said Trump is aware that such indictments are unlikely.

President Donald Trump and Attorney General William Barr in a 2019 photo.(Photo: Chip Somodevilla, Getty Images)

Still, while recovering after contracting coronavirus, Trump has publicly pressured his attorney general.

"Unless Bill Barr indicts these people for crimes, the greatest political crime in history of our country, then we're going to get little satisfaction unless I win," Trump told Fox Business News Thursday.

Trump has expressed similar sentiments in private, said two administration officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss private conversations.

A Justice Department spokeswoman did not respond to requests for comment.A spokesman for John Durham, the chief federal prosecutor in Connecticut,whom Barr tappedlast year to look into the origins of the Russia investigation and the FBI's surveillance activities, declined to comment.

The Russia investigation, which the FBI began in 2016 and special counsel Robert Mueller took over in 2017,cast a dark cloud over much of Trump's presidency and led to the indictment of half a dozen former aides and associates. Mueller's investigation found that Russia interfered in the last presidential race to help Trump win. Members of the Trump campaign were eager beneficiaries of that effort, although Mueller's teamdid not find evidence of a conspiracy with the Kremlin.

So far, the Durham investigation has led to one indictment.

Russian meddling: GOP-led Senate panel offers playbook on Russia's election interference

Former FBI lawyer Kevin Clinesmith pleaded guilty last summer to falsifying an email used to support the surveillance of former Trump campaign aide Carter Page during the early months of the Russia investigation. Clinesmith, who worked for the FBI for four years, altered an email that investigators relied on to justify an application to wiretap Page, according to court records. The altered email indicated that Page was "not a source" for the Central Intelligence Agency; the original email from the CIA indicated otherwise.

Trump and his Republican allies in Congress have beenwaiting anxiously for Durham's full findings, and Barr told Fox News last summer that there will be "significant developments" before the Nov. 3 election.

But White House aides said Trump seems aware there will be no report from Durham or more indictments ahead of November, in part because of the informal Justice Department policy against sensitive legal actions too close to Election Day. Aides said Trump and Barr have discussed aspects of the Durham probe, but they don't know details of those discussions.

During the Fox News interview, Trump claimed that Durham has already gathered enough evidence.

John Durham is looking into the origins of the FBI's investigation into Russian election interference.(Photo: Bob Child, AP)

"I don't know what happened to Durham, but we're going to find out what happened to Durham, but he's got so much stuff," Trump said.

Speaking on Friday with radio host Rush Limbaugh, Trump was asked about media reports that Barr had told Republicans that there won't be a report from Durham before the election.

The Durham inquiry: Ex-CIA chief John Brennan interviewed for 8 hours as part of Durham's review of Russia probe

"If that's the case, I'm very disappointed. I think it's a terrible thing, and I'll say it to his face," Trump said of Barr.

Advocates who see Trump's pressure campaign and the Durham inquiryas reelection tacticsare keeping a close watch on the president.

"Donald Trump has used his administration again and again to prop up his reelection campaign, from propaganda videos to undermining vote-by-mail," said Jordan Libowitz, spokesman for the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. "But he's done nothing more egregious than pressure the Department of Justice to investigate and bring charges against his political enemies."

The Justice Department's inspector general concluded that the FBI was justified in launching the investigation into Russian election meddling and possible ties to the Trump campaign, but it found that the surveillance of Page was rife with errors and misstatements.

The GOP-led Senate Intelligence Committee, which conducted its own investigation on Russia,has also released voluminous reports that backed Mueller's findings on Russian interference.

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Trump lashes out at Barr after realizing inquiry into Russia probe won't be public before election - USA TODAY

Read: Vaccine chaos is looming

First, there simply are not yet enough doses in the world. Regeneron currently has enough doses for 50,000 patients. Eli Lilly, which makes a different COVID-19 monoclonal-antibody therapy that is also in clinical trials, says it will have 100,000 doses in October. To put that in context, the United States has 50,000 new cases of COVID-19 every day.

The manufacturing of monoclonal antibodies cant just scale up on a dime to treat everyone, says Howard Levine, who leads a group of pharmaceutical manufacturing consultants at BioProcess Technology Group. The antibodies are made inside large stainless-steel tanks using genetically engineered ovary cells from hamsters. Like all living things, they can grow only so fast. The tanks are also sophisticated pieces of equipment that can take months to install, Levine says. Regeneron and Eli Lilly have already been increasing manufacturing capacity, and they expect to have 300,000 and 1 million doses, respectively, by the end of the year. The two companies have recently also filed for an emergency use authorizationa looser and faster process than formal approval by the Food and Drug Administration-which Trump says will come soon.

The monoclonal antibodies will have to be reserved for patients who are at highest risk for eventually developing severe COVID-19. To be able to treat thousands [of patients] is probably doable, says Wayne Marasco, who studies monoclonal antibodies at Harvard. Tens of thousands is pushing it, short-term. Doctors will have to predict who might benefit the most. People who are older, have underlying conditions, or are already exhibiting serious symptoms such as low oxygenlike the president himselfwould be more likely to get monoclonal antibodies.

But doctors will have to make the decision early in the course of illness, before those patients get seriously sick. Monoclonal antibodies are likely to work best when the virus is still trying to gain a foothold in the body. In general, you want to stop the replication of a microbein this case, the virusat the earliest point in time, Cohen says. But stopping the virus depends on patients being able to get tested for COVID-19 early, receive their results quickly, and go to a hospital that stocks an experimental treatment before they really even need hospitalization. For now, monoclonal antibodies have to be administered through an IV, so they cant be offered at pharmacies or at most doctors offices.

These hurdles dont pose a problem for the president, who has the very best medical care the country has to offer. But as my colleague Olga Khazan writes, COVID-19 treatment is markedly less comprehensive and accessible for the average person. Ordinary Americans have repeatedly, in the course of this pandemic, experienced delays in testing. And when the U.S. earlier this year began allocating initially scarce doses of the antiviral drug remdesivir, which Trump has also taken, many hospitals came up empty-handed.

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The Presidents Latest Silver Bullet - The Atlantic

If the joke makes no sense, thats the point. This style of scary tweet was popularized earlier this summer by a handful of enormous pop-music fandoms that used it as a pointless trolling tactic. That its now bled over into the presidents mentions is indicative of just how ubiquitous stan culture has become. Memes that were once niche now inform how huge numbers of people react to or experience major news events.

Read: The joke's on us

Though a few of these phrases have drifted around odd corners of the internet for some time, it was stan culture that brought them out of obscurity and turned them into meme campaigns. The most common Punjabi phrase people are using to hex the president seems to have originated in a tweet unrelated to Trump, from a fan account dedicated to Cory Monteith, the Glee star who died in 2013. The phrase was picked up for hexing by fans of the K-pop group BTS and the rapper Nicki Minaj, as well as a random assortment of internet oddballs. And Amharic phrases similar to the ones being tweeted at the president were used by hundreds of Taylor Swift fans earlier this summer, who tweeted them at music critics they believed had given the singers new album unsatisfactory reviews. In that case, the text was usually paired with images of Swift Photoshopped to look like a demon, but since Friday, they have been paired with all kinds of haunting scenes: a Lego character with human skin, a giant tarantula with the arms of a man, Teletubbies with black holes for eyes, the Long Furby. But it remains unclear how Swift fans originally stumbled across this tactic for Twitter taunting, or why exactly they chose Amharic for it. They obviously think it looks spooky, though others have criticized them for this cultural insensitivity.

The hexes are similar tobut far more aggressive thananother common fandom tactic: replying to everything with homemade fan cam clips of ones favorite star. Both are methods of sowing chaos and derailing the logic of a conversation, and often they dont even involve any explicit organization. Networks of fan accounts have been so coordinated for so long that they can make something a trend without tryingeven a fake curse in an arbitrarily chosen foreign language.

Not so long ago, the antics of stans were generally focused on issues related to pop music and celebrity, and typically siloed by fandomAriana Grande and Nicki Minaj and Justin Bieber fans keeping to their own, unless they were warring with one another. But now the experience of being online is a stan-culture experience for nearly everyonea big, somewhat generic, and somewhat hallucinatory one. Earlier this summer, K-pop fans used fan cams to taunt QAnon supporters and people who were tweeting things like White Lives Matter, to much applause from the broader internet. Now people from all sorts of fandoms are tweeting joke hexes at the president, because its simply another thing theyve decided to do. People with no obvious relation to any one of these fandoms are copying them. Unfortunately, it might soon be another de facto way to respond to a tweet from someone you dont particularly like.

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The Creepy Trump Meme Taking Over Twitter - The Atlantic